May 18 Council meeting

CM Adman was absent when the meeting began. 

Several staff members are leaving, including Stephanie Lucash to take a job as City Administrator for Edmonds. 

Real estate purchase: Savage Moose

Mayor Herbig pulled the purchase of the Savage Moose property off of the consent agenda; he does not believe that we should be purchasing it.  Council heard Staff’s recommendation for this in closed session.  CM Loutsis moved to approve the purchase; CM Culver seconded.  The motion passed 5-1 with Mayor Herbig opposed. 

[clarification from Cait:  This is not a done deal, this is just authorizing the City to enter into a Purchase and Sale agreement for the property so that they can do more due diligence. The purpose of the acquisition is for a salmon culvert project, and the City expects King County to pay roughly 75% of the roughly $2m purchase price.  The Moose will remain for now.] 

Public hearing for the TOD parcels along Swamp Creek. 

Debbie Bent briefly presented. These parcels were initially exempted from the TOD for a channel study; when that was complete, they took recommendations on how best to treat them.  These are shorelines of the state, so the new WDFW guidelines for stream buffers do not apply.  The exemption is expiring, and staff wants to come back with a draft proposal in June, and then an ordinance.  They are requesting a six-month extension to continue the exemption until they’re able to put a permanent policy in place. 

CM Culver made a motion to adopt the ordinance; DM Sasson seconded.  Ordinance adopted unanimously. 

Public Safety Enhancement Sales Tax

New .01% public safety sales tax.  DM Sasson moved; CM Loutsis seconded.  

CM Marshall said that this is a regressive sales tax for an essential service and we need to be looking at our budget. 

CM O’Cain said that being mindful of the impacts on our community and affordability, she will be voting no. 

CM Culver said that he would be voting no because sales taxes are more regressive than property taxes.  He said that “we have a study underway that’s going to illuminate some things for us.”

Mayor Herbig is similarly opposed to raising sales tax, but the State has given cities limited options in how we can address our budget. This is just one piece of the things that we have to do in order to get our budget in line.  We have bad options, but he will support even though he’s opposed to raising sales tax. 

DM Sasson said that Council is committed to lobbying Olympia for better options for budget, and a tax system that is not regressive. 

Motion carried 4-2; CM Culver and CM O’Cain opposed. 

Park Impact Fees (PIF)

Presented by Debbie Bent, Todd Hall and Tom Beckwith (consultant).  This was a continuation of the March discussion, with updated fees to reflect State law.  Staff recommended they select the methodology based on square footage since it’s the easiest to understand and implement. Tom Beckwith explained four separate methodologies of calculating the capacity; value of park land, assessor’s data, capital facilities divided by population increase, and growth capacity. The State allows for the charge to be based on bedrooms or on square footage.  Bedrooms is more precise, since as you increase the number of bedrooms, you increase the number of people in the structure.  The correlation between square footage and household size is less direct, and the data that we have is not as good. Beckwith recommended using the assessor’s value, and charging between 70 and 90% of the impact. 

Mayor Herbig asked how you suss out new capacity vs. undeserving current residents.  Beckwith said the PIF is just to accommodate new capacity; adding additional or modifying existing capacity so the parks can handle more usage. Mayor Herbig asked staff to put something together that makes this clearer.  He is torn because looking at charts, the square footage calculation seems to be higher than when we’re looking at the bedroom calculation. He leans towards supporting the staff recommendation, including charging at 70% - we need new construction to pay for the impact, but we don’t need to pile on. 

DM Sasson expressed a preference for square footage and assessor’s value calculations.  She asked about the percentage charge and how much it impacts the budget.  Beckwith said that the sources for parks are impact fees, REET and a levy; they all need to balance out, but that can be done in a number of ways. DM Sasson is on the square footage approach, because the large houses have a small number of bedrooms. She supports assessed value, 75-80%, with exemptions for manufactured and middle housing.

CM Loutsis concurs with DM Sasson, re: square footage, and lower percentage only considering impact fees like these are passed through and will make housing less affordable.  He thinks in a 75-80% range. 

CM Marshall said he likes the bedroom approach, especially given the data on inefficiencies of square footage. Favors something higher than 70%; would like 80%. 

CM Culver said that he heard from the planning commission that the community is satisfied with parks.  He asks how much we’ve been forfeiting by not charging more and how many more projects we could have done. He calculated that we’re forfeiting $900k a year in parks fees, which he believes is taxpayer dollars subsidizing market-rate housing instead of affordable housing. He doesn’t see a dilemma here. He wants exemptions for some missing-middle housing and mobile home communities.  He is “team bedroom” and would like 90% or higher.

CM O’Cain expressed a continued desire to be mindful of affordability.  She prefers the square footage approach at 70%. 

Staff Reports

Revenue measure: next discussion June 15th.  Staff is working on a community page with information. 

Council Reports

CM O’Cain talked about a presentation at Kenmore Community Club about trust in government, and the need to build a community that bridges the divide of differing views. Wants Council to look at ways of engaging the community. We are more than our political opinions. 

CM Loutsis talked about the Public Issues Committee meeting for Sound Cities and three issues they discussed at the last meeting:  Housing Development Consortium considering levy lid lift/ballot measure for affordable housing, they amended a letter on proposed sewer rate, and they adopted a strong statement to Sound Transit to maintain their commitment to voters (light rail, ST3). 

CM Adman was at a joint meeting of Regional Fire Authority and Bothell about Bothell joining. 

CM Sasson reminded everyone of the NUHSA Housing for Everyone lunch and learn at 1pm Wednesday.