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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Committees - Planning and Economic Development Committee - 01/02/1991 CITY CF' md CITY COUNCIL PLANNING COMMITTEE January 2, 1991 4:30 PM Committee Members Present Planning Staff Leona Orr Lauri Anderson Judy Woods, President Lin Ball Christi Houser Jim Harris Margaret Porter Carol Proud Molly Rice Fred Satterstrom Janet Shull Other City Staff Other Guests Gary Gill Charlie Kiefer Roger Lubovich Linda Van Nest Alana McIalwain Linda Martinez Carol Morris SEVERE WEATHER SHELTER FOR HOMELESS (Lin Ball) Senior Planner Ms. Lin Ball reported that on December 4, 1990 the City Council approved Resolution No. 1266, which outlined the City's commitment to respond to the need for emergency severe weather shelter for the homeless in Kent. In trying to put the program together, the two key things were: 1. Tying down a City facility to have a shelter for the men. 2 . Finding an agency to provide for shelter services. Ms. Ball was happy to report that a City facility has been tied down for the shelter. There is a meeting room in the library that can be used. The Fire Department has looked at it and approved it for use. She also reported that Human Services Commission and City Staff are very close in tying down an agency to provide the services. Even though the Red Cross and the Salvation Army were interested, Catholic Community Services (CCS) was the only agency who turned in a proposal. They stated in the proposal that in order to have professional trained staff available, they could not do the shelter on an intermittent night basis, but rather on an every night basis over a specific period of time. This will cost more money 1 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2 , 1991 but, the CCS plans to acquire additional money from the County. This proposal will be going to a special Human Services Commission meeting on Thursday, January 3, 1991 between 3-5 p.m. Originally the meeting was to occur on Friday, December 28, 1990, but due to the inclement weather this meeting was canceled. Ms. Ball explained the main reason that this issue was brought to the Committee was to amend Section 1 of Resolution No. 1266 to read as follows: The city of Kent shall declare an "emergency severe weather shelter crisis" during the winter months of the year, being generally the period of January-March and October-December of each year. This revision is necessary since it is impossible to operate the shelter on an intermittent night basis. It is recommended that this modified resolution be approved and forwarded to full council for their approval at the January 15, 1991 meeting. Council President Judy Woods made the MOTION and Councilwomen Leona Orr SECONDED that the Planning Committee take the modified Resolution No. 1266 to full council on January 15, 1991. GROUP HOMES CLASS III (LAW DEPARTMENT) City Attorney Roger Lubovich recapped what had been discussed at the last few meetings on this issue. Mr. Lubovich also outlined the contents of the two draft ordinances, which will implement a Group homes registration procedure and amend the Kent Zoning Code. The draft zoning ordinance contains modifications to Class I, II and III definitions recommended by the Law Department. The definition of Class I Group Homes was modified to include former drug addicts and recovering alcoholics as necessitated by recent interpretations of the Federal Fair Housing Law. Mr. Lubovich explained further that the definitions of Class II and III were modified so that all adult work release facilities will be defined as Class III and Group Homes for juvenile offenders will be defined as Class II. The Planning Director is given the authority to determine that a juvenile Group Home should be treated as Class III if the residents have histories of violent crimes. There was concern and discussion on Group Homes Class III regarding separation from residential districts. Council members expressed concern that Class III Group Homes should be separated from all residential land uses irrespective of the zoning district they are in. City Attorney Lubovich and Attorney Carol Morris explained that according to the Planning Department research, separation of 1000 feet from all existing residential land uses 2 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2 , 1991 would result in no opportunity to site a Class III Group Home in the City, and that this would be an illegal action. Attorney Carol Morris mentioned that a number of things are considered prior to a final decision on a Group home site, such as the Hearing Examiner having the flexibility to go through the general conditional use permit criteria on an approval of a Group home. Consideration is given to the separation and dispersion requirements, and a recommendation can be made by the Planning Director as different situations occur. Since this item has been recommended and approved previously, no action was required at this meeting. Draft ordinances incorporating modifications recommended by the Law Department will be presented for recommendation of approval to full council at tonight's January 2 , 1991 City Council meeting in a Public Hearing. HISTORICAL PRESERVATION REPORT (M. Rice) Linda Van Nest, president of the White River Valley Historical Society and a member of the Committee, was at the meeting to express her support of the report presented. Ms. Van Nest said that she felt that the committee did