I'll call to order the Monday, September 21st, 2015 City Council
regular meeting and ask those in the audience who'd like to join the council and
myself in the Pledge of Allegiance to please stand. I
pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.
Our first item under special business is agenda bill 7052,
Eastside Month of Concern for the Hungry Proclamation. Pam, I
would ask for you to join me up here.
our King County cities recognize adequate nutrition is a basic goal
for each citizen. And whereas no parent should have to send a child to school
hungry, no baby should be without the comfort of the feeding needed for mental and
physical growth, no elderly person's health should be jeopardized by the lack of
appropriate foods, and whereas food banks, emergency and hot meal programs
working with our cities, local churches, social service agencies, and hundreds of volunteers are
striving day in and day out to stem the rising tide of hunger.
However, still there's more that needs to be done. And whereas we
believe that when the citizens who are not involved hear of the especially
desperate need of the hungry as winter approaches, and their low incomes must stretch to
cover increasing fuel, electricity, and rental costs, leaving even
less money for monthly food purchase. An outpouring of community assistance will
follow. And whereas the Emergency Feeding Program of Seattle and King County coordinates
an annual food drive to help support the efforts of their program and the area's
food banks in fighting hunger, which will be and which was actually held at grocery
stores throughout King County on Saturday, September the 19th, 2015.
And whereas the cities of Kirkland, Redmond, Bellevue, Issaquah,
Sammamish, and Mercer Island would like to extend this effort into the entire
month of concern for the hungry beginning on September 12th, 2015,
now therefore I, Fred Butler, Mayor of the City of Issaquah to hereby proclaim
September 12th to October 10th, 2015 as the Eastside Month of
Concern for the Hungry in the City of Issaquah and strongly urge all
citizens to join the Emergency Feeding Program, the Issaquah Food Bank and other
area food banks to share whatever they can to nourish those who are hungry.
and witness thereof I herein to set my hand and seal at the City of
Issaquah this 21st day of September 2015. And
I would like Pam to thank you and all of the volunteers and staff at
the Issaquah Food and Clothing Bank for the wonderful job that they do in serving
our citizens and our less needy in as far as food and clothing is
concerned. Thank you so much. On behalf of the Food Bank, we are so appreciative
and we are very grateful for everybody's efforts and contributions. Thank you so much. And
so there's a pretty copy inside there. Thank you.
Our next item under special business is agenda bill 7059.
And that agenda bill provides a
legislative wrap up which outlines Issaquah's priorities and explains
which key bills passed and which did not by subject area and helps in understanding
key implementation and follow up. And here to provide that presentation
is our lobbyist and his trusty sidekick,
Brittany. So I would ask Doug Levy to please approach the microphone and provide
your report to our citizens and to the council.
Thanks, Mr. Mayor, and good evening city council members. And thanks, as always, for having
me. So as the mayor said, I'm going to give you a bit of a
wrap-up session on the 2015 legislature. Not a
session, but multiple sessions. And then I'm happy to take any questions you may
have afterward. One footnote I will give you as we talk about the
legislative sessions, if you look at the 105-day regular session, 230-day special
sessions, and then part of a third special session. That was a
176-day single-year session. That's a new record. It's never gone that long. You can
dial back 40 years or so and find one that was longer, but it was
a session that started one year and actually spilled over into the next. So a
record-setting set of sessions. But in the end, after a lot of give and take,
and particularly in your case, I think a pretty successful set of sessions. So
I want to dial back because as we built the 2015 legislative agenda, thinking back
on the landscape we were walking into, remember, we've got a state legislature and
a state government with divided controls. So we knew going in we were going to
have a very closely divided legislature. The Senate has 26 Republicans and 23 Democrats. The
House had its narrowest Democratic majority in quite
some time, 51 Democrats, 47 Republicans. And so when you have that
kind of divided control, there are bound to be some very sharp
philosophical debates on the issues, and particularly, as you all know from building your own
budget, that becomes a very important platform document. And so we
thought we would see some real... sharp divisions on the state's operating budget
and how the state was going to respond to things like the state Supreme Court
decisions on McCleary for K-12 education funding and the like. And all of those things
played out. And in fact, as you know, we have yet another state Supreme Court
edict on McCleary and you know, more legislative discussion that has to go on, in
fact, a meeting that will take place on Thursday. And so as you have all
those sort of 20,000-foot level issues with the legislatures,
one of the battles that we face as a city and that local governments face
in particular is that I think while Your legislators and legislators in general, I think
they like you, they respect you, they understand the role that cities and local governments
have. But they're not always passionate about the issues that you're dealing with
so much as they are about perhaps things like K through 12 or mental health
where they're dealing with state Supreme Court decisions as well. And so there's always a
bit of a battle to get in front of them and have champions inside the
legislature for the cause of local government and the issues that are critical to you
all. So one of the things we did heading into 2015 was spearheaded an effort
to work with some legislators and form in the House in particular, a local government
champions caucus. And I think that really helped on some of the budget issues we're
going to cover. And also in the Senate, Senator Mullet, obviously your state senator and
Senator Ann Rivers from the Vancouver Clark County area attempted to mimic that kind of
a local government champions caucus in the Senate. Probably not quite as
successful as a group of 15 or so that we saw in the House from
both parties. So Let me go through knowing that kind of landscape,
how we did on our issues. I think overall you came out pretty well. I
do want to take a moment before I start. The mayor mentioned my sidekick. I
do want to introduce Brittany Jarnot for those of you who haven't met her yet.
And Brittany really is someone who I have a significant amount of trust in.
filled in for me when I went to care for my mom in late June,
early July, and again, held the fort down just in the last couple weeks
as I've been gone on some vacation time. And just, I think if you ever
need to get a hold of me and don't, if you're getting a hold of
Brittany, it's really the same as getting a hold of me. So I really commend
to you the work she does. in your interest. So in terms of going through
our agenda, obviously you have the session report, but I want to quickly go through
your core issues and how they came out. One of the things we built in
the agenda under the whole rubric of economic development and jobs and quality of life
is we really wanted the legislature after all these years of talking and debating to
pass a transportation package. And the good news is that after a decade,
of not having any new investment in the state transportation system, the legislature did in
fact pass a package. 16 years, $16.1 billion
investment in our transportation system. It's the largest state transportation package
there's ever been. And I think you all ought to give yourselves a bit of
a pat on the back because if you recall the last couple of years in
13, 2014 when there was consideration of a package. We were really scrapping and clawing
to try and get the legislature to understand the issues of the Interstate 90 corridor
and the importance of investing in some new solutions on I-90 for the traffic
congestion and freight mobility issues. And in fact, in the package that the legislature passed,
there's a little over $73 million to construct some new peak use lanes
on both sides of Interstate 90 between Issaquah and Bellevue. And that'll happen in the
first six years of this 16 year package. So it's investment at the front end
of that package. We also wanted to get some seed funding for what we've called
the interchange justification report to look at I-90 and Front Street and some of the
related areas on future interchange needs. And the legislature put $2.3
million into that study. And then later on in the package, there's a $150
million investment for the junction of Interstate 90 and State Route 18,
as well as some money for Issaquah, Fall City Road. So in terms of investments
in your area, I think that came out pretty well. There's also the legislature put
about $325 million over the 16 years into what we call direct distribution,
meaning that a portion of new gas tax money and a portion of
multimodal account money will go directly to cities like ours as well as to counties.
And in the report, I've given you some of that. information about the amounts. It
starts out smaller. It gets to what will be about an $85,000 a year amount
for you all. Not a ton, but something you can help with matching funds for
grants or leveraging some things for O&M needs. The other big part of the
transportation package for you all, of course, is that the legislature provided Sound
Transit some new revenue options to take to voters. That will likely be in the
fall of 2016 for a sound transit phase three
ballot measure. Of course, the mayor sits on the sound transit board of directors and
they are actively looking at either studying or building a light rail
corridor out to Issaquah as part of that package and that'll all be decided in
the coming months. But the good news is the legislature provided that tool and I
want to thank not only the mayor but all of you in terms of advocacy
for that part of the package. The legislature also provided quite a bit of
additional funding for grant programs that cities like this one often apply for. So new
money for the transportation improvement board, for bicycle and pedestrian grants, for
something called the Complete Streets Program that had never had grant funding before, and for
safe routes to schools. So a number of grant programs got additional money, and that'll
be things that we can compete for in the years to come. And then finally
there's also a local option for cities and counties where under current law
you can form what's called the transportation benefit district for local road needs and you
have the ability through city and county councils to do things like a vehicle license
fee a local option at a level up to $20. That's a local decision.
The legislature said that the transportation benefit districts now can have authority up to forty
dollars on those vehicle license fees that's for you all to decide and whether you
have interest in that kind of an option uh... and then there were As part
of the trade-off for new revenue, one of the things that a lot of members
wanted to see is a number of reforms and additional efficiencies in the way that
the State Department of Transportation goes about its business. And there were several of those
passed. One of the things I want you to be very aware of and that
we had an initial meeting with DOT on is called practical design. And that's a
fancy way of saying the legislature is directed the Department of Transportation to look at
every new project in the package and look at whether the design can be done
in a more streamlined, more cost-effective, cheaper way. That's,
you know, in theory a good thing, but I think it's also going to be
incumbent on communities like ours to make sure that the DOT, in thinking
about efficiencies and cost savings, doesn't sacrifice for some of the features of projects
that are important to locals. So the legislature did design into that
law that local communities would have to be consulted, that you should be part of
any process, and that if there were going to be significant changes to a project,
it had to go back to the legislature. So relating that to the Interstate 90
corridor, we had an initial discussion with state DOT and they do very much want
to make your staff part of some of their initial thinking about, for example, the
I-90 lanes. And then I want to just, in terms of your
local delegation, let you know both Senator Mullet and Representative Jay Rodney were yes votes
throughout this whole debate. Both of them were very helpful. Your third state legislator from
the 5th District Representative Magandans was a yes vote on the bonds, the necessary 60%
vote that was needed on transportation bonds to make this package work. So you had
some good cooperation from your local delegation. So segueing into
the capital budget, we had in our priorities that we wanted to have capital investments
to leave a lasting legacy for the community. And one of the things we took
to the legislature was a request for funding for the Confluence Park project. We asked
for 2.5 million. The legislature did allocate 1 million in new funding for you, so
that's a good start. And I think we feel like we have an open door
to go back and ask for additional phases of funding for the project. They also
did a little over $2 million for Lake Sammamish State Park,
and they did about $500,000 for the Central Park field improvements. So a
pretty darn good capital budget for the Issaquah community. We had also sort of put
our oar in the water to see if there might be some additional funding for
hatchery improvements. We didn't see that in the capital budget, although there had been
some money for other repairs at the hatchery, as Councilmember Barbara knows. So
I think we also will have the ability to go back and ask for some
additional capital improvements at the fish hatchery. I do want
to call out Representative Magandans. He was your lead on the Confluence Park
request and was very helpful, I think, in getting that seed funding of $1 million
that I talked about. Then we had this whole
notion of on fiscal issues, we wanted to make sure that the state didn't erode
some of the shared revenues that are distributed down to the local level. and that
they could perhaps provide some new and sustainable revenue tools to Issaquah and other
cities and counties. So one of the key things that the legislature did is they
preserved funding for what's known as the streamlined sales tax mitigation account. So for you
all, that's about $800,000 a year. And remember that what we call SST, not
supersonic transport, but streamlined sales tax. SST is kind of
shorthand for the effort by a number of states to band together and make sales
tax laws across all states more uniform. And in doing that, one of the rule
changes is that sales tax at the local level is
credited to the final point of destination of a product rather than to the point
of origin. So that means for some communities that have a fair amount of manufacturing
or distribution or warehousing, the SST mitigation bucket of money was created.
