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Planning Policy Commission & Development Commission

Thursday, October 28, 2021

6:30 PM · Virtual Meeting
Section
1. CALL TO ORDER
1a
Commission Membership
packet pp.3
Staff report:
PLANNING POLICY COMMISSION Staff Liaison Christen Leeson, Senior About Planner Created in 1983, this commission serves as a Email policy advisory body to the Mayor and provides guidance and direction for Issaquah's future Regular Members growth through continued review and 2022 – Joy Lewis improvement to the City's Comprehensive Land 2022 – Matt Monahan Use Plan and related land use documents. 2022 – Jason Voiss 2022 – Vacant Membership 2023 – Nina Milligan The Planning Policy Commission is comprised of 2024 – Ron Faul seven regular members, with four-year terms; 2024 – Sara Bader and several alternates, with two-year terms. All members are appointed by the Mayor and Alternate Members subject to confirmation by the City Council. 2022 - Richard Zaragoza Terms expire April 30 of the year listed. For 2023 - Vacant more information, see IMC 18.03 and Rules & Regulations. Meetings Unless…
4. REPORTS
4a
Council Update
Christen Leeson · packet pp.23–24
Staff report:
Primary Response No. Source Date Commentor Comment Topic Notes Questions how this differential regulation will ensure the current quality of a strong tree canopy.
4b
Title 18 Code Update: Public Comments
Received · Minnie Dhaliwal, Director, Community Planning & Development
Topics: Land Use
5. OTHER BUSINESS / ANNOUNCEMENTS
5a
Upcoming Schedule
packet pp.25
Staff report:
OTHER BUSINESS / ANNOUNCEMENTS a) 2021 Development Commission Schedule (tentative) (updated 10/14/2021)
0:12 all right well good evening everybody
0:14 fellow commissioners city staff
0:16 i'd like to call tonight's meeting
0:18 this october 28th the planning policy as
0:21 well as the development commission
0:24 to order it is currently 6 30.
0:26 due to the virtual format of today's
0:28 meeting i'd like to start by providing
0:31 some guidelines
0:32 we have participants attending my
0:34 computer and others who have been will
0:37 be attending by phone
0:39 for all meeting attendees please
0:42 speak clearly and pause frequently
0:44 state your name each time before
0:46 speaking
0:48 mute your microphone when you're not
0:49 speaking
0:50 and if you're having any technical
0:52 issues try joining the meeting using a
0:54 different device such as a smartphone or
0:57 tablet
0:58 use the call in information in the
1:00 meeting invite to call into the meeting
1:02 if necessary
1:04 kristin
1:05 would you please call the role for the
1:07 planning policy
1:11 i certainly will commissioner vader
1:15 commissioner zaragoza
1:17 here
1:18 mr monahan
1:20 here
1:22 commissioner lewis
1:24 here commissioner milligan
1:29 uh seeing commissioner milligan
1:32 uh commissioner voice
1:34 here
1:36 and commissioner phil has an excuse to
1:38 absence tonight
1:40 great thank you kristen
1:42 and lucy would you please call the role
1:44 for the development commission
2:03 i i
2:04 thank you i assumed you were having
2:06 problems not me so that shows you i'm
2:08 not up for this
2:11 mike brennan
2:12 here
2:14 richard sanford eric
2:17 richard sowa
2:19 patty dillon
2:22 here
2:24 brook shore
2:26 here
2:29 kevin price
2:31 here
2:33 arthur schulte
2:35 here
2:36 johnny cada
2:38 here
2:40 mel morgan
2:43 thank you
2:46 great thank you lucy and thank you
2:47 development commission i'd like to know
2:50 sorry excuse me that at 6 33
2:52 commissioner milligan is present
2:54 great thank you kristen and hello nina
2:58 uh as we move forward we're going to be
2:59 taking public comment and as all of you
3:01 guys know public comments are an
3:03 important part of the public process
3:06 we take them seriously
3:07 and factor them into the decisions that
3:09 we make
3:10 for the members of the public who are
3:12 joining us right now
3:14 if there is anyone who would like to
3:16 speak in general uh
3:18 please raise your hand virtually
3:21 and i believe kristen will allow you to
3:22 do this i don't know who's actually
3:24 clocking
3:25 maybe it's kristen but somebody
3:28 and if you're on the phone
3:29 when she gets to you you can press three
3:34 right if you'd like to if you'd like to
3:35 speak press
3:37 star 3
3:39 or razor if you're on the phone or raise
3:41 your hand
3:46 give it another minute
3:52 no there's no one who'd like to speak at
3:54 this time
3:57 all right moving along
3:59 so tonight the next thing on our public
4:01 agenda is a regular business
4:03 and at tonight's meeting we will be
4:04 discussing the zoning land use and form
4:07 and intensity
4:09 uh the information that you guys have
4:11 received and i believe many will go over
4:13 this very quickly in her presentation
4:15 but questions three and four will
4:16 basically be reserved for a later date
4:19 she can explain why
4:21 but in the interest of tonight i also
4:23 want to be very respectful of
4:24 everybody's time so my goal as chair
4:27 will be to make sure that we adjourn on
4:30 time
4:31 um as
4:32 we're moving along i'd like to reserve
4:34 about 10 minutes for public comment for
4:36 each question one and two
4:39 but i believe that good management is
4:41 good time management and just as
4:43 everybody here is expected to come here
4:45 at 6 30 all of you guys should have a
4:47 clear expectation of when this meeting
4:48 adjourns
4:49 so as the chair if the meeting or the
4:52 questions
4:54 provide a lively discussion we might
4:56 have a 10-minute extension where we can
4:59 do a round-robin uh ultimately i think
5:01 the discussion for each question will be
5:04 roughly around 40 to 45 minutes kristen
5:07 yes i apologize somehow i still don't
5:09 see it but i um got a text i got a
5:11 message that we do have someone who
5:13 would like to speak uh connie marsh
5:16 is that okay if we do that now before we
5:17 start the topic sure
5:19 okay we'll do that now
5:26 bonnie you are now a panelist
5:29 okay um i'm connie marsh i live on
5:32 squawk so i need to tell you just a
5:34 smidge uh we can't see the participants
5:38 and for some reason you don't seem to be
5:41 able to see my
5:42 uh chats nor could anybody see my hand
5:46 raised
5:47 and some people are having a hard time
5:50 uh getting on
5:53 at all so i don't i don't know how
5:56 that's all gonna work out hopefully we
5:57 can fix it
6:00 um you've gotten a couple of emails from
6:03 me because i find this
6:06 particular topic puzzling because it
6:09 does not match
6:12 what my expectations
6:14 were for
6:17 making the code easier to use which
6:21 seems to be the problem statement
6:23 if that is the problem statement i would
6:26 have expected some conversation about
6:29 how
6:31 the different ways
6:33 that
6:34 what you are planning are going to solve
6:36 the problems
6:38 instead it seems to go into an a
6:42 zoning and use conversation
6:45 that is leading to a larger conversation
6:49 about
6:52 upzoning for more mixed use in areas
6:56 which is is actually a zoning
6:58 conversation that is covered by the
7:00 comprehensive plan
7:02 not something that you would address
7:05 inside of the code
7:07 and so i am perplexed
7:10 as to how
7:12 this presentation
7:14 is leading us to solving the problem of
7:18 a code that is easier for the community
7:21 and the developers and the city people
7:25 to use and i i
7:28 also don't understand
7:31 how somebody could
7:33 decide the mechanism of what to do with
7:37 the intricacies of a table without
7:40 understanding the implications
7:43 of say combining
7:46 two columns
7:47 in a table of a super complicated
7:51 uh form
7:54 maybe you all could
7:57 could ask some of these questions to try
7:59 to clarify what the actual intent
8:03 and uh i will say
8:06 i think it's
8:07 scope creep to start having a
8:10 zoning conversation and what do we think
8:14 about all of our zones when the zones
8:17 are outside of title
8:19 18 and we may need to have that
8:21 conversation but this is not
8:24 the place to have that conversation we
8:26 have way more things to talk about so uh
8:30 thank you very much
8:38 thank you and kristen do we have any
8:39 additional
8:40 people that like to speak
8:46 well
8:47 this is kristin
8:49 not that i can tell
8:51 i'm double checking the chat
8:55 and no and i don't see anything
8:57 on the screen
8:58 it was it was difficult for me to join
9:01 more difficult than usual i had to try a
9:03 few times
9:04 okay thank you yeah i've i've gotten
9:06 quite a few um emails and notices while
9:09 we've been going on so i'm not sure
9:11 what's going on but i right now i don't
9:13 see any other comments
9:14 okay and just for anyone who is out
9:16 there we will have two more public
9:18 comments one after each discussion
9:20 question as i was saying before
9:22 i'd like to keep us on time
9:25 but also as far as the commission the
9:26 commission does reserve the right
9:28 to continue to flesh this out at a later
9:30 date if it so chooses or we can also
9:33 utilize staff by continually sending
9:35 emails
9:37 as far as comments and questions so
9:40 there is always that
9:41 as far as when you guys have a question
9:44 or comment please put it in the chat box
9:46 so all can see and please try and
9:48 refrain from any meaningful dialogue in
9:50 the chat it'd be really just looking for
9:52 question comment or clarification
9:55 having said all that
9:57 i'd like to begin with
10:00 minnie's presentation so minnie please
10:02 take it away
10:04 good evening everyone it's great to see
10:07 uh two boards together where you all
10:09 bring your own expertise one from
10:11 reviewing the development uh
10:13 projects and planning policy commission
10:16 really debating the policy so we're
10:18 looking forward to
10:19 uh you know jointly um having a nice
10:22 discussion i just wanted to take a
10:24 couple minutes just to set the framework
10:26 for the discussion tonight
10:28 and
10:30 one i want to address the question three
10:32 and four that are included in your
10:34 packet um but we're working on a more
10:36 robust uh process for that item um to
10:40 give it more attention that it deserves
10:42 then packaging it with the title 18
10:44 update so it is a gap that's identified
10:48 in the zoning and uses category but we
10:50 are going to have a more um
10:53 well laid out process for that topic and
10:55 it will come back to planning and policy
10:56 commission at a later date
10:58 but it is in your packet
11:01 so that's one item uh the second i think
11:04 there is some confusion about the scope
11:06 of combining the different zones and
11:08 what that means so i want to address it
11:10 so for the benefit
11:12 of everyone including the community
11:14 members that have made the comment uh
11:16 that it's absolutely not uh within the
11:19 scope of title 18 update to re-change
11:23 the policies that are adopted in the
11:24 comprehensive planning policies so we've
11:27 kind of done all those trainings with
11:28 you in terms of the framework that we
11:30 have to operate under a title 18 update
11:33 is an implementation of those policies
11:36 um so by no means uh can we change the
11:38 zoning that is inconsistent with a
11:40 comprehensive plan
11:43 make changes to adopted policies that
11:46 require preserving neighborhood
11:48 character we cannot change through a
11:50 zoning that is inconsistent with those
11:52 policies so nowhere in this discussion
11:56 that scope of having duplexes in single
12:00 family zones if that's not the adopted
12:02 policy
12:03 if that's a discussion outside of the
12:05 title 18 update that can be um you know
12:08 added to the work plan in the future by
12:10 city council but at this point uh the
12:13 focus really is you have multiple
12:16 codes um you know central square plan
12:18 and old town and you know uh the uses
12:21 and as the memo talks about there are
12:23 250 uses that are listed so there's that
12:26 consolidation and streamlining of those
12:28 uses but the question one and two really
12:31 are getting at
12:32 how do you think from your lived
12:34 experience um
12:37 are there uses for instance i think what
12:39 we've heard from from some conversations
12:41 about are there entertainment uses that
12:44 are um you know is code a problem for
12:47 having some of those uses grocery stores
12:50 other pla other things like that that
12:52 from your lived experience in the
12:54 community that you think are missing or
12:56 a problem to locate in issaquah are
12:58 there other uses um that are more car
13:01 oriented but where should those go in
13:04 terms of the pedestrian
13:05 spaces and things of that nature so a
13:07 focus on on those and your experience
13:10 from
13:11 knowing your community would be helpful
13:13 as we uh do this exercise of
13:15 consolidating and streamlining them so
13:17 with that i'm going to turn it over to a
13:20 chair to kind of proceed
13:23 with the discussion tonight
13:27 okay well thank you minnie
13:29 is that the only presentation we have as
13:31 far as okay
13:33 so thank you so basically
13:36 uh ladies and gentlemen we have about 55
13:38 minutes per discussion question and then
13:40 with an additional 10 for public comment
13:43 so please feel free to enter your name
13:46 in the chat if you wish to speak
13:52 kristin has a few slides to show
13:56 i thought so
13:58 i do i apologize i'm getting email after
14:00 email after email saying that people
14:02 can't get in and they want to comment so
14:03 i'm trying to respond to them and see
14:06 what i can to help and then uh not
14:08 having any luck um
14:11 i apologize let me pull out the
14:12 presentation really quickly
14:20 and i promise this won't take long and
14:22 as soon as i am done i will try and get
14:23 to all of those people who are emailing
14:25 um again right after this
14:29 one minute let me share my screen
14:47 all right can you all see it okay
14:54 yes
14:56 yes yes okay thank you
14:59 okay
15:00 so yes we are talking zoning land uses
15:03 and form and intensity and
15:06 as many mentioned we're
15:08 keeping this at a high level this can
15:10 these two topics
15:13 can and do
15:14 touch everything in the code
15:16 so tonight we're trying to stay at a
15:19 higher level and get broader direction
