Planning Commission

okay welcome everyone I'd like to call to order the April 11th 2024 meeting of the Bellingham City Planning Commission Heather can you call the role Rose Le here Scott Jones here Bara plaset here Russ Whidby here J blo here Mike casties here uh uh I don't think we had any minutes no um okay tonight's meeting is a work session continuing our conversation from March 21st on the Silver Beach rezone um on March 21st we had a public hearing um getting on the record testimony from staff and the public um the public testimony was closed um and we did receive a number of written email commentary um in the time since then and um Commissioners were provided that um so we won't be taking on the record testimony about the silver breach rezone tonight but before we jump into our work session um we do allow general public comment on any topic um if you want to address the Planning Commission on General planning issues so if you would like to do general public comment now is the time uh you'll have three minutes uh please just come on down and line up at the podium first by default so um thanks for giving me the opportunity to provide comment again um tonight I um spoke at the last thing that the last meeting and those that information was put on the record so I'm do Susan Kan ronning and I'm a silver Beach resident and I've lived there since 1994 I've been an advocate and activist for Lake wam since the 1990s and I was instrumental in getting the lake listed on the 303d list of the Clean

Water Act as an impaired water body that TR listed listing triggered the tmdls the total maximum daily loadings and the required mitigations from the Department of ecology including the storm water retrofitting according to the Wacom County website properties within the wed have a greater impact on Lake water quality than those in other parts of the county so those Property Owners pay for the additional funding needed Property Owners within the city of Bellingham already pay a storm water utility fee and a lake wcam Watershed protection fee to pay for their portion of Lake quatum storm water program expenses the lake quatum watershed land acquisition and preservation program charge funds land acquis for land acquisition and other land preservation measures in the lake quam Watershed to help preserve water quality I approve of all those measures and I think each of us should pay our share to protect the lake quac water quality residents have been paying for years to protect the lake acquire the land and for storm water mitigation however the city has continued to allow the several multif family Parcels to put untreated water into our drinking water reservoir for decades without problem solving ways to mitigate it frankly I feel duped I've watched the lake degrade observed The increased Organics in the lake as dissolved oxygen is increased mil Creek meets the fewest criteria of all the sample sites in the just released 2022 2023 Lake quatum monitoring program annual report but

we're now being asked to Bear the burden and allow increased density in multif family Parcels for Old Mill Village to finally have storm water retrofitting if even if this occurs the remaining multifam Parcels will still not have storm water retrofitting it will increase traffic in an area that already has outof control speeding with documented accidents and no traffic patrols for years there will be no traffic patrols according to the Bellingham Police Department there's in there will allow increased feal matter into the lake with increased dog and risks for more invasive species through unsanctioned watercraft entering the lake I'm frustrated because we have worked so hard on lake mitigations and recovery and there has to be another option than this option that you're going to talk about tonight thank you thank you hi good evening my name is Carrie bernside I um and thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening I'm the Silver Beach neighborhood association president uh mnac representative and then I'm a volunteer with the Washington State low-income housing Alliance and I am advocating for affordable housing for all income levels and uh particularly in in my neighborhood Silver Beach neighborhood we have a complex challenge ahead of us to meet the needs outl in House Bill 1220 we are exempt from House Bill 1110 middle housing and so we will really need to get creative in how we can provide housing for the lower spectrum of income levels for the 0 to 30% and on up

historically Old Mill Village was was listed as affordable housing under the opportunity Council however you know it was not a tax credited affordable housing it it just was naturally occurring affordable housing uh it no longer is and that was 112 units that were lost in the Silver Beach neighborhood and we need to find a way to compensate for that and then go beyond we also need to know what the need is across the city what is our current housing stock what is available for all the different income levels what's the difference so that we can start building and Meeting those needs and in particularly in Silver Beach we're going to need to utilize existing housing stock and find ways to create to transform those into affordable housing whether it's converting homes into duplexes without changing the footprint um converting uh rentals into Home Ownership having a city-wide ordinance that requires first right a refusal converting apartment complexes into resident-owned communities we really have to get out think outside of the box for Silver Beach um as it's our drinking Reservoir and I I want to keep that up in front of everyone because I think when the update with the Billingham plan it was identified that that our neighborhood doesn't quite have a plan yet it is complex our neighborhood association is willing to help assist with that you know process and be do some creative thinking and do some of the leg work as well as research because we definitely appreciate City staff