And so for you all, that's why that's so important is, you know, if there
were in a mitigation pot, you would be dislocated quite a bit of funding.
The other main thing that I'll touch on is that the legislature restored previous levels
of funding for liquor excise tax. So those are distributions that go to
our city and they had been eliminated entirely in 2012, cut in half in the
2013-15 budget. And although it's not a lot of money to start with, the
legislature finally recognized that under this new experiment in the state of Washington we call
Initiative 502, where we're essentially setting up new retail distribution and processing
on a legalized basis for marijuana, that there were probably going to be local law
enforcement and criminal justice impacts, and they have set aside some revenue to distribute down
to cities and counties. It's $12 million to start in the 2015 15-17 budget. That
doesn't stretch very far when you look at all the cities and counties in the
state. It will ratchet up to about 30 million or more in the coming biennia.
It'll start premised on where there are retail outlets and then it'll transition into a
formula among cities and counties. So That's
better than where we were when I reported to you after the 2014 session, which
is that the legislature hadn't done anything to recognize the needs of locals on the
new 502 system. I don't want you to think that this whole
legislature that everything came out perfectly and everything's rosy. I think there were some setbacks
and there were some challenges. One of the things, you as a city are not
a frequent user of something called the Public Works Assistance Account. but it is one
of the state's bread and butter loan programs for things like water and sewer and
storm water infrastructure. And it's been deteriorating. And once again, the legislature
transferred a lot of money out of that low interest loan account into the general
fund. So I think in this case, you're lucky that you
weren't on a current loan list with the public works assistance account, but it's
one of those where you need to go into it with eyes open if you're
looking at a loan from that account because it's not a very stable source of
funding right now. Also, we participated in some meetings among
what's called the Tech Cities Coalition that's been a firm believer in the incentive programs
for research and development for high tech. The legislature had had
tax incentives for tech for a number of years. And then that program was
allowed to expire after 2014. And in an effort to restore the
R&D incentives for tech and for recruiting new tech companies, that was not
passed in the 2015 legislature. So we're still one of only a handful of states,
about seven states, that don't have some type of tax incentive program for tech. and
that could be a problem in future years. And
those were some of the biggies on the fiscal front. I want to look ahead
a little bit in terms of a potential crystal ball on what we're
going to see. First of all, we're going to see a very short session in
2016. It's a 60-day session, I think with a major
governor's race, with a lot of other statewide offices, with every House member having to
run and with half the Senate having to run for re-election. I think one priority
the legislature will have in 2016 will be to get done on time. So 60
days is not a long session. It's not a lot of time to vet policy
issues. And as Brittany and I go through and meet with your various departments and
think about what to bring to you for a 2016 agenda, One of
my recommendations to everybody on staff is going to be to set realistic expectations. It's,
I think, going to need to be a slimmer agenda maybe than we've had in
a year like 2015. There's also already some changes within the
legislature. Ross Hunter, the longtime chair of the House Appropriations Committee, as
you may have read about or heard about, has left the legislature. He's going to
go direct... the Department of Early Learning under Governor Inslee and a
representative from Snohomish County, Hans Dunschy, has just been named today to be the chair
of the House Appropriations Committee. He had been chairing the Capital Budget Committee, so we'll
have a new chair there. We'll have a new chair of the House Local Government
Committee. uh... the house finance committee chair reuben carlisle is going over to the state
senate so we'll have a lot of moving chairs and new people in high positions
in the legislature and we'll need to get ourselves acquainted there and then i mentioned
the word mccleary we we olympia types throw that one around all the time but
that's uh... the state supreme court decision regarding uh... the paramount duty of
education and the state supreme court did rule that under McCleary
the legislature wasn't fully holding up its end of the bargain particularly in how
it was dividing responsibilities between school districts that do local levies and its
own funding responsibilities. So we will see a lot of uber focus
on K through 12 funding maybe to the detriment of focus on other things and
we We just have to be cognizant of that going into 2016.
Again, I want to thank your legislators. I mentioned the 5th District members. You also
have part of the 41st district and those three legislators, Senator Litzo,
Representative Kliber and the House Transportation Chair and Representative Taunasen. I think they're all
really receptive to your issues. They don't always agree with us, but I feel like
we have an open door with all of them and they try and be helpful
on select issues and I think that's been a good relationship. and I also want
to thank all of you and staff everybody that works and reports on up to
Bob and Emily we always feel like we get what we need from you and
we get information in a timely way and I'm just thrilled that we have council
members that you know care enough to come down to Olympia and schlep around all
these meetings with us and you know it's easy for sometimes for cities to say
well just let Doug do it or just let Brittany do it but you know
the non-community people can only take this so far and sometimes on these core issues
it's really important for legislators to know that the people setting the policy and making
the decisions really care about it and we're not just making this stuff up so
You know, you may not always think so when you're down there, but you being
there and you forcefully getting in front of legislators and saying this is important to
my community, that makes a difference. And it's value added. And so thank you.
So with that, if I've missed anything, if you have questions, I'm happy to take
them. Are there questions? Mary Lou. One of the things you had in your
report, which I thought was really good, was some discussion about changes in fire service.
I think there was three items, and we don't have a fire department, but we
contract with a regional fire agency. So I wonder if you could touch on those
slightly, because those were all big wins, actually, I think. Yeah, I think there were
a number of things. One is that up until 2015,
You know, you take things like the Oso landslide and these just horrific wildfires we've
seen in the central part of the state, and up until this year,
fire agencies that chose to lend people, give mutual aid as it were,
and have men and women on their force do overtime work were not eligible
for any reimbursement from the state except for a very distinct, you know, a
very narrow area for things like wildfires only. So now, be it
fires, be it flooding, be it earthquake situations, the legislature has expanded where you can
get reimbursement for these mutual aid decisions. So that's one.
The legislature, I think, also loosened up the rules on width and height of fire
trucks that you can use to replace your current equipment. They've also made it
easier for some fire agencies to go and get renewals
of levies. They've recognized that the 60% rule may be a little
bit bulky in certain cases. So those are a few of the changes that they've
made. Thanks, Doug. Anyone else for Doug this evening?
Doug, I want to thank you and Brittany for that comprehensive report and the good
work that you did representing our community and our citizens in Olympia this year.
Thank you very much. Thanks, all of you. Thanks, Mayor. Moving now to
audience comments.
Citizen comments are an important part of the public process. We take them seriously and
factor them into the decisions that we make. Anyone from the public who wishes to
comment will have the opportunity to do so this evening. When recognized, please come to
the lectern, speak into the microphone. Please state your name, address, and relationship to the
city. Limit your comments to five minutes. If you have written comments, please provide those
to the city clerk. Personal attacks, obscene language, derogatory remarks, and disruptive behavior
will not be permitted. The speaker is out of order. I will direct the speaker
to return to his or her seat. The speaker does not comply. I will ask
him or her to leave the council chambers. Again, citizen comments, written and verbal,
are an important aspect of the public process. We take those comments seriously, and we
thank members of the public for taking the time to address us during our meetings.
And with that, I would ask the clerk, has anyone signed up to speak this
evening? First on the list, Inez Peterson.
Good evening, Mayor and Council members. Inez Peterson, I'm a graduate of Issaquah High
School. My mother owned a beauty shop on Front Street for many years. I represent
local Issaquah citizens in a legal matter. And I'm here to speak
about the funding for the Issaquah Valley Seniors. That is the nonprofit that manages
the Senior Center. To fund that
nonprofit in the next cycle is a slap in the face to the
seniors of Issaquah, and most especially to the people who were trespassed
from the senior center based on elder abuse, false charges of
elder abuse. One of those persons, Dave Wagner, was trespassed for
harassment for three years. Regina Poyor was banished for life
according to causing trouble and elder abuse. Now,
IVS must be held accountable for this. These allegations of elder
abuse are heinous, heinous if they're true and heinous if they're
false. Any director who thinks it's okay to
banish a member for three years or for life, it shouldn't have that position.
Directors who think it's okay to isolate members in that way are not worthy to
hold that position. Directors who allow false affidavits of elder
abuse to be read into the public part of the board meetings of the Senior
Center and then published, they're not worthy to hold that position.
Directors who think it's okay to send out a defamatory newsletter six pages long to
700 members of the senior center, if they think that's okay, they're not worthy for
that position. And what about the directors who approved an elder abuse policy
that violated state law? How can such a person be worthy to serve
on that board and run that senior center? What
about directors who don't investigate whether the Senior Center has insurance? The last
certificate we saw is two years old. What about directors who think it's
okay to publicly state that a vulnerable adult was bullied to death?
Or what about a tyrannical grievance policy that puts Courtney Jaron in the position as
sole arbiter? How does that meet? notice an opportunity to be heard before a
neutral tribunal. What about a director who doesn't require financial
reports for at least a year from the director? Do you have 2014
990s? And this is the end of 2015. What about directors who allow
or it needed post people's names at both doors to the senior center if they
called the mayor to complain. That is such an inappropriate form of intimidation.
These arbitrary and discriminatory acts would not be
tolerated within the walls of the city hall, and they shouldn't be
tolerated within the walls of the senior center. Of course the Senior Center should
be funded, but I believe it does not need to be funded through the current
nonprofit organization. How many reasons do you
need to look to an alternate means of operating the Senior Center? You can
fund another nonprofit and you could move it in-house under Mayor
Butler's administrative policy.
anything is better than what is currently going on at the Senior Center. I
beg you to defund that organization and look to something else that can give the
seniors of Issaquah a much better Senior Center than they have now. Thank you.
Gregory Wagner. I'm going to exercise
I noticed that King County Auditor Lloyd Harris joined us
this evening and I would ask, do you have a message for our citizens this
evening or are you just observing local government in action? Well, I'm doing
both. Well, please approach the microphone
and thank you for joining us this evening. Thank you, Mayor Butler. I really appreciate
it. I am Lloyd Hara, your King County Assessor. And one of the things I
wanted to make sure that we've been mailing out are revaluation notices. And I want
to make sure that all the citizens have the opportunity to take a look at
their reval notice and make sure that it is correct. Our website is fully
transparent. All the information about your property, your neighbor's property is all there to make
sure that it is fair and equitable. And one of the things I am proud
of the fact that each and every year since we've been in office, the
fairness is improved and uniformity has improved. All of our number of appeals have dropped
by over 50%. I think that is somewhat of a testament in
terms of the fairness. But on the other hand, I know the market has turned
finally, right? And we're starting to see values moving up to the 2008 levels.
There is no correlation between the value increase and the property taxes that
you might pay. It's not a one-to-one relationship. So I want to make sure that
the general public understands that, and I know you as council members understand that as
well. So I invite people to come to our website
and also to take a hard look. I know Salmon Days is coming. I see
a gentleman from the Post doing veterans, which is a great thing too.
I really appreciate the opportunity to speak before the body here this evening. And I
was in the area attending several other events, so I figured I'd Tuesday night stop
by to say hello. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for joining us. And by
the way, I did get the reevaluation of my property, I think, last week. And
I'm delighted that there is not a one-to-one correlation between the increase in value on
my property tax. Well, I think hopefully everybody feels a little bit richer. We're
finally back up where we were. Thank you. Tina, would you?
Certainly. Gregory Ragnar. Excuse me.
Good evening Mayor Fred Butler and the Issaquah City Council members. My name is Gregory
Wagner. I live at 24016 Southeast 111th Street, Issaquah,
Washington. I'm here tonight because I am very concerned about the well-being of the Issaquah
Senior Center and the way it is being managed. I have been a member since
January 2006. In this period of time, I was a volunteer and employed as a
van driver for eight years. I was a board member from March 2008 until May
of 2012. At that time, I resigned because of a big conflict with Courtney Jaron,
director, Craig Hanson, president, and Carmen Llewellyn, vice president. The
conflict started when I was called into Courtney Jaron's office by President Craig Hanson.
