Number One Canyon Property Owners Plan To Retain Legal Counsel In Hopes Of Spurring Action From Chelan County
As clashes over property rights and shared roadways increase, some wonder why Chelan County officials seem hamstrung in the face of threats to public safety and destruction of property
Folks who live up Number One Canyon just outside Wenatchee City limits say they feel as if Chelan County officials have not heard their concerns over the last two years.
Now some are chipping in to hire a lawyer to help keep the county accountable before any more damage is done to their canyon.
For the last two weeks, a group of about 15 people have been getting together in living rooms up the canyon to share their concerns and consider their options. They feel that Chelan County’s historically pro-development attitude has caused the county bureaucracy to turn a blind eye to what they see as concerning and dangerous behavior by Tyler Chambers, their new neighbor.
Chambers bought about 66 acres on the shrub-steppe slopes of the canyon a few years ago and said he plans to build his “dream home” on the property. He admitted that he doesn’t have building permits yet, but said he is well within his rights to start leveling ground and moving dirt to prepare to build on his own property.
And since Chelan County doesn’t require what’s called a “fill and grade” permit, he’s right.
But then boulders started rolling downhill, spring rains came and led to flooding that washed away a lot of the topsoil on Chambers’ newly graded pad down into the creek below his property. The small creek swelled with soil, water and debris that went sluicing down through the path of least resistance – including some of his neighbors’ homes (I covered that last year).
After that, the county issued a “stop-work” order, which according to a lawsuit filed against Chambers in Chelan Superior Court in 2022, Chambers flatly refused to obey.
“I’m not stopping,” Chambers told Chelan County Code Enforcement Deputy Bruce Anderson, according to court records.
You can see that in this summons filed by Prosecutor Sealby in 2022 and read Anderson’s account in an affidavit here.
But the neighbors are frustrated with the lack of progress and information on that suit and the fact that the community development office seems to be opening the door for the project to move forward.
On May 23, Chelan County’s Community Development office issued “a mitigated determination of non-significance relative to the environmental impact” of Chambers’ project and found that “it does not have a probable significant adverse impact on the environment.”
You can read that here.
The neighbors feel that Community Development Deanna Walter is giving Chambers an inordinate amount of support and deference and wonder why. They also question what they see as inaction by the Chelan County Sheriff’s Office in the face of what they see as public safety issues due to Chambers’ behavior.
The word “conspiracy” was bandied about at the second meeting.
They say county officials have been ignoring them and prioritizing Chambers’ property rights over their own. They also say they’re not anti-development, they just want Chambers held to the same standards they are.
“Chelan County officials should be upholding our property rights as they should be upholding his property rights and we want to make sure that is happening,” Vicki Trainor said.
Some neighbors report feeling threatened by Chambers, especially when they use the shared road that leads to his property and other residences off of Number One Canyon Road. Chambers contends that he owns the road, but neighbors dispute that claim. They say it’s a shared road and Chambers’ own lawyer has admitted as much.
They say over the years he has become more possessive over the shared road and some report being met on it with open hostility by an allegedly intoxicated Chambers.
One man, a father of young children, sent the following email to Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison with his concerns on May 21:
“Hello Mr. Morrison,
I am one of the residents who live up #1 canyon who has observed the regular harassment of my friends and neighbors by Tyler Chambers over the last two years. I have observed him drinking while operating his heavy equipment, drunkenly shouting at and threatening the previous owners of the property above him, then driving off down the canyon while still visibly drunk. I have watched him slowly ‘patrol’ the shared driveway and only route to two existing homes which he has repeatedly told your deputies is his personal property. He has told multiple people, mostly women and children, that they could not use the road even to visit the aforementioned homes with no other access points. He struck Matt Canlis with his vehicle as Matt attempted to jump out of the way on that shared road and convinced one of your deputies that Matt, a pastor of solid reputation, ‘attacked’ his vehicle in spite of Matt having video evidence to the contrary. On a night when I was working late, I am a teacher at a local private school, he followed Maria Lopez who lives along the shared drive while she walked on the drive at dusk, revving his engine. Maria called my wife and asked her to call 911 on her behalf because she was afraid of Tyler harming her. My wife called 911 and was told by the deputy who called her back that ‘it was ok, because Tyler had already called in and explained that he thought she was a trespasser.’ No one responded in person to this call. As a husband and father of three I would like to know with certainty that if in my absence my wife calls 911 someone will at least show up to observe the situation in person. After hearing Maria's story for myself I would have expected an officer to respond, observe if Tyler was sober enough at the time to even be behind the wheel, and deal with the situation accordingly. I would hope that a woman alone at night and feeling threatened who asks for 911 to be called could rely on a quick response occurring. This incident, as well as the patterns of seemingly biased responses from your deputies over the last two years, has greatly undermined this community's confidence in our local police forces ability to keep us and our families safe. I would appreciate a response from your office explaining your method of determining when and how you respond to 911 calls.”
That man asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisal.
Sheriff Morrison said there’s no favoritism from his deputies and encouraged anyone who has had these kinds of issues with Chambers to call 911 and make sure there is a record of it so his department can respond appropriately.
“If he’s committing crime call us,” Morrison said. “It’s not ok for anyone to drive around drunk.”
When I called and spoke with him about the issue on May 24, he said his office has relayed information about the situation to Chelan County Prosecutor Robert Sealby.
Doing Chambers’ Homework
Folks in the neighborhood also point to the fact that Deanna Walter basically filled out Chambers’ SEPA checklist for him as an example of favoritism on the part of the county.
Under Washington’s Environmental Policy Act (SEPA), local governments and state agencies use the environmental checklist to help determine whether a proposal's impacts are likely to be significant. Property owners must fill out a checklist and have that reviewed by a government official to ensure their project won’t “significantly impact” the ecology where they are building.