being willing to work with us and assist us um and we'd like to continue you collaborating with the city and and meet that goal together as a community if I have time real quick build for zero off the shelf program that can be adapted to any any City it's being used across United States in 114 cities so far it starts off with having a target audience that you go for um functional zero no more than three per people experience being on house for more than 30 days other communities larger communities are success sucessfully doing that I'd encourage us to look at that as well why reinvent the wheel we can take something that's already successfully working in other communities um it's also being done in other cities in Washington state so the same laws apply uh and then also there's the Washington low-income housing alliance's road map for justice which is also a 30-year uh research document that will assist cities in reaching those goals of house built 1220 thank you for your time good evening thank you hello hello my name is Steve Clark a resident of Bellingham late watom is a source of drinking water for 100,000 plus people there should be a coordinated investigation of all applicable data sources I.E the Bellingham City Planning Department the Army Corps of Engineers because Lake Washington is a tributary to a navigable water of the United States and Washington Department of ecology to prevent the the continued deg degrad degradation of the primary source of water in the

region thank you hell my name is Christopher DIY I'm homeless here and I'm speaking on the um as Carrie burn I touched upon the affordable housing and how it affects the water um I was I happen to be in Colorado Springs a little while ago and I noticed how they had trash underneath a um along Creekside underneath a bridge it looked like homeless people had put trash under there but it was just unbelievable it was all crammed in underneath their bridge but it was right by the creek there's all this trash and garbage and and uh filth and it's like that that wasn't that wasn't by homeless people it's made to look like it's homeless people so I think it's organized they're making homeless look like they're doing this but homeless aren't making that that was organized they they but the point is that it's at risk of contaminating the water so it is an issue of of eradicating the home or solving the homeless problem and I I I hate to be personal but I just had a meltdown today at the opportunity Council because they told me I'm in ineligible for housing and I said well I signed up in 2008 you guys know I've been sleeping on the pavement it's like 15 years now know I'm like a cartoon character in this town everybody knows who I am I speak at the City Council meetings County Council and I try to talk on improving Public Safety and uh so everybody knows I'm homeless and I announce myself it's like a matter of public record I'm Christopher Diley I'm homeless this has been going on since

2008 but the opportunity Council they have me down as being ineligible for housing and they want me to start the whole process over because I haven't been coming in on a monthly basis for 15 years you know when I signed up in 2008 I gave it about 2 to three years of going in on a monthly basis with them telling me no we have nothing no we have nothing no we have nothing and they would give me a bus ticket a bus coupon that's all I I was able to get from them so after two or three years I'm like they're not going to help me so they made me ineligible but I did keep going back for the bus tickets so they've got me eligible for the bus tickets but ineligible for housing and I'm like this is maddening I I was really really sad and full of despair this afternoon and I kind of I I felt badly because I I I embarrassed myself cuz I'm like you know it I can't do anything about this you know you guys are making me inable for housing means I can't get any house I'm going to keep sleeping on the pavement indefinitely with my health getting worse uh uh major risk of stroke and etc etc but I don't want to go on too long but thank you I appreciate the opportunity to talk about it and if somebody could help me because I I did speak with Hannah stone three years ago and and she's on the board of directors of the opportunity Council uh council member Hannah Stone and she didn't help me so nobody's helping me they're all saying sorry you're ineligible there's nothing we can do about it you need

