MALTBY — Flower World, a family-run retail nursery that has operated on the same Maltby property for more than 50 years, has taken its latest clash with Snohomish County Planning and Development Services (PDS) to the Washington Court of Appeals after a Snohomish County superior court judge upheld findings that the business built a large customer parking area, a building, and new driveway without any permits.
On January 28, 2026, the nursery filed a notice of appeal with Division I seeking to overturn Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Jennifer R. Langbehn’s January 8, 2026, order in Case No. 25-2-06240-31. Langbehn affirmed in full a June 27, 2025, decision by Hearing Examiner Peter Camp that rejected Flower World’s claim the 2023 work qualified for an agricultural exemption.
The project in question involved clearing a former single-family home on two parcels immediately south of the main 15-acre nursery, constructing two 4,500-square-foot pole buildings with sheet metal roofing, paving and gravelling roughly 45,920 square feet for a mixed-use parking and plant-holding area, and installing a new driveway entrance onto 200th Street SE with a connecting paved roadway. County officials said the work triggered land-disturbing activity (LDA) permits under Snohomish County Codes 30.63A and 30.63B because it exceeded thresholds for new impervious surface and clearing.
Hearing Examiner Camp affirmed violations for the parking/plant-container area, the North Building footprint—rigid wood siding with sheet metal roofing instead of polyethylene, polyvinyl, or similar flexible synthetic roofing material—and the driveway but dismissed the South Building violation as moot after PDS withdrew it and reversed the pond violation after PDS conceded the pond’s use exempted it from a land disturbing activity permit applied.
The two narrow wins in the Hearing Examiner’s appeal for Flower World did not alter the core outcome: violations related to permitting requirements for clearing and grading over an acre of land including asphalt paving and striping for 110 parking stalls; constructing a 4,500 square foot barn building (North Building); graded and paved a new commercial driveway access for customers to enter Flower World from 200th Street SE including pavement of a new drive isle covering over 4,000 square feet connecting the new driveway access to the main north/south ingress and egress to Flower World.
The Hearing Examiner and superior court both concluded the activities primarily served the nursery’s large-scale retail operations rather than routine agricultural production.
Langbehn’s order adopted the examiner’s findings of fact as supported by substantial evidence and agreed that the commercial retail use of the parking area and new driveway (200th Street SE) fell outside the narrow definition of “agricultural activities” in county code, so the exemption in SCC 30.63B.070(5) did not apply. Judge Langbehn also upheld the examiner’s conclusion that a separate D1 right-of-way access permit will be required for the new driveway under Title 13.
Court ruling carries real-world consequences
Hearing Examiner Camp in his June 27, 2025, decision set a compliance deadline of December 31, 2025, which has passed. County Planning and Development assistance bulletins explain that projects creating 2,000 square feet or more of new impervious surface or disturbing 7,000 square feet or more of land require a full LDA permit, stormwater site plan, soil-erosion controls and fees that can exceed at least $14,000 for Flower Word. The parking lot alone pushed the project into the highest fee tiers, according to fee tables…