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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1995-10-16 Regular MinutesOctober 16, 1995 7:00 p.m. CALL TO ORDER ROLL CALL Robertson excused OFFICIALS CITIZEN COMMENTS CONSENT AGENDA PUBLIC HEARING NEW BUSINESS Res. #1326 Setting Public Hearing for Street Vacation Request S. 158th TUKWILA CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING MINUTES Mayor Rants called the Regular Meeting to order and led the audience in the Pledge of Allegiance. JOE DUFFIE; JOAN HERNANDEZ; ALLAN EKBERG, Council President; STEVE MULLET; PAM CARTER; JIM HAGGERTON. MOVED BY DUFFIE, SECONDED BY HERNANDEZ, TO EXCUSE COUNCILMEMBER ROBERTSON. MOTION CARRIED. Tukwila City Hall Council Chambers JOHN McFARLAND, City Administrator; LINDA COHEN, City Attorney; STEVE LANCASTER, DCD Director; JACK PACE, Senior Planner; ANN SIEGENTHALER, Associate Planner; LUCY LAUTERBACH, Council Analyst; JANE CANTU, City Clerk. Wendy Morgan, 15144 65th Ave. S., #404, Tukwila, announced that Dan Aragon has been released from the hospital and is recuperating from his automobile accident. a. b. Approval of Minutes: 4/3/95; 7/17/95; 9/18/95; 9/25/95 Approval of Vouchers: Nos. 81383 through 81632 in the amount of $984,750.96 MOVED BY DUFFIE, SECONDED BY HERNANDEZ, TO APPROVE THE CONSENT AGENDA AS SUBMITTED. MOTION CARRIED. Proposed Comprehensive Plan. (See verbatim transcript attached.) MOVED BY HERNANDEZ, SECONDED BY EKBERG, THAT THE PROPOSED RESOLUTION BE READ BY TITLE ONLY. MOTION CARRIED City Attorney Linda Cohen read A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF TUKWILA, WASHINGTON, FIXING THE TIME FOR A PUBLIC HEARING TO CONSIDER Tukwila City Council Regular Meeting October 16, 1995 Page 2 New Business (con't) REPORTS ADJOURNMENT 9:33 p.m. THE VACATION OF SOUTH 158TH STREET FROM 51ST AVENUE SOUTH TO APPROXIMATELY 620 FEET WEST. MOVED BY DUFFIE, SECONDED BY HERNANDEZ, TO APPROVE RESOLUTION NO. 1326 AS READ. MOTION CARRIED Mayor Rants reported that the Off Track (televised horse racing establishment) will discontinue business as of December 31st. MOVED BY DUFFIE, SECONDED BY CARTER, THAT THE MEETING BE ADJOURNED. MOTION CARRIED. W. Rants, Mayor i l e E. Cantu, City Clerk Comprehensive Plan (Final Public Hearing) October 16, 1995 Those Present: Mayor Rants; Council Members Joe Duffie; Joan Hernandez; Allan Ekberg, Council President; Steve Mullet; Pam Carter; Jim Haggerton. Absent: Council Member Dennis Robertson. Staff Present: Ann Siegenthaler, Steve Lancaster, Linda Cohen, Jack Pace, John McFarland, Lucy Lauterbach, Jane Cantu. (Public Hearing open at 7:08 p.m.) MAYOR RANTS: Welcome to the regular meeting of October 16th. There must be something special on tonight. I haven't seen this many folks in the audience since I have been Mayor. It's really wonderful. It's nice. Would you rise please and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. (Pledge of Allegiance) MAYOR RANTS: This evening we have a Public Hearing on the proposed Comprehensive Plan. We will operate our Public Hearing in the following manner. Staff will make a five minute report to Council and then we will allow those of you that are on the sign -up sheet the same opportunity of five minutes. If you have not signed up on the sign -up sheet to speak to the Council, you will find it over on the table over to your right. Please sign up if you wish to address the Council on this Comprehensive Plan. I realize this is an extremely important issue to you. I ask you and urge you to keep your comments to five minutes. How long is the Council going to take written comments? At what date? MR. EKBERG: Wednesday of this week. 1 MAYOR RANTS: If you feel that you would like to 2 restate what you say tonight or want to add to it because you did not feel you had enough time at the microphone, please address a letter to the Council or to myself and I'll see that it gets entered into the Public Hearing. I have been corrected. The City Clerk says to send it to her office. If you would do that, please, and then it will get entered into the public record. MR. DUFFIE: I would like to apologize for the people that are sitting behind the map that cannot see the Council due to the fact that you know we have a small chambers here. We would like to let you know that the Council is up here, so please forgive us for not being able to see you. So please come around and talk to us when you're ready so we can see everybody. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: I am going to beg the indulgence of those of you that have signed up on the sign -up sheet and ask that we allow Mr. Aragon to be the first speaker. Mr. Aragon had a head -on collision last Friday. He was in the hospital, but he is here tonight and wishes to speak. And unless there is some objection to that, I would like to let him go first so that he could then go on home. That will come right after the staff report, Mr. Aragon. All right, are we ready? Then I'll open the Public Hearing and we will hear from staff. MR. LANCASTER: Thank you, your Honor. For the record my name is Steve Lancaster. I'm the Director of Community Development for the city of Tukwila. This is the second Public Hearing to be held by the City Council on a new Comprehensive Plan for the city of Tukwila. Once adopted, the new plan will establish the policy basis for a wide range of future decisions to be made by the Council and others that will affect land use, development zoning, environmental quality, transportation, and other issues off vital concern to the community. The first Comprehensive Plan hearing by the Council followed many months of work by the Tukwila Tomorrow Citizens Committee and by the Tukwila Planning Commission. That previous hearing focused on the Planning Commission's proposed Comprehensive Plan that was transmitted to the City Council back in April. 3 That's this document that you spent many evenings going through and working to refine. Since that previous hearing, Council has met in many work sessions and carefully reviewed, refined, and revised that draft Comprehensive Plan as reflected in this document, the green proposed Comprehensive Plan that reflects the changes to the Planning Commission's recommendation that are currently being considered by the City Council. The green document clearly indicates through underlining and through cross through those changes from the Planning Commission's recommendation, and so it does give a good record of the document that was before you when you held your previous Public Hearing and the changes that you have been discussing over these past few months. The primary purpose of tonight's hearing then is to follow up on that previous hearing with specific reference to those changes so that people who have not had an opportunity to comment on any of the new information that's contained in this document and any of the changes that you are considering will have that opportunity tonight. Following the City Council's review of the comments that you receive tonight, together with all of the written comments that have been received to date, and you all should have a red notebook of the written comments that we have received and that is being updated as we speak in terms of comments we've received through today, I believe, and will by updated as well with the comments we receive through Wednesday as per Council direction. But once you have received all those comments, the Council, I'm sure, plans to undertake final deliberations. We have talked to you about some scheduling issues for those final deliberations, and hopefully we will be in a position to have Council action on an adopted Comprehensive Plan by early December. At the same time that the Council was working on the Comprehensive Plan, it's also considering amendments to the City's existing development regulations, and particularly the zoning code to make sure that those development regulations and the zoning 4 requirements of the City are consistent with the plan as you ultimately adopt it. Tonight's hearing does not pertain specifically to any new or revised zoning or other development regulations; however, I want to make sure that the citizens in attendance tonight know that there is a Public Hearing coming up. It's scheduled at this point for November 6th. We are in the process of putting together public notices for that, and they will be in the mail within the next week or so. That hearing on November 6th will be specifically aimed at the development regulations that the Council has been working on in recent weeks. So again, tonight's hearing focuses on the proposed Comprehensive Plan as represented by the green book and also represented by the map nearest to me here that's identified as City Council Recommended Draft Comprehensive Plan dated September 28, 1995. We also have for citizens reference up here a copy of the existence Comprehensive Plan map and the Planning Commission's proposed Comprehensive Plan map dated April 1995. We hope tonight during the public testimony to not only keep track of verbatim record of the testimony that you hear, but also we have Department of Community Development staff here with maps and will try to identify properties that people are talking about, specific properties or specific geographic locations in town. We'll try to identify those, keep a record of those, so that as you do your final deliberations, we will have a clear record of where people are talking about when they give you your comments. So it will be helpful for those testifying if they can point out any specific areas that they're talking about on the draft Comprehensive Plan map here. That's all I have in terms of comments tonight. I want to thank you for your attention, and staff will be available to provide any additional assistance that you may need tonight. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Steve. I will remind the audience that this is a Public Hearing on the changes in the Comprehensive Plan and not on the developmental regulations, which there will be a Public Hearing on in November. So you will have an opportunity to talk at that point on those. 