to start all over the process I'm like if I start the process over I'm at the bottom that doesn't make sense so thank you thank you I am Dr Susan Tosh I'm speaking on behalf of action and sustainability a community based group in water education I'm a PhD hydrologist with a dual background in public health and I also have a masters in environmental planning I specialize in the connections between land use water quality and human health there are a couple assumptions that need a bit of clarification both from this group and possibly uh a large the larger body in the in the community does the moratorium have to end in July um the far-sighted planners who put the moratorium on put it on to uh have a thorough investigation of all the all the variables involved in setting knowledgeable zoning in the area and also in management of that area has that been done if it hasn't done then it behooves uh this this group to extend it or to apply the fourth level of uh zoning which is critical area zoning which is a requirement by the growth management Act AC them on other places when you have sensitive areas second question is do you have on the ground sampling on private property what does it take to have on the ground sampling that means uh site specific grabbing samples of water test Wells sampling strategy uh with the amount of u well drinking water our public water supply is a public health concern and with the amount of violations and public health issues that include in particular

Unown Mill property the manufacturing of elicit drugs the spreading of chemicals and herbicides uh without adhering to um material safety and poison control requirements uh the the car theft that and the um working on cars it has uh fluids from Cars oil and that kind of thing on highly permeable services that are going directly in the water supply uh it behooves and there should be a mandated sampling program that uh has to do with our public health concerns for over 100,000 residents so yes you do have a an Avenue to have sampling on the ground sampling on that property um do you need to permit future development to mitigate prior development impacts that's kind of a key question because one of the issues here is uh $100,000 kind of carrot in storm water drain uh however that same property with the amount of violations also just in in um having any sort of uh mitigation or any sort of requirement on dealing with violations that have already occurred should be held responsible to mitigate in whatever ways possible that includes storm water drainage that includes any drainage uh and uh putting buffer zones uh also protecting areas okay and the final one uh um do we have enough information I attended the uh water group uh and I can attest that there is no on the ground sampling information with the large amount of data collection from all the different agencies this becomes incredibly important in this area just our neighbor in San Juan County uh with just a little bit of

chemical a known chemical with willing people uh ended up polluting their entire aquafer San Juan County now has detrimental uh water supply imagine Lake Wacom not being a resource because of a pollution situation like that we know on oill property there are chemicals already being used in um uh contractors will say in uh buildings that are already below water line in very sensitive areas that include confined aquifers so think seriously about what are the impacts of making a decision without coordinated decision uh coordinated research and not only that but how does one data set affect the other data set you need to understand the interrelationships between what happens in the land use how it affects the water quality and how ultimately that's going to be uh affecting our human health thank you so much okay any other general public comments any uh want to bring in some was that okay we'll go to zoom in we'll go to zoom in one minute go ahead thank you Mr chairman uh John siten I live in the Silver Beach neighborhood my office is 1500 Railroad Avenue and I have to note that despite the admonition many of the comments were directed towards the ordinance that you're considering tonight and specifically details so I'm going to take the opportunity to share in the same luxury uh it's interesting as I said at Bear listening if I hadn't with my client approached the city few years ago about a Redevelopment opportunity and saying we would bring storm water to the site I don't think

we'd be here today you know and the de owners could have redeveloped I mean repaired and remodeled these existing units brought it to Market rents and we still wouldn't be here today looking at a moratorium or extension or considering a medium density and storm water regulations for multif family we came forward and sought a partnership with the city saying we won't pursue the high density that was there we would look at medium density and bring the storm water regul compliance to Bear what is needed to bring the phosphorus reduction on this site I bring this out because one of the regulatory tools you have is to incentivize Behavior the upside here is that the market can allow us to afford the costs our engineer estimate was $2 million to bring the storm water and phosphorus facilities to the site we can bear that cost at medium density we can't at low density that's just the sheer Market aspect of it so we ask you to consider the medium density thank you thank you yes good evening uh my name is ramen falowski I'm also a resident of Silver Beach neighborhood um I've been doing a little research on uh this part of Lake walkom that or speaking of and there were Decades of U Mills on site where lell is the park and also where this uh Old Mill locality is and from what I've been able to determine is that when number of these Mills were in being generated they weren't was before the Consciousness that we have today and the likelihood of when these Mills burn down the research