this project right. An important point she expressed was a historical preservation program consists of historic buildings, sites, and landscapes, which add quality and character to our City. She feels this is an excellent plan and recommended that we go ahead with the plan proposed in the report. Senior Planner Lauri Anderson explained the action needed from the Planning Committee is approval or acceptance of the report, which sends this into the next Phase before it goes to the full council. This would be brought back to the Planning Committee with a draft interlocal and local ordinance with King County. Planner Molly Rice gave a brief background of the Historic Preservation Committee and an overview of the report. Ms. Rice went over a brief history summary from the report that was in your agenda packet. There has been interest on this subject since the 1920 's. On the national level, it started out with people just concerned with specific properties such as some kind of historic aspect, an important person that had lived at some specific site, or some battle was fought, or something real specific in our history. It has evolved more now into architectural kinds of issues and landscape issues, not just related to someone who was famous that lived somewhere but is historical because its representative of a time or a type of industry such as agriculture or farms. She said this consequently this evolved into a much more comprehensive type of system. 3 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2, 1991 She reported that a number of significant properties have been identified in the City of Kent as having unique features. When the City addressed the historic issues in their Comprehensive Plan, which was adopted in 1976, they had policy statements that encouraged historic preservation and supported historic preservation efforts, but there was not actually a program set up at that time. In 1978, inventories were done with 125 properties identified at that time of having some significant value historically. In 1978, Ms. Rice stated the City next appointed a committee, which discussed what kind of plan to adopt to preserve these historic resources. This committee basically discussed the same issues back then as the Committee formed this last Fall. The current Committee came up with similar types of recommendations and plans. The previous committee's recommendation was that the City pursue an interlocal agreement with King County. At that time, King County's interlocal agreement had some problems with how they had proposed to deal with resources. The City has been waiting for King County to work out their interlocal agreement and to change some things, such as control issues etc. This brings us up to the present day. The current Committee consisted of representatives with a wide range of interests. One representative was from Sabey Corporation. They have been involved in renovating older industrial buildings and are familiar with the economic impacts on development. Other members consisted of a Washington State Master Gardener, a couple of people who owned historic residences in Kent, and one person on the King County Landmark Preservation Board. The committee met during the Fall for about eleven weeks and went through a lot of material very quickly. Everyone on the committee had an expressed interest in historic preservation, so this made it easier for the committee. Two issues initially discussed that needed to be decided before anything else was discussed was as follows: 1. The purpose of historic preservation in the City. 2. What type of implementation that was going to be used. Ms. Rice recapped the committee's report. Chapter One presents the background information which was provided to the Committee regarding the history of historic preservation in the City and its interrelationship with both the Downtown Plan and the Comprehensive Plan. Chapter Two outlines the Committee' s discussion process and presents their recommendations. Chapter Three summarized the Committee's conclusions and presents recommendations for future action. Two potential methods for implementation were considered--the Certified Local Government and King County Interlocal Agreement processes. The Committee 4 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2 , 1991 voted to recommend that the City coordinate an Interlocal Agreement with King County based on four(4) factors as outlined in the report. Senior Planner Lauri Anderson reported on the Components of the Draft Interlocal Agreement. Basically, the Committee's recommendation was that the City should try to enter into an interlocal agreement with King County, which would allow the King County Landmarks Commission to designate sites within the City limits. The City then would be responsible for protecting or actually reviewing development proposals from people who might want to change, alter, demolish, etc. those designated properties. So it would be a sharing of the work load in our local agreement with King County and then we would have to have a local ordinance that would address essentially building permit review. We would be looking at all actions that might effect significant features of property but the City would take the responsibility for enforcing the preservation and protection of those structures that the County had designated for us. Once the Committee decided to go with an interlocal agreement, a draft of that interlocal agreement is at the back of the report. The