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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Committees - Economic and Community Development - 07/11/2022 Page 1 of 5 Pending Approval Economic and Community Development Committee CC ECDC Regular Meeting Minutes July 11, 2022 Date: July 11, 2022 Time: 4:00 p.m. Place: Chambers Members: Toni Troutner, Committee Chair Marli Larimer, Councilmember Zandria Michaud, Councilmember Agenda: 1. Call to Order 4:00 p.m. 2. Roll Call Attendee Name Title Status Arrived Toni Troutner Committee Chair Present Marli Larimer Councilmember Present Zandria Michaud Councilmember Present 3. Agenda Approval 4. Business A. Approval of Minutes 1. Approval of Minutes dated June 13, 2022 MOTION: Move to approve the Minutes dated June 13, 2022 RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS] MOVER: Marli Larimer, Councilmember SECONDER: Zandria Michaud, Councilmember AYES: Troutner, Larimer, Michaud B. Appointment to Public Facilities District Board - Appoint As explained by Kurt Hanson, the accessoShoware Center was originally constructed and financed through a partnership between the City and the Public Facilities District (PFD). The PFD was primarily established to assist in financing the construction of the accessoShoware Center, but remain active to advise on decisions related to the ongoing maintenance and operations of the facility. The Board consists of 5 members, three of whom must be appointed based on a recommendation from a local booster organization. The other two positions don't need to meet this criteria, but the position which is the Economic and Community Development Committee CC ECDC Regular Meeting Minutes July 11, 2022 Kent, Washington Page 2 of 5 subject of today's action (the one to be vacated by Randall Smith, who will not be eligible to continue due to term limits) is one of those which does. The City conducted an extensive recruitment campaign that included posting to the City’s website, social media, emailing all applicants to other boards and commissions and emailing the City’s community based organizations. One application was received. The City reached out to the Kent Downtown Partnership and Kent Chamber of Commerce seeking a recommendation. The Kent Downtown Partnership recommended Dillon Stearns, Chief Financial Officer at Davis Door Service located in downtown Kent, and the Kent Chamber of Commerce supported that recommendation. The motion was passed by unanimous vote and moves to the consent calendar of the full council. MOTION: I move to appoint Dillon Stearns to Position 3 of the Public Facilities District Board for an initial four-year term starting on September 1, 2022 and ending August 31, 2026. RESULT: MOTION PASSES [UNANIMOUS] Next: 7/19/2022 7:00 PM MOVER: Zandria Michaud, Councilmember SECONDER: Marli Larimer, Councilmember AYES: Troutner, Larimer, Michaud C. Rental Housing Inspection Program Update Erin George introduces Maureen McCaughan, who was hired back in December is presenting via zoom. Maureen has worked previously for the city in a variety of rolls and is long time resident of Kent, and her grandfather has been a member of the Kent City Council. City Council adopted an ordinance creating the Rental Housing Inspection Program (RHIP) in spring 2018, in response to health and safety concerns from tenants. The program was launched later that year after hiring one staff member to coordinate the program and conducting outreach to landlords and tenants. The city was divided into three sectors to make the workload manageable: NE Hill, West Hill/West Valley, and SE Hill. 20% of multi-family rental units are inspected every 3 years, utilizing private inspectors from an approved list and a city-created health and safety checklist. Working with landlords in all three sectors, over 2,800 units have been inspected and hundreds of important repairs have been made. the COVID-19 pandemic ccreated many delays and challenges, but in providing allowances for that, tenants’ health and safety was carefully balanced with landlord Economic and Community Development Committee CC ECDC Regular Meeting Minutes July 11, 2022 Kent, Washington Page 3 of 5 financial challenges during this unprecedented time. Staff will provide new data and other updates since its last presentation in November. By far the most common deficiencies involve smoke detectors (disabled by tenant, no batteries, etc.) and missing or past date fire extinguishers. Next most common are related to water heaters installed without permits and/or improperly installed water heaters, and plumbing leaks which frequently cause mold issues - a significant health concern. Common concerns related to the exterior of the buildings involve condition of roofs not properly flashed, gutters in poor repair and then broken or missing stair rails, both external for walk up buildings and internal where there are townhouse style units. Once noticed, landlords must address these problems or run the risk of having their business licenses held until in compliance. Other issues found really are tenant caused, such as fire code violations created by blocking egress points with furniture or other belongings, and landlords/managers must take steps to inform tenants of rules and recommendations tenants must follow to ensure safe occupancy of living spaces. With the first live inspector training sessions just completed at the end of June, the next steps for RHIP are as follows: 2022: Continue working with SE Hill landlords to achieve compliance; follow up with properties that have failed to schedule an inspection; re-notify 33 non responsive properties, prior to taking code enforcement action. 