that I have determined is that the uh area was bulldozed buried on site and pushed into the lake and that was back in the 1950s into the 1960s the current Old Mill Village was built in 1971 uh before the EPA or any consciousness of the impact it seems to me is though before anything further is done there needs to be a determination if there's major soil contamination and offshore um Shoreline contamination as well whether it be private property or public property really needs to be be determined at the beginning this process thank you thank you uh do we have any Zoom hands if you can go ahead and bring them in y Louise hi my name is Louise Schmidt and retired physician and a concerned disability support ADV Advocate since disabled 20 years ago I've tried to help others including at Old Mill I understand from your last meeting that you've been uh obliged to rely on public information from residents and citizens to report on the safety of the only local community drinking water supply I'm fortunately that has put the safety and housing of those who in due diligence notify authorities of especially egregious code violations at risk they paid a heavy toll it is essential that you put very strong whistleblower Protections in place with only two known code inspectors on staff and limited data collection and code enforcement resources the risk of exposure to over 100,000 residents is high to date only the local reporting has provided on-site information and notification of public

hazards to and within Lake watcom privately owned reiran and Wetland sensitive areas since the proposed development of over 350 units in multi-story dwellings some with structures already falling below the water line as noted the risk and detriment to Lake watcom is great the people at Old Mill have mostly not changed with the technical changes of ownership and have witnessed them and their attorneys even line in court at Old Mill they have exposed tenants to toxins and other harms this includes sewage backups on-site drug manufacturing distribution leaky fuels fumes and fluids drained from documented Sol cars and those being worked on in residential areas even with fire set in carports electrical shorts black bold indiscriminate spreading of toxins by management including herbicides and pesticides without following manufacturer or Poison Control direction that put one of my people into respiratory crisis was particularly concerned with the effects of the individual explosive device that caused a bomb squad to seal off the area would not trust Old Mill with the main freshwater supply for over 100,000 people nor to follow building codes to keep the water safe and drinkable in the future responsive Old Mill management towards those who try to do due diligence in reporting for these violations to authorities has been one of butal retaliation I've known those who have been physically threatened chased assaulted and defamed had their disabilities ridiculed and their homes and

health put in Jeopardy I myself have been insulted and discounted when I spoke on their behalf the city is going to rely on residents to notify Authorities on seach or other known health hazards that may impact the water supply then there must be whistleblower Protections in place to Halt retaliation and Safeguard the vulnerable from this concerned position thank you thank you go ahead Linda yes hi there my name is Linda Miller I am a resident of the Silver Beach neighborhood and I am urging you to vote no for the proposed recommendation of the multif family zoning in Silver Beach to medium density ideally no new development should be allowed in the lake watom Watershed especially in Area 13 site of the Old Mill Village which is on the shoreline of Lake watcom any possibility of allowing development of any size on Area 13 must require an environmental impact study of the land before any zoning change is considered just yesterday the EPA announced tougher restrictions first ever limits on six posos or forever chemicals in drinking water how do we know if any of those are currently in the soil on the Old Mill Village property I don't want Bellingham to be the next Flint Michigan with a Drinking Water Crisis that could have been prevented thank you very much for listening to my comments thank you okay that's everyone from remote uh any last call for General Public comments before we get into it come on down um just want to speak briefly about the zoning changes in the silverbach

neighborhood my name is John Ken ronning I live in the Silver Beach neighborhood um have for 30 plus years um I believe the best course of action is no building in the Silver Beach neighborhood to be entirely Frank with you I think the city should not allow any additional housing units I've heard the argument that if we allow low density or medium density as our threshold the owner developer Mr Sitkin who I'm respect a lot I know him personally um brought that forth they'll pay for the improvements well that kind of reminds me of something that my father told me a long time ago he said it's kind of like getting a free lunch you know what no lunch is free we're going to pay as a community down the road um they'll do some mitigation for us but there's going to be a whole lot of other problems come along with this increased density so as a community I think it's the wrong direction for us to go currently the city and the county spend or have the resources to spend considerable amount of money to reduce human impact on Lake guala but you know I think one of the most sensible and cost cost effective ways to reduce hum cost effective ways to reduce human impact within the Watershed is basically just to have fewer humans within the Watershed people are messy we bring cars bring in pets bring in all kinds of other stuff that impacts the Watershed we can find other means to mitigate all of the sites within the Watershed not just Old Mill Village but there's other sites within the