Craig Hanson, Carmen Llewellyn, and Courtney Jaron were present. I was asked why
I was bringing up an issue on how the Senior Center was being run. As
a board member, I felt Courtney Jaron wasn't putting enough hours in for all the
money and benefits she was being paid, for I was getting concerns from other
members about Courtney Jaron's lack of management. I was told by Vice
President Carmen Llewellyn, I was a troublemaker. President Craig Hanson told me,
I had to tell Courtney Jaron, Carmen Llewellyn, and himself ahead of time before board
meetings what I wanted to discuss at the future board meetings. They said they
wanted to have to okay it first. President Craig Hanson said, we don't
want any more embarrassments. I decided who in their right mind would want to be
a part of this dysfunctional board, so I resigned around May 2012.
I'm asking you, the City of Issaquah Council members, not to give Director Courtney Jaron
and the Board of Members the $99,000 grant money. Instead, have the Issaquah City
Parks and Recreation Department take over the Issaquah Valley Senior Center. The center would
become a much better place. Hopefully we can get back all those wonderful members we
have lost under the Courtney Jaron regime. I also have just learned that director
Courtney Jaron wants to shut down the pool room. Courtney Jaron wants to make it
into a thrift store for raising more money, taking away yet another activity
that some seniors, including myself, enjoy. Is this really necessary? Respectfully
submitted, Gregory Wagner. Thank you.
Good evening Mayor Butler and council members. My name is Hart Sugarman. I live at
2550 Northwest Oak Crest Drive. I've been a resident and homeowner here for
over 19 years. Tomorrow September 22nd marks the day
when the speed limit along Newport Way between State Road 900 and Lakemont Boulevard
will be reduced from 40 miles an hour to 30 miles an hour. I want
to thank you to those of you who helped and were involved in this decision.
This is a great first step in addressing the concerns of the community.
Pedestrian, cyclist, and motorist safety must continue to be at the forefront
as we anxiously await the report and recommendations from TSI consulting firm that the city
hired as speed is not the only factor in implementing solutions
for Vision Zero. Development along Newport Way will have a major impact on traffic
volumes and significantly affect the vehicle flow as
cars enter Newport Way from neighboring driveways and roadways. It's imperative that the
improvements on Newport Way are done before the development begins. Building the new
Dwellings first will add significant number of vehicles to the roadway and it will be
backwards to fix the road at a later stage. From my logic, it would make
more sense to do the infrastructure work first in anticipation of the development.
Speaking of development, it is the city's goal of creating a walkable
city in the central Issaquah plan. Reference the land use policy I-3
allow for neighborhood hubs and mixed use developments containing small scale commercial,
retail, and office uses intended to serve neighborhood residents.
To show you this little chart here. The number of current dwellings in our local
area, Summerhill community has 55 homes, Spyglass has 50,
Sammamish Point, 132, Bentley House, 47, Pinecone neighborhood, the
old and new dwellings is 78. Total, 362. Coming soon,
the Mull Gateway apartments, 400 units, senior apartments, 136, Bergsma,
subdivision 78, Riva townhomes 33, the total 647.
So we see a dramatic increase coming soon. I don't
think the Mall Gateway Project is an example as it does not meet the criteria
of land use policy I-3. My last point this evening is tennis courts.
The city of Issaquah's current population according to the US Census Bureau 2014
statistics, is a population of 34,056 persons.
How many public tennis courts exist within the city limits? There are only four
locations. Now there are plans to take away the public tennis courts at Tibbetts Valley
Park and hand it over to a private firm as part of a lease agreement
that you have on your agenda. please don't lock out the community's access to
the central facility. Tibbetts Valley Park is a 30-acre
recreational community park. What's next? Lease out the baseball diamonds?
The city should be providing amenities and services to its community and residents
and make this a walkable and workable city that we can all call our home.
Thank you. Thank
you. No one else has signed up. Is there anyone else
in the audience desiring to speak this evening? Mr. Kapler.
Good evening and thank you. David Kapler, 255 Southeast Andrews Street. I believe
the council in their packet has only 12 of the 26 pages of the 2013
990 for the Senior Center.
You're supposed to be dealing with 2016 budget. Hopefully you'll at least get some information
more, final information on 2015, and at least get the 990
for 2014. 990 is a form filed with the Internal Revenue Service.
In the past, it's been done by CPA in the university place down by Tacoma.
Supposedly, it is now being done locally at Tate & Ulrich, which is really a
good sign to me because of my personal experience with my mother-in-law and how
detailed and careful they were in working with her. But
I believe you should have that document before you're doing any looking at the funding
for next year. It was interesting,
mentioned earlier about the food bank and the good job that they're doing, and unfortunately
their director was not here. Another place she can't be is the senior center. She
has essentially no trespass from there. She's told, stay away unless we invite you, which
they have no plan for doing. My membership was denied in the
senior center despite what it says on the recent letter that went out to
actual members. And my question is, will I be no trespassed
if I chose to go over there and buy a lunch or something else? And
will it be Issaquah police officers serving that no trespass officer, which happened to
Dave Wagner and Regina Poyer? Now, changing subject. parks.
I'm hoping through the process of development of the new park recreation trails and open
space plan that there will be real work with the council with the state parks,
state DNR and county parks. This city is dependent upon those agencies
for a lot of our recreation and they all have different plans and efforts going
on that we need to be working together with them. We've had a long and
great relationship with the DNR and the Tradition Plateau. If you look at the map
in the draft plan, it looks like only part of Tradition Plateau is open space
or park because they don't use any of the colors for the DNR property, which
fills in and makes it all a complete whole of one pretty much
managed together open space area. Also, how are we going to involve the different interest
groups in this process over time to make sure that their ideas and their concerns
are addressed? The green necklace is just
kind of a chapter in there. We're betting on the livability of the city of
Issaquah for all the city that the central Issaquah plan is going to work.
And that plan, a very important part of that plan is certainly transportation and
trying to get that part of it working, but also having an attractive place to
live and work with this green necklace and the associated parks. That needs to be
really incorporated in this plan and not just kind of a chapter on the side.
Thank you very much. Thank you. Is there anyone else in
the, Mr. Wagner?
Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. Dave Wagoner, 360 Northwest Dogwood Street, Apartment K204,
Issaquah. I've been a resident of Issaquah since 1945,
except for 26 years when I served the United States Army. You'll never
guess what I'm here to talk to you about tonight. No. When I'm wearing this
hat, I'm here to talk to you about some veteran stuff. You'll be happy to
know that last Friday at TALIS, RVFW Post
installed a POW MIA flag to be flown six times a year. I wish it
was flown 24 seven, 365 days, but we have to go with a
corporate sponsor who says six days a year. And last Friday was
POW MIA day. So we installed that flag. and the residents are
happy to have it. I will tell you that one of the residents, Darlene Allen's
brother, was shot down over Vietnam. He was an MIA for 43
years, 43. They finally found his remains and brought him home, and I was happy
to be at that service. So one other announcement,
since I'm wearing this cap, Veterans Day is coming up. Put it on your
calendar. This year we will be at the community center November
11th at 11 a.m. Why? The 11th day of the 11th
month and the 11th hour. That was Armistice Day. Our wonderful council member
Eileen Barber has spoken a couple of times. I think our mayor has spoken. So
we will be excited to have you Change in venue for all the residents, it
will be at the community center, not the senior center. I don't like handcuffs, so
I'm not gonna try to go to the senior center. So, those are the two
veterans announcements. Now I'd like to talk to you about my favorite
subject that I probably talk about 10 to 12 hours a day. The Issaquah Valley
Senior Center. I just received a... Newsletter, and what's
funny about this newsletter is right here at the bottom, it says, activities are open
to all persons 55 and older, except those problem makers like sitting
over there. Just kidding, he's my friend. I've known him for a lot of years.
I just want you to know it's wrong. One more wrong. How many times do
I have to stand here in front of you and tell you about the wrongs
that are taking place? In this place, we call our home, Issaquah. It's
unconscionable. And guess what? You have the power to stop it. And that
power is not funding them. Now, what I'm absolutely clear
on is a letter written by Mayor Butler. I believe it was August the
25th or August the 30th? I'm pretty close, okay? And that letter
assured the citizens of the city of Issaquah that that senior center will
not close, period, end of discussion. But what I want you to
do is I want you to shut off that NPO that's running that. It's disgraceful.
An 18-year city council member, friend of mine, senior, and he
can't be a member. What's discriminatory about that? I wonder.
So, enough from me. You'll see me again, I promise. As long as this
issue is in front of you, I promise you'll see me again. Thank you. Thank
you. Is there anyone else in the audience desiring to speak this evening? Yes.
My name is Peggy Foster. I live at 2254 Newport Way Northwest. And I just
wanted to again voice my concern about the multiple projects that are popping up along
Newport Way. As Hart expressed, we already have traffic
problems and just add adding more units, more cars, more people
without first doing more studies. And I think there's been a speed study, but I
don't know that there's been a safety study. I've heard rumors that they're planning to
take away the crosswalks. I don't know if that's true. I've also heard that they're
planning to narrow the automobile lanes, add a couple of bicycle paths, and put
an esplanade in the middle with trees, which there's already limited visibility on that road.
So that doesn't make any sense. I don't know how much of this is true
or how, you know, there's so much information out there and I'm doing my best
to catch up and to read through it all, but it's a bit overwhelming. And
the project, those buildings, 18 buildings in that gateway project,
it just seems too much, way too much. And looking
at the picture of the project coming into Issaquah,
that does not reflect our community at all. It looks like some busy city,
some other place, not Issaquah. So just would hope that the city council
really takes a good hard look at that before they push this thing through, because
it's a big concern for a lot of us that live there. Thank you for
listening. Thank you. Is there anyone else desiring to speak this evening?
Anyone else desiring to speak? Third and final call, anyone else desiring to speak?
Seeing no one, then audience comments are closed and we will now move to committee
and regional reports beginning with Council Member Milligan. I have no report, thank you.
And Council Member Pauly. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The Growth Management Policy Committee of the
Puget Sound Regional Council will be meeting Thursday, October 1st at 10 o'clock at
PSRC's office downtown. The agenda has not been set yet,
but I will be able to report out on it at our October 5th Council
meeting. For land and shore, our last meeting was on September 3rd. One of the
items we discussed, which is the Central Issaquah Anchor Project, is on our regular business
this evening. We have, I'm calling it the bonus land and shore meeting coming this
week on September 24th. It's an extra meeting that the council members were able to
fit in. We'll be talking about AB 7041, which is the first
round, round one of three of a set of land use code amendments. that will
be coming before Council. This first set, if it passes through Land Insure this week,
will be coming in with a recommendation to Council in October. It is a mix
of items that include both Central Issaquah Plan amendments and other land use amendments. Planning
Policy Committee had their public hearing on September 10th, and that is a
video that is available for the Land Insure Committee members to review prior to a
meeting on the 24th. We'll also be getting an introduction to round two of three
of the land use code amendments at that meeting. Our regular meeting will be on
October 1st, and there will be three items on there. AB 7048, which is
ratification of the King County Planning Policies, which includes a city school siting collaboration.
More Central Issaquah Plan and land use code amendments. potentially the Atlas
Park Agreement, which may either may come to Land and Shore or it may go
to Safety and Services Committee. And that's all I had. Thank you. Council Member
Martz. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The City Council Services and Safety Committee met
on Thursday, September. Did I put the
wrong date in there? No, I didn't. Sorry. Thursday, September 10th, we had we
approved agenda bill 6962 old town short-term project AB 7049,
police gun range renovation, or we recommended approval of those, along with Agenda Bill 7034,
commercial fueling card. Those are all on the consent agenda this evening for potential action.
