The Growth Management Act (GMA) requires as part of the Comprehensive Plan Update that Yakima County review urban growth areas (UGAs) for each of its fourteen cities and towns and revise them if necessary, to accommodate the urban growth projected to occur in the County for the succeeding twenty-year period.
Yakima County split the UGA update process into two separate phases over a two year period concluding in 2016. The two phases were necessary to better accommodate the varying GMA update schedules of the County's fourteen cities and towns.