Watershed that need mitigation also there's not a free lunch and we don't need to accept it from development we need to find alternative ways to fund improvements in our community thank you thank you okay uh we'll go ahead and oh did you want to speak okay yes please if there's anyone else who wants to speak please come down and stand next to the podium now I'm James Davies I've lived in Bellingham since um see what I see on the Watershed thing is you have a legacy what I would call a legacy decision look good at this he chokes me up need to take Coast Masters or something what you decide with a leg Legacy decition has impact that lasts a generation and more it's on you guys's head sorry but that's a pretty Brut blun statement what the impact is in the future it makes no sense to me in terms of basic logic to develop in order to protect it's just it just kind of blows few es up in my mind like we're going to develop so we can protect the wed I grew up in the Seattle area my family moved out to East King County um had a girlfriend out there and that was the first time I encountered the Seattle City Watershed there's a big chain link fence for miles and beyond that it's like a Wilderness Area Wilderness Area is a designation that's better than national parks it's a roadless area area that's preserved with and you're not even allowed to use power tools in a Wilderness Area Watershed should have that kind of sacred designation King County Seattle City city Watershed is like that

and if this this town could roll back time make watcom would be like a Wilderness Area we'd have a chain link fence and it would be wild on the shores we'd have no issues we wouldn't be having this conversation to develop in order to protect what are you thinking and that's all I have to say about it all right thank you um so we're going to go ahead and close the general public comment and start our work session Steve do you want to kick us off please thank you Steve sundine planning department in the interest of time I'll be brief we've provided materials for you to review they've been provided to most I'm assuming most of the people are here tonight so I don't want to fur to say everything so just kind of set the table if you will uh since we met in March uh we invited uh people including planning Commissioners to attend the joint uh council meeting that occurred on the following Wednesday on the 27th just to have a understanding uh of the bigger picture in terms of what the city does in terms of watershed protections and existing programs and so on that are out there and Ava and available and being implemented uh day by day week by week and so on uh we have developed a uh project web page which you can see here I provided links to you folks here and a lot of the people who are parties of record who commented and they they received this project page with the intent of sort of putting all the information in one specific spot um especially as it relates to and there's just a

quick overview of The Proposal generally and then kind of this key piece here in the middle which is learn more about Lake W instead of requiring people to go all over the web uh we wanted to provide a lot of the resources right here on this page so hopefully that was helpful to people and then we have the two document or the documents here the materials for the 11th April 11th um work session which is where we are now um and so I'm just going to just open that real quickly and we wanted to really respond to uh sort of the three themes that we ended our public hearing with and I'm just going to use these terms generally we're not going to get into detail because I want to have that discussion later amongst staff and the Commissioners um what we did first of all was addressed this uh notion of establishing a mandate uh which city council would do and and the takeaway was to establish a mandate without absent any type of development regulation so what we did in this section here is we talked about what that would mean we did a cost analysis and we gave some examples uh of what that would mean to individual single family property homeowners and also multi existing multif family property owners and we went through that analysis and we provide that you know sort of a broad brush back of nain but the intent was to show what the cost burden would be to individual properties if we were to say go and do it without having a development regulation that was triggered where they would