15:22 from you all
15:23 so zoning
15:25 i don't think this was in the packet out
15:27 of our existing land use code
15:30 the purpose says plural of zoning are to
15:33 one achieve a balanced community
15:35 promote quality of life and a people
15:38 place
15:39 and require environmental excellence
15:42 okay so what does zoning do zoning
15:45 touches and it regulates
15:47 uses inside each zone so you'll see on
15:49 the screen
15:50 we have you know
15:53 cultural and business district and
15:55 single family small lot zoning and
15:57 community facilities
15:59 recreation and um mixed use we have all
16:03 these different zones each one of these
16:06 has different different uses that are
16:09 allowed to go in there and with those
16:10 uses
16:12 are in those zones are also what are the
16:14 setbacks how high can the buildings go
16:15 what does the impervious have to be or
16:17 say central issaquah
16:19 what is the floor area ratio what is the
16:21 maximum what is the base so it regulates
16:24 all those things or so many things
16:27 involved in development
16:31 so with it and we did talk about this in
16:33 our packet a little bit are intense
16:35 statements each zone has an intense
16:37 statement attached to it
16:39 and this is also pulled out of our
16:41 current title 18 imc
16:44 uh whoops not 180
16:46 1806.020
16:49 are the what's the point why do we have
16:50 these so it's to determine the
16:51 appropriate locations of uses which
16:53 zones do they go in
16:55 determine appropriate conditions of
16:57 develop for a development
16:58 and provide the basis for reviewing
17:01 for the reviewing official to interpret
17:03 the standards so
17:05 i've said it before and it came from
17:06 lucy i'll give her credit but the intent
17:09 or the vision for the zone stays the
17:11 same but how you achieve those things
17:14 can change
17:15 so with the intent statements for each
17:17 zone you're setting that vision for the
17:18 zone
17:19 and the regulations are how you get
17:22 there
17:27 i'm sure you all are familiar with this
17:28 but i'm going to go over it again this
17:30 is a snippet from our permitted uses
17:33 table
17:36 excuse me
17:37 on the left hand side
17:39 right here
17:40 our list of uses now we have 250 uses
17:44 right now that are listed in here
17:46 and it doesn't even include some uses
17:48 that are out there new things pop up all
17:50 the time
17:51 so one of the things we would like to do
17:52 is try and find a way
17:54 to have a smaller list of uses
17:57 but still be able to know clearly what
18:00 goes in each zone and if we don't know
18:01 clearly then what's the criteria to
18:02 determine that
18:04 that's something that we'd like to do
18:06 up here
18:07 you have the zones
18:09 this is another problem because we are
18:11 about to throw in
18:13 all of the zones from palace and all of
18:16 the zones from
18:18 central issaquah all of the zones from
18:20 mexico highlands
18:21 so that's a lot of zones so something
18:24 that we have talked about is grouping
18:26 these and that's part of what came up in
18:27 the memo and was a little confusing but
18:30 what some cities do many cities do is
18:32 they will take all of the residential
18:34 zones and they will just have a
18:36 permitted uses table for those would
18:38 look something like this it would just
18:40 have residential uses
18:42 zones with all the uses that are allowed
18:44 in there on the left hand side and then
18:46 we would do commercial and then maybe
18:48 facilities so
18:49 that's
18:50 something that we've been talking about
18:52 doing would help staff
18:54 and then in here
18:57 right now
18:59 we're not going to talk about what the
19:01 numbers mean it's it's level of review
19:02 but we're going to get into that later
19:04 but if there's a number in that box that
19:06 means that that use is allowed in that
19:08 zone
19:09 so a billiards and pool hall is allowed
19:13 in these zones professional office
19:15 cultural business mixed use
19:17 retail
19:19 intensive commercial and community
19:21 facilities facilities that's that's how
19:23 that works and
19:24 right now in our code it's a crazy mess
19:27 and we need to find out a way to
19:29 streamline and clean it up
19:33 i'm not ready to questions um
19:36 are you all ready or do you have any
19:37 questions for me and any clarifications
19:39 that you need made first before we move
19:48 i talk about enough information because
19:50 that was really fast but there's also a
19:51 lot in her packets so
19:53 uh kristen yes we have a question from
19:56 commissioner milligan
19:58 yes
20:00 thank you chair voice this is
20:01 commissioner nina milligan uh kristen
20:04 the question i had was
20:06 were you also talking about
20:09 reducing the number
20:11 of the different types of zones
20:14 and combining
20:17 several zones into one zone
20:19 and then if that
20:21 if that was the case i i didn't see a
20:23 recommendation or is it just
20:25 reorganizing the document into different
20:28 categoried charts
20:31 so right now it's
20:33 it's the category charts and i'm not
20:36 going to say it hasn't been talked about
20:37 but it's just a matter of us going
20:39 through it and saying i don't know what
20:41 are we going to do maybe we need to look
20:42 at that
20:44 maybe there are some some zones that
20:46 have the exact same uses and what's the
20:48 difference between them all or
20:50 one zone only has this many it's i don't
20:52 know it's something to talk about
20:55 um but that's not on the table right now
20:57 it's not it's not part of title 18 i
20:59 don't think
21:02 well i and just to build on um what
21:05 kristen said
21:07 lucy sloman um
21:09 i i think that we haven't done that
21:12 level of evaluation yet
21:14 and
21:15 so um
21:16 that's part of the value that we see in
21:19 combining all the residential zones into
21:23 one table
21:24 and all the commercial zones into
21:26 another table
21:28 because it'll make it much easier to see
21:31 where there are
21:32 highly similar
21:34 zones
21:35 and to consider uh
21:38 is you know what are those differences
21:40 are they meaningful
21:42 um what would the potential impacts be
21:45 and then to have that conversation
21:48 where
21:49 there's
21:50 more
21:51 differences or for some reason that you
21:53 know maybe there's very few properties
21:55 that have
21:57 a zone which is the case with
21:59 professional office for instance i think
22:01 there's three properties they're all
22:03 developed
22:05 what we want to do is see is it similar
22:08 enough to another zone where there might
22:11 be an opportunity to combine
22:14 but that's the kind of evaluation that
22:16 we would do following this conversation
22:25 the other thing this is mini dolly well
22:27 i want to make sure um you know it's
22:30 we can't change the comprehensive plan
22:32 without changing the comprehensive plan
22:35 there are there's in your packet there's
22:38 a table that shows the grouping of uh
22:41 zones by comprehensive plan designation
22:44 so no work you know even if we do this
22:47 exercise we're not going to be able to
22:48 change the the zoning or collapse them
22:51 if they belong to different
22:53 for instance mineral and conservancy
22:55 you know are two different comprehensive
22:57 plan designations so we we're not going
23:00 to be able to combine those for instance
23:04 and and that wasn't our intent either
23:06 but
23:06 we wouldn't be able to
23:10 great thank you and i think what i'll do
23:12 is i'll wait till after questions until
23:13 we start discussion to kind of figure
23:15 out the timeline
23:16 and that way everybody can be clear and
23:18 then we can have a wonderful and lively
23:20 debate and discussion
23:21 right now commissioner brennan has a
23:23 question
23:24 please
23:26 thank you so i'm uh just a question
23:28 about um
23:29 so in the presentation it was about code
23:32 structure
23:33 usability
23:35 understandable etc the question
23:38 one is more about substance and so i'm
23:40 i'm not clear yet about the breadth of
23:43 what it is we're doing
23:45 with regard to this particular
23:48 effort so when we're talking about
23:50 locations where
23:51 you know allowed uses are form and
23:53 intensity standards that control the
23:55 size in bulk yeah um
23:58 that's that's a substantive question
24:00 about does it does the development fit
24:02 within what you think the community
24:03 should be
24:04 but the setup that um
24:07 that preston did was about the structure
24:10 of the code and trying to make it more
24:13 uh understandable maybe more efficient
24:15 to use so i'm still not clear about how
24:18 far into substance we're going to get
24:20 about the content of the coding is it
24:22 accomplishing
24:23 the outcomes versus
24:25 usability understandability
24:28 is it understandable is it efficient to
24:30 operate with
24:35 this is kristin lisan it it does make
24:38 sense and um
24:40 maybe maybe it came off that way but the
24:42 beginning of it had to do with
24:44 intensive zoning
24:46 and
24:47 which goes to the uses in each zone and
24:50 looking at the permitted uses or things
24:52 that you've seen out there
24:54 are the uses that you see in say single
24:57 family or any mixed-use residential or
25:00 different zones are they what you expect
25:02 to see
25:03 and i'm going to go ahead and touch on
25:05 question number two
25:06 which is are there things that you see
25:08 that you don't want to see
25:10 is one
25:11 are there things that you'd like to see
25:13 which would make an area more livable
25:15 than it is say you want
25:17 you know ten thousand square foot
25:19 commercials you know retail stores or
25:21 little grocery stores in your
25:22 neighborhood that aren't allowed and
25:23 maybe you want to allow those
25:25 so that goes toward the intent of the
25:27 zone and what which so it's it's a mix
25:29 of the two are there uses that you'd
25:31 like to see in these zones with the
25:32 visions for these zones that you're not
25:34 seeing now or that you'd like to see go
25:35 away
25:38 okay great that that helps thank you
25:42 great thank you commissioner brennan we
25:44 have a process question from
25:46 commissioner milligan
25:51 hi commissioner milligan here are we
25:54 trying to cover both those questions or
25:56 are we just trying to talk about zoning
25:58 and then uses or what is the order of
26:00 the night because i think i heard chair
26:02 voice say that there be multiple
26:03 opportunities for the public to speak so
26:05 are we trying to
26:08 divide the topics into
26:11 sections so i guess i will take that
26:13 question thank you commissioner milligan
26:15 so what i'd like to do is flesh out all
26:16 the questions right now that anybody has
26:18 as far as the presentation and then
26:20 allow basically we can start with
26:22 question one and question two after the
26:25 end of question one debate we as a group
26:27 can figure out if we need a little bit
26:29 more time we can do a round robin but
26:30 i'd like to give ten minutes for public
26:32 comment after question one ten minutes
26:34 for public comment after question two
26:38 so it might take us from nine to nine
26:39 twenty but like i said i'd like to set
26:41 the expectation that you guys know you
26:44 know i don't want this to be a meeting
26:46 in perpetuity
26:48 again we all have the opportunity to
26:50 vote if we want to
26:51 meet and continue this conversation at a
26:54 later date or continue to utilize our
26:56 staff by emailing
26:58 so that was my intention so again just
27:01 looking for more questions as far as the
27:02 presentation and then we'll move on and
27:04 dissect question one and two
27:16 and i guess i'll give it a few more
27:17 seconds
27:19 and then we'll probably move into
27:20 question one debate and discussion
27:33 i'm not seeing anything
27:35 so let's open it up to the first
27:37 question asked of us tonight
27:39 i don't know if we want to bring it back
27:40 on the presentation screen
27:43 but if we could that would be good at
27:45 least to start the discussion
27:48 please
27:52 and if anybody wants to jump the gun and
27:54 just uh put in commentary or
27:56 anything there we go
27:58 commissioner monahan
28:00 please the floor is yours
28:02 yeah uh good evening i'm matt monaghan
28:04 here um i guess i'll take him at one
28:06 particular use uh that i'm not a fan of
28:08 so i i live in the issaquah island and i
28:10 love walking around it um but the one
28:12 area that's kind of dead is the area in
28:15 front of the um the storage facility
28:17 kind of towards the the north end and so
28:19 i i know that there was a a request to
28:22 put another storage facility on another
28:23 parcel in the highlands and i just don't
28:26 think that that would really drive the
28:27 kind of neighborhood that we want here
28:29 um the west ridge north houses are
28:31 selling like hot cakes right now those
28:33 town homes are going to go too so we're
28:34 getting a lot of families here
28:37 and i don't think we'll be well served
28:38 by having two storage facilities uh in a
28:42 within half a mile of each other so i'd
28:43 like to see that use um
28:47 if not cut out made very very very high
28:49 bar to put in one into a walkable
28:52 mixed use neighborhood
29:01 thank you commissioner
29:08 we have a comment from commissioner
29:09 milligan
29:15 commissioner milligan here thanks i'm
29:16 waiting for other people to sign up but
29:18 i didn't want to eat away your precious
29:20 time thank you commissioner monahan
29:22 that's on my list tonight too and though
29:24 we may be too late to
29:26 change the zoning that's going to impact
29:28 the isoqua highlands
29:30 uh self storage uh self storage has been
29:32 a sore spot for quite a while and it was
29:34 a very heated debate uh the folks in the
29:37 room here i wasn't in the debate i was
29:39 just watching it but the folks in this
29:41 room a lot of them will remember it and
29:43 i i remember it being unsatisfying in an
29:46 effort to reduce the number of zones
29:48 where
29:50 self storage was
29:51 allowed
29:52 and i would like to revisit that
29:55 in reducing the number of zones where
