Seattle City Council Land Use & Neighborhoods Committee Special Meeting 10/25/21

Thank you, son.

Good morning, colleagues.

The October 25th, 2021 meeting of the Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee will come to order.

It is 11 a.m.

I'm Dan Strauss, chair of the committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Peterkin?

Here.

Council Member Lewis?

Council Member Juarez?

Council Member Mosqueda?

Present.

Chair Strauss?

Present.

Three present.

Thank you.

The Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee of the City of Seattle begins with land acknowledgement.

This is not meant as an external procedure for the viewing public.

Rather, it is a moment for us as committee members to reflect before engaging in our work on the Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee.

Because this is a land use committee, this is why we reflect about the history of the land we stand on.

So we begin this meeting by acknowledging we are on the traditional and ancestral lands of the first people of this region, past and present.

Represented in a number of tribes and as urban natives and honor with gratitude the land itself and the people of this land.

We start with this acknowledgement to recognize the fact that we are guests on this land and must steward our land as such as guests.

It is not a checklist or rote behavior and it does not give us a passport to proceed however we desire.

It is a reminder that we must steward our work as guests as our time here is short.

Thank you, colleagues.

For today's agenda, we have one item on the agenda today, clerk file 314367, an application for a contract rezone of 14302 30th Avenue Northeast.

And the next meeting of the Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee is a week from today on Monday, November 1st, starting at 1030 AM or after council briefing to vote on the item before us today.

As you know, I have a practice of having items before the committee twice before voting them out.

Before we begin, if there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

At this time, we will open the remote public comment period for items on today's agenda.

Before we begin, I ask that everyone please be patient as we learn to operate this new system in real time.

As a reminder to the two people signed up for public comment, public comment is limited two items on today's agenda.

That is the past practice of this committee.

And because we have only one agenda item on today's agenda, and it is a quasi-judicial matter, council rules prohibit public comment on quasi-judicial matters.

So while we are opening public comment, we will immediately close it.

If you've signed up inadvertently for full council's public comment, full council has been canceled for today.

So the public comment script.

While it remains our strong intent to have public comment regularly included on meeting agendas, the city council reserves the right to end or eliminate these public comment periods at any point if we deem the system as being abused or as unsuitable for allowing meetings to be conducted efficiently in a manner in which we are able to conduct our necessary business.

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Public comment period for this meeting is up to 10 minutes and each speaker will be given two minutes to speak.

I will call on each speaker by name and in the order in which they registered.

on the council's website.

If you have not yet registered to speak and would like to, you can sign up before the end of public comment by going to the council's website.

The public comment link is also listed on today's agenda.

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Please begin speaking by stating your name and the agenda item in which you are addressing.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of the allotted time.

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We ask that you begin to wrap up your public comments.

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And if you plan to continue following this meeting, please do so via the Seattle Channel or the listening options listed on the agenda.

Again, because Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee only allows public comment for the items on the agenda, and the only item on today's agenda is quasi-judicial, which does not allow for public comment, I will move to close the public comment.

And if there's no objection, the public comment will be closed.

Objection.

Public comment is now closed.

Our only item of business on today's agenda is clerk file 314367. Mr. Ahn, will you please read the abbreviated title into the record?

And one quick file 314367 application to rezone portions of the lot located at 14302 30th Avenue Northeast and portions of the lot located at 14330 30th Avenue Northeast from single family 7200.

Thank you.

And Mr. Whitson, would you like to?

I guess we are joined by Lish Whitson of Council Central staff.

I guess, Lish, before you begin your presentation, can you provide a brief refresher on the rules and processes for considering quasi-judicial rezones?

Sure.

Under state law, the council's action needs to be based on a record that is compiled.

by the City Hearing Examiner.

So the process generally is that someone seeking a rezone for a particular piece of property, or in this case, two adjacent pieces of property, files an application with the Department of Construction and Inspections.

SDCI reviews that application and compiles a record.

The director of SDCI makes a recommendation to the Seattle Hearing Examiner.

The hearing examiner holds an open record public hearing, compiles a record of the important documents related to the rezone, and forwards a recommendation to the city council.

In this case, the recommendation is to approve the rezone with conditions.

Um, the council's decision on a rezone like this, where it's an individual party applying for a rezone of their property, um, needs to be based on the record that's compiled by the hearing examiner and cannot consider anything outside of that record.

Um, so today I'll be walking through some of the key points in the record, um, and, uh, then answering any questions to the best of my ability.

Let me share a presentation.