have to do it anyway and those are those examples here um we also uh talked in here about effective development acres and the reason I think last time we met we sort of focused on phosphorus and how much phosphorus was entering the lake and loading and preventing that or treating it before it got there after going to the Joint Council um meeting on the 27th and listening to how they were presenting the information it became more about removing effective development Acres from The Watershed and so so we shifted the conversation slightly to that because that's really what the tmdl says we're we're prepared to give some um rough numbers in terms of what the phosphorus is that's associated with this but we thought changing the the um the perspective to this uh was a more effective way to convey the message and just a quick house uh house cleaning here so the red line which shows the 373 um develop uh edas to be reduced or removed from the Watershed that's our actually our Target I know I know in the narrative the numbers say something different so 373 is the Target right now currently we're at 347 so we have another essentially 13% to go to reach that number and then we did a a quick analysis below that to talk about um if the multif Family Properties in area 8 and Area 13 which is what we focused on uh we could move the needle you know significantly within the next let's just say five years and get us quite a bit closer to our Target that was the intent of the graph uh the

intent of this picture here was to talk was to discuss options that was another thing that was suggested that we go and look at and analyze and you can see here in the see here in the drawing that the just to be General the green areas are treated essentially and they are treated through the mechanisms that uh the city has uh installed and those are all represented by the blue dot so you can see there's quite a bit of area that's already been treated that that effectively represents some of the 373 uh there's some nuances to the way the numbers are are are used but I'm just being General and then you can see the remaining properties that that aren't and those are on the shoreline we discussed last time how those properties are difficult to treat because they're largely developed um and it's difficult to put uh public facilities on private properties and you can see here obviously Area 13 encompasses this large area and then area eight is tucked in here and so what we wanted to really convey is that the city has done a lot already and it's getting more and more difficult to find additional space within areas that we control that we can effectively uh either remove phosphorus or remove an additional development Acres this is another graph that uh shows essentially the city actions moving you know sort of from the bottom left up to the top right and it shows these individual things that we've done over time and how that has moved us towards um this notion of phosphorus removal

or or effective development Acres removed and you can see that as we continue to implement actions over time with each of these um objectives or things that were done Capital project uh the number of Acres removed increases we spent a little bit of time on uh Workforce housing and affordability and what we conveyed here is that there are programs out there this is kind of a repeat of what we talked about on the 27th U but nonetheless we we stated that there are programs out there um we don't feel like it is appropriate to taret Target one specific area without having um that analysis conducted Citywide and there are uh moves being made that in which we're starting to address this currently both through the Bellingham plan and through some inclusionary zoning analysis again that's kind of a repeat from last time and then finally this is just an extra thing here that uh we we put in the response and that is just kind of take you through the overall process and give an indication of how things would move forward if some if the if the proposal were adopted um or some other version of it or what have you and and and this describes that process sort of um Soup To Nuts I'll use an older person's term there but I love it it's it works um but the key is to focus on letter C and letter C sort of addresses this this notion that um you know hey we need to be providing Baseline information now before we make this decision so what this says essentially that if a development application is

filed in the future we do ask for that as part of an actual development application we are asking for that Baseline information to be provided so those are the things I wanted to convey briefly to the folks who are here and online and so on Commissioners um we have sort of an outline of other just a few other things that we wanted to respond to Carrie provided Carrie Burnside provided a a sort of a question uh list of questions in her public comment and so we kind of wanted to use that as our guide and just go through and make sure we hit those items really quickly um and so we'll do that now and we'll start with um and this is this is the this is the public comment that has questions relating to storm drains in RM zones medium density versus low gentrification reforestation and restoration and then essentially their ask or their or their um their essential recommendation for how to move forward so that being said we'll go through uh Public Works uh folks oh by the way let me introduce people here sorry we REM missed not to do that we have Jason Porter here in the orange and blue checkered shirt from Public Works we have Curt alfeld senior uh Services just got to slow down senior development manager uh we also have Rene lroy over here I know you didn't want to be pointed out but there you are assistant Public Works director and then we also have Public Works director Eric Johnson planning director Blake Cen so that's that's it so now we we're going to go through this quickly

