A. The determination of whether a proposal is categorically exempt shall be made by the responsible official. The determination that a proposal is exempt shall be final and not subject to administrative review. If a proposal is exempt, none of the procedural requirements of this chapter shall apply to the proposal. The responsible official shall not require completion of an environmental checklist for an exempt proposal.

B. In determining whether a proposal is exempt, the department shall make certain the proposal is properly defined and shall identify the governmental licenses required (WAC 197-11-060). If a proposal includes exempt and nonexempt actions, the responsible official shall determine the lead agency, even if the license application that triggers the department’s consideration is exempt.

C. If a proposal includes both exempt and nonexempt actions, the responsible official may authorize exempt actions prior to compliance with the procedural requirements of this chapter, except that:

D. For projects submitted as planned actions under WAC 197-11-164, the city shall use its existing environmental checklist form or may modify the environmental checklist form as provided in WAC 197-11-315. The modified environmental checklist form may be prepared and adopted along with or as part of a planned action ordinance; or developed after the ordinance is adopted. In either case, a proposed modified environmental checklist form must be sent to the Department of Ecology for review prior to use as provided by WAC 197-11-315. [Ord. 2004-09-064].