5 MR. HAGGERTON: Mr. Mayor, could I ask a question before we get started? Is there any possible way to get the maps from blocking the people in the audience there. That doesn't seem very professional to me, but is there any other way we can arrange that? MR. DUFFIE: I've been trying that all night. Maybe we could put them behind the Council and let everybody walk up there. I think that would be better. MR. HAGGERTON: I know you wanted people probably to point out the parcels over there. MR. LANCASTER: It would be most helpful to have the Council recommend the plan there that people could refer to. MAYOR RANTS: I would suggest that we can still read them and understand them if they were more horizontal to the wall. I think that's better. Ladies and gentlemen, were you able to hear from that speaker? Were you able to hear the DCD director while he was talking? All right, good: We do have problems with the system in here. I just want to be sure you can hear. The legislative analyst will keep track of the time. She will give you a one minute to closing signal, so keep an eye on her. All right, Mr. Aragon, will you come forward, please. I'm sure you don't feel it, but you look better than I thought you were going to. MR. ARAGON: Thank you. I'm Daniel Aragon, 4610 South 124th Street, Tukwila, Washington 98178. I also am a landowner owner of the area that they're proposing to make light industrial. One of the things is that I came in here to talk on my behalf. We have other committee members that will be speaking. In fact, they talked to me prior to me coming because they didn't expect me to be here. I have to get up and show up anyway. Like they say with the Mariners, we refuse to lose. I refuse to die. Believe me, if you had seen my truck, you would see why I say that. But anyway I was told that I had a broken back, I 6 was told a lot of things, but I make it through with a lot of prayers and a lot of friends. So thank you to all of you people who remembered me during those times. Thanks to the Council people that called during that time. But anyway, as far as the proposed area that we're talking about it is right here. The light industrial area by the Union Tank area where they're talking about making that a light industrial area. Number one, as a resident, last week, last Sunday, I decided that I would go out and talk to the some of the residents in that area. I talked to approximately 15 residents in the area, and it was interesting enough. I don't do this for myself. I do it because of what the residents want. I do it because if it was up to me, number one, I want to keep that residential as much as possible, but when I fight, I fight for what the residents want. And when I go out and I talk to 15 people and out of the 15 people I only have one person that says no, that they don't want residential there, that they want it light industrial, I think that opens my eyes completely. And I think that was one of the main reasons I wanted to come in here and let you people know today. Just a while back I had a City official go to my house and I had him come into my house. I had asked the City officials to go over there before, but they were never in my house. They stepped outside. So I had the City official come in there and touch on my walls while a truck passed by my house. I showed him the cracks that the trucks had done to my house, destroying my house as the trucks go by. He heard the doors rattle, and then we went outside and we stepped outside on the road and just as we stepped on the road, it was just like a big tornado came right through because we just kind of rolled with it. We stepped out on 46th and 124th, right on the corner right there. You should have a report of that by now. I think that should really tell a lot of people what's going on there. If we put that light industrial in there, not only are we going to we've been trying to get rid of those trucks out there and now what it's going to do is get more trucks in that area. Not only that, but we were promised, we were promised as residents, by the MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. Aragon. William O'Connell. 7 Council people, by the Mayor, by the Mayor that came in now that's up there right now, Mayor Rants. When he took his position, one of his big things was when he was running for Mayor that, no, we will keep this city residential. We will keep Allentown residential, and we have had to fight with everything we've got to try to keep that place residential. Sure, some of you Council people were not here at that time, but there are some of you up there that were up here at the time when we were promised that, and I think we need to look at that. We need to look at the promises that were made. I know that we have new faces up there and I know some of you people want new changes up there, but we were promised. All these promises were made. Don't go to Seattle, stay in Tukwila. We promise you that Allentown will stay residential. But I guess my biggest concern is when I talked to 15 people or so and everybody wants it there, and in the area, right around that area right there. And out of the 15 residents that I talked to and they tell me, no, they do want to keep it residential, but they don't know how to come up here to the public. They don't know how to come up here in front of the Council people and talk. I'm not a speaker myself. But I will say make the right decision. Make it for the people. Let industry go to the areas where they belong. Don't take our place. Don't take our side. Because once we get residential on that side, then it's going to be across the street and then it's going to be farther and before we know it, we're doomed. We have no place to stay. Thank you. Any questions? MR. O'CONNELL: My name is William O'Connell. I am the president of Union Tank Works. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I have, as a matter of fact, previously spoken to you on the first hearing, and I'm here to talk to you just briefly about the Allentown zoning issue on 44th Place South. Union Tank Works owns and occupies a business in Allentown since 1957. We have.coexisted for 38 years in and with the neighbors without a problem. And now Union Tank heavy industrial property owner is faced with down zoning to residential. 8 The financial impact of this action is devastating. Interested buyers would shy away. And Union Tanks' only option would be to exist with a variation of businesses. The idea of raising Union Tank and developing residential is completely and financially unfeasible. I have made concerted effort to get together with the neighbors, with my neighbors, on the Burlington Northern side of the street on 44th Place South. And my objective with the neighbors is to solicit positive and logical opinion for light industrial and commercial zoning. Over two thirds of the property owners on block 4 support light industrial commercial zoning. I have their signed statements to this effect and they are enclosed. Union Tank owns approximately nine acres in Allentown, and currently five of the nine acres west of the main plant on 46th Avenue South are under option for sale to a residential real estate developer. Union. Tank is not opposed to residential real estate development in Allentown in the appropriate locations. Light industrial commercial zoning made sense on the perimeter on the Burlington Northern Railroad yard. It buffers residential areas to the west from the heavy industrial of the Burlington Northern facility. Both Boeing Field Airport and the Burlington Northern Railroad support a cascade zoning buffer to mitigate the impact of their operational complaints. In closing, I ask the Council to seriously reconsider the Planning Commission's recommendations to the Council. Let your vote be a win win for all landowners in Allentown, residential and business. Thank you for your attention and effort in this appeal. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. O'Connell. I will ask the audience to maintain some of their thoughts that they want to let go during these talks, but all of you have the same rights to come up and speak at the podium. Please confine those kinds of comments to the podium and your right to do that. Mr. Donald Marcy. MR. MARCY: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. My name is Donald Marcy. My address is 701 5th Avenue in Seattle. I'm an attorney with Cairncross Hempelmann Cross. I'm here this evening on behalf of Union Tank Works. As Mr. O'Connell indicated to you, his concern is about property located along 44th Place South. In particular, I have two maps here; one that shows the Union Tank ownership in blue, which is both on the northeast side of 44th Place South and on the southwest side. The main facility is located right here in this triangle. The property that we're talking about as a whole this evening is shown on this other map in green. It is the property that's located next to the Burlington Northern Intermodel Center and the existing Union Tank Works site. Union Tank Works is not opposed to the designation of this additional property next to them as residential. It's only their existing facility and the property next to the Burlington Northern Intermodal facility. The Planning Commission recommended that this property be commercial /light industrial, and in your review so far, you have reverted back to a low density residential. We believe that that is not the right choice for this property, and we're asking you to go back to the commercial /light industrial. This is a tough zoning problem you have got here. You've got existing residential uses in Allentown that you want to protect. On the other hand, you also have to recognize that there are existing heavy industrial uses that have some pretty significant impacts to residential uses in this area. The Burlington Northern Intermodal facility has a lot of truck traffic and a lot of train traffic. It makes a lot of noise for 21 hours a day, sometimes 24 hours a day. You also have this property sitting right in the flight path of Boeing Field. Boeing Field is the 21st busiest airport in the country. There is a huge amount of noise and pollution that comes from the airplanes that utilize that facility. As Mr. O'Connell indicated, both Burlington Northern and Boeing Field are concerned about zoning additional areas residential in proximity of the flight path and in proximity of the intermodal facility. There basically have been two proposals for this area. One is to leave it residential. The other is to 10 make it commercial /light industrial. We don't believe that designating this property for residential uses is an appropriate one, because the properties are never going to redevelop as residential uses. I would ask you to seriously consider, would you buy a home next to the Burning Northern Intermodal facility. Would you invest in single family residential property next to the Burlington Northern Intermodal facility. I suspect in most cases you would not. The cost is simply too high to go in and develop these properties for single family residential uses when you consider the cost involved with demolishing existing uses, creating some kind of noise attenuation facility, and still be able to produce a house that is affordable in that particular location. It's going to be a very difficult task and one that we do not believe is possible. Similarly, office uses are very difficult ones to develop in that particular location because of the impacts of the Burlington Northern facility. If you leave this as residential, you will not get the redevelopment of the Union Tank Works site because no one is going to come in and buy it for residential uses. With commercial /light industrial, it might happen. Those uses can tolerate more easily the adverse impacts of those heavy industrial uses. Also the impacts associated with commercial /light industrial uses are not nearly as large as those associated with the Burlington Northern facility. There may be some truck traffic, but it is nothing compared to what the Burlington Northern facility produces. There are an average of 600 to 700 semi trailers a day that go along 124th. That is a tremendous amount of truck traffic, and even if this entire area developed as commercial /light industrial, you wouldn't see anywhere near that number or size of trucks. Union Tank has been in the neighborhood for many years. They aren't objecting to all the residential designations, simply a desire to have this area be something that could be used economically. I know that concerns have been raised about trucks and their impacts, but you can condition development so that the trucks have to use particular routes. They can come down 124th up 51st and then up 44th so that there's minimal impact to the rest of the neighborhood. MAYOR RANTS: Mr. Marcy, your time is up. 11 MR. MARCY: I am ready to conclude. Like a say this is a difficult zoning problem; however, I don't believe that designating this property as residential is going to solve the problems in the future. You need something that buffers the residential uses from the heavy industrial. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you very much. Larry Quicksall. MR. QUICKSALL: I'm not a speaker but I'm up here and scared to death, but anyway I'll give it a try. My name is Larry Quicksall and I own property on 44th Place South and I'm presently living at 11326 Rainier Avenue South in Renton, and I'm in the process of getting ready to move back into my home in Tukwila. I'm in regard to this 44th Place South with this light industrial. I would like to see it go. The last time I talked about the airports and all of the air travel overhead above the property, and I thought, well, I don't want to go back into that and I respect your wishes that I don't go back into it. But I have done a little research since I talked the last time, and I was devastated when I found out the air traffic that there is at Boeing field. And you heard the last gentleman say that it ranks 21st out of the top 50 busiest airports in the continental United States. Our little airport out here does? I couldn't believe it. So I turned around and I had my mom go ahead and check on the figures for me and she called me back and said, well, yeah, this is what they said, Larry. No, mom, you got that all wrong. You don't know what you're talking about. You wrote it down all wrong. I was surprised. In 1992 this will give you an idea of how many planes travel in and out of Boeing Field on a daily basis. Now, every plane that lands is counted as one. Every plane that takes off is counted as one. In 1992, to give you an example, there was 383,000 aircraft that went in and out of Boeing Field. I said, no, this can't be right. I turned in this afternoon to you people a copy of the book, the fact booklet. The Administrators Fact Book is the name of 12 it from the FAA, which comes out every six months or once a year to all major airports. It gives information to them as far as safety, air traffic, airports, aircraft, organization charts, resources. Industry trends is in this book and any organization of it. I left this information this afternoon. I was very surprised because that comes out in 1992 at 1,049 aircraft a day. Well, now you have got to remember that that's not coming in and going out. Each landing is one and each take off is one. All right. So we could possibly have 600 coming in on the south end of the airport to land and 400 or 500 taking out the same day. So they are not all going over my property. I want you to take this into consideration. A lot of these aircraft are small aircraft, and they'll do touch and -goes which brings up this amount quite a bit. But that's still a lot of airplanes. Other information, in 1994 it increased 40,000 aircraft to 423,000 aircraft in 1994 as of October of '94. Now I say that's a tremendous amount of traffic that's going directly over the flight pattern over my house. I have a house on 44th Place South, and I maintain that nobody is going to buy with that type of air flow over the top of that house, let alone what Burlington Northern does. So I can't see where the property in essence is worth basically anything unless a poor man is going to live there. I'd like to put a green house in. I showed some pictures the last time about the aircraft flying directly overhead. I have a chart that was presented this afternoon for straight in -line landing on runway 31 -L, which would be the one on the south end of the runway. All right. And their altitude that they have to be above ground according to the chart, in parenthesis, is 682 feet. In the chart I marked back how far I live from the end of the runway. I live 1.6 miles back from the end of the runway from 31 -L. And according to what I was told at the tower, they have to be 700 foot at that point. I went ahead and went up to the tower. I spent two hours. After spending two hours and watching all of these people, talked to all these pilots, I was real shocked. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Roland Becker. 13 MR. BECKER: Thank you. My name is Roland Becker. I'm the president of Becker Trucking, 12677 East Marginal Way South in Tukwila, 98168. We strongly oppose and object to the down zoning of our property along East Marginal Way South as proposed by the Comprehensive Plan. There is a lot more activity around the Becker property than necessary. The goal should be to minimize the activity by becoming more efficient. Efficiency by definition is accomplishing more by doing less. We move most of our trailers two, three, four times a night before we can even get one loaded out. With an efficient terminal, most of the trailers would not have to be moved at all minimizing the impact on the neighborhood. This should be a common goal by Becker, our neighborhood, and the city of Tukwila. By adopting the neighborhood commercial for this property, the city of Tukwila is preventing an opportunity to become an enabler and a cheerleader for the private efforts to become more efficient and less of an impact on our neighborhood. At this point in time I would like to introduce my attorney who has some additional views on the Comprehensive Plan for this property. MAYOR RANTS: Are you through, Mr. Becker? Then I will call the next one, which is Mr. Grant. Mr. Grant. MR. GRANT: Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of the City Council. My name is Harry Grant and I am an attorney with the law firm of Riddell Williams in Seattle. We represent Becker Trucking which is located at 12677 East Marginal Way South in Tukwila. The reason that I am speaking tonight after Mr. Becker has described some of the things that he sees from the standpoint of operating his business, is to raise with you our concerns on behalf of Becker Trucking with respect to the proposed neighborhood commercial center designation in the Comprehensive Plan that is proposed from Mr. Becker's Trucking Company property. 14 As Mr. Becker was explaining to you a moment ago, it appears from the Comprehensive Plan that that designation would prevent Mr. Becker from continuing to be able to effectively use that property, and that's an issue that should be of great concern to this City Council. A bit of history on that might be important. The property on which Becker Trucking operates has been zoned in such a way that it allowed for the operation of the trucking company for a long period of time, certainly for at least the last 20 years and perhaps longer. Becker Trucking today employees approximately 75 people, some of whom are Tukwila residents. And I'm sure as members of this City Council you would agree that one of the things that's vitally important to the health of this City is the continued strength, the economic vitality that comes from businesses, small businesses and medium size businesses, that can operate effectively and efficiently in the city. Unfortunately, the neighborhood commercial center designation that's proposed in the Comprehensive Plan would limit Becker Trucking in its efforts to make modifications that would actually make the trucking enterprise a more effective business and one that has even less impact on the neighborhood where it is presently situated and where it has been situated for a long time. Mr. Becker and his employees can find ways to restructure the way that the trucking enterprise operates so that it has even less effect on that neighborhood. But sadly, because at this time we don't know what the development regulations under this Comprehensive Plan will say about nonconforming uses, we're in absolute darkness in terms of knowing whether Becker Trucking would be able to make the modifications that it's considering in order to make its business not only a more efficient business, but also a business that has less impact on the neighbors in the neighborhood where Becker Trucking has existed historically. So the plea from a legal standpoint, as well as from the standpoint of pure simple business common sense, is pay attention, please, to the existing businesses that have been a part of this community for a long time, and see to it that this Comprehensive Plan, which is an awesome challenge that has been MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. Grant. Mr. Hart. 15 imposed on this City under the Management Act, is drafted and approved in such a way that you take great care of the businesses that help to make this community the vibrant and vital community that each of you I'm sure wants it to be. We have left for each of you in your red books, as I now understand they're called, a letter in which we have set out in some greater detail some of the legal issues that we think are important legal issues under, for example, the Growth Management Act. And we have tried to set out in writing for you so that you'll have a chance later on to review our views on the problems that exist under the proposed designation that exists in the Comprehensive Plan. I know that you're going to be very busy between now and the time that you make your important decisions on this, but I ask that you please take the time to review the letter that we have made available to you, and I've given tonight to your planning staff a sufficient number of copies for each one of you. Thank you very much for your consideration. We appreciate having the opportunity to talk with you. MR. HART: I'm Bob Hart. I am with SGA Corporation. Our office is in Lynnwood. We build and develop a lot of real estate in Tukwila. A couple of the projects are Gateway Corporate Center and Gateway North that we're just finishing the final two buildings. I am working with Mr. Becker on his facility right now, but I also want to talk in more general terms about what you're trying to do with the zoning. I'm on the other side of real estate. I try to use real estate to make a profit, and you all use real estate to try to control it and make sure it works for everyone. As we have done at Gateway and Gateway North, is we've found ways between the city of Tukwila and ourselves to make both goals work very well together. I think the same thing can happen here. The key thing that I have learned in my years in real estate is that you've got to be flexible. The product has to be flexible. You're not exactly sure of what the market is going to do. Just because you build a retail center does not mean that tenants are going to come. 16 An example of that is at Gateway Corporate Center one of the buildings with a deli in it still has a vacancy after four years. It's got all the signage, it's right on Interurban, the traffic goes by, and we still have some problems there. It's very difficult to determine what the market is going to do. When you change the zoning from CM to neighborhood commercial, you are in fact limiting your flexibility. Now instead of saying what can we do, there is a whole list of businesses or types that you can't do. You can't do this, you can't do that. And in fact it renders most of the existing businesses nonconforming.