Mr. Watson, could you just expand a little bit on the process and rules when you say we are not allowed to have ex parte communication and that we must only consider information on the record?

Can you confirm that this means we are not to be speaking with any opponents or proponents of this legislation that all of the information we must receive at this time is from you and no one else?

Is that?

the lay person's understanding.

That's correct.

Yes.

Thank you.

So this is a proposal for a rezone at the northeast corner of 143rd Street and 30th Avenue Northeast.

It covers two portions of two split zone parcels on the northeast corner of that intersection.

The site is two blocks west of Lake City Way and one block south of the city border.

The black dashed line shows the portions of the parcels to be rezoned.

The primary applicant is the owner of the property at the corner of the 143rd and 30th, 14302 LLC.

The property owner to the north is the Seattle Housing Authority.

They have a surface parking lot that is zoned single family 7200, as is the portion of the property owners site that's proposed to be rezoned.

So two portions of the block are currently zoned single family 7200 and the proposal is to rezone both of those.

They're both portions of split zones lots and the rest of the lots are zoned low rise three with a mandatory housing affordability suffix.

Any questions about just the location and the site that we're talking about?

Great.

This is zooming in.

Surface parking lot on the north side serves Seattle Housing Authority property apartment complex.

The main property is currently vacant and is proposed to be redeveloped with 12 townhomes in four structures.

The eastern portion of that property, is currently zoned low rise three and is a riparian corridor.

So it is an environmentally critical area.

No development is proposed on that portion of the site because it is a riparian corridor.

And you can see on this slide that the site slopes to the east down into sort of what's a gully or a ditch.

that is currently an open waterway on the east side of the site.

Most of the block is sown low-rise three with mid-rise on the east side of the block.

The site is well served by transit.

There's a bus stop for the 65 bus adjacent to the property.

30th Avenue Northeast in this area is an arterial, as is Northeast 145th Street, where a number of bus routes run, and there are a number of routes on Lake City Way as well.

So this is the proposed development that the rezone would facilitate.

12 townhouses and preservation and restoration of the riparian corridor, 12 parking spaces are proposed to serve the 12 townhouses.

In reviewing the rezone proposal, the hearing examiner and SDCI considered criteria that are laid out in the Seattle Municipal Code Land Use Code, Chapter 2340. Sorry, that should be 34 in the title.

Among the key criteria that the hearing examiner highlighted where the site is within existing to support rezoning to low rise three is that the sites within existing multifamily area near an arterial near commercial zones along Lake City Way well served by public transit with direct arterial access and supported by parks and retail services.

And this is an image of the site.

And that's all I have.

It's a fairly straightforward request, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Great.

Thank you, Lush.

I do have a few questions.

I'll ask one and then pass it to my colleagues.

I understand that there are exceptional trees proposed to be removed on this site.

Can you elaborate on which trees are being removed, the reasons for those removals, and what the replacement procedure is at this time.

Thank you.

So on this site, the red numbers are exceptional trees on the site.

There are five that were identified by the arborists for the developer.

Two of those are proposed to be removed.

They're shown with an X.

The arborist found that they were high risk and recommended removal.

They're both western red cedars.

The Development includes planting three new western red cedars along the eastern edge of the property, of the development.

And also a number of additional trees will be planted within the riparian corridor as part of the restoration of that area.

The restoration project will involve both carrying out invasive species that are currently in there and replanting with native plants.

Thank you.

And can you confirm for me the riparian area that is an area that cannot be developed under any circumstance?

Correct.

So on this image, you may not be able to see it.

It says no development allowed in that white section of the lot.

There are limits on development in the area in a buffer zone.

So development on the site is primarily limited to the, I guess that's the salmon color area on the site on the Western portion of the law.

With some development allowed in the buffer area, but mitigation is required for development in that area.

That's helpful.

So just maybe, may I provide a summary of what I heard you say and let me know if that's correct or not.

While we are losing two of the five exceptional trees, we will gain, you said three trees or four?

So three cedars adjacent to the development and then a number of trees.

I think there are as many as 21 in the riparian corridor.

And the three trees, the three red cedars will be planted in the riparian zone that can never be developed and has the space it needs for the roots to grow strong and the canopy to grow large.

Is that correct?

So the three cedars are being planted in the buffer area.

In addition, there are 21 cedars that are being planted within the riparian corridor.

Great.

And the mitigation plans.

So we'll have 21 cedars in the riparian corridor that can never be developed.

I do have some other questions, but want to open it up for colleagues.