and then we'll get into discussion thanks all right Jason Porter Public Works get it on the record here um so one of the questions that they had is While Lake walkom is showing signs of improvement will the gains be lost with median density development the property's currently zoned high density and without the moratorium could be developed to a higher density so the recommendation of a medium density is to reduce those impacts um low density could reduce them further but it's with the planning Department's housing unit considerations um so but for that one there it's currently Zone High The Proposal here is to move it to medium density the next one is how will the addition of 300 units in zone 13 impact other areas that have upgraded storm drains um not completely clear on the question but Steve had provided a graphic and if you could bring it up there but it shows the areas treated um by the city of Bellingham Public Works we'll get it here and so those what we call our Capital facilities those are the things that the city builds and maintains and that's filtering storm water we've got about 90% of all of the city area that we can get to a capital facility already treated and we have plans to retrofit a couple more of our treatment systems and we'll be able to achieve our tmdl waste load allocation that 373 effective de Bakers we believe we'll be able to achieve that within 5 years but that isn't through Capital facilities only because we've grabbed about all the water we

can grab with these Capital Construction facilities and if you look at the graphic here primarily the areas that are in yellow are downhill from our infrastructure Northshore Drive where the infrastructure is is uphill so these are all areas that are Lakeside or Creekside properties you can see a silver Beach Creek a little bit of yellow there those are areas that we cannot grab and move water uphill from private property up into a capital storm water facility so with these Redevelopment there's two things on the table here there's the density zoning but it's also the adoption of amendments to 1680 which are these stormw rules when you look at these properties unless we can come up with some creative partnership which we haven't found yet our strategy for our tmdl response that we've been working on for about 15 years now is for those properties to redevelop and put in that storm water mitigation that we can't put in for them and that's the idea with the Redevelopment or new development that they would then put in these improvements so it's a little off from what the question is asking but I think that that's kind of the general idea of you know where are the areas that are being treated where the areas aren't and then I thought I'd explain why and you can see the largest portion is the Old Mill site yeah there are programs that the feds and the state can help with private property owners in order to achieve this instead of doing it through density correct correct we actually

have a homeowner incen of program that's funded through the property acquisition fund that was another comment that came up here about being able to vote on how to use these funds so the city of Bellingham has an incentive program the homeowner incentive program to do storm water improvements on these properties it's currently not offered to multif family because of the challenges with ownership and all the tenants and that but we're looking at adopting that but that's what I'm getting at is even for the multi family there is an option to get the state involved or the feds involved to help mitigate that right there is funds available because it is a troubled Waterway there are funds available for the city or for the state and the FEDS to come in and say you know we can help you fix this hi NE lroy Public Works um so just distinguishing between the city the feds and the state so the city has a land acquisition program and um that funds not only land acquisition but our homeowner incentive program that Jason was describing earlier where we can use that money to do retrofits on properties um and usually those are storm water retrofits that are on properties that either are adjacent to the Shoreline and there's no other way to treat them are adjacent to a stream or have large lawn areas which are the biggest source of phosphorus in the Watershed so that program at the city already exists um it right now we don't have it focused on the multif family areas but that's something that

we can look at in the future dep independent of whether it's single family or multif family it requires a willing land owner to work with and so that's you know there's options available I'll leave it at that so that's what I'm hearing here is that the landlord is not willing we haven't had the chance to have that conversation with the landlord and I just want to just reinforce that point is that the city's acquisition program and the homeowner incented program are from willing Property Owners uh the city does not have the ability to compel a property owner to do something um because I'm sorry I was saying for the overall well they they in very very rare circumstances would that be available but in this circumstances the city does not have the ability to compel a property owner to either sell us their property to remove it from development or compel them to retrofit their property that constitutes what we call a taking we we don't have the ability to do that um the the and and and the city is certainly not saying that we want to promote development to get the to get the uh uh Capital to retrofit properties what the TMD has allowed for is saying that one mechanism to fund retrofits to existing properties whether it's a single family home or a multif family property is that allows for the recognition that that capital investment can result in the ability to pay for retrofits and so the the proposed code changes are to to allow that increased or that the density provision and

