Chelan County, WA Building Safety: Childcare Center Rules (2026)

93. The Hearing Examiner decides whether the site's access is adequate to handle the pedestrian and vehicular traffic the use generates, and can require it as a condition of approval. Where the facility sits in or next to a residential district, the Hearing Examiner must impose screening, plantings, walls or fencing of a nature and density fitted to that specific site, so a center backing onto homes does not simply rely on a bare parking lot as a buffer. 90's parking standards, the same off-street parking chapter that governs every other commercial and institutional use in the county.

Two numeric floor standards apply directly to the building itself: the facility must provide adequate outdoor play space, and it must provide thirty-five square feet of room space for every child in care, a per-child interior area standard that effectively caps how many children a given building can serve. Finally, the section requires the use to be licensed and operated according to state regulations, layering the county's zoning conditions on top of, not in place of, state daycare licensing rules. 240, which does not carry the same square-footage or conditional use permit requirement because it is treated as an accessory use of a residence rather than a standalone facility.