29:58 cell storage is allowed because i know
30:00 that it was a frustration something
30:01 about the process
30:03 as i said i don't
30:04 know the details as well as those other
30:06 people in the room but
30:08 one of the
30:10 issues that i had with this topic is not
30:13 only that it doesn't create the vibrant
30:15 streetscape that we are all hoping for
30:18 and nor does it
30:19 add to the beauty of our city but it
30:22 appeared that
30:24 um homebuilders whether they were
30:26 apartments or townhomes or whatever were
30:29 teaming up with these self storage and
30:32 saying hey i don't you don't have to
30:34 build as big a home because i'm going to
30:36 plunk down a self storage within a
30:38 couple blocks from there and then
30:40 everybody can store their stuff over
30:41 here in this
30:42 in this vacuous block of storage so i i
30:47 do hope that we have a
30:49 lively discussion about that and i'll
30:50 just throw it out there i wish we could
30:52 just reduce the zone that that wasn't
30:55 allowed use to intensive commercial
30:58 dare you to put it on the intensive
31:00 commercial
31:01 thank you chairfall careful no share
31:04 voice
31:05 boy old habits
31:09 thank you commissioner mill again
31:13 he's a little slow at their keyboards
31:15 tonight especially from these groups
31:22 basically i have it down at 7 45 to
31:24 begin public comment on question one so
31:26 we've got some time to fill and again i
31:28 won't force anybody's arm but
31:42 commissioner milligan
31:44 please um
31:46 we've got so many smart people in the
31:48 room tonight this is commissioner
31:49 milligan and i really hope these people
31:51 from dc speak up like mike brennan thank
31:53 you for signing up mel morgan all these
31:56 veterans of this issue please speak up
31:58 for us tonight i also wanted to talk
32:00 about something like either the vending
32:02 stand or the
32:04 smaller classification of
32:06 grocery store
32:08 and the reason i'm bringing this up is
32:09 that there's been a great deal of
32:11 concern about the car dependent
32:13 neighborhoods that we have
32:15 and i'm going to just use a couple
32:16 examples like squawk mountain and south
32:18 cove
32:19 and these folks to get anything done
32:21 have to get to get a cup of coffee to
32:23 get a quart of milk have to get in the
32:25 car and go somewhere and i as i was
32:28 looking at the allowed
32:29 uses and where they are
32:32 how close could we get
32:34 um to going into a denser residential
32:37 neighborhood
32:38 and allow more of those commercial uses
32:41 the very small scale daily need
32:44 i got i have to have a coffee and a
32:46 cookie kind of store or i need some
32:48 flowers for my mom
32:49 i've seen a great
32:51 use of this in some of the older cities
32:54 like victoria i just love it
32:56 so i'm wondering if there's a way that
32:57 we can do that
32:59 without imposing upon our single family
33:02 neighborhoods with any any large-scale
33:04 commercial
33:06 the purpose would be to reduce vehicle
33:08 miles traveled thank you
33:14 thank you commissioner milligan and now
33:16 we go to commissioner brennan with a
33:18 comment well commissioner milligan was
33:20 thinking along the same lines i was
33:22 thinking it is those neighborhood
33:24 neighborhood serving businesses so
33:26 smaller scale
33:28 convenience um and then i would add on
33:31 one thing like the third place it's a
33:32 place where people go to gather
33:34 community gathering locations
33:36 whether it's a library a local pub a
33:40 small restaurant with a patio places
33:43 where people can go and gather
33:46 have community space
33:47 that could be public or private
33:49 near the neighborhoods or in the
33:51 neighborhoods and i know that gets a
33:53 little bit
33:54 tricky in development in
33:55 already developed neighborhoods but
33:58 there's clearly a a benefit not only to
34:00 reducing hard trips but even creating
34:02 community in a place where people can
34:04 connect so i think there's some benefits
34:06 to that as well
34:11 great thank you commissioner brennan and
34:13 uh obviously people have questions as
34:15 far as question one please feel free and
34:18 now we go to commissioner sanford
34:21 thank you mr chairman
34:22 uh this is richard sanford i have a
34:24 comment about a permit that came before
34:27 the development commission and i think
34:29 some of our other commissioners will
34:30 probably remember this one
34:33 we were tasked with looking at a permit
34:36 that was in intensive
34:39 commercial
34:41 zoning district
34:43 and also within that
34:45 district
34:46 were critical areas king county critical
34:49 areas
34:50 it had a
34:52 stream of salmon salmonid
34:54 it was in a flood hazard area
34:57 and a critical aquifer recharge area
35:01 and this was an intensive commercial
35:04 zone
35:05 use a permitted use within that zone as
35:08 i said it was very challenging for us to
35:10 try to balance
35:12 environmental protection with the
35:14 requests that
35:16 were in that
35:17 that permit request and to be able to
35:21 uh come up with satisfactory conditions
35:24 that would protect the environment as
35:26 well as um allow the permitted use
35:30 so i guess it raised the question to me
35:33 should we be
35:35 permitting
35:37 intensive commercial use
35:39 that
35:40 underlays essentially
35:43 critical area overlay districting
35:47 and raise the question to me are those
35:49 overlays sufficient to protect
35:52 critical areas
35:53 basically
35:55 if one of the purposes of the code is to
35:57 require environmental excellence
36:00 and a description in our code and ims
36:04 1806
36:06 of intensive commercial is provide areas
36:09 for intensive commercial services
36:11 which may have negative impacts
36:14 it's hard for me to see
36:17 whether we should allow those too
36:19 to try to co-exist
36:22 they seem anaphytical
36:24 thanks
36:31 great thank you
36:32 moving along we have a comment from
36:34 commissioner morgan
36:36 uh thank you chair boys mel morgan from
36:39 the development commission
36:40 and i would just like to second
36:42 the comments from
36:44 commissioner monahan and commissioner
36:46 milligan about
36:48 limitations on self storage i agree with
36:50 their comments about
36:53 the limitations they place on the
36:55 pedestrian activity
36:59 within city commercial zones and so i
37:01 would agree i think commissioner
37:03 milligan was
37:04 recommending only allowing those
37:06 intensive commercial areas and i would
37:08 agree with that
37:10 thank you
37:14 great thank you
37:16 commissioner lewis has a comment
37:22 you chair voice commissioner joy lewis
37:23 here um i wanna i think that uh
37:25 commissioner stanford said far better
37:27 than i so i want to piggyback on to his
37:29 comments about uh
37:31 heavy uh industrial commercial uses um i
37:35 echo those sentiments and concerns uh
37:38 and i think that nina commissioner
37:39 milligan brings up an excellent point
37:41 when we talk about um how unacceptable
37:43 it is in isaiah we have food deserts and
37:46 we see the way that we were
37:48 directed in old town to be unable to
37:51 really protect that community and by
37:53 losing the front street market we became
37:55 very vulnerable and that by looking at
37:57 how we're allowing our uses differently
38:00 we can start to address some actual
38:01 needs of the community
38:03 that have been kind of fallen to the
38:04 wayside so i think it's important for us
38:06 to again start looking at how we're
38:07 allowing um a constricted
38:10 use right to allow a way whether we've
38:13 talked before in this commission whether
38:14 it be about a large national chains
38:18 whether it be about the size and scope
38:20 that we're dealing with as far as square
38:22 footage
38:23 but allowing a way for communities to be
38:26 able to address the needs that they have
38:27 specifically around food
38:29 thank you
38:32 great thank you commissioner lewis and
38:33 as somebody who lives on front street i
38:35 can tell you i miss front street from
38:38 apple street so much
38:39 it's just a short walk for me
38:44 all right we have a comment from
38:46 uh commissioner schulte am i saying that
38:48 right uh yes thank you chair voice
38:51 um thank you great to see everybody and
38:53 you know great presentation glad we're
38:55 getting involved in this conversation i
38:57 um i you know i just wanted to support
38:59 my you know voice my support for um an
39:01 encouragement to you know continue
39:03 exploring and
39:05 um growing uh the zones where we do
39:08 offer you know multi-family and
39:10 mixed-use developments um
39:12 and one of the big reasons is just the
39:14 affordability factor um as we might have
39:17 noticed yes as we notice already
39:20 um housing is expensive and uh
39:23 multi-family and mixed use is you know
39:26 one of the best ways to to offer a
39:28 somewhat affordable housing and there's
39:30 different levels of affordability that
39:32 can come with that so
39:34 you know issaquah and actually in some
39:36 amish too in the surrounding area i just
39:38 saw in the news i think some amish was
39:40 rated number one uh small towns small
39:43 city in the nation to live and
39:45 um and obviously that impacts us right
39:47 because we're the neighbors um so we you
39:50 know to promote that and um to encourage
39:56 you know community development i think
39:59 multi-family and mixed use is important
40:01 to to be mindful of and continue you
40:03 know pursuing the zones where we can see
40:05 a little bit more of that growth so
40:07 thank you
40:13 great comment thank you
40:21 may i make a quick response
40:23 absolutely
40:24 i just wanted to say tune in next week
40:26 on november 4th because we're going to
40:28 be talking about affordable housing
40:31 truly
40:32 yeah
40:33 we'd love to hear from you
40:45 commissioner morgan please
40:48 um thank you chair i um one other
40:50 questions i have is is the necessity to
40:53 still have a suburban estates
40:56 single-family designation within the
40:58 city i think it's 1.24
41:02 units per acre and
41:04 given urban growth boundaries and
41:06 how little
41:07 land there is left
41:09 seems to me that we
41:10 should have more intensive zoning
41:12 throughout the city than that so
41:15 thank you
41:35 my ticker stopped ticking
41:40 there we go just have to wait a minute
41:42 commissioner brandon please that's a
41:44 cave under pressure i guess thank you
41:47 chair boss um
41:50 we did a walking tour of some of the
41:52 projects um with staff and
41:56 looked at projects that have been
41:58 constructed and looking at in multiple
42:01 locations we did visit some that were in
42:03 the central izakawa plan area
42:06 and one of the things that's really
42:07 striking as that plan continues to get
42:10 um to evolve with construction is what's
42:14 happening at the street level at grade
42:18 one of the projects the atlas project
42:19 that fronts onto seventh
42:21 street
42:22 or avenue
42:24 it doesn't engage at all with the
42:26 pedestrian environment
42:28 there's
42:28 no uh
42:29 front porches there's no ground floor
42:32 retail it's essentially you're walking
42:35 along um
42:36 you know what is an impenetrable wall of
42:38 the building so to speak i mean there's
42:40 nice landscaping so i don't want to
42:42 you know
42:43 bash it too hard but we've got to make
42:46 sure that what what's going on with the
42:48 in the intense areas these mixed use or
42:50 high intensity development areas is that
42:53 as it evolves it's in an
42:56 enjoyable place to be there are things
42:58 to see there are people
43:00 there are um
43:02 places to go
43:03 um there are
43:05 you know breakout places where you can
43:07 go relax
43:08 plazas etc so and i know that's in the
43:11 plan but i think we need to make sure
43:13 that what's happening
43:15 is a in on the ground with the
43:17 development is actually
43:18 realizing that for the long term because
43:20 the projects that are being built now
43:22 are going to be there for a very long
43:24 time and so we want to make sure that
43:26 that that attention to what's happening
43:28 um at the pedestrian level
43:30 uh is engaging it's interesting uh an
43:33 attractive thing uh attractive place for
43:35 people to be so that that's one when
43:37 we're talking about the form of
43:39 development and what's in the
43:41 in the lane use code
43:44 particularly these high density areas
43:45 that we're
43:46 paying close attention to for long-term
43:49 success
43:52 great thank you commissioner brennan and
43:54 and again to kind of piggyback off them
43:56 and not to pick on atlas but it's my
43:58 understanding that their park is
44:00 actually a public park
44:02 is that correct
44:05 that recreational space that's kind of
44:07 fenced off my understanding is that is
44:10 open to everyone that is not
44:12 their property
44:14 so there's both public and private open
44:17 space on the site um near the uh isquad
44:22 creek the bridge in gilman
44:25 is a public park
44:27 which is center park and i don't think
44:29 any of that is fenced
44:31 there are three um
44:34 required well their community spaces
44:37 that was how they met their um
44:40 project open space and there are some uh
44:45 sort of open fences uh that define
44:48 public from private space
44:50 um so
44:52 when you say fence that's what i think
44:55 right i appreciate that lucy i think
44:57 that the problem is is there's an
44:58 allusion to people passerby that thinks
45:00 that is completely private property
45:03 i'd be i'm imagine you'd be hard-pressed
45:05 to actually find anyone outside of atlas
45:07 that probably uses that utilizes that
45:09 space
45:10 so this is santa park
45:13 right yeah
45:15 all right thank you commissioner lewis
45:20 thank you chair boyce commissioner joy
45:21 lewis here it's kind of actually that's
45:23 a good segue for me because
45:25 while this has less to do with question
45:27 one it kind of more addresses steph's
45:29 comments and question about how we want
45:32 to be restructuring and reorgan
45:34 reordering the uses
45:35 i think that a good example would be if
45:37 you guys were hesitant to do a deep dive
45:39 and do
45:40 all of the uses under these categories a