Additionally, we moved forward Agenda Bill 7051, Issaquah Human Services
Campus Funding Set-Aside, and we asked that it be put on regular business this evening,
particularly so that Pam Mock could attend and give a presentation on that effort.
Then the Sound Cities Association Public Issues Committee met on Wednesday, September
9th. There were no actionable items related to decisions that our
council would need to make in terms of support or not support. The King County
Growth Management Policy Council will be meeting Friday, November 6th at PSRC Chambers. The
King County Regional Law and Social Justice Committee will be meeting this Thursday, September 24th
at Valley Comm's offices in Kent. The agenda is still to be determined. King
County Emergency Management Advisory Committee met on Tuesday, September 8th. There were
also no issues that I need to bring before Council. And then finally, the Washington
State Emergency Management Council will next meet Thursday, November 5th at Camp Murray in Tacoma.
This concludes my report. Thank you. Councilmember Scherer. Thank you, Mayor, and good evening to
members of the viewing public. The Council Infrastructure Committee met last week, and we had
one agenda bill before us. That was 7047 concerning speed limit reductions being
proposed in a number of different corridors throughout the city. Those were, if memory serves,
Lake Sammamish Parkway, just to the north of Isquah
Falls City Road, the portion of Lake Sammamish Parkway that goes past South Cove and
Greenwood Point, up to the city limits near the Sunset Elementary Roundabout, and Front
Street South, south of, I believe it was either 2nd or 6th Avenue.
So the committee took a look at those proposed changes. We had a very
detailed discussion about the rationale for the
changes, policy concerning speed limits generally, and ultimately after a
fairly lengthy meeting on just one agenda bill, IT WAS LIKELY HEADED TOWARDS A
MAJORITY DO NOT PASS RECOMMENDATION. AND SO WHAT THE COMMITTEE DID, RATHER THAN REFER IT
BACK WITH THAT RECOMMENDATION, IS WE HELD IT FOR AN ADDITIONAL MONTH IN COMMITTEE TO
GET SOME ADDITIONAL INFORMATION RELATED TO SPEED LIMIT POLICY AND ALSO
SOME SPEED COUNTS IN THOSE PARTICULAR CORRIDORS AND THEN TO HAVE IT COME BACK TO
US AT OUR OCTOBER MEETING. SO THAT WILL BE ON FOR OUR NEXT
COMMITTEE MEETING ON OCTOBER 15TH WILL BE THE DATE FOR THAT. WE ALSO HAD AN
ITEM THAT WAS BROUGHT TO OUR ATTENTION REGARDING A CITIZEN CONCERN ON NORTHWEST STONY
CREEK DRIVE AND NORTHWEST HARMONY WAY WHICH IS IN THE TALES NEIGHBORHOOD JUST SOUTH OF
TALES DRIVE. AND IT'S GOING TO BE EVENTUALLY COMING BACK TO THE COMMITTEE A RECOMMENDATION
TO MAKE THAT FROM 25 TO 15 MILES PER HOUR. THE COMMITTEE TALKED
ABOUT POTENTIALLY DEVELOPING developing policy on 15 mile an hour speed limits
and discussing that sort of change with the neighborhood and the HOA. In terms of
another report, we had our Eastside Transportation Partnership meeting on the 11th. We had an
update on the upcoming technology and transportation symposium that will be
on Friday, October 9th at 8 o'clock in the morning. And that's at the Mercer
Island Community Center. And I mentioned this a couple meetings ago, but we
have an outstanding lineup of speakers planned. We have remarks from Secretary of Transportation
Lynn Peterson, PSRC's executive director, the CEO of a company called Inrex that deals
with high technology issues in transportation, representative of Ford Motor Company,
King County Metro, Uber, Lyft, and then legislators including Judy
Cliburn, Chad Magandans, Mark Mullet, and Dick Murie, who will be attending a
legislative panel. So really excited about this event that's coming up. We also had a
presentation at ATP from King County Metro on their long-range plan and a
presentation from Sound Transit providing an ST3 update as that heads
towards an eventual likely ballot measure and also an update on the Eastlink
project and 2016 service implementation which includes both the University
and Angle Lake Link Extension, which is down to the south, and other improvements,
bus improvements on the 520 corridor. So a lot of exciting things happening in the
world of transportation, and that concludes my reports. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Barber.
Thank you, Mayor. I attended the Wyver 8 Salmon Recovery Council meeting for the City
of Issaquah. The first thing we reviewed was a number of our 2016 legislative
priorities for the Puget Sound watershed health and salmon recovery. The
first of three that we're supporting is an appropriation requesting of at least $65
million for the Pacific Coast Salmon Recovery Fund. in departments of commerce, justice
science, and related agencies. The next was supporting Puget Sound recovery
legislation to designate Puget Sound as a great water body, making it a formal Clean
Water Act program. The third is to support and funding for the Army Corps of
Engineers to implement critical prioritization infrastructure repairs and updates to the Hiram,
Chet, and Ballard locks. We reviewed quickly stream habitat
status and trends. As we all know, the water's been warm, the salmon have been
slow to coming home. So hopefully one more quick piece that we did
review was just to highlight that the salmon are coming home. Salmon season,
S-E-E-S-O-N, is here. So I was encouraging everyone to get out and take a look.
And we all know that Issaquah Hatchery is probably one of the most premier. I'm
a little biased, but there are also 16 other great locations that you can see
salmon. So go to www.kingcounty.gov slash salmon, and you'll be able to
click on a number of great sites to view salmon. So that's the end of
my report. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Goodman. No report. And Council
President Winterstein. Thank you. Last Wednesday, September 16th, we had a board meeting of the
East Side Human Services Forum Board. And two items of note, we got an update
on winter shelter update on the East Side. So as of last Wednesday, September 16th,
at the Sound Transit location in Bellevue, I believe, a shelter opened up for both
men and women. It's open 24 by seven, 24 hours a day, seven days a
week. It's capped at 75 people. So that's a nice early
opening. It is just temporary. It's this year. But that is available to
people in need on the east side. And then on October 15th, Catholic Community Services
working with Sophia Way will be opening another shelter for women only as well.
I don't have any more details about counts and exact location, but there has been
the same group of people that have been working for years at trying to locate
and create permanent shelter. This is their work year in,
year out. We got an update also from Arthur Sullivan on Arch. There's still work
going into creating a permanent winter shelter. A number of communities
are actively, other councils are actively looking at how their cities can maybe host
that. So I don't, again, we didn't get a lot of details on that, but
that is, that work continues to go forward. We also considered
an endorsement for the Best Arts for Kids legislation. However, due to the
too many board members having to recuse themselves because their boards or councils had not
yet taken action on that. They were not eligible to vote, so we couldn't even
have a majority to consider that. I know that that is something I believe it's
on our action plan to take up as an individual council, and I learned at
that meeting that even though even I had to
recuse myself from action at the board meeting because we had not taken it up
as our own board yet. So that didn't, that unfortunately didn't happen. And then
coming up on next Thursday, it's already this
Thursday, this Thursday the 24th, I have a meeting of the Joint Recommendations Committee. We'll
be awarding, we'll be reviewing 10 projects that have been recommended to receive $1.4 million
in federal HUD Community development block grant
monies, $1.4 million for 10 projects throughout King County. Of note in those, I learned
something. A number of those projects are ADA-related in terms of
improving sidewalks. And so, and as far as
I can tell, should even our city in the future want to apply for such
funds, we would be eligible to at least apply for ADA type improvements to sidewalks
within Issaquah, which is a good thing to note. And then lastly, we have our
committee of the whole meeting tomorrow. I believe that's the 22nd of September.
And the parks plan, that we heard a little bit about
already this evening is going to be, is the agenda for that. It is gonna
be an introduction. It's titled the 2015 Parks, Recreation, Open Space and Trails Plan.
I don't have a lot of detail what we're gonna do, but of course it's
a community of the whole, so there's gonna be discussion and presentation. We've already outlined
a number of times, at least in services and safety, and then again, community of
the whole later this year, Any action by the Council currently is
forecasted for January of 2016. So that's on the agenda for tomorrow.
That concludes my report. Thank you. There will be an executive session held this evening
for the purpose of discussing a personnel matter under the provisions of RCW
42.30.110 per N1 per NG. The item is expected to take approximately 10 minutes and
will there be action?
At this time, it's unlikely any action will be taken. I attended the
September 10th Pugetstown Regional Council Transportation Policy Board meeting. They recommended
certification of Issaquah's comprehensive plan update. I received a briefing on
Sound Transit's ST3 priority project list, which includes light rail from Issaquah
to Kirkland via Bellevue. And we received an update on the stuck-in traffic
that you may recall this was
what has happened from January to June of this year.
People continue to move to the region. 63,000 people
have moved to the Puget Sound region. 77,000 more jobs.
Transit ridership continues to grow and
Because of all of that, delay is still increasing.
On September the 10th, I chaired the Sound Transit Capital Committee meeting. We awarded a
contract to begin event planning for the U-Link launch, which
will take place during the first quarter of next year. That's a 3.1-mile
extension from the University of Washington to downtown Seattle.
There will be a VIP event Friday followed by a public event on Saturday.
Although specific dates have not been announced, we anticipate at least 25,000
folks attending the event on
Saturday. So an exciting time. I participated in the Leadership Eastside Mayor's Luncheon
at Cascadia College. The theme of the luncheon was Many communities, one east side,
nine east side mayors attended the panel discussion and there were a number of local
mayors in attendance. Each of the mayors on the panel had an opportunity to
present a charge to the new class that is beginning.
Mayor Vance and I were present two Saturdays ago to kick off
the Mayor's Month of Concern food drive in front of the Issaquah Food and
Clothing Bank. On September 15, I was part of a
public lands round table with Congressman Reichert to discuss his support of the
Land and Water Conservation Fund reauthorization. Issaquah has greatly
benefited from that fund that supports local quality of life projects, through access to parks,
trails, and outdoor recreation opportunities in our community.
And on September the 17th, I attended the King County Metro
Services Guideline Task Force. We reached a unanimous consensus on the
final issue, which was service types. I would point out that
unanimous consensus included all Sound Cities Association
representatives who are on the task force itself. So that's most likely an item that
will not be before the pick for a recommendation. And
This past Saturday, a skate park benefit competition was held at
the skate park next to the community center at
the Skate Issaquah Funding Committee, Issaquah Drug-Free Community Coalition,
Issaquah Kiwanis, and the city of Issaquah hosted the event to raise awareness of the
funding campaign for the new skateboard park that will be
constructed at Tibbetts Valley Park after the first of the year. The event
included skating competitions for all ages, professional skating demonstrations,
prizes, and a barbecue. The Skate Issaquah fundraising
team is working with the community to raise $75,000 through GoFundMe.
And the benefit competition was a great beginning for that fundraising
effort. There is an item on tonight's consent calendar that
I would like to provide some clarification to, and that is Agenda Bill 70.
which is a referral to the Council Services and Safety Committee.
In that agenda bill is proposed funding for the
Issaquah Senior Center. We are very close
to reaching an agreement on clarifying one final item
which was one of the conditions that you have been briefed on for
funding the skateboard. I expect that that final issue will be
resolved before it gets to the Services and Safety Committee.
So just that brief clarification so you know where we are on that
item. So with that, And moving to the
consent calendar, I would ask if the payables and payroll for
September have been reviewed? They have. They have. Thank you.
I would then ask the clerk to read into the record the consent calendar.