And Council Member Lewis joined us at the start of this meeting.

Apologies for not jumping in sooner.

Council Member Lewis has been with us this whole time.

Colleagues, any other questions?

I'm not seeing any, so I'll continue.

And if folks have questions, please just raise your hand.

Lish, can you share details about any amendments we need to make to this rezone if we decide to approve it?

So there are a couple of things.

Let me just walk through all of the different documents that you'll need to act on as you consider this proposal.

The first is council findings, conclusions, and decision.

That's typically based on the recommended findings, conclusion, and decision from the hearing examiner.

The council's findings, conclusions, and decision are a draft based on the hearing examiner's recommendation.

Plus a couple of changes that I'll get into in just a minute are attached to my memo.

The changes are the recommendation that came to council was for a M designation under the mandatory housing affordability program.

M designation is the simplest or the lowest designation.

It's appropriate, for example, a rezone within a category.

So if, for example, this were a rezone from low-rise 1 to low-rise 2, that would typically get an M designation.

The code states that a reason from a low-rise or from single-family to low-rise three should receive an M2 designation under the mandatory housing affordability program.

That's the difference of, in this area, it would go from $7 a square foot for affordable housing to $12.50 a square foot for affordable housing.

to comply with the mandatory housing affordability program requirements or a change from 6% of units to 9% of units if the developers chose to, the performance option under MHA.

So I would recommend that you modify the hearing examiner's recommendation to change the designation from M to M2 consistent with the land use code.

Thank you.

That's helpful.

And can you remind me, in reviewing the documents, was this already an assumption within the documents on the record?

A number of the documents did show M2, but the recommendation that came to council didn't include that designation.

So there was an error somewhere along the way.

OK.

And I noticed that there are, we don't, of the documents that we have to approve, we do not have a document to approve redevelopment plans for the Seattle Housing Authority site at 14330 30th Avenue Northeast.

I wanna confirm with you, this is due to the fact that there are no redevelopment plans for the Seattle Housing Authority site at 14330 30th Avenue Northeast.

Is this a correct understanding or am I missing?

Correct, yes.

The development proposal was only for the corner lot.

It's privately owned.

The housing authority was brought in primarily because it didn't make sense to keep a small portion of the block in single family.

And so there was a request that they be brought into the rezone as well.

So thank you for taking up the second set of amendments to the hearing examiner's recommendation.

There are three conditions that the hearing examiner recommends applying to development on these sites.

The first two are both related to the mandatory housing affordability requirements.

The third is that development should be consistent with the plans that were filed for the redevelopment of the corner property.

And I would recommend that you only apply that condition requiring consistency with the plans to the corner property and not to the Seattle Housing Authority property.

Um, if you do apply to the housing authority, um, they probably would need to come back if, if, and when they chose to, uh, pursue development on that site for an amendment to, um, what will become a property use and development agreement that they will, uh, be required to file, um, in order to effectuate the rezoning.

Thank you.

Are there any other amendments that we need to be aware of?

Any potential amendments?

So those are the two issues that I've flagged for you.

We can discuss any other amendments council members may want to pursue, but I didn't see anything else in the record that warranted council changing the hearing examiner's recommendation.

And do we have an ability to require any tree replantings or is that outside the scope of this rezone?

So any amendments or additional requirements should be based on the record.

And I didn't see anything in the record that would necessitate additional mitigation of tree impacts.

Okay, thank you.

Colleagues, any other questions?

I'm seeing, I'm not seeing any.

Feel free to pop up if you do.

Lish, my last question is, if we decide to approve this rezone next week, what are the next steps from there?

Yeah, so in approving the rezone, you would, in recommending approval of the rezone, you would be, you would add the findings, conclusions, and decision to the clerk file.

and direct me to prepare an ordinance that would effectuate the rezone.

I'll work with the property owners to file property use and development agreements that reflect the proposed conditions that you place on the property and introduce a bill, counsel probably, a week after your vote on the rezone, and then that can be ready for a council vote a week after that.

Thank you.

Seeing no other questions, colleagues pop up if you'd have them.

I will thank you, Mr. Whitson and Mr. Ahn.

This contract rezone will be back before the committee on Monday, November 1st.

Hearing no items for the good of the order, this does conclude the Monday, October 25, 2021 meeting of the Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee.

As a reminder, our next committee meeting will be on Monday, November 1, starting at 10.30 AM or directly after council briefing.

Thank you all for attending.

We are adjourned.

Thank you.