45:42 good one would be the conservancy
45:44 designation right now we have a lot of
45:47 layers when we look at the purposes and
45:49 the intents of whether it's
45:51 open space facilities whether it's parks
45:53 whether it's designated to future be
45:55 something whether it is supposed to be
45:58 complete green open space in perpetuity
46:00 and
46:01 i think that this would be an
46:02 interesting one to see i give an example
46:04 of how are we aligning our values to
46:07 what we actually have in the code and
46:09 being able to use that to say we both
46:11 want to be able to clean this up and we
46:12 want to be able to be protective
46:14 so for me that would be kind of a
46:17 direction to go from if you guys were
46:18 looking to pick one particular type of
46:21 uh use and then be able to break that
46:24 down
46:25 by category i would recommend starting
46:26 there and having us look at it and see
46:28 hey does this represent
46:30 our guiding documents does this actually
46:32 reflect what we want in the community
46:34 rather than having
46:35 you know we often have discussions of
46:36 saying well what is allowed there and we
46:39 can start to see oh well you know could
46:40 it be something one day and what where
46:42 is that wiggle room and being able to
46:44 kind of really comb that in and narrow
46:45 it in i think would be a good place to
46:47 be able to start
46:48 thanks
46:50 this is kristen lisa may i ask a
46:52 clarifying question
46:53 you said conservancy do you mean
46:55 conservancy or community facilities
46:58 um well i think that when you talk about
47:01 being able to have categories and break
47:03 them all down they're probably going to
47:04 all roll into what they're all of a like
47:06 mind and so i would i would be surprised
47:09 in a simplification of title 18 that
47:12 you're going to end up having both a
47:13 conservancy and an open spaces right now
47:16 we have open spaces that have several
47:18 tiers right and then we have our
47:19 conservancy right so i'm guessing that
47:21 those are going to all be rolled up into
47:23 one category that are going to have
47:25 allowed uses and so my suggestion would
47:26 be to start there and have us look at it
47:29 and say hey is this reflective of the
47:31 community's desires this is reflective
47:34 of all the policies and plans we've put
47:36 in place
47:37 rather than starting with for instance
47:38 ones where we have hundreds of uses
47:41 for instance like in commercial zoning
47:45 does that help
47:48 yes thank you
47:50 thank you
47:54 commissioner milligan
47:57 hello about question one commissioner
48:00 milligan here i wanted to piggyback on
48:03 commissioner brennan's comments and
48:06 somebody else
48:08 maybe it was commissioner morgan about
48:11 and to follow up this is similar to the
48:14 issue that we have with self storage and
48:16 so we're talking about mass and use and
48:19 these large buildings when we reduce the
48:22 setbacks and we have these buildings
48:23 right up to the street front if they
48:25 don't have an active use on the ground
48:26 floor
48:28 then uh we're not getting the result
48:30 that we were hoping for you know if we
48:32 have uh as say
48:34 even if it's
48:36 entirely a residential building if it
48:38 doesn't have access and activity on the
48:42 ground floor at the street level
48:44 then we're not getting the engagement
48:47 quality that we're hoping our community
48:49 would enjoy
48:50 so i'm not quite sure what to do with
48:52 that or where that goes but i thought
48:54 this seemed like the number one seemed
48:56 like the place to talk about that so and
48:58 and commissioner brennan was bringing up
49:01 the missed opportunity and i think that
49:03 some of that has been solved in the
49:05 central isoqua plan about what happened
49:06 at atlas without um or not getting
49:10 access on the ground floor to units or
49:13 retail oh and i'm sorry i want to bring
49:15 up one more piece of
49:18 inspiration
49:19 it's more of a question or a problem
49:22 quiz for us all to lay awake at night
49:24 thinking about we have these wonderful
49:28 ground floor spaces in issaquah
49:30 highlands where i live in star point but
49:33 how do we encourage those spaces to be
49:36 used
49:37 you know in a dynamic lively community
49:40 valuable way there's one that's sitting
49:42 empty for god knows how long of course
49:44 we're in a pandemic so i'm not gonna
49:46 um call that out as a as a real problem
49:49 it might be related that way but
49:51 even um front street uh talks about
49:55 the uses that would make it the most
49:57 vibrant
49:59 part of town
50:00 without being too
50:02 prescriptive how can we encourage the
50:04 kinds of uses that give us the lively
50:06 streetscape that we're looking for
50:09 so a question not a comment sorry back
50:12 to you
50:14 we're taking them all tonight questions
50:16 comments clarification so don't feel bad
50:20 yeah no i think i kind of look towards
50:21 like bellevue i look like towards
50:23 certain streets in nyc
50:25 where they've done a real good job of
50:27 not only creating the density that they
50:29 they have to have
50:31 but also that engagement
50:33 i think all of us who walked any of
50:34 those streets can realize
50:36 there is a way to do it and to your
50:37 point as far as more of a vibrant front
50:39 street um i think i saw a plan not too
50:41 long ago about like alder street where
50:43 they wanted to turn you know put lights
50:45 on it and kind of make it uh
50:47 can't think of an example but more of
50:49 one of those lively streets you see i
50:51 think that's a great idea and again it
50:53 kind of promotes not only the area
50:55 itself helps promote the business and
50:56 again makes it a lively part of town
50:58 that people want to be at so
51:02 commissioner lewis
51:06 thank you chair voice commissioner joy
51:07 lewis i do have a question for staff
51:10 generally when we look at our packets we
51:12 are getting an overview um of how staff
51:17 has engaged with the public right not
51:19 just the public comments that are being
51:20 submitted but different town halls
51:23 different avenues for interested parties
51:26 to be able to have spaces to connect
51:28 even whether that's questionnaires right
51:30 there's a variety of things we can do i
51:32 didn't see anything in this packet and
51:34 was surprised especially when we talk
51:35 about question one being where have you
51:37 seen places in your community i expected
51:40 a little bit more from staff to tell me
51:42 where what is the community telling you
51:44 where is the community found that we're
51:45 falling short where staff found hey
51:47 we're getting questions we're getting
51:49 requests for things that aren't allowed
51:51 and kind of having that overview so i
51:52 would love to hear a little bit more
51:54 about how
51:55 staff has reached out to the public
51:57 in prior to this meeting to have this
52:00 very question answered by the people
52:02 that it connects with
52:11 someone from the city like to pick that
52:13 you know i i can start off with in in my
52:16 little time here um you know it's um six
52:19 months now
52:21 staff always gets calls where you know
52:23 this is a business can we go in here
52:25 which is the use you're allowed in we
52:27 get business licenses
52:29 one of the things that i think um people
52:32 have talked to me about
52:34 was places like towing companies you
52:36 know nobody wants everyone wants a very
52:38 livable
52:39 walkable community but there's still a
52:41 need for those kind of spaces and and
52:44 should isaqah
52:45 you know uh
52:47 designate spaces where those can go
52:49 um people still are driving cars and
52:51 they still need to have a call in a
52:54 towing company and where do they go or
52:56 other businesses like a boat repair shop
52:59 you know i've talked to those people
53:01 where where in israel can we locate
53:03 which zones allow these kind of uses
53:07 other types of uses that are you know
53:10 you get concerns from community members
53:11 are the where can this marijuana retail
53:14 store go in and what the
53:17 the separation between these uses needs
53:19 to be is there going to be an impact for
53:22 parking for instance i mean how do we
53:25 manage the parking for a very successful
53:27 business if and and what that parking
53:29 spaces need to be so those are
53:32 my interactions and my little time here
53:34 of of the problem things that i've heard
53:37 um yes of course the other
53:39 the the desire for
53:41 you know a grocery store um
53:44 the um
53:46 you know places for entertainment a
53:48 trampoline place you know that was
53:50 brought up as a place where people go to
53:52 and and do we have enough of those in
53:55 our community
53:56 um uh surfing you know places so so
54:00 there's a desire for the live work play
54:02 kind of vision for the community that
54:04 that you know are we missing some of
54:06 those uh spaces and there may be more
54:08 than just the code that plays into it
54:10 the economics the the market factors you
54:12 know where people choose to locate those
54:14 kind of places so it may not be just a
54:16 code issue
54:17 uh but but to answer your question
54:20 commissioner lewis what are we hearing
54:22 that's what i've heard in my little time
54:23 here but lucy and kristen feel free to
54:26 pitch in what you guys hear
54:28 from community members that reach out
54:31 well and i think that's a i think minnie
54:34 you summarize the kinds of comments that
54:36 we are getting
54:38 on a kind of individual basis
54:41 i i would add sort of
54:43 two other avenues
54:46 one which i haven't really participated
54:48 in as much
54:50 are the affinity groups and there are
54:54 four title 18 there are these groups i
54:57 sat in on the
55:00 development group
55:02 there have been
55:04 other
55:05 uh ones that have taken place but they
55:07 have not been as targeted as you're
55:09 describing commissioner lewis they're a
55:12 broader brush with the intent of really
55:15 providing an avenue to hear what instead
55:19 of responding to these more targeted
55:21 kinds of questions
55:23 uh really
55:24 what are your concerns what's working
55:27 what's not working
55:29 now that doesn't mean that some of it
55:30 isn't um
55:32 feeding those answers but um
55:35 it's uh less specific
55:37 uh i think the other part of this um
55:40 which
55:42 uh i'm gonna take a little step to the
55:44 side and just say
55:46 that if you haven't already uh suspected
55:48 this there's likely to be a um
55:52 what we're calling a bike barn instead
55:53 of a parking lot of topics that are
55:57 gonna
55:58 come out of title 18
56:01 but are too expansive to really be
56:04 undertaken within title 18. they have
56:08 too much policy
56:09 there's a bigger community conversation
56:12 that's needed
56:13 and one of those that
56:15 we anticipate from the
56:18 city strategic plan
56:20 are these neighborhood conversations
56:23 about
56:24 amenities and services and
56:28 maybe facilities that neighborhoods
56:30 either want to preserve or feel need to
56:33 be added to um
56:37 support and create the unique
56:40 neighborhoods that we know that we have
56:42 in the city um so
56:45 you know i think
56:46 in some ways this is kind of the
56:48 beginning of some of that work that
56:50 we're we're seeing is going to come as
56:53 we kind of work uh incrementally through
56:56 neighborhoods
56:58 trying to understand what that is and
57:01 and so i see this as a beginning rather
57:04 than necessarily a conclusion as part of
57:06 this process
57:09 thanks minnie and thank you lucy
57:12 fantastic answer what i'm hoping is that
57:15 when we actually are getting our draft
57:17 code that maybe it's even a symbol of
57:20 that bike barn saying hey
57:23 focus on this shiny object and let's
57:25 start making a bucket let's start saying
57:27 these are the need this is what we want
57:29 to be directing because certainly there
57:32 are many
57:33 questions
57:34 regarding policy how we fine tune and
57:37 get what we want to get that have come
57:39 up in this discussion of title 18 so
57:41 being able to even have that um
57:43 visualization for us and being able to
57:45 have that we hear you let's put that on
57:47 the list let's get these buckets going
57:49 and let's start to organize this now it
57:50 helps us to be able to say okay this has
57:53 been heard this is something we're going
57:54 to be really fortunate to deal with in
57:56 2023 let's focus right now uh when we're
58:00 obviously next year going through and
58:01 finishing up our draft code on on title
58:04 18 so i appreciate that
58:20 thank you commissioner lewis and thank
58:22 you staff
58:24 according my clock we still have some
58:25 discussion time
58:30 please feel free
58:38 commissioner schulte
58:41 uh thank you chair voice i uh
58:43 uh back to the earlier discussion
58:45 by commissioner milligan and
58:47 commissioner brennan um you know both of
58:50 which i support i
58:51 i also want to voice my support for you
58:54 know creating a more uh
58:57 you know community-based uh interaction
59:00 amongst the you know the at the ground
59:02 level
59:03 of developments i
59:04 for me
59:05 it seems like a lot of parts of issaquah
59:08 i've seen as be more kind of a
59:10 pass-through instead of a destination
59:13 you know in terms of the heavy traffic
59:16 for example that we see going down
59:17 towards maple valley or towards the
59:19 south
59:20 and the congestion that's formed as a
59:22 result of that so i think if if we can
59:24 work on you know developing and building
59:26 communities that you know do promote
59:28 that ground level activity
59:30 i think that's critical and and with
59:32 that um
59:34 you know comes the the need to to bring
59:36 people right and to house people um and
59:39 and that's why we we should be taking a
59:41 look at bulk and scale um because it's
59:44 very difficult to
59:46 to have one level of retail uh one story
59:49 of multiple retail but
59:51 not so much residential around it
59:54 to support that
59:57 anyways i just wanted to provide my
59:59 support for you know ground level
1:00:01 community and