Thank you. The consent calendar was distributed to Council in advance for study. If authorized,
Council action will occur by single motion regarding the following items. Item A, seeks approval
of account payables and payroll dated September 21st. Item B, AB 6962,
Old Town Short-Term Project seeks approval. Item C, AB 7034,
Commercial Fueling Card System seeks authorization. Item D, AB 7041
is an ordinance amending central Issaquah plan, Issaquah municipal code, including vesting,
wireless communications, master site plans, clearing and grading, affordable housing, assisted living facilities,
and the zoning map regarding lakeside properties. This agenda bill seeks referral to Council Land
and Shore Committee. Item E, AB 7045, which is the 2016
nonprofit funding. This seeks referral to Council Services and Safety Committee. Item
F, AB 7049, Police Gun Range Renovation Project. This seeks authorization.
Item G, AB 7055, Fiscal Year 2017,
Water Quality Assistance Program, Grant Application Submittal. This seeks approval. And that concludes the reading.
Thank you. Does any council member desire to remove an item from the consent calendar
and consider it separately under regular business?
Seeing none then, council member Winterstein. I move that we adopt the consent calendar as
presented. Second. Moved and seconded. All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye. Those opposed, that carries unanimously. Moving now to regular
business, the first item under regular business is
agenda bill 6906, Cable Television Commission
Recommendation. And this is coming back from the Services and Safety
Committee. Council Member Scherr. Infrastructure. Oh, of course.
Thank you. The other one I'm on. Thank you, Mayor. My apologies.
I'm gonna provide the summary statement update for the council's benefit. In 1980, the city
of Issaquah formed the Cable TV Commission to negotiate and regulate cable TV franchises with
providers in Issaquah. In 1991, the city started a local government access TV station and
the Cable Television Commission, CTC, not to be confused with former Council
Transportation Committee, was tasked to oversee and run the day-to-day operations of the channel. With
less local regulatory authority, direct competition as a motivator for higher levels of customer service
and increased city staff, the CTC feels that the need for a full-time commission for
oversight on cable TV issues is no longer needed. With this in mind, the CTC
created a white paper outlining three options for moving forward and a recommendation to
update the ISQA municipal code, rules, regulations, and policies, and procedures. The
infrastructure committee met on July 23rd to review this bill. After a presentation and discussion,
the committee recommended approval 2 to 1 to accept the recommendation of the commission to
alter the duties to an as-needed basis. The descendant council member, that was me, preferred
the option to expand the role of the CTC to a technology commission. The committee
requested this item be placed under regular business at tonight's council meeting. So with
that background, I would look to one of my fellow committee members if there is
a motion to be made. Council President Winterstein. Yes, I would move to adopt ordinance
number. 2745. 2745,
amending chapter 2.50 of the Issaquah Municipal Code relating to the Cable Television
Commission. Amending section 2.50.030, sub-
B, relating to meeting schedule, and amending section 2.50 subparagraph A
relating to the duties of the commission. Second. Moved and seconded
discussion.
Councilmember Milligan. I'll jump in with discussion here and maybe get some guidance on whether
there's an opportunity for another motion or an amendment to the motion. Of the
options that were presented to us by the discussion, there included an expansion
of the Commission's purview to include all technologies. And I
was attracted by that because the challenges that face us
have expanded beyond cable television since 1980-whatever. I also thought that a
A standing commission has a little more initiative on our behalf than a commission that
just responds to our needs when we call them. And I wanted to see if
the other council members might be interested in discussing that further. A standing commission can
come as the chairman of that commission can say, hey, I know about this and
this concerns me, and I think they would show more initiative that way. I want
to point out an example in just recent deliberations where I had wished that I'd
had a technology commission to vet a topic before it came to Land and Shore
and that is something that we are talking about that was in the consent
calendar to refer back to us in agenda bill 7041. The bonus meeting,
the one I'm so excited about. The wireless communications
piece in that there's information that comes from the federal government and yet needs to
be interpreted and by the municipality and experts
on a technology commission could be of great assistance to us in this. So I
was hoping that we would still have the opportunity to consider a technology commission as
a standing commission.
I might be the only one. So...
I THINK I... IS THERE ANYONE ELSE DESIRING TO SPEAK
TO THIS? COUNCIL MEMBER SHARE. I DIDN'T HEAR A MOTION. NO, I DIDN'T MAKE A
MOTION. I WANTED TO SEE WHAT OTHER PEOPLE HAD TO SAY. SURE. I'LL SPEAK TO
THE ISSUE. The issue that's before us is limiting the scope of the Commission's duties.
And we have Commission, I neglected to mention, we do have Commission members who are
here this evening if there are particular questions to ask. But we didn't need necessarily
a presentation given the summary statement. I looked into this issue and
found that there are a number of other cities, and I certainly didn't do a
comprehensive analysis, but Seattle has a community technology advisory board, and they
advise city government on things like their comp plan, which we've just gone through
ourselves, FCC regulations, Something I found in their minutes called Comcast Internet Low
Income Program that I've never even heard of. Something called a technology matching fund that
Seattle has that I don't know what it is. EGov issues, social media issues.
Philadelphia has a technology commission that I looked into that
concentrates on stimulating economic development by targeting activity aimed at bringing
technology-intensive businesses and jobs to the city of Philadelphia, as well as legislation, regulatory
review, regional issues and relationships, requirements, and future trends. Smaller
cities I found, Calabasas, California has a communication and technology commission to
advise their council on matters relating to cable television franchises, it's within the scope,
telecommunications, other relevant emerging technologies, and in Calabasas it
even acts as a planning commission when reviewing and approving the wireless telecommunications facilities.
And then another city, Franklin, Wisconsin, not a very big city, has a similar commission
dealing with their city website, technology policy, GIS, e-commerce, e-records,
cable TV. Now, these are all just examples. And a technology commission for our city
could set its own formal charter. But I think those issues that these other cities
have taken up, plus things like wireless, fiber, emerging tech such as drones,
This can even overlap with transportation planning. I referenced in my committee report about the
October 9th full day conference on technology and transportation in our region. You know,
in some, I would just say, why wouldn't we want to have specialized input on
these sort of topics? And this could be either regularly or as needed. I'm not
adverse to an as needed basis in terms of the committee, but it's the scope
of the committee that I'm interested in seeing expanded. It would be as if we
were members of the record industry and we had a board dealing with cassette technology
and we said, well, you guys can just meet a few times a year and
talk about cassettes. Well, why wouldn't we want to include CDs, MP3s, things that
people 20 years younger than me know about and that I don't even know. Why
wouldn't we want to be progressive and innovative and forward-looking? The last time, according to
CTC's report, that the charter was amended was around 1996 when the Federal Telecommunications Act
went into effect. We're now 15 years into the 21st
century, and we're not talking about moving forward. We're talking about just keeping our foot
on the brake and in fact limiting the amount of meetings that this commission undertakes.
So I think this really shouldn't even be a divisive We should move forward into
the future and this is the time to act. We can seize this opportunity that's
before us to request not just fewer meetings limited to cable TV, but an
actual commission that deals with emerging technology. And to me that's just a very
compelling progressive viewpoint that I would support. So I think
there's enough there to at least take a look at it. I'm not sure if
Nina was going to bring a motion or not. I'm not sure how to phrase
the motion, but that might be an issue that is causing us to stumble on
this. I'm interested to hear from my colleagues up here. If there's not sufficient
groundswell for this, then there's really no point in making the motion and going through
that exercise. We do have a motion before us. The amendment, sorry.
Other questions or comments? Sure. Thanks for your comments, Nina and Josh.
In principle, this idea that we not only the administration but
we, the council, could receive needed services from something like
a technology commission, I don't disagree at all with that in principle.
I'm pursuing this action in a very narrow way that it's presented. It's simply a
realistic way to make an adjustment to our code for what is the current
charter of the cable television, the cable commission.
So this is just a very narrow change to reflect really
the demands on that organization per their current charter.
the administration had an opportunity to consider alternatives and instead came forward with
the recommendation, let's make these simple changes to this. And so as a matter of
protocol, what I'd like to see us do is just follow through,
make this change as it's presented in the agenda bill this evening. But I think
in a follow-up at a time that seems appropriate, It will
be a project to figure out what the charter would be and
how to convene, essentially, a new commission. And again, I don't
disagree with that, but I think rather than trying to take a
recommendation, setting it aside, and grow it into something at this time,
I'd rather, I'm going to support the motion and the changes as we've, as are
outlined here. And I think we have an open opportunity then to work with the
administration to further review and look
at what it would take and what would be the purpose in the charter of
convening a technology commission. I think I just want to see these on separate tasks.
I don't really, the one statement, I'm not so sure that this is an opportunity
for us to seize. I'm not sure what that opportunity is. They're not really
presenting an opportunity. It was an idea that was considered and not moved forward and
not recommended to us by the administration. it's an idea who probably should get some
more discussion but i think in a different track rather than taking doing something other
than what's proposed tonight with the cable commission
council member goodman followed by council member paulie i would agree with what paul said
and we discussed that at the um at infrastructure um additionally it wasn't just um
city staff it was the cable um TV Commission itself the recommended option one
so that was that influenced my thinking at
infrastructure and I Agree that there isn't anything to prevent us from considering Something
expanded that would be done in a separate agenda bill Also member Polly Just
sort of echoing those comments, before Nina had mentioned that tonight, I did actually read
this in a very narrow interpretation as well, but I actually wanted to express strong
support for what Nina and Josh had said tonight, and I think we should be
looking at this technology commission. So we should be doing that, just maybe not in
this forum tonight. That's a good suggestion. Council Member Marks. At
the risk of being accused of bandwagonism, I would also say I'm very, very interested
in seeing a concerted effort to look at new technology options for the city. I
think that it's becoming absolutely critical for people's businesses that they have
high-speed Internet access, and that's just accelerating. We have a bit of a
digital divide in our city. Some folks are lucky enough to have entire neighborhoods that
have gigabit access, And I covet that. But I also agree that I think this
evening is not the place to make that change. But I want to signal my
general support for this concept going forward. Thank you. Thank you. Additional comments are discussion.
Council Member Scher. Thank you, Mayor. I appreciate the comments and I'm glad that there's
some willingness to focus on the types of items that I mentioned in my analysis
I guess I just see it very differently because we have an agenda bill before
us this evening that came to us with multiple options one of which was simply
to disband the entire Commission we're not going there but the other option was to
change the scope of its duties and so when I said opportunity I'm referring to
the fact that all it would take is a simple motion and approval to direct
the commission to revise its charter. We don't have to sit here and craft what
that is. And then we've accomplished the very thing that I've heard everyone up here
saying they're interested in. So it really doesn't take an additional lengthy
process or discussion or a lot of effort. It just takes council action to direct
the commission to go in a different direction. that is an opportunity we have before
us this evening is to not follow that recommendation that's being made. And I said
it, I think, at our last meeting, a recommendation is just a recommendation and we
have the ability to adhere to it or not adhere to it. So I just
feel like we're missing this and why wait? Being in the year 2015, coming up
on 16 years into the new century and we're still just talking about cable TV.
All it takes is a motion and a vote and we can move forward into
the future together. I don't wanna wait, so I'm not gonna agree to amend the
code to limit the commission's duties at this point. I think that it's very
short-sighted on our part as a progressive city. Thanks.
Council Member Milligan. someone who almost made a motion. I thought I'd make
one more comment. I can see the logic on both sides of this and I
think that if TOLA is going to be a bandwagon or I'll be a vote
counter and I'll see that I'm not going to put out a motion that won't
have enough votes to pass. Just as a reminder, there is a motion on the
table. There is a motion. I wasn't going to make another one or amendment. An
amendment. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. But I do I do hope that the
momentum of the conversation will be taken up very quickly with an agenda bill that
discusses the formation of a technology commission because I think it's very important to our
community for all the reasons that we've spoken here and that delay and need not
occur. There can be momentum from tonight and we'll find a way to do it.
