EPHRATA - Citing concerns about overregulation to farmers, county commissioners removed two bodies of water used for irrigation from the county's Shoreline Master Program before approving it unanimously.

Commissioners rejected the opinion of Grant County Planning Director Damien Hooper and two Washington Department of Ecology employees who told them Trail Lake and a two mile section of irrigation water near Sand Hollow should be included in the SMP.

"Based on the high-water mark of Trail Lake, it fits the criteria for inclusion in the SMP," Hooper told commissioners. He said that because the irrigation waters near Sand Hollow flow at more than 20 cubic feet per second it should also be included in the SMP and have to follow the same rules for development regulation as other large or flowing bodies of water.

Commissioner Cindy Carter said that she believed including those bodies of water would create another hurdle for farmers wanting to irrigate their crops.

"This is my area, and if a farmer's pump goes out in July, they're not going to call (Washington Department of Ecology employee) Jamie (Short) they're going to call me." Carter said.

Both of the other commissioners agreed.

"I can't seem to take off my farmer hat on this one," Commissioner Richard Stevens said. He said that including those bodies of water in the master plan could be burdensome if a problem arises and they need to fix their irrigation.

Commissioner Carolann Swartz said that she did not want to create more regulation for farmers to follow.

Hooper said that the law includes an exemption for agriculture use, and that farmers who wanted to work on the irrigation canals that are included in the SMP, would only have to get an exemption letter, that costs $150, from his office.

Still, commissioners were leery of adding another layer of bureaucracy to farmers.

The SMP now goes to the state ecology department for a review and public comment. Hooper said that he thought that department would add those bodies of water back to the SMP and commissioners would have to revisit the issue.

Bureau of Reclamation employee Stephanie Utter told commissioners that she too was leery about including those bodies of water in the county's SMP.

Ecology department employees Jamie Short and Jeremy Sikes said that the two-year process of adopting the SMP was "amazingly well coordinated" and other counties should be using Grant's SMP as an example of how to develop their shoreline rules.

At the end of the meeting, Stevens held up the three-inch thick SMP and said, "If in this whole packet we are disagreeing about a couple of paragraphs, I think we have done pretty well."