1:00:02 interaction i think is very important
1:00:24 mr brown
1:00:28 thanks jay boyce um
1:00:30 so lucy's response made me think about
1:00:34 um when we're talking about the single
1:00:35 family or the low density residential
1:00:37 zones
1:00:39 was a couple years ago i guess somewhere
1:00:42 and then we went through
1:00:46 an update of the
1:00:48 old town
1:00:49 residential design standards
1:00:51 so there was a
1:00:53 concentrated effort to really preserve
1:00:55 the character of that neighborhood
1:00:57 because of its you know location
1:01:00 so when you're thinking about
1:01:03 the future growth we you know we've been
1:01:05 talking about primarily around the
1:01:06 higher density uses the commercial the
1:01:09 commercial or mixed use zones but i also
1:01:12 need to think about the residential
1:01:14 neighborhoods or zones some of them
1:01:16 older in the
1:01:18 in down in the valley on the floor
1:01:20 of issaquah and then the newer
1:01:23 residential neighborhoods up in
1:01:24 highlands and palace and other
1:01:27 developing areas
1:01:29 so it's being really thoughtful about
1:01:31 where does the density go when you're
1:01:34 talking about
1:01:35 housing and that gets really um
1:01:38 controversial i think
1:01:40 but it is it is thinking about when
1:01:43 you're thinking about the character of
1:01:44 the neighborhoods uh lucy that you were
1:01:46 describing it's it's looking at the
1:01:49 location of the low density or lower
1:01:51 density residential abuses and thinking
1:01:54 about
1:01:55 i know this could be complain stuff too
1:01:58 so i don't want to cross the line here
1:01:59 but thinking ahead about what is the
1:02:02 character the future character of those
1:02:05 neighborhoods
1:02:06 including
1:02:07 whether or not you're going to allow for
1:02:09 additional density to occur
1:02:12 with town homes or or other things
1:02:14 depending on the location so i think
1:02:16 that is a phone and function issue that
1:02:20 needs to be
1:02:21 maybe it's a bucketed item but it's
1:02:23 something that the city needs to think
1:02:25 of that we collectively the city needs
1:02:27 to think about
1:02:28 um i think the work done in
1:02:31 the old town
1:02:33 neighborhood made a lot of sense
1:02:36 and we probably aren't going to undo
1:02:37 that i mean that was
1:02:38 you know that was a purposeful effort
1:02:41 but thinking about that sort of an
1:02:43 effort in other parts of the city and
1:02:44 it's not just about preserving the
1:02:46 character sometimes it's about what's
1:02:47 the future character we want to have and
1:02:49 that means changing it
1:02:52 so just another another quite another
1:02:55 issue to think about on the on the form
1:02:57 particularly out in the residential
1:02:59 neighborhoods
1:03:06 thank you commissioner brennan and now
1:03:08 we have commissioner zaragoza
1:03:13 thank you chair
1:03:14 uh commissioner zaragoza
1:03:17 i wanted to comment on having
1:03:19 residential above
1:03:21 uh retail but also talking about these
1:03:23 big box supermarkets safeway
1:03:26 and qfc
1:03:28 they're massive they're huge they take
1:03:30 up you know very large spaces inside
1:03:33 where we want to really pack those those
1:03:35 uh communities in you know building up
1:03:37 above those i think would be great and
1:03:40 there's awesome examples of uh the
1:03:42 wajamaya and the id in seattle
1:03:45 also i think in capitol hill there's
1:03:47 another
1:03:48 market very similar to that
1:03:50 they're bustling
1:03:51 all around those markets there's just
1:03:54 always people it's always kind of alive
1:03:56 and and fun places even though you're
1:03:58 standing in front of a supermarket
1:04:00 so i think that would be
1:04:01 a great target as we get new stuff in or
1:04:04 we're replacing or or retrofitting or
1:04:07 upgrading
1:04:09 thanks
1:04:14 great comment yeah i'm thinking myself
1:04:16 of of that qfc or the pcc
1:04:19 uh down there that have you know all of
1:04:21 that living space above it and then we
1:04:23 look kind of at some of our big box
1:04:24 stores and there is nothing above it and
1:04:26 it is just impervious surface and big
1:04:38 commissioner schulte
1:04:40 uh thank you chair boyce um
1:04:43 great point uh commissioner zarga
1:04:45 zaragoza am i pronouncing that correctly
1:04:47 okay great um
1:04:49 yeah great point you know as we look at
1:04:50 the future um and especially is kind of
1:04:53 what we're discovering you know through
1:04:55 the pandemic i think what we'll start
1:04:56 seeing
1:04:57 is um you know a lot of
1:05:00 retailers really looking at a way to
1:05:02 reduce their footprint um
1:05:04 both from a you know sustainability
1:05:06 perspective
1:05:07 but as well as you know rentable and
1:05:09 usable square footage
1:05:11 um you know with e-commerce and uh you
1:05:14 know with examples of what's happened to
1:05:16 sears in the past years that they as
1:05:18 they've started downsizing and
1:05:21 those big box buildings have either been
1:05:23 demolished or converted um to other uses
1:05:27 so you know i think we'll see a lot more
1:05:29 of that um and with that comes
1:05:31 additional space right as as these
1:05:34 retailers look to downsize reduce their
1:05:36 footprint
1:05:39 more opportunities for you know
1:05:42 residential living
1:05:44 as well so great comment
1:05:49 thank you commissioner schulte and and
1:05:51 to piggyback off of him um you think
1:05:54 about all the things that we're doing as
1:05:55 far as amazon home deliveries i mean
1:05:57 home depot delivers and you think about
1:05:59 you know again we're talking about 20 to
1:06:01 30 years out which is kind of a mission
1:06:03 statement at least for our commission
1:06:05 and you think of drone deliveries that
1:06:07 will probably be quicker here than
1:06:10 any of us would have selected things so
1:06:12 all of these things um
1:06:15 will probably reduce the footprints of
1:06:16 some of these bigger retailers
1:06:27 so i'm not seeing any more comments i'll
1:06:29 give it a i'll give it a minute
1:06:31 and then
1:06:33 and then from there we're going to go to
1:06:35 public comment but i want to give i want
1:06:37 to give the commissions at least an
1:06:39 opportunity
1:06:41 if anything pops up last minute
1:06:43 and again everybody has the opportunity
1:06:45 you know at the end we'll decide if we
1:06:46 need to continue to flesh this out in
1:06:48 another joint meeting or if uh emails
1:06:51 will suffice so
1:06:53 i'll give it a minute
1:07:08 all right
1:07:10 so what i'd like to do now is open it up
1:07:12 to public comment for this discussion
1:07:14 question i know there were some people
1:07:17 that were having connectivity issues so
1:07:19 i'm sure we'll we'll probably have some
1:07:21 additional comments
1:07:23 the idea was to try to keep it around 10
1:07:24 minutes but i know some people who
1:07:26 couldn't get into the general at the
1:07:27 very beginning
1:07:28 so this might go a little bit longer
1:07:30 so um kristen do we have anyone signed
1:07:32 up to speak
1:07:35 no one is signed up but let's see if
1:07:36 anyone would like to speak either
1:07:38 raise your hand
1:07:40 or hit star 3 or let me know in comment
1:07:44 we have one right here
1:07:46 with connie marsh i'm going to
1:07:48 make you a panelist
1:07:53 connie you are a panelist you can turn
1:07:55 your screen on if you'd like
1:07:59 okay some
1:08:01 other people have finally been able to
1:08:02 get on get on it took them almost 45
1:08:05 minutes to get on
1:08:08 um well
1:08:12 this is the same conversation we had
1:08:14 with the issaquah highlands
1:08:16 how many 20 almost 20 years ago
1:08:19 and then we have the same conversation
1:08:21 again
1:08:22 with the central issaquah plan
1:08:24 and so
1:08:26 not so much with talus because that
1:08:28 turned into this
1:08:30 sort of housing area as compared to
1:08:33 a a uh mixed use area issaquah highlands
1:08:38 was provided the opportunity to have
1:08:40 much more open land and be much more
1:08:43 dense instead it chose to sprawl out
1:08:46 over the land which is interesting
1:08:48 our central issaquah plan
1:08:50 allows many parts of our entire valley
1:08:54 floor to be
1:08:55 12 stories tall
1:08:57 and we have all these rules in place in
1:09:00 order to make it
1:09:02 walkable
1:09:04 and active with parks and getting people
1:09:07 out of their cars
1:09:09 and you'll notice in the central
1:09:11 issaquah plan what we have achieved
1:09:13 is housing development way out on
1:09:16 newport way
1:09:18 we have not gotten much further than
1:09:21 that we have the zoning in place and the
1:09:24 rules in place to achieve
1:09:27 what you all want
1:09:30 and it's not here yet
1:09:32 right the esco highlands have the
1:09:34 capacity to do that they chose not to do
1:09:38 that we have old town
1:09:40 which has the rules in place to be able
1:09:47 do what you want and it is not
1:09:50 achieving
1:09:52 so rather than changing
1:09:55 or spreading the uses around hoping that
1:10:00 if we actually add uses in more
1:10:02 neighborhoods that that will
1:10:05 occur
1:10:06 i think we need to ask ourselves why
1:10:09 it's not occurring in the places we
1:10:12 where we already have the rules and
1:10:14 regulations and want it to happen
1:10:17 because those are the places where we
1:10:19 are actually going to be able to get a
1:10:22 people are actually going to be able to
1:10:23 walk around and use the existing retail
1:10:27 we can get some of those owners of these
1:10:29 stores who say they aren't going to
1:10:31 redevelop for 50 years because they're
1:10:32 making mega bucks off their box store
1:10:35 to want to redevelop
1:10:38 those are the nuts and bolts of our
1:10:40 issues so i don't want to have the same
1:10:45 conversation for the third time
1:10:48 and end up with the same result that we
1:10:50 don't get the dense vibrant areas that
1:10:53 we like
1:10:54 our problems are more in our inability
1:10:58 implement
1:11:00 the rules and regulations than we have
1:11:02 that we have
1:11:03 then it is to create more uses
1:11:08 and places
1:11:11 i i i agree
1:11:14 with y'all's vision i don't agree with
1:11:17 what the solution
1:11:20 might be
1:11:21 and one quick thing
1:11:23 on uh
1:11:25 combining columns in the use table
1:11:28 i use the use table all the time
1:11:35 anything we don't have enough discrete
1:11:38 columns for parks
1:11:40 we've had many issues for not being able
1:11:44 to define what kind of a park should go
1:11:46 in what place and what kind of storm
1:11:48 water should go in what place maybe
1:11:50 there's a different way to do that
1:11:54 i'm not sure
1:11:55 um with all the varying types of housing
1:11:59 i'm not sure that consolidating the
1:12:01 columns
1:12:03 and then creating overlays
1:12:05 is a simplification it sounds
1:12:08 suspiciously like what we already have
1:12:11 we just don't call it an overlay we just
1:12:14 go to a separate set of codes
1:12:17 so what i would like to hear in this is
1:12:20 combining the tables
1:12:25 and squishing them
1:12:27 is going to solve the ease of using the
1:12:31 code as i use it every day as staff uses
1:12:34 it every day and has developers use it
1:12:36 every day and and so that part is
1:12:39 totally missing from this conversation
1:12:43 for me it's an interesting conversation
1:12:46 but it it isn't a title 18 conversation
1:12:49 to me thank you
1:12:56 thank you
1:12:58 um kristen do we have any additional
1:12:59 speakers yes we do um susan neville
1:13:03 would like to speak
1:13:05 susan i'm making you a panelist
1:13:08 you are a panelist you're muted and you
1:13:11 can turn on your camera if you'd like
1:13:12 okay thank you i'm just can you hear me
1:13:16 yes oh good i'm glad to be here it took
1:13:18 me a little while to get here um
1:13:20 thank you everyone it's really been
1:13:22 stimulating conversation it's
1:13:25 and um
1:13:26 i wanted
1:13:27 to really speak to
1:13:29 number one which is what you're doing um
1:13:34 i was i'm not sure where this fits but
1:13:36 i'm gonna tell you my thoughts and then
1:13:38 we'll configure it
1:13:40 i was traveling north
1:13:42 towards gilman on a side street right
1:13:45 heading towards wells fargo
1:13:47 and it was the evening and i looked up
1:13:50 and there was this huge
1:13:52 light
1:13:53 massive structure and i thought a
1:13:56 spaceship had landed and i realized it
1:13:59 was the new costco building and all the
1:14:01 lights were on and i had not seen it in
1:14:03 the evening
1:14:05 so it kind of took my breath away
1:14:08 and i thought wow
1:14:12 being part of the title 18 process and
1:14:14 following it all the way along we have a
1:14:16 huge amount of challenges and i don't
1:14:18 know where this fits but
1:14:20 what i thought to myself is
1:14:22 we as a community we have a vision
1:14:26 when i looked at that structure and the
1:14:28 lights in the building it didn't quite
1:14:30 fit that vision and i was wondering
1:14:33 how we're going to encourage our
1:14:35 corporate partnerships that are
1:14:37 important going forward but yet still
1:14:42 height and the density uh in line of
1:14:45 what we want so i don't know if this is
1:14:47 the place that you speak about it but i
1:14:49 just wanted to share that
1:14:52 episode that happened
1:14:55 had one other comment regarding
1:14:57 transparency and
1:14:59 i think when you are saying going
1:15:01 forward we can handle some of our
1:15:03 discussion email that kind of leaves the
1:15:05 uh some of that transparency out and i
1:15:08 think i don't want to be lost along the
1:15:10 way so i just wanted to share that too
1:15:12 thank you
1:15:19 thank you
1:15:23 kristen any additional
1:15:25 public comment
1:15:28 yes and
1:15:32 thank you um sorry i was reading the
1:15:33 comments i will i do want to let
1:15:34 everyone know but for some reason the
1:15:36 hand raising is not working tonight i
1:15:38 cannot see it um so if
1:15:41 i'm going to let
1:15:44 let's see let me just here's what i'm
1:15:45 going to do
1:15:47 i can see it kristen you can
1:15:50 okay i can't see it tonight but i'm
1:15:51 going to ask um someone real quick we
1:15:53 have a calling user with uh the first
1:15:56 few numbers are 206 300.