So thank you. Any other discussion or comments?
Seeing none then, all those in favor of adopting ordinance number 2745
amending chapter 2.50 of the Issaquah Municipal Code relating to the
Cable Television Commission amending section 2.50.030
paren B relating to meeting schedule and amending section 2.50
paren A relating to the duties The commission signify by saying aye. Aye.
Those opposed? Nay. And that carries by a vote
of 6-1 with council members share in opposition. Our next item for
consideration this evening is agenda bill 6961
Central Issaquah Anchor Project. This is coming back
Land and Shore. The Land and Shore Committee. Council
Member Polly. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The staff will do an introduction on this agenda
bill this evening, and afterwards I'd like to have a few moments just to talk
about Land and Shore and how they did adjust the recommendation slightly before it came
to Council tonight. Great. And so, Keith Niven, Director of...
economic development for the staff presentation. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, City Council.
I have all of maybe two slides and then a five minute video I'd like
to show you. So
this is, in 2014, the City Council passed a
goal which was called Central Issaquah Community Development, the Anchor Project.
And the description of this was identify a core project that establishes the tone and
character in central Issaquah and create a strategic plan for implementation. And if you look
over at the bottom right hand corner of the slide, the action items and
timeline basically gave this work item to the economic vitality
commission. And as the staff member for that commission, I'm here to report out what
we did and how it went down. What they were supposed to do was to
discuss the concept of an anchor or catalyst project, discuss private-public
partnerships, gather feedback from the community and stakeholders, and then
kind of work on some recommendations. So this is really what
our process looked like. First was really understanding what this goal said. And part of
it was coming to a common vocabulary about what is an anchor project. Is it
a catalyst project? Is it a demonstration project? Is it a signature project for our
city? We spent quite a bit of time at the commission to really
understand what was the intent of this particular goal. And once we
kind of got to that common vocabulary, Then we discussed what it was. Then
we asked the commission to bring examples of places that they knew that
kind of met that recipe. So Pike Place Market, Pioneer Square in
Portland. There were a number of kind of regional and national examples and
international examples that people brought to the commission and talked about their favorite places and
why they were what they would consider anchor or memorable places. Then we
looked at our central Issaquah plan area
and tried to understand whether or not there was an anchor project somewhere in the
midst. Part of the assumptions, and I want to give you this piece of information
before we watch the video, is part of the assumptions that the commission came to
was that we really, you know, we didn't own
kind of a central, you know, acre, two acres of land that we could create
kind of a central square or park, you know. We didn't have millions of dollars
sitting in our treasury, you know, with what to spend it on. So part of
the decision-making process, our commission really decided that there probably wasn't one project in our
central Issaquah plan area, and don't forget our central Issaquah plan area is It's about
1,000 acres. So really what our commission came to conclude was there's
probably a number of potential opportunities located throughout central Issaquah that could be
taken advantage of to create that sense of neighborhood and uniqueness that we really want
as that area develops. So with that, I think I can do this,
but Tim has stayed. just in case I can't. Am I
in the wrong spot? And so while you're figuring that out, I'd like to acknowledge
that we've been joined this evening by King County Council Member Kathy Lambert. Kathy,
welcome this evening and thanks for stopping by to watch us in action.
And being technologically challenged. Issaquah is building a vibrant future. The council's interested in.
Issaquah is building a vibrant future. With the central Issaquah plan, we've created a roadmap
to transform about nine. Apologies. Okay, we'll start again. Yep.
Issaquah is building a vibrant future. With the Central Issaquah Plan, we've created a roadmap
to transform about 900 acres of suburban strip malls into a dense, walkable urban
neighborhood. Since the plan was adopted in 2012, we've seen significant investment in
Issaquah's commercial core. That transformation will continue in the decades ahead. With that in
mind, our city council adopted a goal last year to create an anchor project in
central Issaquah. What would make people want to be in the central Issaquah area?
What would make people want to live here, to work here, to play here, to
visit here, to locate businesses here? It's one thing to just build a high density
area, and it's another thing to create a space where people want to be where
they want to live. There are a lot of things that an anchor project could
be. I think one of the common themes was that it was a place for
people to gather, a public place, a focal place. I mean, Issaquah has a lot
of really wonderful open spaces but not really a place where people can gather either
in small groups or large groups. We talked about Ray Oldenburg's book, The Great
Good Place, and he talks a lot in there about a third place. He talks
about people having a first place, which is their home, second place, which is their
place of work, and then a third place, which is somewhere in the community that
is a gathering place, a public space where people can come and interact. And it's
neutral ground and just a place where people feel great coming and interacting and there
can be events there and that kind of thing. So the third place really became
something that we talked about a lot when thinking about the concept of an anchor
project. So one of the great things
about creating an anchor project in this location is that it really A
GATEWAY FOR THIS COMMUNITY. ONE OF THE ISSUES THAT WE HAVE HERE IS THAT WHEN
PEOPLE COME HERE, THEY SEE GAS STATIONS, THEY SEE
AUTOMOBILE-RELATED INDUSTRY, AND THEY MISS ALL OF THE GREAT BEAUTY AND
ALL THE THINGS THAT ISSAQUAL HAS TO OFFER, THE DOWNTOWN, GILMAN, ALL OF THE THINGS
THAT has to offer just gets missed. So I think by doing an anchor
project here we're creating a lot of excitement, a lot of civic pride, we show
off our community, we have a gateway to both the central area and to the
downtown and really gives us a great sense of community.
connecting the two halves of the central Issaquai area together, which are slated for densification
as part of the economic vitality plan for the city. It would also connect the
transit corridor of I-90, by the rail or bus rapid transit, as part of that
design. And that would then also facilitate also the densification on either side of the
freeway and create a nexus there where all the transit already exists.
There's a lot of reasons, but there are three or four really key ones. One
is the transit center is close by. Even though I drove here, I like to
think of Issaquah as a great place for your feet. So when you can travel
to the transit center, transit-oriented development, we can build things here. We're close to Tibbetts
Park, another place where I can go use my feet. We're just down the street
from new construction from the Marriott Hotel. And the last thing that's not really about
the feet, but is about the vehicles and the cars and the trucks. The trucks
that are here, non-pedestrian oriented development, are a great thing to move out of central
Issaquah and we can do more with this property and still satisfy great companies like
CenturyLink here.
great opportunity. It's in a central location. It's on one of the signature
corridors that we have in the city, Gilman Boulevard. It's crossed the straight from Gilman
Village. which a lot of people consider a treasure of the city. And it's
also located next to 4th Avenue, which goes under I-90 and is a local street.
And that's a pretty rare thing, as we all know, in the city of Issaquah.
And, you know, it's one of the largest pieces of property that's not developed right
here in this particular section of central Issaquah. So all of that makes it a
pretty unusual and noteworthy piece of property to look at. really an opportunity
to consider what we could possibly do with it. But then if you look at
all the land uses that are between here and Front Street, it's a lot of
really auto-oriented, freeway-oriented land uses. And so what you could use this property for
is really setting up that transition to hopefully maybe
inspire some adjacent property owners to kind of fall in
line with that more dense Central Issaquah Plan vision. The
great thing about this location is it also has great access to the city's trail
system. And so, you know, having maybe a big public plaza here at the corner
that would be inviting for people to ride their bike to or to walk to,
I think is, gives this piece of property a particular edge over say some others
in the city. As you can see, we have an exciting future ahead as Central
Issaquah transforms into a vibrant urban neighborhood. The potential project
locations you've just seen represent a starting point. There are numerous options throughout Central Issaquah
that can become the home of a signature project. We have a tremendous opportunity to
change the way our community evolves by creating a sense of place in the heart
of our city. Now is the time for action. We must work with property owners
to influence the market, to ask what if and why not.
So does that conclude the staff presentation? Absolutely. Council member Pauly.
That was really fun. We did not get to see the video. Stacey, you look
pretty good up there. So
the only thing I wanted to add to Keith's presentation was that the original recommendation,
if you go to in the report, was
The Commission recommends the City Council direct the administration to develop detailed implementation plans, including
predictable incentives and a regulatory advantage for each of the identified core projects, and to
work to bring these projects forward to the Council for subsequent implementing actions.
During our discussions, we changed that recommendation slightly.
We did agree that some catalyst demonstration projects be brought
forward. But and number one under the
recommended the recommendation tonight, but we didn't
want to limit it to only the four opportunities that were presented in there. We
realized a lot of work went in by the Commission to identify the projects, but
we wanted to make sure that if during the next six months, 12
months, another parcel or another property comes in and it meets the same criteria that
was used by the commission to evaluate it as a catalyst or an anchor project,
that it also ought to be included. So we just didn't want to say whatever
comes back could only be the four that were listed here. Something else may come
up. There's a lot of talk about different parcels and properties all through the central
Issaquah area now. The second part was that We wanted at least one project to
come through back to Land and Store Committee with that detail. Not all four at
once, but at least one because we felt like there was a big conversation that
would have to happen first at committee level and then Council. Evaluating what those
tradeoffs are, that each parcel, each project comes with its own different set of
incentives that might be required. So can they walk us through one before we actually
have one in front of us for real where we are being quickly asked to
then evaluate and approve incentives or
things that would have to happen within our codes to make that project possible. So
those were the two things we did. We wanted to make sure if there was
another project outside of the four, it could also come through in that process. And
we wanted to have one come through rather quickly so that we could just start
this conversation of what we might be looking at in terms of changes to the
code or incentives we might have to offer to make something work. That was the
change. And actually, both Eileen and Nina may want to comment on that too.
I'll comment just a little bit. Thank you, Mary Lou. So
maybe I should wait until there's a motion and discussion. Well, I was going to
suggest that Mary Lou, are you prepared to make a motion? I will move to
direct the administration to work to develop and bring forward catalyst demonstration projects, which would
be those mixed use pedestrian oriented community space creating redevelopment projects encapsulating the
vision of the central Issaquah plan Similar to, but not limited to, those potential opportunities
identified in the report produced by the Economic Vitality Commission and attached as Exhibit A
to this AB 6961. And two, bring forward to the Land and Shore Committee in
2016 a proposal, real or mock, for a catalyst demonstration project with the purpose of
testing and exploring potential approval processes, potentials for partnerships, public
incentives necessary to balance current market economic conditions and criteria for success.
Moved and seconded. Council Member Milliken. Mr. Mayor, and thank you, Mary
Lou. Thank you, Keith. What an awesome video. That was great. I WANT TO EMPHASIZE
JUST A COUPLE POINTS IN THE MOTION, WHICH I SUPPORT COMPLETELY. ONE IS THAT THE
ANCHOR PROJECT WENT THROUGH A LOT OF DEFINITION DURING THE PROCESS, AND I BELIEVE THAT
ONE OF THE MAIN SPONSORS OF IT WAS COUNCILMEMBER GOODMAN, AND SHE WAS AVAILABLE TO
HELP GUIDE, BUT I THINK ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT wordsmithing things that we've done
at the motion is to call it a catalyst demonstration project because the spirit of
the project wasn't just to anchor like something in the center or something weighty, but
something that would kickstart and get the rest of Central Issaquah going and to set
an example. So that's why those two words were equally placed just with a
slash between them to exemplify what anchor project meant and to replace the word anchor
project. Then the second THE SECOND PART OF IT ABOUT BRINGING FORWARD A TEST
THE LAND AND SHORE COMMITTEE TO CONSIDER, I THOUGHT WE HAD A GREAT DEAL OF
WISDOM IN IT BECAUSE WE WANT TO BE A MORE PROACTIVE GROUP, ONE THAT SAYS
THIS IS HOW WE WANT TO DO IT, MORE THAN EVALUATING OPPORTUNITIES AS THEY FLY
BY US. AND I THINK THAT THIS WILL GIVE US THAT PROACTIVE STANCE AND SAY
THIS WORKS FOR US. THIS IS WHAT WE CAN FULLY SUPPORT. AND I THINK THAT
GOING THROUGH A SCENARIO WITH SOME SPECIFICITY THAT WE DID NOT HAVE AT THIS TIME,
will help us in that proactive stance. So thank you. Council member
Barber. Thank you, Mayor. Also, I mean, as we were going through this piece, and
to me the word anchor project, as I kept reading all of this documentation, it
kept being talked about anchor project. And really to me, if you go back and
you study, it's like a hospital, it's a university, it's a major cultural arena of
some sort. It's, and it's, holds a significant, these people have invested
a large amount of dollars. It's Bellevue Square. They've invested a tremendous amount of money
and they hold significant investments within the community. That's not necessarily what I was viewing
was what we were looking for in the words catalyst. And what's the other word?