• This is for this south portion of East Marginal Way, as well as certain areas along Highway 99 also. I think you do have to be careful about the flexibility in trying to determine what the market is going to do and influence it. The market is not influenced by zoning. It's influenced more by demographics and economy. I'm also concerned that neighborhood commercial, from a real estate perspective, just won't work in that area. You've got Pacific Highway or 99 on the west and Interurban on the east side with industrial areas on the north. What neighborhood commercial is supposed to do is provide the products and services for the nearby community, which means that it is not a destination area that they would use these services by walking, riding your bike, etc. I just got back from Europe and it works wonderfully there. One of the reasons is because they don't have as many cars and that's the way the neighborhoods were established hundreds of years ago. It won't work here. We have limited success in other areas where the demographics and economics work much better. So what would happen if it doesn't work and we stick with the zoning of residential commercial. It means that when someone that is existing there is an industrial commercial use and wants to do something different, whether it's something small like just adding a little nook or revising a certain portion of their structure because maybe it doesn't meet seismic codes or what, they go in and get a permit. And you don't get past the counter because it will say, sorry, MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Bob. Allen Cullen. Since this process has been going on on the 17 that's a nonconforming use. And the result is the owner would say forget it, I can't do anything. Then they say don't improve the landscaping, they don't improve the parking, they don't paint it. It's a lost cause. They give up. So what's better for the community is to have decay and a vacant building that's boarded up or to have something that makes sense. Some of the mechanisms that are already in place that can lessen the impact on the neighborhood is the SEPA and the Design Review. Both of those processes I'm very familiar with. And we as a builder in working with the community have is that my signal? Okay. Anyway, those mechanisms are in place currently, and I think in these certain pockets where there are residences, you can even be more stringent and still work with the builder in order to provide better setbacks, more landscaping, better parking, lighting, sidewalks. There are a lot of benefits that can be done for the residences, as well as providing a business and keep it alive and keep the employees there. This process has evolved, the businesses are there, and I think that the current zoning is the only way to keep it all viable. Thank you. MR. CULLEN: My name is Allen Cullen. I own property at 7220 South 180th Street. I also have a business at that property. That's in Tukwila. I'm up here requesting a change from low density residential to commercial /light industrial. The property that I'm addressing here currently has no buildings or houses on it. It has no access. You cannot access the property by street. You can walk to it. You have to cross railroad tracks or use the Interurban Trail. There is a 30 -inch high pressured jet fuel line that runs through this property, Olympic Pipeline. It also carries diesel and gasoline. There are high voltage overhead Puget Power lines running parallel and on this property. Burlington Northern Railroad tracks are also parallel and running through this property. 18 Comprehensive Plan, I have requested why this property is zoned low density residential and am told that it just needs to be zoned something. I'm still asking the question. The map that's on the second page there will give you an idea of where that property is at. It's located just south of 180th and runs about 40 feet across there and goes about a half a mile north to where it is approximately 100 feet across. It is boarded on the east by Burlington Northern Railroad tracks, by the west by commercial /light industrial properties. The properties are owned by Burlington Northern, Puget Power. It's located between two sets of railroad tracks and the Interurban Trail. It is virtually landlocked with no access. Property directly west of this parcel is commercial /light industrial. Low density residential zoning would have a direct impact on the westerly commercial /light industrial property with no benefit to anyone. Setbacks on the commercial /light industrial property would serve no purpose to the low density residential zoning, as this land is railroad tracks and industrial easements. The easements are Metro sewer, Olympic Pipeline that has a jet diesel and high pressured gasoline lines, and Puget Power. Our request is that this land be zoned to correspond with neighboring parcels which are commercial /light industrial. The land parcel directly north of this, which is Tukwila Urban Center, has the same characteristics with all these properties and all these easements running through it. It happens to be zoned Tukwila Urban Center which corresponds to that zoning. So all I am doing is requesting that we have the same benefits so that so we don't have undo setbacks put on us as a commercial /light industrial property. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Jim and Rae Nelson. MRS. NELSON: Good evening everyone. I'm really nervous. This is the first time I've ever done this. My husband and I own three lots, and they are bounded by the north by South 116th and on the west by East Marginal Way. MS. CARTER: Pardon me, could we have your name first, please. MRS. NELSON: Rae Nelson. 15727 Jim Creek Road, Arlington, Washington. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. 19 MRS. NELSON: As I was saying we own these three lots and it's north by South 116th and west by East Marginal Way and on the east by the Seattle City Light right -of -way. The Comprehensive Plan has designated this property to low density residential, and it is just across from East Marginal Way which has property zoned for light industrial and storage. And given the fact that this property is on a busy, noisy thoroughfare and abutting the power line, it is unlikely that the property would ever develop into low density residence. We would like the public recreation corridor, which exists adjacent to the power lines. The power lines and the recreation corridor would then become a buffer between the light industrial and the storage of the residential area. We were at this property in August and looked at this property and it is nice lots, but no one would ever build a house there because of the Marginal Way highway. And then to the south is a residence that they have already abandoned. It's empty and unkept and just sitting there. And then to the south of that is an old motel that used to be, or probably eons ago, and it is also unkept, and I think there was one residence living in the apartments. We just feel that this property would never ever be able to be used for a residential. And of course it's not of the magnitude that some of these people have issue with, but we would still like to have it under consideration to maybe make it a light industrial, because right across the street from it is lights industrial. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. MS. CARTER: I have a question. What did the Planning Commission have it? MRS. NELSON: The Planning Commission have it as low residential area. MS. CARTER: So what's the change you are objecting to? MRS. NELSON: I would like it to be light industrial. 20 MS. CARTER: I thought there was something I wasn't understanding because she had said this was about changes, and I can't tell on my maps. I thought there was a change. MRS. NELSON: I would like it changed from light residential to MR. DUFFIE: This is just strictly for information for them. We are not to discuss it with them. MS. CARTER: I wasn't discussing. I was asking for information. MRS. NELSON: Did I explain myself properly? MAYOR RANTS: You did, Rae. Thank you very much. MRS. NELSON: I'm going to leave this letter here for the City Clerk and then she can have that for you. MAYOR RANTS: She will get copies into the file. Jack Stevens. I know, ladies and gentlemen, that I call you by name and you'd think that would be enough, but for the public record we need your name and address on the microphone which goes into the tape and then comes back out on the minutes. MR. STEVENS: Thank you. My name is Jack Stevens. I live at 4655 South 200th. My reason for being here is that I think the Council has made a mistake. At one time I was zoned commercial /light industrial, and that's the only thing that's fitted for my property with the progress that is happening in the area. I have noticed that your maps and your area here doesn't show the new highway going through there, from East Valley Highway to Orillia Road. If this happens, there will be five lanes of traffic in front of my place. The shoulder of the road will probably be less than a foot and a half to two feet from my front yard, which is very small at this time. There is no other housing in the area except one. The rest of them have been moved out. And my point being that if I am zoned correctly, that I will progress the same as Tukwila has progressed over the last few years. I wouldn't mind being a part of that and I have proved that with paperwork which I have sent to the Council. I thank you for your time. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. Stevens. I know I'm going to pronounce this one wrong. Terrell Newby. I guess I got it so wrong that no one can understand me. We're going to try several names here. Teresa? Terrell? T- e- r- r- e -1 -1, and then I make this N -e -w -b J or Y. When this whole list is done and you're ready to come up here we'll discover who you are, I guess. Address, none. No address and no phone number. So I think I'll stop right there. We'll move onto Jo Boone. MS. BOONE: I'm Jo Boone. I speak on behalf of Daniel Boone Paints, 15701 Nelsen Place South, Tukwila. We would simply like to reaffirm our desire to stay a legal conforming business and not be squeezed out. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Stephanie Arend. 21 MS. AREND: Good evening, Mayor, members of the Council. My name is Stephanie Arend. I'm an attorney at Gordon, Thomas, Honeywell, and I represent Baker Commodities with respect to their Tukwila site at 5795 South 130th Place. First I would like to thank or acknowledge our appreciation in the FEIS for being recognized by the city of Tukwila finally as a solid waste processor. I think that's very important and something that we would like to recognize. On the other hand, I am also very very concerned that we are here in our last Public Hearing on the Comprehensive Plan and there is yet so much work that has not been done. I think there are fatal flaws that still exist in the Comprehensive Plan. They have been pointed out to you at previous hearings and in writings that we have submitted. And Charlie Frame just submitted yet another writing showing a number of the 22 fatal flaws that continue to exist or were created by the most resent changes in this Comprehensive Plan. And I would like to address just a couple of those briefly in my remarks. I feel kind of like we're going back to the beginning here or that we never got off of the first square. I'm going to refer you to RCW 36.70A.070, the first section of it, and read two sentences to you because this is to me the foundation that your Comprehensive Plan is supposed to be built upon and it's lacking. It says the Comprehensive Plan of a county or city that is required or chooses to plan under RCW 36.70A.040 shall consist of a map or maps and descriptive text covering objectives, principles, and standards used to develop the Comprehensive Plan shall... It's absolutely mandatory that you have both the map and the descriptive text. The second sentence is; the plan shall be an internally consistent document and all elements shall be consistent with future land use maps. With respect to light industrial zoning outside of the manufacturing industrial center, your Comprehensive Plan does not meet those two sentences of the Growth Management Act, and we have pointed this out to you several times. It troubles me that we