1:16:01 i can't unmute you
1:16:02 i don't know
1:16:03 okay i'll figure that out but in the
1:16:05 meantime yes ann fletcher would like to
1:16:07 speak
1:16:08 so and i am making you a panelist
1:16:12 and you are unmuted you may turn on your
1:16:14 camera if you'd like
1:16:24 thank you uh
1:16:26 i just um this is my first time doing it
1:16:28 on the phone uh since the other way
1:16:30 didn't work so thank you um i am a
1:16:33 little bit um
1:16:35 discombuberated here
1:16:37 so thanks for your patience
1:16:41 i just uh wanted to make some general
1:16:43 comments because i'm feeling like i'm
1:16:45 just starting to get into this but my
1:16:47 name is ann fletcher i'm a
1:16:48 long time resident and i'm in with
1:16:51 people for climate action
1:16:52 um the zoning
1:16:54 uh is something that the
1:16:57 climate action
1:16:59 people have been interested in as a way
1:17:01 of reducing
1:17:04 our carbon emissions
1:17:05 with the mixed use
1:17:07 i believe it's one of the items in the
1:17:10 draft climate action plan
1:17:13 but there aren't any specifics about how
1:17:16 we would go about doing that
1:17:19 so the comment that i wanted to make is
1:17:22 i i i'm learning a lot tonight i think
1:17:26 there's a lot more discussion to be done
1:17:29 i think that we have um as one person
1:17:32 mentioned we have
1:17:34 places where we have mixed use we need
1:17:36 to study and make those work
1:17:39 better i think we have to be careful
1:17:41 about um
1:17:43 you know our steps
1:17:47 selecting studying selecting and
1:17:50 prioritizing those areas for mixed use
1:17:53 so that we
1:17:54 are the most effective and efficient
1:17:57 that we can be i don't see um
1:18:00 getting
1:18:01 at this point
1:18:03 getting rid of
1:18:07 single-family zoning completely i think
1:18:10 it needs to be much more thought out and
1:18:13 and um
1:18:16 a step-by-step process
1:18:18 and i i do believe that we i heard one
1:18:21 commissioner say that
1:18:23 this really is hard not to get into the
1:18:25 comp plan
1:18:26 uh business because the the comp plan
1:18:29 needs to support whatever um steps that
1:18:33 we take and i so i i will
1:18:37 like to see
1:18:39 overall planning discussions methodical
1:18:43 thorough way of going about doing this
1:18:45 transition that i do believe we need to
1:18:47 make for the future
1:18:49 so thank you very much
1:18:58 thank you and mary lynch would like to
1:19:00 speak next so mary i am making you a
1:19:02 panelist
1:19:05 whoops
1:19:14 there you go mary you are a panelist and
1:19:15 you're unmuted
1:19:19 yeah i don't know if my video's working
1:19:21 it doesn't matter
1:19:23 um some of the comments that came up
1:19:25 about
1:19:26 you know a lot of questions going on
1:19:28 from some of the potential um
1:19:32 companies moving into isa quad where
1:19:34 they should go i was part of the central
1:19:37 area task force and then i was very
1:19:39 active when we went back and redid the
1:19:41 central area task force and all those
1:19:44 times we talked about specifically the
1:19:47 central area plan and
1:19:49 what areas you know could be used for
1:19:53 um storage you know and identified the
1:19:56 areas over along east lake samamish that
1:19:59 already have the storage you know those
1:20:01 places could be there and made sure as
1:20:04 part of the central area plan we
1:20:06 identified the different areas
1:20:08 to house those things that were needed
1:20:11 or also the auto repair and that we
1:20:14 didn't want some of these places to go
1:20:16 into the other parts of the central area
1:20:18 plan just like i don't think we want it
1:20:21 into the single family
1:20:23 and i think connie kind of alluded to it
1:20:25 and so susan my disappointment has been
1:20:28 is i think we as a city have not gone
1:20:30 out and talked to those people wanting
1:20:33 to come and develop in his applause what
1:20:35 our vision is
1:20:37 because it was very disappointing where
1:20:38 we saw all the build out
1:20:41 with anthology with ravel with riva and
1:20:45 now with the other one that is now
1:20:47 before the city
1:20:48 all we're getting are housing units with
1:20:51 no mixed use at all
1:20:55 when we're at the development uh
1:20:57 planning meeting when we first heard
1:20:59 about these developments going in that
1:21:01 was the first time
1:21:02 and it already was a done deal and city
1:21:05 staff said sorry you know they didn't
1:21:08 have that in their plan and we're going
1:21:10 ahead with it as it is and so i don't
1:21:12 think as a city we're selling
1:21:15 what our vision is and i would hate to
1:21:18 see that we expand it and change you
1:21:20 know the zoning and make it more
1:21:22 complicated or look at moving it into
1:21:24 the single family areas
1:21:28 as part of what we're doing now with
1:21:30 title 18
1:21:32 and so i think we need to concentrate on
1:21:35 working with people and
1:21:37 those that are coming and getting them
1:21:39 to see our vision
1:21:40 and making sure that we live up to our
1:21:43 vision
1:21:44 that being said
1:21:46 that's it
1:21:56 let's see
1:21:58 anyone who else wants to speak
1:22:06 i'm not seeing anyone else
1:22:09 and i think everyone who's out there has
1:22:11 spoken so
1:22:12 okay well thank you kristen
1:22:14 so now what i'd like to do everyone is
1:22:16 to move on to question two and if we
1:22:18 could have staff
1:22:19 uh maybe for the next ten minutes or so
1:22:21 put that question up on the screen maybe
1:22:23 take it down after 10 minutes but just
1:22:25 to get the conversation going
1:22:28 yeah we'll start with question number
1:22:47 and we have a comment from commissioner
1:22:49 milligan
1:22:51 oh i'd love to start it off commissioner
1:22:53 milligan here and because i cheated and
1:22:56 talked about something during question
1:22:59 i i wanted to follow up on it here
1:23:01 especially to clarify since we heard
1:23:02 such good comments from the public
1:23:04 and i think what what i was saying and
1:23:07 and commissioner brennan can clarify
1:23:09 what what he was saying but i think
1:23:13 and and even uh commissioner voice um
1:23:15 lewis had comments about this about how
1:23:17 do we have these um
1:23:19 residential areas
1:23:21 that do not have their daily needs such
1:23:24 as in food or gathering spaces
1:23:27 and i had suggested how do we solve that
1:23:31 or i had asked how do we solve that and
1:23:32 wondered if it had to do with uses very
1:23:35 light uses that could be allowed in
1:23:36 residential areas is that the solution
1:23:39 i don't know that that's the solution
1:23:41 perhaps a better
1:23:44 application could be looking at those
1:23:47 large areas
1:23:49 uh single family residential say
1:23:52 or even
1:23:53 mixed use i'm not issues but multifamily
1:23:57 where
1:23:58 pockets that are served by possibly by
1:24:01 transit or at the nexus of those
1:24:03 communities that could be zoned to allow
1:24:06 light
1:24:07 community
1:24:09 retail
1:24:12 i am i don't i mean to
1:24:15 suggest
1:24:16 the behavior that i'd like to see and
1:24:18 not necessarily how we get there
1:24:20 so i mostly wanted to clarify that for
1:24:22 the public because i i don't think that
1:24:25 it would be appropriate to add those
1:24:26 uses just anywhere
1:24:28 in our single family neighborhoods but
1:24:29 the single-family neighborhoods
1:24:30 definitely need something to reduce um
1:24:33 their dependency on
1:24:34 cars and transit which isn't serving
1:24:38 uh and to find a way to serve those
1:24:40 communities needs to to get together and
1:24:42 be a cohesive and whole neighborhood
1:24:45 that's my that was my intention
1:24:47 thank you
1:24:55 thank you commissioner million
1:24:56 and as i wait for a few more
1:24:59 comments or questions into the chat
1:25:02 um just so i'm
1:25:03 completely clear and i know i had the
1:25:04 opportunity to talk to staff a little
1:25:06 early today
1:25:07 is basically we're still kind of looking
1:25:09 at this high level view
1:25:10 and i think some of the concern is is
1:25:13 the idea that you know this is all going
1:25:15 on to a chalkboard somewhere and we're
1:25:16 never going to see it again i don't
1:25:18 think that's what's going to happen so i
1:25:20 hope that would put some people's mind
1:25:22 at ease this is to give the city some
1:25:24 direction as far as what we're thinking
1:25:26 about
1:25:27 and again this is just the first part
1:25:31 i think a three-step process so there is
1:25:33 more to come
1:25:35 in fact i was looking at the calendar
1:25:36 and it looks like we have a couple of
1:25:39 joint meetings with the development
1:25:40 commission
1:25:44 yeah so we still have a ways to go
1:25:47 commissioner lewis
1:25:49 please
1:25:51 thank you chair boys commissioner joy
1:25:53 lewis here um i think that this question
1:25:56 is a very interesting one that i think
1:25:57 is very
1:25:59 fun to think outside of the box and
1:26:01 something that i find that our community
1:26:03 is missing is the chance for
1:26:06 true community investment and being able
1:26:09 to have the city control more of its
1:26:11 land use right now we have a policy of
1:26:14 buying up spaces along our creek beds to
1:26:17 be able to better manage for ecological
1:26:19 reasons and i would like to see this
1:26:21 actually spill over more towards our
1:26:24 large disparity of jobs numbers when
1:26:27 looking at our housing numbers and one
1:26:29 way that that could be done is through
1:26:30 incubators there's been a lot of
1:26:32 successful arts incubators
1:26:35 in georgetown
1:26:36 is a good example of a not too far away
1:26:39 neighbor where this has been successful
1:26:41 and being able to create spaces in our
1:26:43 community for people to start businesses
1:26:45 and to be able to have a buy-in to be
1:26:48 able to say you are able to lease space
1:26:52 at an affordable price when we talk
1:26:54 about uh affordable housing
1:26:56 it's important also to look at
1:26:57 commercial retail and we all i think
1:27:00 expected there to be some type the
1:27:02 market to bear some type of that weight
1:27:05 in pandemic and we haven't seen that
1:27:07 right commercial banking has decided to
1:27:09 prop up commercial real estate to a
1:27:11 degree that has really boxed out small
1:27:13 local businesses from being able to get
1:27:16 the square footage they need just to
1:27:17 start something off in the community
1:27:19 when we look at how
1:27:21 the intent of what issaquah highlands
1:27:23 was supposed to be uh 20 years ago this
1:27:26 is not what was envisioned this was not
1:27:28 the plan instead we let the market
1:27:31 decide what could go in and so we ended
1:27:32 up getting big box chains in the
1:27:35 highlands and it was not conducive to
1:27:36 the community
1:27:38 uh i'm excited to see
1:27:40 uh small inroads that we've had recently
1:27:43 to be able to create market spaces for
1:27:46 small local businesses and i think that
1:27:48 needs to be increased and i think a good
1:27:50 way to do that is to think about how we
1:27:52 promote entrepreneurship in our city and
1:27:55 being able to have
1:27:56 more spaces for artists to be able to
1:28:00 see if their ideas can grow into a
1:28:02 business so that would be my
1:28:05 comment on this thanks very much
1:28:10 great comment great comment commissioner
1:28:12 lewis that was fantastic um commissioner
1:28:14 dillon
1:28:17 thanks sure um that that is a hard act
1:28:19 to follow um going back to to
1:28:22 commissioner milligan's comment and and
1:28:24 this discussion kind of of mixed use and
1:28:27 and how we
1:28:29 promote that and haven't been seeing it
1:28:31 even in areas potentially where it's
1:28:33 allowed are there avenues
1:28:36 that we actually restrict uses in some
1:28:38 particular areas and that
1:28:41 that purely residential is is not an
1:28:43 allowable use but mixed use is in order
1:28:49 to discourage the the type of
1:28:51 development that we've seen out along
1:28:52 newport uh without those
1:28:55 neighborhood commercial type
1:28:57 uses to complement the residential
1:29:03 may i comment
1:29:05 this is kristin leeson
1:29:09 there are avenues to do that we have a
1:29:12 zone called the that was created in the
1:29:14 2016 moratorium
1:29:17 uh called the vertical mixed-use zone
1:29:19 and it requires that you have mixed use
1:29:21 so you have to have either an office or
1:29:25 commercial use on the bottom floor
1:29:27 and then residential uses on top so we
1:29:29 do there are avenues to do it that was
1:29:31 one that we used at that time and there
1:29:34 there are other things to look at as
1:29:43 thank you kristen and thank you
1:29:44 commissioner dylan i apologize for that
1:29:46 frantic running my my mac just gave me a
1:29:49 message it's about to die
1:29:53 all right still waiting for additional
1:29:56 comments questions clarifications
1:29:59 commissioner sanford please
1:30:02 thank you chairman voice
1:30:04 our former beloved front street market
1:30:06 has been mentioned a couple of times so
1:30:08 i think this is a somewhat related point
1:30:10 uh when front street market disappeared
1:30:12 i communicated with the city council and
1:30:14 mayor
1:30:15 to try to see if there were any kind of
1:30:17 incentives that we could offer the owner
1:30:19 to keep a neighborhood grocery there as
1:30:22 kind of the anchor of that neighborhood
1:30:24 i think
1:30:25 often for neighborhoods when we think of
1:30:27 them it's one of the most
1:30:29 central and important uses we can
1:30:31 provide the neighborhood market
1:30:34 essentially
1:30:36 the answer was that
1:30:38 there was no
1:30:39 incentive that they could
1:30:42 come up with to incentivize the owner
1:30:45 to have another
1:30:47 small food store in there and i maybe
1:30:49 this is a mike barton issue i don't know
1:30:51 but it kind of echoes some of the other
1:30:53 points that have been raised so
1:30:56 the idea of incentivizing owners either
1:30:58 through reduced fees or taxes i think
1:31:00 could be something that could be
1:31:01 explored
1:31:03 thanks
1:31:12 thank you
1:31:20 yeah it's interesting how throughout
1:31:22 human history it's always kind of been
1:31:24 centered around the market right
1:31:29 in costa rica they still have
1:31:30 neighborhood markets called potpourrias
1:31:32 uh where everybody goes and buys their
1:31:34 eggs their milk their chicklets all of
1:31:36 these things and they are still there
1:31:38 and they still have the big box stores
1:31:40 that came and moved in
1:31:41 20 years ago but
1:31:43 they haven't been able to put the
1:31:44 potpourri out of business
1:31:51 i see a hand and i believe that's um
1:31:53 commissioner solo correct that's right
1:31:55 not you know i'd be curious from staff
1:31:57 perspective
1:31:59 you know look it seems to me that we
