MARYSVILLE — The Marysville City Council and the Snohomish County Council voted July 13 to authorize the inter-local agreement between the city and the county, providing for the annexation to the city of the unincorporated urban growth area in roughly the center of Marysville.

So what happens next?

City of Marysville Community Development Director Gloria Hirashima offered The Marysville Globe a rough timeline of the events to follow, but she admitted that any such timeline will be “highly variable.”

From here, notice of intent will be sent to the Washington State Boundary Review Board, which will have 45-120 days to act on it.

Hirashima expects that the city of Marysville Planning Commission will conduct a pre-zoning hearing in September, after which “the earliest we could expect it back” to the City Council would be in October, although it could be as late as December, depending upon the Boundary Review Board.

“Final appeals would occur after the passage of the ordinance,” Hirashima said. “If the Boundary Review Board denies our application, we’ll appeal following their decision.”

Hirashima predicted that annexation could take effect anytime between December of this year and March of next year, although she warned against regarding even this window of time as a set of hard-and-fast dates, since “annexation involves a lot of process.”

Some residents of the currently unincorporated area, such as Lisa DeGreave of the Timberbrook neighborhood, recycle and dispose of trash on their own, without the aid of Waste Management. The Revised Code of Washington mandates a delay of seven years after annexation before the city of Marysville can take over garbage service in the annexed area, during which time Hirashima explained that garbage service in the area “would go on as it does currently.” However, once the annexed area falls under city garbage service, that service is currently mandatory.

“That’s a long way off, though,” Hirashima said. “The city is already discussing whether to stay in the garbage business and it’s still a very active discussion.”

As for businesses in the unincorporated area, Hirashima explained that those businesses will be required to obtain city business permits once they operate within the city limits, but elaborated that existing businesses that currently comply with county rules would be grandfathered in. Hirashima anticipated that most such businesses would be home-occupied businesses, and she isn’t aware of many significant differences between the city and county’s residential use laws.