Slog

Notice of the meeting was in Sally Clark's newsletter mailed on August 14th:

Updating our Neighborhood Plans

Over the course of this year I’ve worked with the Department of Neighborhoods (DON), the Department of Planning and Development (DPD), the Office of Policy Management and the Mayor’s Office on how to best create an effective update process for Seattle 38 neighborhood plans. We started in February with an approach from the Executive side of the shop that would have divided the city into six sectors for the purpose of prioritizing the order of updates. Things have changed since.

Here’s a brief summary:

We’ve added a Neighborhood Plan Advisory Committee (NPAC). This is very important to me as way to make sure neighborhoods guide every aspect of the updates. Similar to the group that advised on the Neighborhood Plan creation process in the 1990’s, NPAC would serve as an advisory body throughout the update process. NPAC would help design outreach strategies to underrepresented communities, provide advice, and help develop implementation strategies once plans are adopted. Each of the 13 neighborhood District Councils would appoint a representative, joined by two members of the Planning Commission and seven at-large appointments from the Mayor and City Council.

Immediately this fall a city-wide plan and planning area status review will commence. This is a triage and reporting phase designed to gather all types of information that will essentially create a snapshot of where a neighborhood is right now compared to 10 years ago, including demographic shifts, zoning, housing units and affordability, transportation upgrades in the past 10 years, new parks, and a neighborhood plan implementation report. The status reports should help neighborhood advocates and the city recognize gaps and inform decisions about whether to update a particular plan.

The order of plan updates has been an ongoing debate. While the triage and reporting phase is carried out through 2009, light rail will start rolling through Rainier Valley and Beacon Hill to Downtown. Three neighborhoods in Southeast Seattle with light rail stations and significant multi-family and commercial area around them are about to become very popular, very fast -- Beacon Hill, McClellan and Othello. Updates of the plans for these three areas would get under way immediately.

Based on community input and quality, good-faith staff work, we now have three documents. Council will consider:

A draft resolution to establish a Neighborhood Plan Advisory Committee (NPAC)
A draft ordinance that would direct funds toward neighborhood plan and station area updates
A narrative of the update process
I encourage you to review them, and I’d be interested in hearing what you think. I’ve scheduled a public hearing to hear directly from you: Mon., Sept. 8, 5:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers.

Following that, the Planning, Land Use & Neighborhoods Committee will discuss and consider adoption of the proposals and releasing the funds on Wed., Sept. 10, 9:30 a.m. in City Council Chambers. The full City Council could take a final vote Mon. Sept. 22, 2 p.m. in City Council Chambers.

My goal is to ensure an update process that carries forward the best elements of citizen engagement and partnership from the city-wide planning effort of 10 years ago while bringing more varied voices into the fun. Ultimately, updating the neighborhood plans is a chance for us all to recommit to the vision of safe, affordable, sustainable neighborhoods for ourselves and as a legacy.

Another council tenancy...

Before you can get more low-income and minority residents involved in land-use planning, you need to be able to HEAR them. Which means there are some preconditions to sincere outreach:

1) Stop subsidizing their displacement
2) Stop taking money from developers and their lobbyists

Will Sally do #1 or #2? No. Whose idea was rethinking the neighborhood plans in the first place? I somehow doubt it came from a groundswell of grassroots activism.

I'm the current chair of the Capitol Hill Neighborhood Plan Stewardship Council. Our group, formed in 1999 by the City Council Comprehensive Plan Ordinance #119498, is, according to the Plan, charged with overseeing long-term implementation of the Plan and continuing to update it. We have found it challenging to stay abreast of the City's Neighborhood Plan update planning.

We received no specific notice of this meeting. Today, I received e-mails about it sent yesterday by Irene Wall of the CNC Neighborhood Planning Committee and from neighborhood activist Chris Leman.

One concern Leman's e-mail included was:

After more than a year of discussion, and many requests that the executive branch and the City Council do so, these proposals have still not been sent out to the 38 neighborhood planning stewardship groups, which should be partners in this process.

The Council hearing can be viewed live on the Seattle Channel's stream.

Wouldn't it be a better idea to see how much of the Neighborhood Plans were adopted before rushing to change them?
I realize it is much easier to change to new priorities than to keep past promises.
Yet another cop out.