1:32:00 have a whole bunch of opportunities in
1:32:03 the code to
1:32:05 do just about
1:32:06 whatever you want in a lot of different
1:32:08 places and i'd be curious if there are
1:32:10 applications that people have asked for
1:32:13 were told they couldn't do it because
1:32:14 the code wouldn't allow because the
1:32:16 zoning wasn't allowed it seems like
1:32:18 we've got this notion that there are
1:32:23 community uses that the community
1:32:24 desires but i don't know that there have
1:32:27 been any that haven't been able to be
1:32:29 fulfilled so i'd be curious on on what
1:32:31 the perspective of the staff was
1:32:34 that made sense
1:32:37 uh one i would point out um that may be
1:32:43 one of those interim uses while we're
1:32:46 waiting to empty our bike barn
1:32:48 uh is
1:32:50 food trucks
1:32:51 um our code um this speaks to something
1:32:54 kristin mentioned at the beginning uh
1:32:57 during the pandemic
1:32:59 excuse me we got a lot of requests to
1:33:02 put food drugs out there and our code is
1:33:04 confusing
1:33:06 um and it's not really clear where they
1:33:09 can go uh in especially in right-of-way
1:33:12 and um
1:33:15 that's probably a use that's more
1:33:17 palatable because it doesn't exist all
1:33:20 the time
1:33:21 and and so that's one that i know that
1:33:23 we want to clear up through this process
1:33:36 and i guess the other thing i would add
1:33:38 is we do also get a um
1:33:40 [Music]
1:33:43 this is not so much that we're turning
1:33:44 them down because um it's not allowed
1:33:49 we get a lot of requests that we hear
1:33:51 about from economic development for
1:33:56 research development
1:33:59 small businesses small business
1:34:01 manufacturing processing of
1:34:04 coffee beer wine things like that and
1:34:07 those are tricky
1:34:09 because we don't have a lot of
1:34:12 intensive commercial land use a land and
1:34:15 therefore there's just not a lot of
1:34:17 places where those businesses could go
1:34:27 thank you lucy yeah i'm i'm reminded of
1:34:29 commissioner lewis's comment and it's
1:34:32 really what type of city do you envision
1:34:33 in 20 years are we going to have local
1:34:35 brewers
1:34:36 are we going to have places for arts
1:34:39 um you know more of the small retail
1:34:42 small business owners are we going to
1:34:44 have big box stores
1:34:46 and i won't mean i won't mention any
1:34:48 names because that wouldn't be fair but
1:34:50 i think you all know what i mean
1:34:53 commissioner schulte
1:34:55 uh thank you chair boys uh it was great
1:34:57 to hear from minnie and lucy earlier
1:34:59 about you know some of the concrete
1:35:01 examples in terms of kind of what the
1:35:02 community members are looking for
1:35:05 um i think i've come to the realization
1:35:07 in acceptance really
1:35:10 it will be very difficult
1:35:12 to um
1:35:15 to satisfy all the wants and needs if if
1:35:18 not impossible to really bring
1:35:22 all the uses that that we've discussed
1:35:25 in the community is asking for um you
1:35:27 know to our city um just due to you know
1:35:30 land you know availability of land um
1:35:34 the the geographical challenges
1:35:37 you know the wetlands and i think that's
1:35:39 okay um i think one of the
1:35:44 one of the
1:35:45 big things about being a strong
1:35:46 community is also being a good neighbor
1:35:50 a neighbor to
1:35:51 to the the cities near us whether it's a
1:35:54 mammoth bellevue snoqualmie north bend
1:35:58 you know i think it's okay that if
1:36:01 there's only
1:36:02 if there's not a specific use within the
1:36:06 yet is nearby right
1:36:09 near bellevue right off 590 i think
1:36:10 that's okay to do a drive and
1:36:14 you know it's
1:36:15 i guess what i'm saying is we shouldn't
1:36:17 spend too much effort um
1:36:20 taking on a task where we're trying to
1:36:22 fit everything
1:36:24 into the city of issaquah
1:36:26 i think it'll be a challenge if not
1:36:28 impossible
1:36:30 and it's okay
1:36:31 because we do have great neighbors
1:36:33 around us
1:36:35 you know that's just something that kind
1:36:37 of i've come to accept
1:36:40 thank you
1:36:43 thank you commissioner schulte that's
1:36:45 that's definitely profound i mean i
1:36:46 think all of us would agree quality over
1:36:48 quantity
1:36:50 what that looks like i don't know that's
1:36:52 why we're talking
1:36:53 so commissioner milligan
1:36:56 uh thanks this is commissioner milligan
1:36:58 and thank you for the inspiration uh
1:37:00 chair voice and um
1:37:02 and uh lucy sloman
1:37:04 i have two two
1:37:06 questions
1:37:08 because it's hard to make a comment
1:37:09 because i really don't know what the
1:37:11 answer is but i think what we're trying
1:37:12 to do is point attention to trouble
1:37:14 areas where we could
1:37:16 improve and and this is micro but i'm
1:37:18 just using it as an example i don't mean
1:37:20 to be so micro about uses but clothing
1:37:23 fabrication is only allowed in intensive
1:37:26 commercial
1:37:27 why is that you know i mean to
1:37:30 share voices point there are businesses
1:37:33 of the future that aren't the sweatshops
1:37:35 of the past
1:37:37 that perhaps don't need to be
1:37:40 cordoned off to a very small zone in our
1:37:43 city and i don't know what you know
1:37:45 that's just one maybe it is there was a
1:37:47 beautiful um clothing
1:37:49 designer
1:37:51 in bellevue downtown bellevue wasn't a
1:37:54 problem to have them there
1:37:56 so i wondered is that kind of legacy
1:37:58 thing and are there others like that
1:38:01 and then the other um inspiration that
1:38:03 i've had from these previous comments is
1:38:06 we do make use of square footage
1:38:08 limitations um in
1:38:10 some of our uses and zones and it sounds
1:38:15 to me like i'm hearing that we might
1:38:17 like to do a little more of that
1:38:19 would that encourage small businesses
1:38:23 uh or would it just make our place a
1:38:25 really expensive place to do business i
1:38:26 don't know
1:38:27 but i thought it would be worth
1:38:29 amplifying that and finding a nexus in
1:38:32 in the words in our title 18 about
1:38:35 square footage limitations maybe that's
1:38:37 something that could help us in this
1:38:39 thank you
1:38:42 can i uh add to that i i think um
1:38:45 commissioner milligan's bringing up
1:38:48 a point that um may be kind of buried in
1:38:51 our memo
1:38:52 um because uh
1:38:55 you know and and uh kristin touched on
1:38:58 this in our presentation that there's
1:38:59 some things that are extremely specific
1:39:02 in our land use code
1:39:04 um but sometimes what we need is more
1:39:06 performance standards that allow us to
1:39:09 evaluate
1:39:10 what what we wanted a zone
1:39:14 so for instance if you have an art i'm
1:39:17 just going to take your micro example um
1:39:21 and say if you have an artist who's
1:39:23 making one-off clothing pieces that
1:39:26 really aren't different than a painting
1:39:28 or a sculpture then that is one thing if
1:39:32 you have
1:39:34 someone who's manufacturing clothing but
1:39:37 still on a modest scale
1:39:40 you know that's one thing and then i'm
1:39:42 not sure i'll go as far as sweatshops
1:39:44 but you know a more robust
1:39:47 uh significant uh manufacturing process
1:39:51 is another thing
1:39:52 and so you know
1:39:55 how do we
1:39:56 capture
1:39:58 the intensity
1:40:00 and the size and the
1:40:04 support functions you know for instance
1:40:06 loading and services and
1:40:09 um you know is it does it need to have
1:40:12 blank walls all the way around you know
1:40:15 so those are the
1:40:16 some of the things that i think we're
1:40:18 struggling with in trying to have a land
1:40:20 use code that's more
1:40:22 that that gets us what we want gives us
1:40:25 the tools we need to create good edges
1:40:28 and yet be agile when someone comes in
1:40:31 with something
1:40:32 that meets the intent
1:40:38 thank you lucy i think that is the
1:40:39 million dollar question right is how do
1:40:41 we have a
1:40:44 a vision of specificity
1:40:46 that is clear and concise but giving us
1:40:49 the flexibility to do it and to get
1:40:51 there
1:40:52 and that really
1:40:53 that really is the question
1:40:55 yeah you know if i made sure i had to
1:40:57 add to that
1:40:59 so through this exercise we're
1:41:01 definitely going to be looking at these
1:41:03 very specific and unique uses and does
1:41:05 it make a difference to call you know
1:41:08 call out a barber shop from a retail
1:41:10 service to a bank you know if they all
1:41:12 sort of are a service type of a use
1:41:15 perhaps there's not
1:41:17 any advantage to splitting the hair and
1:41:19 calling them out separately so so in
1:41:22 this exercise of collapsing those uses
1:41:24 for retail services you know and and i
1:41:27 think the memo talks about their 250
1:41:30 specifically listed uses clearly that
1:41:32 doesn't serve any purpose of meeting the
1:41:35 vision
1:41:36 but to answer
1:41:37 commissioner milligan's question if we
1:41:39 have a square footage limitation will
1:41:42 that get us smaller
1:41:43 stores or smaller businesses you know
1:41:46 there's a lot that goes into why why
1:41:48 some businesses are successful and
1:41:50 others are not
1:41:51 all right so
1:41:52 the square footage limitation can do one
1:41:54 thing for you it'll if you want smaller
1:41:57 size and you want to keep out larger big
1:41:59 box retail and you have a square footage
1:42:01 limitation it will keep those large
1:42:03 boxes out because you have a maximum
1:42:05 size that they can go in will it get you
1:42:08 the smaller businesses it's a question
1:42:11 and and and the reason why people will
1:42:13 locate that is because of economics you
1:42:15 know will i mean smaller i heard a lot
1:42:18 of uh comments about the desire for the
1:42:20 community to have these smaller places
1:42:22 to gather which you know is is something
1:42:25 that needs to occur
1:42:26 but a small food place
1:42:29 cannot survive
1:42:31 because the same small neighborhood that
1:42:33 it's going to capture aren't going to
1:42:35 come to that same place on a regular
1:42:37 basis but it might if they serve a
1:42:39 certain thing so so really the success
1:42:42 of a small business is going to depend
1:42:44 on a lot more
1:42:46 reasons than just code but if code is a
1:42:48 barrier for locating those then we can
1:42:51 eliminate that barrier through the code
1:42:53 update so it you know i don't know if
1:42:56 that answers your question but
1:43:04 thank you minnie
1:43:05 uh commissioner zaragoza
1:43:09 thank you chair commissioner zaragoza um
1:43:13 i was thinking about uh temporary spaces
1:43:16 right there was a pop-up shop in the
1:43:19 rogue brewery this was months and months
1:43:22 ago but it's a bunch of local artists
1:43:24 came in there that was fantastic
1:43:26 um i really enjoyed it we showed up
1:43:28 bought a few little things um felt very
1:43:31 much like we were part of the
1:43:33 neighborhood that day
1:43:35 in addition to that
1:43:36 during the pandemic we had outdoor
1:43:39 um restaurants
1:43:42 all that all the streets were shut down
1:43:44 that was a lot of fun
1:43:45 and it made me think why don't why isn't
1:43:47 this a normal thing obviously it could
1:43:49 become a normal thing but
1:43:51 that we don't have street vendors right
1:43:56 usually you know
1:43:58 active weekend places you have your
1:44:00 restaurants you have your retail but you
1:44:02 also have street vendors places where
1:44:04 you go to get
1:44:05 you know a little treat
1:44:07 some food
1:44:09 and there isn't much of that
1:44:11 around that i've seen and i don't know
1:44:12 if that's
1:44:14 you know something that
1:44:16 is related to
1:44:17 food trucks and things like that but you
1:44:19 know do we have
1:44:21 room for temporary spaces pop-up shops
1:44:25 street vendors things like that i grew
1:44:27 up in los angeles as a child we never
1:44:30 bought our tamales from internet or but
1:44:31 someone with a
1:44:33 with a cooler on a corner somewhere and
1:44:36 they're always fantastic so
1:44:37 um that's a nice thing it comes with all
1:44:40 of its
1:44:41 complexities but it's a nice thing and
1:44:43 it gets people out on the streets and
1:44:45 talking with each other and enjoying
1:44:48 each other's company so that would be
1:44:54 get a seattle hot dog in isaiah i love
1:45:06 commissioner schulte
1:45:08 uh thank you chair boyce um
1:45:10 back to what uh minnie was mentioning a
1:45:12 little bit earlier
1:45:14 which was a great point um i think one
1:45:16 of the things we have to be mindful of
1:45:18 when we are
1:45:19 looking at the the various uses and
1:45:21 spaces is really how they interact with
1:45:24 each other uh the symbiosis
1:45:26 amongst the spaces and and can they
1:45:28 survive um
1:45:30 depending on the uses that are adjacent
1:45:32 to them
1:45:33 um i've had the privilege to work with a
1:45:35 lot of great developers um and uh i've
1:45:38 gotten to hear things from their
1:45:40 perspective in terms of why
1:45:42 they don't build um in areas uh in
1:45:45 certain areas and a lot of it is due
1:45:47 just to the challenge of you know
1:45:49 getting people to those areas um
1:45:52 what are what is nearby
1:45:54 um the tenants they're targeting um and
1:45:57 sometimes those tenants themselves
1:46:00 retailers
1:46:01 companies
1:46:03 you know they have you know non-compete
1:46:05 disclosures where actually they
1:46:07 don't want to be close
1:46:10 to any uh competition themselves um
1:46:14 within a certain radius um you know a
1:46:17 distance you know mile or whatever it
1:46:19 may be so
1:46:21 you know it's great that we're talking
1:46:23 we're starting the discussion of you
1:46:25 know what does the community want what
1:46:26 kind of uses
1:46:28 um but then we also do have to think
1:46:30 about you know how do they play um with
1:46:32 each other and and the food trucks is a
1:46:34 great example you know a food truck you
1:46:36 can't go wrong with right you bring in a
1:46:38 food truck it brings people it gets
1:46:40 people eating excited and you know all
1:46:43 of a sudden they have the ability to
1:46:44 start seeing the surrounding areas the
1:46:47 the stores and the markets whatever it
1:46:48 may be right so
1:46:50 um things like that so thank you
1:46:58 thank you commissioner
1:47:00 commissioner morgan
1:47:04 if you don't mind i'll throw in a
1:47:05 counterpoint i guess
1:47:07 with regard to food trucks is
1:47:09 if we do want ground floor retail in our
1:47:12 buildings um
1:47:14 with people going into them
1:47:17 one way to to kill the restaurants in
1:47:19 those buildings is bring in food trucks
1:47:21 during prime time and
1:47:23 and take away the traffic that would
1:47:25 actually go into those retail sites so