On the SEPA checklist Chambers submitted to Walter’s office, most of the responses from Chambers were “N/A” or “not applicable” and you can see his answers in black ink in the screenshots below. Then Walter went through the checklist and corrected Chambers or provided information he did not. Her handwriting is in green ink.
In response to a prompt about where runoff could come from and where it will go, he wrote “N/A – unknown” more than a year after a flood went through his property. Walter corrected him and wrote “proposed 2 SW retention areas per mitigation plan.”
Anyone who lives in the shrub-steppe foothills of the Cascades knows those areas are mule deer migration territory, and neighbors say everyone is used to seeing mule deer on their property frequently.
Yet in the wildlife portion of the checklist when asked if the site is a part of a migration route, Chambers wrote “no”
Again he was corrected by Walter, who wrote “mule deer.”
He also wrote “none” in response to the prompt to list any threatened or endangered species in the area. Neighbors say it’s a well-known fact that golden eagles nest in the area and apparently Walter knew that because she corrected that answer as well.
You can view the entire SEPA checklist here.
While there isn’t much Chambers and his neighbors see eye to eye on, he shares their feelings of frustration with the county. And he told KPQ recently that he’s being unfairly maligned in the press by his neighbors.
"We're trying to build our dream home and help our kids," he said. "And all the county and all this corruption and abuse of power and discrimination, all it has done is made so much animosity for everybody. And they've taken a dream that we've worked so hard for and turned it into a nightmare."
Who’s Suing Who
Obviously, this situation has caused a lot of litigation. Chelan County is suing Chambers. Chambers is suing Matt and Julie Canlis, who have had the most contentious relationship with Chambers out of all the neighbors so far. They are suing Chambers back, and the Chelan Douglas County Land Trust is also in the mix with a suit against Chambers.
The Wenatchee World reported that suit had been dropped but CDLT spokesperson Micky Fleming said that case against Chambers is still pending.
The group of unhappy neighbors who have been meeting for the last few weeks are about 12-15 strong, and each has their own story.
Julie Tarbert spoke out about Chambers’ behavior at a hearing regarding the issue on May 19 and she said that evening Chambers’ son and a few friends brought large speakers and lights to the edge of their property, pointed them in the direction of their home and the Canlis’ home and proceeded to drink and party until early morning hours.
“After the commission meeting, when I spoke, then last night he had his lights shining – the big D6 lights – shining down on our property and the Canlis’ property with the music loud,” she said. “Which I recorded.”
Here’s the video:
Shortly after 5 pm on May 19 neighbors said that Chambers headed up the shared road at a high rate of speed, hit a bench on the Canlis’ property near their chicken coop, and kept going.
Julie Canlis said their daughter was cleaning the chicken coop at the time while babysitting another child.
I walked up the driveway with her to take a look and asked her if she’s worried about her kids’ safety.
This was her response:
The Ecological Effects
On top of the public safety concerns are the ecological impacts of the work Chambers has done so far.
A neighbor who found her home in the path of flood waters last year wanted her story on the record but also asked to remain anonymous.
She gave this statement:
“As a resident who is part of the Number 1 Canyon neighborhood, we are terrified of the possibility of excavation and building of structures on a steep mountain-side based on the results of the most recent flood of June 2022. There are serious implications from erosion in general. We routinely experience major slide-offs from snow, rocks, debris and even trees/bushes. We see the mountain trees & bushes with bare roots these days barely holding onto the earth where once they were deep rooted into the mountainside. When we bought our home, we were educated of past flooding situations and how it impacted our own home. We were convinced that the county remedied the future possibility of the impact of our home being affected with the creation of overflow ponds. This was not the case, as the flood in June 2022 was serious enough to cause expensive damage to landscapes and several structures of the Number 1 Canyon neighborhood. Although, we were informed it was determined that the majority of the wash-out was from up the canyon itself, the overflow ponds weren’t enough. The excavation of the mountain-side prior to this flood was also a contributor. Rivets & streams still seen today of the excavated mountain shows a good indication of that. We are also deeply concerned with disruption of the wildlife and natural habitat.”
She provided a few photos to illustrate her point.
Public Engineer Austin Harper with Munson Engineers, Inc. noted the need for stormwater facilities in a geological evaluation first submitted in 2022 and updated in February of this year.
“No storm water facility has been developed on the site,” he wrote. “If runoff occurs, it will sheet flow off the site to the north and onto adjacent properties. Some features of the site may allow runoff to concentrate before leaving the site.”
You can read that full evaluation here.
What’s Next
The community has until June 10 to submit comments or letters to Walter before the next hearing, in which Chambers may get the go-ahead to apply for permits to build. There’s currently no date set for that hearing.
Walter said she cannot comment on pending litigation and Chelan County Prosecutor Robert Sealby also declined to comment. He did write that he “can’t comment on any issues involving a private road or easement in which the county has no involvement.”
As far as what the neighbors want, they say they simply want a safe place to live. They said they don’t want to worry if an ambulance can get up the road because it’s flooded, or if they can’t get back up the canyon to their kids if they go shopping.
And they said they want Chambers to be held to the same standards as everyone else.
“Make him follow the rules everybody else has to follow and not be stomping on our property rights. You know, flooding the drainage, taking out the road,” Dennis Tarbert said. “Putting neighbors in danger because of his development.”
You can listen to an interview with a few Number One Canyon residents after their May 29 meeting here:
This sounds really horrible. Hope the county gets its act together soon
https://fortress.wa.gov/ecy/ezshare/wq/Permits/Flare/2019SWMMEW/Content/Resources/Images/Figures/RelationBetweenEnvSciAndStndrdsInSWRegs.pdf