As the saying goes, “It’s better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission.”

In Island County, however, you apparently don’t even have to beg for forgiveness. Sometimes, even if you’ve been flouting the law for years, you can still get permission to do what you want, just by eventually doing what the law required from the beginning.

As reported in the past few issues, a Woodinville couple, Christina and Scott Hensrude, own seven buildings in an Oak Harbor industrial park. On April 15, they had a site review plan hearing before Hearing Examiner Michael Bobbink.

The Hensrudes were seeking permission under the land-use laws to convert those buildings from commercial rentals into marijuana growth and production operations. Hiller West, Island County’s director of current-use planning and community development, offered a few suggestions but made no objections.

Just one thing: according to numerous witnesses, six of those seven buildings have housed recreational marijuana growing and processing operations for as long as two years without no permission from the county.

That seems to violate land-use laws. West said it does. County code-enforcement officer John Clark said it does. County Commissioner Jill Johnson said it does.

As the Whidbey News-Times has reported, other marijuana businesspeople in unincorporated areas held off opening for business until they obtained the county’s permission. One was temporarily shut down for failing to do so.

The Hensrudes are very likely going to get Bobbink’s permission, despite their flagrantly ignoring the law.

Why? During the hearing, West made no mention of the applicants’ ongoing violation, and Bobbink made it clear that he won’t consider the ongoing activities when making his decision.

No complaint of prior unlawful land use could derail the current application, he said, because that is irrelevant in his deliberation. Bobbink said he is concerned only with whether the application currently meets land-use requirements.

What’s needed, he said, is a complaint.

A complaint against the applicants might have resulted in a stop-work order being issued, fines or even litigation — and it still could, Bobbink said, even after he approves the application.

West insisted last week he never received a complaint about the facility operating without county permission.

Mike Haun, whose tire business adjoins the seven-building complex, testified under oath that he wrote the county letter after letter and sent email after email about the situation, starting in 2014. He even persuaded former Planning Director Dave Wechner to go look at the site.

None of that constituted “a complaint,” according to West.

A News-Times reporter went to the facility, called West and described his findings, and offered to show him photos of the fenced-in buildings.

None of that would consitute “a complaint” either, West said.

The News-Times ran several stories starting in 2014 about tenants being ejected from the buildings to make room for incoming marijuana operations.

Nope. Not a “complaint.”

Whether or not this operation is good for the county’s tax base, this kind of formalistic thinking enabled the Hensrudes get away with ignoring the law, and the law must be evenly enforced.

Unevenly enforced ordinances encourage lawbreaking, disdain for government and leads some to speculate that some people truly are above the law.

A few things need to change here:

Island County shouldn’t be so particular about what form a complaint takes. Ordinary people shouldn’t need to be concerned about how precisely their complaint is expressed or worded. County officials should be open to hearing — and acting upon — complaints in whatever form they are made.

The county should get its permitting act together. Allowing a land-use permit to languish for two years is bad for business, bad for the community and just plain unprofessional. Earlier this year the commissioners increased hours, pay and staffing to handle just these sorts of matters.

County land-use laws need to have teeth so that, when violated, there’s an appropriate repercussions.

Now that Haun has finally filed a formal complaint, we’d like to see the brazen Hensrudes socked with a hefty fine for their ongoing defiance of Island County’s laws.

Otherwise, the county must allow this precedent to set the standard for how all new businesses’ permits are handled in the future.