Letter to the Editor: Rezone plan is too rushed, too big
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
To the Editor:
Citizens of Shoreline are getting understandably alarmed about the proposed Light Rail rezones.
The Shoreline Preservation Society is a state non-profit working to alert citizens to the magnitude of these proposals, effectively be involved, and give their input.
Groups of 70, 80 or 90 at a time are regularly turning out for City meetings to comment.
And we urge more to do the same and send comment letters.
The proposals for massive, unprecedented rezones are generating anxiety, legitimate questions and precious few answers from Council or City staff. Citizens want to know:
• What will truly be the environmental impact on our community?
• How will these rezones affect our ability to sell our homes, remodel them or obtain mortgages?
• Why are we rushing this?
Though Light Rail is coming in 2023 it should not naturally lead to these speculative development proposals. Citizens have a right to be upset when they feel they are ignored. They may be displaced by the City they’ve invested in, raised families in, voted in and called home for decades, just to accommodate unknown future imaginary residents now.
The City process for citizens’ involvement is terribly confusing. Though some notices have been posted, most were in Currents magazine and unnoticed by those most affected.
The dates for citizen comment and public hearings are changing constantly. One entire Planning Commission meeting recording was lost at which the 145th Station Area was discussed.
It is clear that this plan is too rushed, too big, and instead of providing certainty, it is creating nothing but confusion for most residents and even developers.
The Council needs to speak out for a more rational, scaled back plan and for sanity in our Community! These rezones are wrong for Shoreline and wrong for the environment. Save Shoreline’s Neighborhoods!
Janet Way
Shoreline
Posts
5 comments:
Right on!! Thanks for stating this very positive commentary about preserving Shoreline. The people who live near these areas deserve much more consideration for all the reasons stated. The changes also will effect all of us, not just those living nearest the areas. These two changes, and the Point Wells development on the west side, will create a new Shoreline, a much different environment than what the present residents know. Will these changes be what the residents want, or just what the city government and developers want? I agree with Janet Way, slow down and plan better. Glenn Cannon
Please send your comments to the City Council and Planning Commission
There are 7 people who are on the city council who have been elected to represent and respect the wishes of the citizens of Shoreline. When people ask me why they don't get to vote on this proposal, my response is they get to vote for a city council.3 members of the Council are up for reelection this November. Council member Eggen has consistently opposed these proposals. Council members Salomon and Mc Connell will put themselves on record as supporting the citizens of our city or the Development community. Remember how they vote. Hold them accountable.
Despite the Shoreline City Council saying that they have taken every step to inform the citizens of Shoreline, I just heard about plans to rezone from a man walking door-to-door in time to attend my first meeting February 9th. I had several questions and no opportunity to ask them. Now, our next meeting will be Feb. 23rd for the Council to vote on the FINAL EIS! How absurd, the community is being blindsided and railroaded. I am glad there may be a couple of voices on the Council who 'may' vote on behalf of those who elected them, but it is not enough to instill confidence regarding my own future retirement in Shoreline. My husband and I have raised our family in our Shoreline rambler and been here for 40 years. We have been improving our home with plans to live our retirement years here and have taken the steps to prepare. Rambler = no stairs. I wish the City of Shoreline would do the same - long-term planning on BEHALF of the community.
Anticipate needs and plan for our lives, schools, streets, crime, rodents, water supply, traffic funnels, the underground stream that flows to Ronald Bog and the extreme burden that will be placed upon all of our public parks, utilities and services. Who will pay to build another school? Who will pay to expand the police and fire departments? Who will pay the expand power, water, sewer lines and covering ditches?
I don't speak for anyone but myself, and I understand and support the need for Light Rail. I do, however, feel that the people who chose to step forward and seek election to the City Council should have known that they would be expected to seek input and opinions to prepare themselves to represent us. This is not an easy job, this is a diverse community but our citizens all have one thing in common - they chose to live in Shoreline. I believe the reasons for choosing to live here are varied but share many commonalities: single family homes, lot sizes, trees, schools, and trees again, to name a few. It is the responsibility of the Council to make themselves and their meeting times ABUNDANTLY available.
My questions and requests of the City Council:
1. Save my neighborhood, protect the future of our homeowners, save my trees and sunlight.
2. Tell me how my home value and property taxes will be affected - and whether I will be able to afford to retire and die here.
3. Slow down! Comply with the MINIMUM demands from the Planning Commission, then re-assess our position. Your own words were that nothing will happen quickly. I might add a qualifier to that - UNLESS THERE IS MONEY TO BE MADE!
4. Why did you give us 6 MAPS to analyze, trying figure out which one the citizens on the City Council will choose to support. We don't even know which map you are seriously considering.
5. Consider the landscape design work done at the University of Oregon and UC Irvine. They completed projects at each school and left them without sidewalks for one year, during which time they observed where the foot traffic created paths in the grass. THEN they built what was needed, WHERE it was needed based upon the needs of their population. A novel idea, right?
6. I stayed quiet during the Aurora Project, to my shame. The end result is that I find it difficult to trust the "leadership" in Shoreline. You closed long-standing businesses, cost people their income, bulldozed buildings and replaced them with GRASS!! Really? Explain that to those who lost their jobs and income. You insisted we call it "Town Center", which it is not. It never has been and can never be. It is State Highway 99, one of the main North/South highways from Canada to Oregon. You said you wanted to fashion it after University Village, upscale shopping and people drinking coffee, laughing in the sun and strolling around our Town Center. We don't have a Town Center unless you are referring to a geographic center point.
7. Pointing out that we do NOT have a Town Center begs the question why we would be so compelled to bridge the area from 10th NE (or 15th NE - still left unclear at our community information meeting) to where 185th intersects with Hwy 99.
8 Since Sound Transit will not "mitigate" from the Light Rail Station to the Town Center aka 185th & Hwy 99 - what additional huge expenses will you be passing on to the "little people" of the Central Shoreline Corridor. Central Corridor has the highest number of low income households in Shoreline, as measured by school lunch subsidies. This means that low-income seniors are not even considered in these numbers. You have unfairly targeted those least able to defend themselves.
9. What measure will you take to protect us from predatory, profit-driven developers? Please refer to the promises made when Ballinger Commons apartments were built on the last 84 acres of untouched, virgin land in King County. Water retention ponds with a 20-year bond to maintain them and keep from flooding 205th and Lake Ballinger. 20 years has passed, so who addresses future problems? We should have thought of that and pressed Lincoln Properties to do more. They were approved to build more units than they actually ended up building because they were building in a "Preferred Enrollment School District". No one even checked. My children were attending the nearest school, Echo Lake, where music classes were held on the lunchroom stage because there was not space available anywhere in the school.
I apologize for the rambling message but I have not been afforded another means to communicate my concerns, input and questions.
Respectfully,
Cheryl Anderson
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