“The key thing is this is the start of a very long process,” said Bothell Mayor Mark Lamb.

Lamb made the comment after Bothell City Council voted unanimously, with two members absent, to jumpstart its efforts at annexing the city’s urban growth areas through an interlocal agency agreement method created by the state last year.

Essentially, the city will seek agreements with various other governmental agencies and taxing authorities involved in the annexations.

Most notably, those agencies include at least two local fire districts, as well as King and Snohomish counties.

Also notably, the interlocal approach could allow an annexation to occur without a public vote. Still, Lamb has emphasized the process will involve plenty of public outreach and allow for plenty of public input.

As a matter of practicality, Lamb said the next step is to send notices to each of the other agencies or governments involved informing of them of Bothell’s wish to initiate annexation discussions. Those officials would then have 45 days to respond, indicating their willingness to launch talks or declining to move forward.

Lamb said he does not expect any authority will refuse even to come to the table.

Discussions with Snohomish County fire districts 1 and 7 will be crucial to Bothell’s plans. Their objections helped kill last year’s attempt by the city to annex its northern urban growth area in Snohomish County.

Primarily, the districts claimed Bothell was not prepared to take over emergency fire service in the annexation area.

For now, officials outside of Bothell aren’t saying much publicly regarding the city’s plans. For example, through a spokesperson, Fire District 1 officials declined comment saying they had not yet received any formal notification of Bothell’s intentions. The district’s Leslie Hynes said she expected the annexation question to be a topic of discussion at the next district board of directors meeting. That meeting took place after the deadline for this issue.

Lamb said that, eventually, he expects Bothell Fire Chief Bob Van Horne and the chiefs of the various districts involved to handle most of the fire-service negotiations.

“We’re going to really reach out,” he added, further expressing a hope that another new state law might help ease some of the concerns expressed last year by the fire districts.

The state now requires any city undertaking an annexation to hire certain persons who lose their jobs as a result of the annexation process. Lamb specifically said the rule applies to any firefighters who might be displaced should Bothell take over fire service in the annexation area.

In voting to pursue annexation by way of interlocal agreements, Bothell’s council was acting on the advice of city administrators. By forging agreements with any parties concerned, the city removes the boundary review board (BRB) of both Snohomish and King counties from the annexation equation.

Responding to the concerns of the fire districts, it was the Snohomish County BRB that formally squelched the annexation process for Bothell last year.

According to information coming from the city, Bothell’s staff recommends a process that would run through the end of 2010 and possibly into 2011.

Under the proposal, the city would work toward agreements with the fire districts, the counties and whatever other parties come to the table, while at the same time holding open houses and public hearings.

Once those activities were completed, the council would have the opportunity to move forward with an annexation by whatever process it chose or put the whole effort on hold.

The city has put the price tag for the annexation efforts at $150,000.

Lamb noted state law requires Bothell to take over its designated urban growth areas at some point.

“This is something that someday we have to do,” he said.