## Facts

- A developer owned an approximately eight-acre parcel in Spokane’s Lincoln Heights area.
- The parcel was rezoned in 1991 to a limited residential office classification permitting an office-park development.
- In 1992, the city approved restaurants in qualifying office parks under the neighborhood-specific plan within the city’s comprehensive plan.
- In 1993, the city granted a further rezone needed for a restaurant; the restaurant was built while the broader office-park development was deferred.
- In 1996, the developer applied to amend a land-use policy in the neighborhood-specific plan to allow “mixed use” (residential, office, and retail) for office developments of at least five acres.
- The city council adopted the comprehensive plan amendment as immediately effective and contemplated a future zoning ordinance with design standards; it also directed processing of an appropriate rezone.
- The developer applied for a rezone to allow mixed-use development.
- The city hearing examiner denied the rezone because the contemplated implementing zoning ordinance had not yet been enacted.
- The city council reversed, concluding the rezone could be processed using the comprehensive plan amendment’s mixed-use concepts despite the absence of implementing regulations.
- Homeowners and neighborhood groups sought judicial review; the superior court upheld the city council’s decision.
- The court of appeals reversed, holding the city could not authorize the rezone based on the comprehensive plan without adopted implementing zoning regulations.
- The state supreme court granted review.

## Issues

1. Whether a city council may process a rezone application under an immediately effective comprehensive plan amendment before adopting the implementing zoning ordinance contemplated by that amendment.
2. Whether a municipality may rely on comprehensive plan policies to guide a rezone decision during the interim period before detailed implementing regulations are enacted.

## Decision

- The state supreme court reversed the court of appeals and affirmed the superior court’s judgment upholding the city council.
- The court held the city council acted within its authority by allowing the rezone application to be processed under the immediately effective comprehensive plan amendment despite the absence of the contemplated implementing zoning ordinance.
- The court accepted the council’s determination that the amended plan supplied sufficient policy guidance to evaluate the rezone in the interim.

## Legal Principles

- An immediately effective comprehensive plan amendment may be used by a municipality to guide interim land-use and rezone decisionmaking before adoption of contemplated implementing zoning regulations.
- The distinction between comprehensive planning policies and zoning regulations does not necessarily bar rezones when the governing plan amendment is lawfully adopted and effective and provides operative guidance.
- A zoning decision is valid when it is consistent with the comprehensive plan and within the city council’s delegated land-use authority, even if more detailed implementing standards are expected later.

## Conclusion

The court upheld a city council’s authority to proceed with processing a mixed-use rezone based on an immediately effective comprehensive plan amendment, rejecting the view that a rezone must wait until the city enacts the implementing zoning ordinance contemplated by the amended plan.


Pinecrest Homeowners Ass'n v. Glen A. Cloninger & Assocs., 87 P.3d 1176 (Wash. 2004)