The catalyst demonstration project is exactly what we were looking for. The anchor project are
those jobs and these will also do the same thing. They are going to create
the jobs, they're going to attract the residents, they're going to support economic growth and
the strong communities. And those words work for both anchor projects and for this catalyst
project that we're looking for. I'm still... really confused,
and I like the word mock in there, because I'm not sure exactly what we're
going to be presented with, and what we can offer, and how it's going
to move forward. So going slowly with this, making sure that we're
building a community with the guidelines that we've worked hard over the past years to
bring forward. I want this to be a success. and the business or
the project to be successful. So if we can take a bit of time, go
a little bit slower, take a good hard look at how we're progressing, and if
it's just starting off with a mock project, I'm comfortable with that. And if
we've got a project for real, that would be interesting, but I still would like
to see the process and how we're gonna get through this and begin to, it's
gonna be a, Being a retailer in
this community for a very long time, it's really hard to take a look at
how fast we're looking at changing this. And there's been conversations in regards
to the whole area of Front and Gilman changing quickly.
And that's not gonna happen. I mean, there's residents, there's business people down there with
20-year leases. It's not gonna change fast. So we have to be...
mindful of those people that are here, that are business people, that are providing for
our community, and work to make sure that the projects we bring forward and the
way we're doing it is beneficial for everybody that's here for a long time.
Council Member Martz. So I'm going to be supporting this today, but I do
have some concern around this idea of the mock proposal. Newton 300
some odd years ago in Principia said a body at rest tends to stay at
rest and a body in motion tends to stay in motion. And so it goes
with government as well. And I have a concern that if we go through a
mock, one of these, and it is an idea that has a lot of legs,
what we'll find is all of a sudden we'll be talking about, oh, there's a
grant that's available this year. And gosh, if we move forward, this grant is really
incredible. Like I said, I preface this with I'm going to support this today, but
I would I asked the administration to consider how this potential mock
goes forward. You could do a mock that's outside the central area, which would be
explicitly not what the project would be. I just want to be very careful. We
have a history of getting rolling on major projects and then putting deadlines
in front of them. And then all of a sudden, we have legislation that is
completed. That's all I want to say. Thank you.
Thank you, Mayor. Take of the comments. Great video. That was spectacular.
And not just because Stacy was in. That was definitely a compelling reason. A lot
of local celebrities in that. We had a former council president on there talking about
my favorite project, which is number four, and that is the 12th Avenue overcrossing.
And you know, when I look at these four, and really I'm enthusiastic about all
of these ideas, and as was mentioned, there may even be others that are out
there. But then I sort of wonder about, you know, what is the city's role
in making something happen amongst just focusing on these four choices that are before
us. And I'm glad that I don't have to participate in deciding, you know, which
one to move forward on as a mock or however it's going to be mocked
up. But, you know, when I look at these, I say, well, okay, three of
them are specific parcels with redevelopment opportunity. One of them though is an
infrastructure project that the city has a direct role in potentially
moving forward. And you know, with the other three, You can change policy. You can
create incentives. You can work with the property owners. But it's really only the
overcrossing that provides the necessary infrastructure to support the future development.
And I've talked about this every time we discuss development and growth in the city,
that I'm not against growth and I'm not against redevelopment and I'm not against our
future plan. It's just sort of the overnight character and keeping up with the pace
of growth and making sure that our infrastructure supports that growth that most concerns me.
And so when I look at these projects that I say, well, what can happen
at, you know, Front Street? What can happen at the Yard? What can happen at
Fourth and Gilman? There's so many opportunities for community spaces and private industry to
merge and present great opportunities for our citizens. But styles
change and tastes change. And something that we think might be a great anchor project
now or a few years from now may not stand the test of time. And
it reminds me of the law school building at the UW where I
attended, the old Condon Hall, which was considered in the 1970s an architectural marvel and
won, I think, national awards for its concrete exterior and linoleum floors. And
that thing didn't even 40 years before they moved into a brand new facility on
the main campus. So, you know, a great project can be put together that everybody
oohs and ahhs about today. But something like the overcrossing, the infrastructure improvement that we
so sorely need to make the central area support the future development is something that
we, I think, as a city should strongly move forward on. I've been saying it
now for eight years. We need to take those first steps. I'm really fascinated by
some of the ideas, you know, with the crossing. We've long talked about simply either
a two or a four lane facility or three lane, some configuration connecting into direct
access for HOV. And then I read on here lid or platform. And that's
something that I haven't really been given a lot of thought to as a big
proponent of this idea. But making it into something more than just an infrastructure improvement,
but actually a community space. And on Mercer Island, there's ball fields that they have
on their lids and things that can be done that's not just a road that
can connects one end to the other. So there are some great opportunities here
to look at and so I really am excited about seeing what gets come up
with here in the future. So I'm fully in support of the bill tonight. Thanks.
Council President Weierstein. Followed by Council Member Goodman.
Just for clarity, we had an existing council goal, so this is somewhat of a
symbolic. We've reached a state. There's been a couple concepts that we've put together and
say, hey, let's continue working on it. So it somewhat feels symbolic to me. It
says continue to move forward on something you were already told to move forward on.
So I think that's important. Also, there's been multiple comments about mock. This language says
real or mock, so it could be real, too. So... Sorry?
It could be a lid. So just to make sure everybody's clear is that this
language says a proposal reel or a mock for a catalyst and demonstration. And so
just a small little housekeeping thing. I am very interested in hearing what Council Member
Goodman says about the adoption of a word that says catalyst slash demonstration. It
does work for me, but I'm interested in your comments.
Well, I'm super excited about this agenda, Bill, as if you can't tell.
I, as Nina alluded to, I did go to some of the meetings of the
commission, and I didn't guide as much as I was there because I was very
interested in the conversation. And as we went through the goal-setting process, I had a
conversation with council members who were not
necessarily completely in sync with what I was envisioning in my head, and it's a
very difficult concept to try to get across. And so I was interested in the
conversation that the Commission members were having, and it was very inspirational and very
interesting to watch some of that evolution as it happened. And
they were really into it, I thought, and very... didn't just take this as some
kind of a, okay, well this has been handed to us, we need to do
this. They were very involved and very thoughtful. And I think
they sort of got what I was initially trying to communicate in the original goal.
And I think Keith mentioned a couple of things tonight that
are examples of what made me feel as though that the Commission got it when
I was at some of those meetings. Key said the goal is to inspire developers
to fall in line with the central Issaquah vision, and it's about influencing the market.
And I think that really was the initial thought, because
the alternative is just to let that area develop organically and redevelop organically, and you're
going to get what you're going to get. And whatever it redevelops into, you might
as well consider that to be permanent because it's there for a long time. So
I'm excited and I wanna thank the commission for all of their work and Keith
and his team for all of their work and Land and Shore because I didn't,
of course, obviously go to Land and Shore, but there's just so much thoughtful work
and I would agree with Paul that it's exciting that this really is
an affirmation to continue moving forward. So I'm excited to see what eventually comes out
of this. Council Member Barber. Just a quick question for Keith.
We've got two projects, basically the yard and 12th and Gilman that probably have
some potential of moving forward earlier. Have they contacted you or have
you or any of your committee members or department members attacked, attacked,
had any conversations with them in regards to their interest in moving forward and how
soon and what their vision of what their property is and
are hoping to be? So to give it tangible, and this is why it does
say mock or real, because it could very well be that we do have a
real project next year. And I don't want to have to bring a mock project
forward if I've got a real one that I can, that just seems like a
lot of work. So, and I'm lazy. So the answer is yes. I mean, so
to give you guys an example, Fourth and Gilman, and I don't think that this
needs to be confidential, so I'll go ahead and share. Fourth and Gilman, that property,
as you can see from the report, is actually under the post office development agreement,
and they have vested standards that are very non-central Issaquah plan. They're
low, two-story buildings with surface parking lots, and I think we would all say, you
know, those are the things that we're trying to get away from. If we really
want a more dense, walkable community, that's not it. So one of the real opportunities
for that particular property is to try and get them to think differently about
their property. And so they came into my office the other day with a
single story project with surface parking. And it was an interesting use,
something that I think we might like. But the conversation was, why not put three
stories of apartments above it? you know, well, that then means you have to have
a parking garage. Well, that then turns the construction cost per square foot into a
different animal. And, you know, part of the conversation is, well, this developer has done
stuff in Seattle and they've used multifamily tax exemption to help the economics work. And
so that could very well be a pilot opportunity for us to consider whether
multifamily tax exemption in that location to get mixed use in maybe four-story or five-story
configuration as opposed to one-story configuration with surface parking, might be a good
community benefit trade-off or not. And so that's one tangible example of
how this could play out. Now, we've talked about having a big plaza on the
corner, and so there's that community space component that would go with that project. But
this is where having this in front of us gives us some good direction on
what the council kind of is really looking for in terms of bringing projects along
that would start to create that sense of identity for our central
area. So that's one example. But there's a whole list on page eight
of other places that the commission talked about as possibilities. Just for example,
If you were to just look at the geography of Central Issaquah, one of the
greatest places I think that has great potential is where Top Pot Donuts sits. It's
walkable to the Transit Center, it's walkable to Tibbets Park, but right now there's really
nothing going on there. So, you know, we could sit down with that property owner
and see what, you know, kind of conversations could happen. That might be a mock
project we could bring forward as a... HERE'S SOMETHING THAT COULD HAPPEN IN A GREAT
LOCATION NEXT TO A NEW HOTEL THAT'S BEING BUILT. THAT PIECE OF PROJECT, I MEAN,
THAT PIECE OF PROPERTY HAS HOW MANY DIFFERENT PROJECTS HAD BEEN PROPOSED AND DIDN'T FOLLOW
THROUGH. SO MAYBE THIS IS A GREAT OPPORTUNITY NOW TO CREATE SOMETHING THAT WE'RE HOPING
TO FIND. The reason I was asking the question was that the idea of
having a mock process go through is a whole lot of your time, a lot
of our dollars, and I would be far more if we had a live project
that was hopefully coming forward soon, something that we could begin to work with and
begin to look at it as a real project as opposed to a mock. But
I don't want to force that issue either. I don't want to just say, you
know, we're going to work something, and if it needs to be a us the
ability to look at this process a little bit of time and looking at some
mock projects i'm not opposed to it council member martz
thanks mr mayor first off let me just clarify that I wasn't suggesting that we
needed to do a mock project. I was suggesting that if we did a mock
project, sometimes things develop a life of their own. So if, in fact, the city
comes up with a really great, awesome project that they want to look at moving
forward with full steam, then that's fine. Secondly,
Principia was published 328 years ago. But the final thing is that would we
expect to see some sort of a gate or check back with the council
prior to a deep dive. If you identify a great opportunity, will the council
sort of put some sort of stamp on it before you guys deep dive into
it? Is that the expectation? As mock or as a real one? A real one.