2023: Return to NE Hill Sector and select a unique set of units equivalent to 20% of inventory; use third party software for this cycle while continuing to work with IT on a custom system to integrate RHIP data into the Amanda system. 2024-2026: Revisit West/Hill Valley units, and consider whether splitting this wide ranging district in half in light of its recent significant growth. Chair Troutner wants to know if any units have been discovered to be so unsafe that people were forced to vacate. Ms. McCaughan reports that while a few landlords have seemed to drag their feet on needed repairs, no conditions have risen to the level of lfe safety issues requiring vacation of a unit. D. Preliminary Analysis: New Tax Tool for Housing; General Update Chief Economic Development Officer Bill Ellis provides an engaging explanation of Tax Increment Financing and its potential uses by playing a Economic and Community Development Committee CC ECDC Regular Meeting Minutes July 11, 2022 Kent, Washington Page 4 of 5 video produced by our own multi-media department, which can be seen here https://wedaonline.org/tif-for-jobs/https://youtu.be/yH4uIBcj-Y0. Briefly, TIF captures property taxes generated from the increase in assessed valuation on the site that results from private development which follows infrastructure investments. The City is interested in and planning to utilize this newly available tool which has been successful in many other cities and regions of the country. Kent plans to deploy it primarily to finance the infrastructure needed to support a broad assortment of housing types. The process of analysis and creating a TIF district that will realize maximum gain takes some time so it is unlikely it will be utilized for any projects until at least 2023. Examples of the types of projects TiF can fund: sidewalks, stormwater, brownfields mitigation, rehabilitation projects to preserve affordable housing, historic preservation measures to create historic and more valuable residential or commercial districts. There are guard rails in place which make careful choosing imperative. No more than two active increment areas per sponsoring jurisdiction will be allowed and they may not overlap. Increment areas may not total more than $200 million in assessed valuation, or more than 20% of the total assessed valuation of the sponsoring jurisdiction, whichever is less. Additional public areas may not be added nor boundaries adjusted once an increment area has been adopted. A few areas of Kent are being considered. One is the corridor along central between Smith and James which includes the coming sounder garage the cold storage facility, an old gas station, school district property and potentially abandoned right of way. These environs feature flexible favorable zoning for dense high impact development, but also Mill Creek which makes the whole corridor a flood plain and will require extensive infrastructure investment to realize its potential. Another area is the Canyon Ridge Shopping Center North quadrant, a former grocery box development and its adjacent parking field. It recently came back on the market at a greatly reduced price from where it had been marketed and it is easy to imagine that this is an area that would tolerate extensive redevelopment and reinvestment gracefully. Additional reasons to proceed with care include the need for a good deal of collaboration between departments in the city, other stakeholders such as utility and transportation providers, property owners, etc. and the final piece is that there must be developers willing the make the investments once appropriate infrastructure or environmental concerns are addressed. Economic and Community Development Committee CC ECDC Regular Meeting Minutes July 11, 2022 Kent, Washington Page 5 of 5 TIF In Washington state is carefully designed to address the "but for" elements that can sideline ambitious redevelopment plans in communities of any size. As talk concludes Councilmember Larimer asks Bill for good and bad examples of TIF utilization. Bill mentions that Memphis, used TIF $ to finance the building of a giant glass pyramid on its riverfront property, to house a gaming casino, but also eventually a bass pro shop went in there too, and in that case, the money just went right to the developer and there was really no thought given to whether that was an optimal outcome for that area. A good example of TIF usage occurred when an older section of Eugene's downtown that had been struggling, was set up to support new student housing along with amenities and services attractive to both student residents and the community at large. Kent's interest are directed toward an emphasis on redevelopment with housing and residential and commercial affordability as a core goal, and Econ Dev staff are networking with a variety of groups who have ties to Kent and experience in these areas, so there is more news coming on this front probably within six months. 5. Adjournment 4:53 p.m. Rhonda Bylin Committee Secretary