Committee went through that draft interlocal agreement and picked out areas that they felt uncomfortable with. Some of the points that were made specifically start on page 14 (six items were listed) of the report under the title, Local Jurisdiction Responsibilities. Senior Planer Anderson mentioned the action needed is for the Planning Committee's acceptance of the report and direction to staff to begin this process of negotiation with King County in the drafting of the local ordinance to set up the Historic Review Committee. At the point that this is finished, this item would come back to the Planning Committee and then ask for further direction as to whether the Committee would take it on to City Council. Council President Judy Woods made the MOTION with a change in the wording to say accept the report and Christi Houser SECONDED it. The MOTION carried. SERVICE AGREEMENT FOR GROWTH MANAGEMENT (L. Anderson) Before Senior Planner Lauri Anderson explained this issue, Planning Director James P. Harris first commented on Page 3 of the agreement. He stated that some things still need to be worked out with reference to the role of King County Planning Directors Association, as there is no such formal Association. Senior Planner Anderson explained that Resolution No. 1263 was adopted October 16, 1990 by the City Council, which said the Council wanted to accept the GMA grant funds and agreed to work cooperatively with the County to take them. The Service Agreement that was included in your packet really 5 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2, 1991 establishes the process for how the money is handled. This is just the next step in getting that process formalized so we can receive $62,835 in GMA funding. The MOTION was made to accept this Service Agreement by Council President Judy Woods and SECONDED by Christi Houser. The MOTION carried. ADDED ITEM - KENT SPRINGS TRANSMISSION (ENV-88-28) (C. Kiefer) Mr. Charles Kiefer attended the meeting in reference to a request for documentation on proof of posting on the Kent Springs Transmission ENV-88-28 project. Mr. Kiefer asked Mr. James P. Harris if he had received a handwritten letter dated December 26, 1990. Mr. Harris stated the letter was received. Mr. Harris explained to the Council the background on this issue. This same request was asked in the past in a public hearing at a City Council meeting and an answer was given to Mr. Kiefer at that time. What the Planning Department was not doing at that time, which was 1988 for this project, was documenting that we were going out and posting. Therefore, the Council asked that the Planning Department staff to come up with a better system to figure out whether or not posting occurred so the public could find out if we did post. The Planning Department came back to the Planning Committee in June 5, 1990 for the modification of this procedure. Mr. Harris said we worked through the City attorney's office for an affidavit so the person that posts said, "I so and so •posted on this date" , and the Planning Director had a statement below that line that said, "I affirm that the posting took place on the date mentioned above" , and the Planning Director signed his name. In 1988, we were not doing this. Sometimes in the record, it was marked that it was posted and sometimes it was not. The Planning Department did keep a record as to whether it was notified in the newspaper. Anything since June of 1990, we do have a record of posting. Mr. Kiefer asked Senior Planner Carol Proud if there is an ordinance adopting SEPA rules? Ms. Proud said yes to the question. She said we have adopted KCC 12 . 12A.410, which specifies our requirements of SEPA. All it says is that you shall post and shall publish in the newspaper. She also confirmed that posting did occur because it was the policy of the Department but the procedure internally was never too documented in any kind of affidavit sort of way. Ms. Proud stated that everything that was sent to Mr. Kiefer in April 1990 would be the same now, which is the newspaper affidavit advertisement and a copy of the file. Mr. Kiefer stated he still was having a hard time believing this project was posted. 6 Planning Department City Council Planning Committee January 2 , 1991 Council President Judy Woods stated that Mr. Kiefer asked many questions in the past and we tried to do something from that point to the future. She said we responded to Mr. Kiefer's concern and the Council did it because Mr.Kiefer asked. Unfortunately, we cannot go into the past and make it right, but for six months we are now documenting the posting and we will do it for evermore. Mr. Harris stated that he does not want to continue to go over and over this issue again. He said that when he answered the original question as to will he rescind the DNS, Mr. Harris said he will not rescind it. Prior to Mr. Kiefer's direct question about posting, Mr. Harris said we posted even though we do not have a record of it and that's the end of that. Mr. Harris said we cannot every three or four months open this back up again and have the same questions asked. At the time, Council President Judy Woods stated that the opinion of our Legal Department was that we had done things correctly. This is all we can do. With the request by Mr. Kiefer at the meeting, Mr. Harris did state the Planning Department will respond to Mr. Kiefer's letter of December 26, 1990 in writing. ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at 5: 58 p.m. 7