A real one? So a real one is going to kind of organically to some
extent. I mean, it's hard to know how it's gonna unfold. You know, if we
were to focus on 12th Avenue or, you know, the front and Gilman
intersection, I mean, both of those are gonna potentially include WSDOT in those conversations. And,
you know, so that will unfold in a very different way than, say, a private
property perspective would. But I think, I mean, so,
What I would guess is no matter if there's going to be an ask involved,
and I assume there would be, that we would need full council to potentially consider
that ask, whatever it might happen to be. So the process, whether that comes to
land and shore first, and then pings to like a workshop, or whether it goes
to a workshop first, I don't know. I'm open to suggestions.
I guess the reason that I ask is because this is a council goal and
because, you know, if somehow you or a successor decided that, you know,
burning facility was a really awesome opportunity. I would hope that the council would have
a chance to intercept that prior to much activity occurring on the city and the
administration's part. I can assure you that before we consider a tire burning facility,
you'll know about it. But you get my point. Absolutely. Thank you.
Any other questions or discussion before we act on the motion? Just one quick comment
on what Tola just said. It is possible, Tola, Nina and I were looking back
through points one and two on that recommendation. It is possible to add something between
those that just says that there's a check back. I mean, if you feel strongly
that you want a heads up just even before the reel or the mock starts,
we just add that to the recommendation. It's not a big deal. Just a notice.
I think we've got a pretty good track record of not keeping the council in
the dark going forward. We work very hard to make sure that you know what's
happening. Even tire burning facilities? Even tire burning facilities. I think through the vividness of
my example, I'm now confident that you understand the point. Are you ready to
act on the motion? And I'm not going to read the entire motion. It's in
the agenda bill. All those in favor of directing the
administration to do items one and two listed in the agenda bill
signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed, that carries unanimously.
Moving to our final business item this evening, agenda
bill 7051, Human Services Campus
funding set aside. And this
is coming back from,
I'm guessing, Services and Safety. And Margaret,
good evening. Great. Thank you, Mayor Butler and council members. My name is Margaret Moore,
and I'm here tonight on behalf of a large group of volunteers who have tried
valiantly for a number of years to put together a human service campus for the
city of Issaquah. And with me tonight is Pam Mock, and Pam is here as
the CEO of Together Center, which has been our lead partner and somebody who has
really given us a model that might have been something that would have been well
implemented in the city of Issaquah. I think all of you have already received a
press release that tells you what we're about, and unfortunately, we're pointed out
we could not identify a property that we could make this work on. We've looked
at probably 15 to 20 different properties over the years and for one reason or
another they were not feasible or didn't become available. We had thought perhaps during the
economic downturn we might find some properties that were in distress but that did not
turn out. The primary reason that we asked for time on the council
agenda tonight was that we really wanted to say thank you to you in person
and publicly. The council and the mayor and the city administration have been wonderful partners
through this process and we truly appreciate it. We also want to express public appreciation
to the numerous volunteers that have been with us along the way and particularly to
the city staff that have given us many, many hours. I'm reflecting as I look
at you tonight, some of the city staff that have been very good to us
are no longer here, and we hope that they find appreciation through these words maybe
in the press. And some of you are in different roles than we first encountered
you, so time has moved through and we can see it visibly tonight.
But before we conclude, we want to underscore several things that we think are really
important to mention. And the first one is the model that we were hoping to
implement we know would be a successful one. And we've seen it operate for 25
years with the Together Center that's located in Redmond. Together Center, even though it's in
Redmond, serves the entire east side. And in one-stop shopping, it's a hub
for many, many people who come in in need. And we know that many people
in need need more than one thing. So we found that this is a marvelous
model. In fact, it's so good that within the last year we've had over 37,000
clients come through the Together Center for various reasons. This is an
unduplicated That is a duplicated count. Oh, okay. But they've
needed more than... More than one thing, right. So we feel like, even though we
know many thousands of these have come from Issaquah and within the I-90 corridor, so
we feel like there is a real need for that kind of service in this
area with a model that we know has been successful. Together Center is celebrating its
25th anniversary this year. So it's been here a long time. The other thing
that we want to acknowledge is that we've had over a dozen partners in agencies,
non-profit agencies with various services to offer that have been very interested in participating
with us. And they have been disappointed that this did not happen, but remain residually
interested in participating if something like this happens again. And finally,
we want to emphasize that the need is still here. and probably growing even though
we haven't documented that within the last couple of years. As part of this process
we did interview 50 key members of the community, stakeholders in business agencies,
schools, all of these people. They absolutely said yes that there is a need for
this kind of set of services in the Issaquah area. There's a lot of wonderful
services operating here now but they all said to us that even though they're wonderful,
they are not in one location. Transportation is an issue for people in need and
lots of the things that people who have provided services in Redmond have said
is that it's wonderful to have the agencies together because transportation is an issue and
oftentimes they can refer to others. We can do triage, we can direct people and
this has been a real resource. So we're hoping that this kind of thing can
happen in the future. I'll just finish
up. I wanted you all to know that Together Center stands ready to assist in
any other iteration or partnership or just sitting around brainstorming. We're happy to share our
expertise. What we were hoping to see is more services for Issaquah, more
comprehensive system, ease of access to services. That's really what our model's about.
The community has been very interested in this project and if there's other next
steps or just sitting down and thinking through some other ways to get those goals
met. We're very happy to assist. And I wanted to add also, we're just very
appreciative of the Council, your patience, and the support throughout this project. Thank
you very much. Thanks to both
of you for your hard work on this. And so,
Council Member Martz. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I move to approve resolution number 2015-16,
redirecting funding for a Human Services Campus in the City of Issaquah as presented. Second.
Moved and seconded. Questions or discussion? Council
Member Martz, followed by Council President Winterstein. So I just want to
mention one thing that came out of committee that sort of for the record. There
was public comment from Corey Walters, ISSAQA Food and Clothing Bank Executive Director. She asked
if the council would consider reserving some of the funds to establish a wraparound service
model. There are continuing ongoing efforts to look at bringing
congregated services, that's probably not the right adjective, to the city. And
We decided that because this, there's nothing that binds future councils from considering that, and
it certainly, it would be an interesting option to take a look at. We did
decide to specify this back towards
affordable housing because it had originally come from affordable housing. It had been
part of the TALIS development. And so we wanted to make sure that that got,
that got in the language of bringing this money back in, that that is
remembered. But I also really want to reiterate that we thought it was an interesting
proposal on Corey's part. And certainly, there would be potential interest down the road if
something did come together that would be really good for the community. And I guess
I just wanted to make sure that we put this into the record, that there
was this conversation going on. And perhaps it will bear fruit going forward. And it
doesn't, of course, change my support for this which I will be supporting. Thank you.
Council President Winterstein. Thank you. So I seconded the motion, but that was really
hard. It really was a motion I would hope never would come in front of
us. Later on this evening, perhaps, if this were to pass, it's
going to be a resolution I really never wanted to see and never wanted to
sign. So I'm saddened by that. It was probably 2008,
maybe 2009, when I was very, yes, when you started. And I was very much
a public policy neophyte. But as a member of the new Human Services
Commission, I kind of weaseled my way in to join you, Margaret, and Pam, along
with John Rittenhouse and Barb D. Michelle, as you guys brainstormed how to make this
happen. And I knew right then, I was sitting among some real rock stars. I
realized that people with passion and intelligence and a good idea could come together, could
really move people and had the opportunity to create something that was needed by the
neighborhood. And Margaret, you did a wonderful job of explaining all that had happened. And
I knew this was very, very real. And only when I actually got elected to
council that I had to step away from that. But I really took, I mean,
you guys really did help launch me into, you know, public service from a public
policy setting. So I appreciate that extremely. I'm in your gratitude, in your debt.
But the need does exist. And the irony that we're discussing this following the previous
item is just was really hard for me. It was all uplifting and looking forward
and vision and wonderful things that we want to achieve. And yet this
well-intended effort with a significant fund set aside from the city,
the sun is going to set on this opportunity. But the need has not gone
away. I think the opportunity to create a more efficient model, both in terms
of the delivery and the receiving of services, I still believe in that as well.
I want to thank you both and everybody who who did work on it so
hard over the years. You know, my day job has me in Redmond. I actually
walk by the campus off and up there, and I think of you guys, and
I know that that's an excellent model. I appreciate your comments about being at the
ready, should anything ever turn this direction again. But anyways,
thank you. It's with some heavy heart that I'm gonna move forward with this this
evening, AND IT'S MADE A BIG DIFFERENCE FOR ME AS WELL.
THANK YOU. COUNCIL MEMBER SHARE. THANK YOU,
MAYOR. I'M ALSO SADDENED BY HAVING TO MOVE IN THIS
DIRECTION. THERE WERE SUCH HIGH HOPES. WE ALWAYS HEARD THE UPDATES
HERE AT THE COUNCIL AND THE PROGRESS THAT WAS TRYING TO BE MADE. It's
just so unfortunate, as I think Paul was alluding to, with all this future-looking growth
that we have, that a place just couldn't be found in the city. All the
redevelopment that's going on, and yet there wasn't even a parcel where this center could
come to fruition. It's really just kind of surprising, to be honest. But I hope
that the effort doesn't just fade away and that there is a continued and renewed
emphasis on finding opportunities and I know there are a lot of dedicated individuals who
will continue to look for those opportunities and I really applaud their persistence and your
efforts that you've undertaken. You know, in committee we did talk about
having this check-in where this comes back to the council on an annual basis in
terms of reporting on how these dollars can be used and I agree with
what Tola said which is You know, putting the money back to what its original
purpose was, which was affordable housing, but it doesn't limit the ability of a future
council to repurpose the funds yet again. But I will pick up on
something Tolas said earlier, and it has nothing to do with burning tires. It has
to do with your statement about Newton. I think this is actually an example
of that as well because we are now going at rest with these funds
and they are no longer in motion. And so by putting these funds at rest,
my concern is that they will stay there, as you pointed out from your example.
And that's why having this check-in on an annual basis will hopefully provide the necessary
momentum to generate some efforts again in the future because a million dollars
is not worth as much tomorrow as it is today. It's a basic principle of
economics. And these funds have already been sitting ready and available for over 10 years
since they were originally allocated for this use. And now, you know, here we are
and we're not any one single step further to seeing this through. So
I hope that there can be something that comes out of this that's good and
that these funds can get used in a way that a million dollars actually is
a million dollars. It's a lot of money, not just a drop in the bucket.
It can really do some benefit to our residents and the region as a whole.
So I'm supporting this bill with a heavy heart.
Are you ready to act? All those in favor of approving resolution number 2015-16 redirecting
funding for Human Services Campus in the City of Issaquah as presented signify by saying
aye. Aye. Those opposed, that carries unanimously. Moving now to
good of the order. Does anyone have anything this evening for good of
the order? I think I know what you're going to say, Eileen.
Just a quick reminder to all of our viewing audience, your tagline there, that
October 3rd and 4th is Salmon Days and it's been ordered for good weather. The
team that we've put together, our Salmon Days committee team is working all the corners.
We are getting everything put together and ready to go. So we are welcoming everybody.
Starts Saturday with the grand parade. and has lots of youth activities. The
Doc Dogs will be back. And we can't forget the Kiwanis Salmon Barbecue, so make
sure you, if you can, inch your way over the bridge because it's always very
packed, and have barbecue at the Kiwanis. And we'll see everyone on the 3rd and
the 4th. Thank you. Thank you, Eileen. Anything else this evening for good of the
order? Seeing none then, we will now move into executive session. The
purpose of the executive session is discussing a personnel matter
under the provisions of RCW 42.30.110
paren 1 paren G. No action expected.
It will take approximately 10 minutes. And so we are
Now recess to executive session.