are still here today asking you to comply with these two sentences. I'm going to give you two or three examples of changes you've made to the Comprehensive Plan that are reflected in this draft but continue to expand on this problem. First of all there is no section called light industrial if you're outside of the MIC. There is no descriptive text which is mandated by the Growth Management Act to be in your Comprehensive Plan setting forth standards, objectives, and principles of the light industrial zone. It doesn't exist. I assume that the change made in this most current draft on page 213, the definition of light industrial which refers to the manufacturing industrial center, was someone's attempt to address that concern that we previously expressed. But it doesn't solve the problem. The reason it doesn't solve the problem is all of the rest of the plan speaks to areas within the MIC versus areas without the MIC. So how can we look at 23 this plan and say which policies, which objectives, apply to light industrial when it is located outside of the MIC. I'll give you a couple of examples. In the shoreline designation areas on page 60 and 61 compare the priorities of the two different shoreline designations, one of which geographically defines the light industrial zone that encompasses the Baker site. It has one set of priorities found on page 60 of the Comp Plan. The area within the MIC has a different set, a very different set, of priorities for it. We are not geographically within the MIC. I would like to you include us, but if you are not going to, you need to articulate principles and standards for the light industrial zone that are consistent with that zoning. Those priorities for the shoreline designation found on page 60 are not consistent with the light industrial zone and it is not consistent for us to then look to the MIC. I know my time is up. I would also just like to direct you to the Interurban corridor, which is the only section that at all discusses our area. It doesn't meet the GMA standards for principles and objectives of the light industrial zone. I would ask that you take the time necessary to go back and make sure you comply with the Growth Management Act. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Stephanie. Steward W. Kuhran. MR. KUHRAN: Mr. Mayor, I would like to pass at this time. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Grant Neiss. MR. NEISS: Good evening. I'm Grant Neiss. reside at 16318 45th Place South. I am also the chairman of the Tukwila Planning Commission. I am here before you to speak on behalf of the Tukwila Planning Commission. I have prepared a written document which has been submitted to the City Clerk which ultimately I hope you get, if you haven't already received it. I'm just going to touch on a few items that are in the document, rather than going through all of it which would be quite time consuming. 24 First of all I'd like to express our appreciation for the time and consideration that you have taken to the plan that we had submitted to you several months ago. We certainly understand the difficulty and challenges of this plan and the process. Having a Public Hearing is a great way to get some feedback and hopefully improve upon the plan that all of us have been working so hard on. There are a few items which we would believe that would add some greater consistency, both from a land use perspective as well as policy issues. A lot of them I have listed out by item in my document, and I am not going to go through each one of those. But I would like to touch on a few of some of the general policy and zoning issues which we felt real important and I would like to make part of the public regard. First of all, dealing with residential lot sizes. The Planning Commission spent a considerable amount of time discussing minimum lot sizes allowed for single family residential uses. All but one of the commissioners feel that allowing 5,000 square foot lot sizes will benefit the city. The overwhelming opinion is that our City is too transitory in nature. We believe smaller lots will encourage infill of more affordable owner occupied homes. We also believe that smaller lots do not necessarily correspond to poor quality. An example of this is the Street of Dreams. Many of the homes are on smaller lots, yet you would have to agree they are not poor quality. Another consideration is the fact that more homeowners are looking for a living environment that has less yard maintenance. Again, this is another area where smaller can be more attractive. How many times have you driven by homes that have large lots that are not maintained. This can provide as much, if not more, of an eyesore to the community. Smaller yards will require less maintenance, therefore, allowing the homeowners to easily control overgrowth. Lastly, Tukwila has very few areas where lots could actually be subdivided to two or more lots. The areas where this could truly be accomplished would be spread throughout the city. Infill can be achieved while minimizing the impact. So we would consider some additional consideration by you on that. 25 I'll touch on a highly volatile issue that appears tonight. The Union Tank and the properties along 44th Place South. We felt that it was important to restate our position on those properties just so that you had additional background from our perspective and how we came to our decision on our recommendation to you. It is a controversial area and it is due to the dramatically diametrically opposed opinions from both the residents that surround the area, as well as the owners that own the property, or some of them anyway. During the Planning Commission Public Hearings we heard an overwhelming support for the people who own land along 44th Place South who wanted to increase the usability of the property. Given the intense and noisy nature of the Burlington Northern truck yard abutting the properties, it seems logical to provide as much of a buffer from heavy industrial as possible. Our solution was to allow commercial /light industrial for the properties along 44th Place South and the Union Tank Works property. The decision to allow this type of use has also additional benefits to the residents of the area. We envision smaller commercial operations which would have more of a local appeal. This would potentially provide employment for those who live in the area, as well as adding to the city's tax base. Economically it would make sense to allow increased use for the area. There are two policies that directly reflect the need to increase the zoning of the land along 44th Place South. The first one appears on page 143 under policy 11.1.5. It reads, zoning in the MIC that permits manufacturing, industrial, and related uses along with retail, eating, and personal service establishments of limited size and location permitted but with uses such as residential and large retail prohibited. And admittedly this is not in the MIC, but it is directly abutting to it. The second policy is 11.1.6 which, to paraphrase it, you're asking for appropriate zoning that directly abuts or impacts residential zoning so that MIC uses may operate without significant degradation of the residential environment. It's obvious that these uses 26 are abutting each other. Allowing residential zoning would be counted as a policy objective and would not improve the quality of the residential environment in Allentown. If you feel that the commercial /light industrial is more intense than you're comfortable recommending, we would suggest looking at neighborhood commercial for the properties along 44th Place South. This would be more neighborhood friendly while fulfilling the objective of appropriate zoning. Additionally, since the buffer can be achieved by the properties along 44th Place South, possibly look at other zoning opportunities for the Tank Work property individually. I want to touch on the urban center, and I'll just read right through what I have here. We would like to applaud you for the thoughtful and dynamic approach you have taken with the Tukwila Urban Center. We believe you have improved the plan from its original design. In fact, during our deliberations of the development regulations, the Planning Commission decided to follow the lead set by the City Council and wrote development regulations that augmented the one zoned concept with a few changes. We agree with the one zone concept, but we also feel there are two distinct types of development within the urban center. Our suggestion is to provide increased design review standards for the area along Strander Boulevard and the main retail areas. We identified the distinct areas on our original zoning map proposal, and I have attached a map in my packet. We feel the businesses should be allowed to respond to a changing market; however, we also feel there should be a designated level of design to the building to enhance or be harmonious with the businesses in the same district. In other words, we were looking for increased design review for the more retail areas and less in the industrial areas. That's about it. I'm sorry, Highway 99. There is a lot of things on Highway 99 that I would like you to read in my document that I have submitted. There is a lot of input that has been provided by the Economic Development Advisory Board for Tukwila, as well as the Highway 99 Task Force. They have offered their insight and opinions to that, and there are several issues on there that we feel need to be addressed. Thank you very much. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Grant. Ann Nichols. 27 MS. NICHOLS: My name Ann Nichols. My address is PO Box 88050, Tukwila, Washington. I am here on behalf of the Segale family who would like to thank you for giving us a further opportunity to comment. And in order to do so, I think I'll make this short and I'll just pass out our comments and move on to the next person. MAYOR RANTS: I'm going to have to try this one again. I believe the last name is Day, 12050, 44th Place South. time. MR. DAY: I'm going to pass on my comment at this MAYOR RANTS: All right. Thank you. Lanny Vickers. MR. VICKERS: I'm going to pass on my comment at this time. MAYOR RANTS: Ellen. MS. GANGLER: Good evening. My name is Ellen Gangler. I live at 13727 Macadam Road South. I was asked to speak to the Council by the Highway 99 Task Force. I am currently a member of the task force, and prior to that, I was a member of the Tukwila Tomorrow Committee. The following views expressed reflect the majority views of the Highway 99 Task Force, along with former members of the Tukwila Tomorrow Committee, including Diane Meyers, who is present tonight; Mike West; Betty Gully who is also a representative on the Economic Advisory Council, among others. The following text was adopted from a presentation given by Mike West to the Planning Commission. Tukwila Tomorrow had an ideal vision for the corridor which included an urban village centered at 144th and the highway and extending from 139th on the north end to 148th on the south end. The principal zoning for that area was suggested to be made neighborhood commercial. As a member of the Tukwila Tomorrow Committee, we were concerned with the Comprehensive Plan for the entire city. We spent several evenings considering the highway, but were necessarily under pressure to move 28 on. Our view is that the highway should develop as a retail center for the citizenry of Tukwila. Businesses should be neighborhood oriented rather than regional. I agreed, but upon reflection, study, and activity on the Highway 99 Task Force, I admit that the view is idealistic and the