1:47:27 it's kind of
1:47:29 we might be able to get one or the other
1:47:30 but but maybe not both
1:47:33 thank you fair point thank you
1:47:37 definitely appreciate the counterpoint
1:47:39 because it's it's important
1:47:53 anyone else like to speak
1:48:05 we'll give it a minute and let anybody
1:48:08 finalize any thoughts
1:48:25 all right
1:48:26 fantastic discussion
1:48:28 hopefully staff has some wonderful
1:48:31 notes to go back and work with
1:48:33 um as we continue to get deeper and
1:48:35 deeper into this process
1:48:37 so now we'd like to open it up to public
1:48:39 comment again
1:48:41 uh hopefully pertaining more to question
1:48:42 two but again
1:48:44 as far as
1:48:45 in general all topics but uh maybe an
1:48:48 emphasis on
1:48:49 number two if they so choose
1:48:52 so kristen do we have anyone signed up
1:48:54 to speak
1:48:57 anyone i can sort of see now it turns
1:49:00 out it's a black hand being raised on a
1:49:01 black background so i can sort of see
1:49:05 i do see that connie marsh has our hand
1:49:08 raised
1:49:09 and as does susan deville if you all
1:49:11 would like
1:49:12 to speak maybe turn your hand on and off
1:49:16 or if anyone else would like to speak
1:49:18 please raise your hand
1:49:20 or put a note in the chat
1:49:22 if connie marsh would like to speak
1:49:24 again
1:49:28 connie you're a panelist go ahead
1:49:40 things that are difficult or missing
1:49:44 special event permits aren't
1:49:46 really in title 18
1:49:49 and i think they would be more effective
1:49:51 in title 18 right now they go through
1:49:54 administration and then they sort of
1:49:57 weirdly weave their way around public
1:49:59 works engineering and sort of ricochet
1:50:02 off of planning and it makes it
1:50:04 difficult for
1:50:06 anyone to do a special event like let's
1:50:09 see a whole circle of food trucks with
1:50:12 dancing and
1:50:14 music over in the pickering parking lot
1:50:17 in the evening to turn that desert of a
1:50:20 parking lot into an active thing and
1:50:22 send people into michael's uh and and
1:50:26 let those people who hate food trucks go
1:50:28 eat at jennifer
1:50:29 um and that would be a way to enliven
1:50:33 some of our dead spots and be able to
1:50:35 have neighborhood parties easily if you
1:50:37 guys want to bond and you and you
1:50:41 want some action it needs to be
1:50:44 easily permittable instead of formidable
1:50:49 we have almost no direction
1:50:52 for parks in our title 18 code we have
1:50:57 exemptions
1:50:59 where they don't have to follow the code
1:51:03 and we also have exemptions
1:51:05 for our roads because they are
1:51:07 considered to be outside of title 18
1:51:11 because they are in the right of way and
1:51:13 this leads to a tremendous amount of
1:51:15 confusion because it's sort of different
1:51:17 rules for different people
1:51:19 and it perplexes the public and it does
1:51:21 not give our public works engineering
1:51:24 nor does it give
1:51:25 our parks department sort of definitive
1:51:28 guidelines
1:51:29 for what they need to do and it leaves
1:51:32 the public out there with i don't know
1:51:35 it's a road what process does a road
1:51:37 have i don't know it's a park what
1:51:39 process does a park have
1:51:43 so i think that these things need to be
1:51:46 brought together so that the public
1:51:48 knows a consistent pathway and all of
1:51:52 the city has the same set of rules to
1:51:55 follow and this will help alleviate a
1:51:58 lot of the confusion that we have had
1:52:01 with the centralist plan out at newport
1:52:04 where we have different sections of the
1:52:06 city who have to be totally aligned to
1:52:08 be successful and they have not been in
1:52:12 the past now
1:52:14 you all are thinking well that's not
1:52:16 wandering around in neighborhood and
1:52:18 that's not something that's missing well
1:52:20 welcome to my boring life this is what i
1:52:22 do i read code and then i follow these
1:52:25 things through in the evening so this is
1:52:28 part of my my city so it might seem
1:52:30 oblique and really dull to you all but i
1:52:33 think it will have
1:52:37 positive impact if we can do such things
1:52:39 thank you
1:52:50 is there anyone else who would like to
1:52:51 speak
1:52:54 so a hand come down if anyone would like
1:52:56 to speak raise your hand please
1:52:58 mary lynch would like to speak
1:53:01 mary you are a panelist
1:53:05 i found my hand
1:53:06 um i just want to build on what connie
1:53:08 was saying because in talking with parks
1:53:12 on the use of the new park there on the
1:53:14 south end of front street
1:53:16 kind of what i was saying that would be
1:53:18 a great place to have pop-ups to work
1:53:21 with the library to have you know
1:53:23 readings to have artists but
1:53:26 basically what parks was saying well we
1:53:28 don't know how we can use that park that
1:53:31 we also have a park we didn't get any
1:53:34 buildings or local
1:53:36 shops with the newport weight build out
1:53:39 but we have a little piece of land that
1:53:42 was dedicated to the park which there's
1:53:44 no funding for and no plan for and right
1:53:48 the developer has to keep it in grass
1:53:52 and is being used as a dog park by those
1:53:55 apartment people
1:53:56 that would be a great place to have
1:53:58 pop-up art fairs
1:54:00 um to have pop-up
1:54:03 theater
1:54:04 music that type of stuff
1:54:06 but how do you go about activating some
1:54:09 of that and that would you know help us
1:54:11 out here so with what connie was saying
1:54:13 is we need to make sure that in the
1:54:16 codes we can do that on some of the
1:54:19 parks and city land as well as some of
1:54:22 the private ones and i really think you
1:54:24 know a lot of our restaurants around
1:54:26 here they have their own food trucks so
1:54:28 they could by bringing it out to some of
1:54:30 these remote areas
1:54:32 they could advertise themselves by doing
1:54:35 it plus we could be then
1:54:37 with the incubator
1:54:40 we've got areas that the city could help
1:54:42 work with companies to incubate whatever
1:54:45 they want whether it be food or others
1:54:47 and let's use some of our houses that
1:54:50 are city-owned properties to do that
1:54:51 incubation and get going and then
1:54:54 hopefully they'll go and be part of the
1:54:56 new community or work with raleigh with
1:54:59 his build-out why can't he also the city
1:55:02 work with raleigh to have a building
1:55:03 over there that's an incubation facility
1:55:07 that's partnering with raleigh and um
1:55:10 with the city to to do those things that
1:55:14 has been brought up already
1:55:15 that's
1:55:16 my conclusion
1:55:28 great thank you
1:55:30 kristen do we have any more public
1:55:32 comments
1:55:38 there are no other hands raised but i'll
1:55:40 ask one more time is there anyone else
1:55:41 who would like to speak please raise
1:55:42 your hand
1:55:54 no there's no one else who would like to
1:55:56 speak
1:55:57 great thank you
1:55:59 all right moving on to the next item
1:56:02 thank you all for the great discussion
1:56:05 now i'd like to turn it over to kristen
1:56:06 to provide any city council updates
1:56:10 please
1:56:13 i do not have any city council updates i
1:56:15 will wait um until the next
1:56:18 topic
1:56:19 two topics to talk um i don't know if
1:56:21 minnie has any council updates many
1:56:24 nothing to report um the um
1:56:28 they're they're deep in the budget uh
1:56:31 systems
1:56:32 and discussions so um
1:56:35 in terms of development you know we've
1:56:37 looked at our fees
1:56:39 um and we're just making a nominal
1:56:41 increase
1:56:42 to reflect the consumer price index
1:56:45 so there was a more robust
1:56:48 analysis of the fees done in 2020 so at
1:56:51 this time it's a nominal fee increase as
1:56:53 far as development
1:56:55 fees go so that's all you know that's on
1:56:57 their agenda on november 1st and then
1:57:00 budget adoption on november 15th but
1:57:02 other than that um
1:57:04 there isn't any discussion there's
1:57:06 potential under uh on november 1st we'll
1:57:08 discuss the ad hoc committees process
1:57:11 under the good of the order we have that
1:57:13 discussion with the title 18 ad hoc
1:57:15 committee what their role is and how
1:57:17 um you know they participate in this
1:57:19 title 18 update but that's upcoming
1:57:22 meeting so that's all i have to say
1:57:25 i was wrong i do have one uh the
1:57:27 2021 comprehensive plan and zoning map
1:57:30 amendments are going to council on
1:57:31 november 9th for discussion
1:57:34 and potentially on december 6th for
1:57:37 action so if you all are interested
1:57:39 you can tune into that
1:57:42 great thank you minnie and thank you
1:57:44 kristen and finally kristen do you have
1:57:47 any business or announcements
1:57:49 it has nothing to do with the city
1:57:50 council
1:57:51 i had two things that i wanted to let
1:57:54 you know one is just a note for ppc
1:57:56 really quickly dc might want to hear the
1:57:57 rest but
1:57:58 um ppc i want you to take note that the
1:58:01 next three meetings are not on our
1:58:02 typical schedule
1:58:04 because november 11th the regular
1:58:06 meeting is a holiday november 25th is
1:58:09 thanksgiving and december 25th is
1:58:13 christmas so those three meetings would
1:58:15 have been canceled so we are having it
1:58:17 next week november 4th and then november
1:58:19 8th and then december 2nd i mean excuse
1:58:22 me november 4th november 18th and then
1:58:25 december 2nd so
1:58:27 mark it on your calendars that those are
1:58:28 not usual dates please
1:58:30 the other thing that i wanted to let you
1:58:32 know is that we applied for and received
1:58:33 a grant
1:58:35 um today
1:58:36 the grant is for
1:58:38 implementing some of our housing
1:58:40 strategy work plan
1:58:41 one one of those is potentially
1:58:44 expanding inclusionary zoning outside of
1:58:46 central issaquah
1:58:47 another is
1:58:49 looking at missing middle which would be
1:58:51 things like condominiums townhomes
1:58:53 cottage housing um
1:58:55 micro units and that kind of thing and
1:58:57 looking at where that's sort of a
1:58:59 directive from the state to start
1:59:00 including more of that so it's to look
1:59:02 and see where that might
1:59:03 fit in our city and the other one is to
1:59:05 try and get
1:59:07 more condominium development here which
1:59:09 also falls into missing middle
1:59:12 we don't know yet exactly which path
1:59:14 those are going to take but they will be
1:59:17 coming to you at some point
1:59:19 in the relatively near future
1:59:24 yeah yeah that's kudos to kristen for
1:59:27 putting in a lot of work on the
1:59:29 grant application and being successful
1:59:31 with that um so we'll be going to
1:59:33 council for the we went to council for
1:59:36 approval to apply and then
1:59:38 in order to accept it has to be accepted
1:59:40 by city council and the only thing i
1:59:43 would add to this is this is the housing
1:59:45 strategies program that the community
1:59:47 and the council have adopted so this
1:59:49 will be implementing existing strategies
1:59:52 that that have gone through that public
1:59:53 vetting out process but now it's time to
1:59:56 to to implement them
2:00:00 right
2:00:05 all right well i'm going to open it up
2:00:06 one last time for any of our
2:00:08 commissioners staff for the good of the
2:00:10 order does anyone like to comment
2:00:16 commissioner milligan
2:00:19 slow on the keyboard i'm sorry i just
2:00:21 wanted to revisit the questions three
2:00:23 and four
2:00:25 as i didn't quite get where where we
2:00:27 were going with those when they were
2:00:28 going to come back
2:00:30 and and to say for our audience what it
2:00:32 is you're talking about questions three
2:00:33 and four people aren't always looking at
2:00:35 the piece of paper
2:00:36 can you sure
2:00:38 i think
2:00:39 i we touched him in the beginning um i
2:00:42 think we're figuring out a different
2:00:43 process for it um and to give it the the
2:00:47 attention it deserves so
2:00:49 um we'll be back we don't know at this
2:00:51 point what that process looks like but
2:00:53 we will be shaping it up uh to make it
2:00:56 more robust uh then just fold it in
2:01:00 currently the way it's set up so we'll
2:01:02 we'll have more information for you and
2:01:04 and to be clear so
2:01:06 questions three and four had to do with
2:01:08 something called house build 1220
2:01:10 and the state this past summer enacted a
2:01:13 bill that requires all cities to allow
2:01:18 for emergency for permanent for
2:01:20 permanent um
2:01:22 affordable sort of housing which we do
2:01:25 um transitional housing which we do we
2:01:27 need those need to be a little clear in
2:01:29 the code but we do both of those but
2:01:30 also emergency housing and emergency
2:01:32 shelters which currently our code is
2:01:34 silent on so that's something that needs
2:01:36 to be addressed and like as many said
2:01:38 that will
2:01:39 a different path
2:01:42 find it maybe too big to be involved to
2:01:43 be part of this discussion
2:01:48 i think that was a wise choice
2:01:52 so i wanna
2:01:54 um is there any further comment for the
2:01:56 good of the order
2:02:00 okay well i just wanna say on my behalf
2:02:03 i want to thank all the people that made
2:02:05 public comments i want to thank my
2:02:07 colleagues on the planning policy
2:02:08 commission
2:02:10 and i'd also like to thank our wonderful
2:02:11 city staff
2:02:12 lucy minnie and kristen
2:02:15 and finally i want to say thank you to
2:02:18 our friends development commission
2:02:20 i know tonight is your guys's night off
2:02:23 so you guys coming into our house and uh
2:02:26 providing just
2:02:28 a great discussion
2:02:29 it's always
2:02:30 enjoyable when we get to
2:02:32 hang out with one another
2:02:34 and i know all of us really appreciate
2:02:38 there being no further business
2:02:41 i adjourn this meeting of the planning
2:02:43 policy commission on the october 28th at
2:02:46 8 31.
2:02:47 thank you
2:02:50 thank you
2:02:51 thank you jason

Attendance

Council / Members (6)
Jason Voiss, Vice Chair Michael Brennan
Joy Lewis Kevin Price
Matt Monahan Richard Sanford
Nina Milligan Richard Sowa
Sara Bader Patty Dillon
Richard Zaragoza, Alternate Brooke Shore
Excused
Ron Faul Jon Ikeda
Mel Morgan
Christen Leeson, Senior Planner
Lucy Sloman, Land Dev. Manager
Minnie Dhaliwal, Director, CP&D
Audience commenters (1)
Connie Marsh

Recommendations & actions (1)

Sentences extracted from the narrative containing words like recommended, requested, directed, moved, or approved. Best-effort — verify against the full minutes for context.

  • She explained that the scope of the Title 18 update is not to alter policies that are already in the City’s adopted plans, including changes in zoning.