highway wouldn't develop because there just isn't enough of a market to support it. The view is supported by the market analysis the task force received in July of 1995. The 99 Task Force is composed of business owners and residents along the highway, and we have concentrated exclusively on what would work along the corridor for several months. Our vision for the highway opens up the area from 154th to 137th to a more realistic zoning that would allow a revitalization of the area supported by a broader more economically viable market while retaining a very citizen friendly neighborhood atmosphere. We have envisioned a mix of several commercial zones and light industrial with a retail outlet as not only allowable, but necessary. We see viable development of the corridor under this core zone and believe that the light industrial with a retail outlet makes excellent economic sense while retaining a neighborhood atmosphere we want with a retail outlet. Hotels and motels will be allowed as a conditioned use. We believe that we have enough of them but our close proximity to the airport makes them a reality of our city. To prohibit them would only prolong the decay, and to allow them unconditionally would cause more of the sleazy development that we already have. Therefore, we have allowed them as a conditional use. The boarders we propose for this core zone would run from 154th on the south to 137th on the north. This is a longer and more economically realistic area than was originally envisioned by the Tukwila Tomorrow Committee. This would give the corridor a more vital and thriving economic base. The area from 154th to 160th we envision as very reasonable for high -rise hotels as we approach the boarders of Sea -Tac and come closer to the airport. The area between 116th and 120th on the north end of our corridor we feel that light industrial would compliment the topography. 29 The area between 128th and 137th reveals a transitional zone. It is currently predominantly residential and has commercial zones on the west side with office and residential zoning on the east side. We would like to see the office and medium density residential for both sides of the highway with height restrictions. This makes a good transitional area into our core business zone. Thank you. I would like to give a copy of this to the City Clerk, if I could, to be handed out to the Council members. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Vera Locke. MS. LOCKE: Pass. MAYOR RANTS: Gladys Bigelow. MS. BIGELOW: I'll pass. MAYOR RANTS: Martin Durkan. MR. DURKAN: Mr. Chairman, Honorable members of the Council, I'm Martin Durkan, Jr., 330 Southwest 43rd Street in Renton, Washington. I represent the Wen Lin family, who are the owners of the Econo Lodge and the adjacent property on Highway 99. I'm sure you're all familiar with Mr. Lin's situation up there. His family and himself have been working very hard with the City staff trying to remedy the situation. We support the changes in the latest draft Comprehensive Plan which would allow Mr. Lin and his family to revitalize their property and to replace the existing dilapidated uses with some new more modern facilities that will hopefully help revitalize the area. And if you can recall, Mr. Lin turned in a number of petitions signed by neighbors and residents supporting his project. I just appreciate the Council's working with Mr. Lin and his family and also the hard work by the staff, and thank you very much for your support. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. John Emanuels. MR. EMANUELS: My name is John Emanuels. My address is 4112 58th Place Southwest in Seattle. My Since then, there has been absolutely no development in that area and there has been no investment into the existing property owners' properties. As time goes by the properties are not being improved and the quality of the renters in the area is getting worse, and we're seeing a situation where the transitory tenants and the inherent problems with that are becoming a reality there. 30 family owns a small piece of property. It is just west of Foster Golf Course across Interurban Avenue up the hill adjacent to a nice little park there. I have been a commercial real estate agent in Tukwila, Renton, and Kent for the last nine years. I have a lot of experience with properties, and that's why the family is putting me up here to submit our opinion. 1 have two reasons to ask for your support for medium density residential in that neighborhood. The history has been when the city of Tukwila annexed the area from King County, it went to a professional office zoning which allowed of course office uses and then it had a little sub paragraph that said you could do some low density residential where you could have an office space with residential above it. So we're asking for the Council and Mayor to respectfully agree with the Tukwila Tomorrow people and their efforts and the Planning Commission efforts where they are agreed with us that it should be a medium density residential. These people are professionals. They spent a lot of time at it. And they did, what I think, an excellent job in assessing the situation, asking the questions, and spending a lot of time at it. Right now it is zoned office PO. And the reason why people are not investing in that area in their own homes and fixing them up or in development, is office land costs about $6 a square foot, give or take $2. So 4 to 8 bucks. On a 5,000 -foot lot that's 6 times 5,000 is $30,000. So when you look at those homes one might think it's a $100,000 home, but it's really not. It's really about $30,000. So the owner of that is looking at that going, okay, I can fix it up and it's a nonconforming use and some day maybe there is a greater fool that will come along and buy it from me, or I can just let it decay and my kids can inherit it some day and then they can sell if for $30,000. That doesn't help us as property owners and it doesn't help the city. 31 What we need, again, is a medium density residential where that will motivate my family to develop our little acre into nice new medium density residential development, and that will help the other neighbors have pride in their properties, reinvest in theirs, and then we can have a nice neighborhood. As I was sitting here, I was thinking why wouldn't the City Council agree with the Planning Commission and the Tukwila Tomorrow people. What came to mind and I have no idea why it keeps coming back to office. It's not an office neighborhood. In closing, it's not big enough of a property to affect the residential real estate market. No one's property value is going to go down from overdevelopment in the area. So none of your constituents will worry about the property values going down. It's only going to be positive. We're not asking for high density. No high- rises, just nice homes. Maybe a duplex, maybe a fourplex, something like that. Thank you and please respect your Planning Commission and Tukwila Tomorrow's decision. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, John. Louise Strander. MS. STRANDER: Louise Strander, PO Box 88636, Tukwila, Washington. I'm here to address you on lot 9 block 8 of Hillman Seattle Garden tracks. This is one of four lots which has historically consisted of one building site known to most as the Golden Nugget. I have enclosed here a 1968 site plan showing the contiguous lots. For some reason, and I have yet to discover why, lot 9, which is simply a flow of asphalt for the parking lot, was taken out of the zoning of the rest of the site and given a different zoning. That accomplishes nothing, and I'm simply asking that the zoning be given back to this small portion of the contiguous site. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Louise. Dwight McLean. MR. McLEAN: For the sake of time I will submit another letter. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. George Human. 32 MR. HUMAN: My name is a George Human. I am at 9438 Des Moines Memorial Drive South. I have a letter here to request to take my name off the reference. At first when you made the map they went around me, then they included me. I want my name off the register complete, permanently. I have one letter here and you guys can look at it and then go from there. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Rosemary Unterscher. MS. UNTERSCHER: Good evening. My name is Rosemary Unterscher. I live at 4110 South 114th Street, which is on poverty hill. I sort of look over the cliff down to where the new fire station is going to be built, just to let you know where I live. I'm here tonight just to support the Planning Commission's recommendations to keep 44th Place South as low density residential. The reason that I am in support of this is I feel the impact daily of living in an area that has much noise and vibration. And I think the Council and the Planning Commission is supportive of really maintaining our quality of life in Allentown and also a commitment towards affordable housing, which I believe Allentown provides. I want to just share a short story. As you know I live above Yard 3 from Burlington Northern. I know that Union Tanks has been in the neighborhood since 1957, but I'm old enough to know that the trucks they drove in 1957 are quite different than the ones they drive today. Burlington Northern had gotten some new loading equipment. I don't know what they're called. They are a type of truck anyway. But they got a new truck that was much larger, much noisier, and has very large loud speakers on it, in which they communicate with each other in the yard, I guess. In the first week that this equipment was working, I could tell you who was working the shifts because I heard their names to each other inside my house. So what I did was at midnight I went and talked to the supervisor. I went down to Burlington Northern just to talk to him about what was going on, and he asked them to turn it down so that I could not hear them, at least so clearly. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you G.L. Dave Smith. MR. SMITH: I'll pass at this time. MAYOR RANTS: Carol Huber. 33 My concern is that allowing even light industry into the areas which protect us, we want to have some protection from this kind of thing. Because upgrading the equipment, upgrading the trucks, just increases the impact to our lives. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Rosemary. G.L. Arnold. MR. ARNOLD: Mayor, ladies and gentlemen of the Council, my name is G.L. Arnold. I live at 20016 Orillia Road South in Kent, which is still in King County. I am here to ask the Council this evening to change the zoning of our property, which is directly in the corner of South 200th and Orillia Road. Right now you have it designated as low density. Well, we are the only people that live in that intersection, and I'm here to ask the Council if they would consider changing the low density to light industrial. That is a very busy intersection, and it is one of the most dangerous intersections in south King County. There are many accidents and fatalities that carry on there. So once the improvements are done, then that's putting us, our house, our land, and everything closer into the intersection. And we would request the Council this evening to change from low density residential to light industrial. Thank you. MS. HUBER: My name is Carol Huber. I live at 3810 South 158th, Unit C -5, Tukwila, 98188. I am concerned regarding the zoning of an undeveloped property just to the east of Lewis and Clark Theatre. I live in the condos that are just east of that undeveloped piece of property. The area I am in you have designated as high- density residential, which I have no problems with. That's what it is. The Comprehensive Plan, however, has designated the undeveloped property as commercial regional, and it is designated as part of the Pacific Highway transportation corridor, which could include commercial services, offices, lodging, entertainment, and retail with associated warehousing. The plan also indicates that building height limits could go up to ten stories for this area. When you are in a two -story condo next door, a ten -story designation appears a bit overwhelming and quite undesirable from a residential standpoint. Most currently a developer has proposed to construct a golf driving range right in our backyards with 90 -foot high girders and 90 -foot nets and the associated increase in traffic and noise and lighting. I won't get into more details, but that's a real obvious concern. On page 230 of your draft here you have deleted, it appears, all references to allowing structures that are compatible and complimentary with residential areas. I would ask the Council and the committee to reconsider the zoning category and attempt to redefine and limit the type of construction and developments that are allowed next to a long established high- density residential area. Bearing in mind that existent residential property values can be greatly impacted and possibly negatively impacted if developments are not complimentary with existent neighborhoods. Possibly a neighborhood commercial designation might be more appropriate for this area. So I would ask for your reconsideration. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Carol. Pat Paynton. MS. PAYNTON: I concur with Ms. Huber at this time, and I will pass. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. Ken Peckham. 34 MR. PECKHAM: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Council members. I'm really surprised that I'm here tonight. When I first got the Comprehensive Plan back in April of 1995 MAYOR RANTS: May I have your name and address for the record, please. MR. PECKHAM: I apologize. Ken Peckham. I'm with Schneider Homes. Our address is 6510 Southcenter Boulevard. And the property I am talking about tonight is directly east of our office complex. And like I said I'm surprised that I am here tonight because back 35 in April we received the, at that time, new proposed Comprehensive Plan to show the property directly east of our office as being future office. And when we got the resent updated proposed Comprehensive Plan, we have seen that that's now been changed to low density residential. I'm surprised. Because given the change in the area, I can't for the life of me understand why that would be low density residential with fringe along Southcenter Boulevard. Everything that is east of I -5 along Southcenter Boulevard is office, high- density residential, or commercial business. And really I am here to ask why. Why could we possibly find justification for low density residential on Southcenter Boulevard. So as you guys continue to deliberate this new Comprehensive Plan, I hope you will take that into consideration and give it some serious thought. Because if we're talking about highest and best use, I don't see how low density residential can be just that. Thank you. MS. CARTER: I'm not really sure where you are referring to. I see the pen pointing to pink. Isn't that office? MR. PECKHAM: If I may, our office is right here. This right here is the old one that she has got up here. Your new Comprehensive Plan has low density residential there. MR. CARTER: I didn't understand. Okay. MR. PECKHAM: I was having her put that up to show you what we were looking at back in April and now what we are faced with here in October. MAYOR RANTS: Gerald Schneider. MR. SCHNEIDER: Mr. Chairman and members of the Council, I am Gerald Schneider. Our office is at 6510 Southcenter Boulevard. I am here strictly for the zoning that we were told this spring we were going to come in because we had use for some office, and the staff said that the Comprehensive Plan would beat our zoning request. So we decided to back of the zoning request and just wait for the Comprehensive Plan to be developed, which was going to be office like it has been designated, I think, for the past ten to 15 years. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you Mr. Schneider. Ed. 36 Two weeks ago when the new plan came out we are designated low density single family, and I would like to ask any one of the Council members, would you like to live over top of 405, and if you do, we could build you some houses there. Thank you. MR. WOYVODICH: Good evening. My name is Ed Woyvodich. I live at 14448 57th Avenue South in Tukwila. I was born and raised here in town, I'm raising my family in town, and I own a business in town. I have been in business since 1978. I own some lots on 44th Place South and it seems like it's a pretty hot topic tonight. I have owned those lots for 18 years. I am for the Planning Commission zoning on that. I feel that there's a great need for a buffer right there, because the basic intent of the city of Tukwila is for the quality of life in residential neighborhoods. And I would really like you guys to take a good look at that and make a good common sense judgment on your vote. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Ed. Tom. MR. KALIL: I'm Tom Kalil, and I'm with Industrial Crating at 15450 Nelson Place South. I am just a little bit unclear as to how the zoning has affected us and whether we can remain a legal business. We are bounded by the freeway and Puget Power on two sides and the railroad on one side and they seem to be changing us from a manufacturing area pushing it towards commercial and residential. We intend to stay there and I want to make sure it stays legal. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Tom. Sharon Stanley. MS. STANLEY: I have some handouts for the Council. I want to make mention, the two letters on top, the originals that we submitted earlier, these are just letters that were obtained and were not in that package for the Council. There's a map in there I would like you to look at as I begin my comments, if it is possible, so I can show you. 37 MAYOR RANTS: Jane, why don't you ahead and pass them around and we'll take the map out so we can look at it. MS. STANLEY: Thank you. It's the top document so it shouldn't be difficult to see. My name is Sharon Stanley. I live at 12072 44th Place South, and I am here to address the matter of block 4, Hillman's Meadows, the old Allentown area now annexed into Tukwila. And as you see from the map on the top that you should all have there, the red items are the property owners who do approve of the commercial /light industrial zoning on 44th Place South, and attached to the map are the signed signatures of those property owners so that you can see that they are in fact valid references. On 44th Place South there is one owner there are we have been going back and forth and I think there are five property owners there who have not necessarily given us their consent to show their property on the map. And one of those property owners owns six contiguous lots. So you can see from that that there are five property owners now that don't agree and the rest of them do. On the second map, if you don't mind looking on the second page there, you will see depicted in the color chart those lots that are now well, they're all residential, but where there is a residence, then you will see a vacant which is by the green. You will notice that there are some businesses being operated there which are commercial business operated in a residential zone. And I just would like you to refer to those, and then attached to that are the letters. We have letters from Burlington Northern, which is in your packet. There is a letter there from the Boeing Field administration in your packet. We have contacted the Washington State Department of Transportation. Because the citizens, we wanted information to know how our property is going to be impacted. I believe in the letter that is dated October 6th of which several of the residents have signed, there are comments there, and we have the names of the people at the State Department of Transportation. They are telling us that rapid transit was voted down by the voters. We have a problem here. Our population is 38 expected to double by the year 2020. We know that our population does double every 20 years. That's a married couple having one child. For every two persons, one more. They are telling us that they do intend to contact the local municipalities in December because they want to talk about how they can expand existing facilities. I'd like to talk to you and have you visualize your own backyard. Can you see your own backyard. I'd like to tell you about our backyard, the people that live on 44th Place South. The back fence of our yard is Burlington Northern Railroad. That's our backyard. The next thing that we have is the roof over our house has air traffic of the airport that is the 21st most busiest airport in the continental United States, Boeing Airfield, and the statistics have been submitted to you. The other thing that we have in addition to that is the freeway. All of these are polluting sources. Every single one of them are polluting sources. I want you to know that some of the people that have signed on that property, there is a gentleman that's 94 years old. He has lived there since 1924 and raised his family there. There's a gentleman at the other end, he's 85 years old. He has lived there for a long time and raised his family. We have senior citizens there, we have people of retirement age, and a whole broad spectrum of people, and they are saying we are impacted. We cannot use this property. We cannot sell this property as residential. I heard someone mention earlier, well, the promises that were made. This is the way I remember the promise that was made at annexation. We intend to keep the zoning as it is currently presented, and the current presented zoning for block 4 by King County before and prior and for the last 20 or 30 years has been that in the future when we get ready, when the time is right and it's time to expand, block 4 becomes commercial industrial, not residential. You asked for new information. I want to make this point. You all know that we're here because new laws have been passed, the Comprehensive Management Plan required by the Growth Management Act. These are types of regulations and types of environmental laws. The land that a person buys let me just I'm trying to say this short. 39 Polluted and contaminated land attaches. That attaches to the land. It doesn't matter whether you own it now, whether you sell it, or whether your people inherit it from you. They inherit the liability for cleanup. And, no, we won't be responsible for the contamination that Burlington Northern and the airplanes and the freeway and everyone has made, but we will be responsible to defend. We will have to defend the allocation costs. And these people down there that have saved their life savings for a lot or two lots for their retirement can now look forward to spending their money, at least $200 or more, for a downtown lawyer to defend them against these environmental claims. This is a real situation for these people. We are the buffer zone for Allentown. Allentown has an opportunity to gain something from their lots. Their lots can be subdivided. They can make a gain. We cannot subdivide. We have no access. We urge you to listen to the experts now from your own Planning Commission who have recommended that this be zoned commercial industrial. Thank you for your time and your efforts. We all appreciate it. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Sharon. Lanny Vickers. MR. VICKERS: Lanny Vickers. I reside at 12227 45th Avenue South. First of all, I'd like to tell you that I concur with Dan Aragon on what he said. This lady spoke on the experts. I tell you to listen to the people who live on that street. The last several days I have taken a considerable amount of time. There are 15 homeowners, these are people who have homes. 11 have said leave us alone. I have documents here that they have signed. There is one elderly gentleman. I took a neighbor along with me so there would be no question as far as his understanding this. The other family is a Vietnamese family. Their son speaks English very fluently, and he was there at the time to convey to his parents what was going on I will submit to you out of the 15 homes, that 11 people are the ones that said we want to stay. You have Larry Quicksall, you have Stanley, and you have the Tank Works. The lady in San Diego, Ms. Sanderson. I called her last night. She has said to remain 40 neutral, but she also has offered her property to sell to a neighbor there. As far as going commercial /light industry, there is a strong rumor going around, Mayor, that you favor this, and they feel that you should convey to them your feelings if they are other than single family residence. It's interesting the statistics that come up for the Tank farm about being good neighbors, etc., etc. They have not been that. I have documents here to show you. If they are in question, I will be glad to sit with the Tank Works and chew the fat there and they can tell me where they are coming from. One lady last night said that she has been badgered to the point where she used colorful language to Mr. O'Connell on the phone and said leave me alone. He called her again today. Her son called me. He is the manager of the Paramount Theatre. He said that his mother is tired of being badgered. That is her home that she rents out. It's a livelihood. The other people in there, Mr. Primacio, I believe it is, the lady spoke of did not give permission to use his property. He did me. He has six lots. He is the largest single owner with property in that area outside of Union Tanks. And if you look at this, the property the Union Tank has are not homes. It is vacant lots. These people have 250 feet deep lots. They are satisfied where they are living, they have conveyed that to me, and they want to convey to you people. If there is any other question, they would by glad to answer any questions. Some of them are not here tonight. Like the one lady says, sometimes it's difficult to get people up front to speak, and a lot of times politicians count on that so that they don't hear really what's going on. On the petitions, we went around the Tank Works to people who boarder the Tank Works on that piece of pie, and they have stated, no, we want to stay single family residence. That's what it is zoned with King County and the city right now. I have checked on that. It's interesting that some of the people who speak about turning it into commercial or light industry that it's not suitable for anything else have not moved out of there. The only person that's moved in 15 years, and he died. The other people that live there have MAYOR RANTS: Thank you Vera. Gladys Bigelow. 41 continued to invest in buying property, vacant lots, and their goal is for you as the Council to fatten their bank account, and you're not here for that. I will reiterate. These people want to stay where they're at. They have a better buffer zone than the people who live South of 124th. They enjoy what they have and they want to keep it, and they want you to really consider the material you have got. Three people have told me personally, and I have talked to all of these people here, that they have been badgered in the last two days, and they used stronger words than that, and they are tired of it. They have told, they used the word Bill, to leave them alone, that they did not want to be bothered anymore, and this has not been solved. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: I'm going to go back down the list now to those of you who deferred to see if you wish to speak at this time. I'll begin with Steward Kuhran. We'll move on then to Vera Locke. Did you wish to speak at this time? MS. LOCKE: My name is Vera Locke. I live at 11810 42nd Avenue South, 98168. I'm not a good public speaker, but as Lanny says, I want to stay in my home. I have had it for 30 years. I'd like to die there. I'd like my children to inherit and possibly one of them would like to live in it. But if you are going to industrialize it, what's going to happen? We probably won't get a true value market out of it. They'll probably just give us what they want to or what they need, or my children probably. I want to stay in my home MS. BIGELOW: I'm Gladys Bigelow. I live at 12062 42nd Avenue South, and I have actually only lived on the other side of the river for the last 15 years, although I have been in the area. And from all the people that I talked to previously that the Tank Works, when it came in originally, snuck in and just spread like a beautiful cancer. And a few months ago, I went down kind of canvasing around to see how things were going, and buildings had popped up that I haven't seen there before. And I don't know anything about the conditions or anything, but they were supposed to be closed down and they were reopened and everything. But 42 the noise is just terrible. And I live on 42nd so it doesn't affect me. As far as the airport, since they have taken the planes out of Sea -Tac and very graciously given them to the Boeing Field, it has been real fun. But the people that live there still rely on your slogan, this annexation slogan of single family residence. And we would really like to all stay there. It's a place that children can still walk down the streets and call home. And we have sold a home just two houses from me and a nice little family is coming there and they are just delighted. How many places are you going to find that's in a flat area and it's still home. Thank you very much. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Gladys. Is there anyone now that wishes to speak that has not signed up? MR. SAARI: I didn't sign in because I thought maybe it would be a long meeting. My name is Lawrence Saari and I live at 13535 53rd Avenue South, which is located down by the park- and -ride and the Foster Golf Course and the park, Foster Park. My concern is the area that is shown on the screen there as being zoned for office use, which is entirely inappropriate for that area. I am surrounded there by apartment houses, and I think that RMM or medium density is the proper designation for that zoning. The other comment I have to make is that I want to thank the Council and the Mayor for putting up no parking signs on 53rd down by the park- and -ride. It has gotten to be a real problem there. So we are very thankful for that. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. I have one more name here. George Saxton. MR. SAXTON: Good evening. My name is George Saxton. I live at 16412 120th Avenue Southeast in Renton. And my family has owned property on 44th Place since before the Tank Works. My grandfather and grandmother built a home there. My mother currently owns the property, but it is considered family property. Probably one of the reasons that this issue is so hot is because people still live there. I think that MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. Saxton. One last call of anyone else who would like to speak in the Public Hearing? 43 the idea of using that street as a buffer doesn't make sense to me. I would think a buffer being a green belt, trees, flowers, paths, stuff like that. I don't consider warehouses and trucks and forklifts and things like that to be a buffer. I think the next problem will be the next street, and then the next street. That area is obviously residential. It is a community. It has been one for 75, 100 years. Allentown has been there for a long long time and I think it should stay that way. It is unfortunate that the railroad took over the cow pasture. But I can see that and it happened a long long time ago. The airport has been there since before my family was there. And there is just certain things you tolerate, you put up with, they are acceptable. To begin to chip away at this community and take away the homes that people have lived there for 30, 40, 50 years I think would be a mistake. I hope you will consider that in your decision. Thank you. MS. PEIRANO: My name is Sally Peirano, and I live at 4716 South 122nd. We moved in there in 1964. And whenever we moved there, we heard all the noise coming from the Tank place. So we inquired why they were there. So the neighbors told us that they went around with a petition to be just a little workshop. Well, it got bigger and it got bigger and now it is bigger than ever. So for a while Mr. O'Connell filed for 11 bankruptcy, so it stayed closed for quite awhile. Then all of a sudden he sold all of the equipment in there. And then a little while later all these trucks come through hauling all of this steel putting it over there. The noise. I had to call the police one night to come out there and stop it. It was so noisy. So now there are three names up there that don't have Mr. O'Connell's name on. There are three companies up there that have their names up there working out of there. So how can they do that whenever they don't have a permit. Just Mr. O'Connell. So now you tell me that. 44 Now they want to change it for commercial. Well God knows what we would go through if they do. So we would like to stay just as it is. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you. All right, ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to close the public hearing. MR. STANLEY: Excuse me. Could I make one statement, please? MAYOR RANTS: Yes, sir. MR. STANLEY: My name is Louis Stanley. I live on 44th Place South, and I have lived there since 1971. 44th Place South is a truck route, it's a shortcut, that goes all the way through. They don't even stop, every day. So the truck traffic is nothing new for that area. The other part is this. In our particular area there has not been one new house constructed since 1957, that I know of. You can name about five new houses all together in Allentown. And this property certainly can be used for better use than a few people who, because some disabilities they have, many of them don't mind the noise. But it's because of that that we have to stop progress. What would have happened if Boeing had to stop at that little red schoolhouse they have down there for the museum because somebody across the street did not like what they were doing. We can't stop progress no matter that, and it's going to occur. And I feel that our Council should help us put more jobs in this area. This, I would say, will employe roughly 200 people if that goes commercial, in my mind. And that will be walking distance to work. I appreciate your considering what I have to say. Thank you. MAYOR RANTS: Thank you, Mr. Stanley. One last call. I will close the Public Hearing. The Council will take these notes and minutes into consideration at your next meetings. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming down. Thank you for your patience with listening to all this testimony. The Council will consider all of it and make decisions on the final Comprehensive Plan. (Public Hearing closed at 9:04 p.m.)