then put additional requirements to put those retrofits as a requirement as a condition of development but we do not have the ability to require them to do something unless they come to us and say we want to do something okay now that requirement comes into place so um also now what I'm hearing is is that um we're not going to require them but we also don't we aren't required to give them medium density or high density either so Mr Mr lion just that they the current Arrangement they have a high density today so the moratorium was put in place to say this is the allowance we have there are there other things that we need to do to mitigate and minimize the effects of that or do we lower that density to a certain level so at the high density that's currently allowed for uh recommendation from staff is to reduce that to a medium density which lessens the impacts uh and but allows for the capital Investments that are needed to meet the requ requirements for that level of density including Street improvements or some offsite mitigation and specifically to the storm water retrofits that would be acquired on that individual piece of property as well as to address the uh as has been talked about the deficiencies in the existing units that need to be brought to a higher standard and if we allow a development we could also be unleashing something we don't that we don't actually know might be there right because this is we're talking like there was mines and stuff in this area there's a

lot of things that you know his historically that have been done to this property that um if you drive around it you you can see some of the stuff that's still laying around right so old construction stuff and all of that kind of stuff and so what I'm saying is is that if we if we allow development and then we disturb something that we didn't know was there we can't take that back right I think the key the the key to remember here is that before anything is developed that's when we have the ability to to require those studies so nothing no shovel of dirt is churned until we actually know what's underneath the dirt and what's going to happen so that that's that balance again of we don't really know until something happens and what is that something that's going to or could happen is you develop it before you can actually develop it you have to go study study all the impacts of that development so there's you know this balance that we're we're trying to do of um in uh meeting our our residential needs protecting the W Lake walkom water quality and when we did our analysis between the low and the medium density um you get to this point where it just it doesn't doesn't pencil out and I mean that that's a basic reality when it comes to development if you can't get some sort of return on it you can't pay for the improvements that are needed going back and retrofitting these properties is very expensive I mean from the information that we've gotten from the information that the

applicant has has shown or or one of the property owners and um the the Watershed has shown is that you know we're we're looking at about $2 million to try and retrofit a large piece of property you can't do that you can't get your the rate of return just doesn't isn't there at a lower density and so what ends up happening is they don't redevelop if we don't redevelop you don't get the improvements one of the other potentials is that is that if you try to drive those improvements then the cost of the existing units changes to amortize those and address those costs so you're going to drive your rents up to cover those additional costs and so there's a there's a luse economics that we have to pay attention to in this so that leads me back to there are other programs other than the ones that we are currently implementing right there are other programs with the because it's a troubled Waterway the state could come in and do more help than what we're currently doing right they and that there are federal programs also for for water Improvement especially when the community at large is mostly at risk I mean right now again it's only for willing or desirous Property Owners so the feds are not going to come in and force a property owner to do something with with the arrangement the TM deal we have is for dissolved oxygen so if we're saying that um if the property owner shows good faith by implementing some of these new programs that maybe somewhere down the line we could uh maybe

change the density of their property but I'm not I would rather see good faith from this property owner before we we go down that road well I think part part of The Proposal from the developer and again the zoning proposal is to lower the density from high to medium the the property owner has been on record of saying we're willing to do the stormwater retrofits that the city would require as proposed by the requirements in the code which under the definition of the tmdl as approved by the state would meet the requirements to achieve those goals identified in the tmdl so so would the state and the FEDS do something more than what's identified in the tmdl I think that would be unlikely it would be unlikely for them to force a property owner to do something that they would not willingly want to do property owner would stipulate I think that the requirements that the city is going to put in place with the code changes that are recommended with the zoning change from high to medium would meet the require re Ms of the city standards and the state standards as covered by the tmdl so I think it' be unlikely that we would see a state or federal program come in and make additional changes beyond what is currently required it still doesn't make sense to me to add more density to the water shed itself it doesn't again the density is to be lowered not increased right recommendation is from high to medium but the lowering going from from um what they currently have sitting on the property

right now to medium is going to be an increase in density it's going to be a bigger footprint it's going to be uh more traffic it's going to be more of everything I think seems like though the I mean the things that they're putting in place for the development would actually be removing Acres from the The Watershed total I mean like in in looking at the report in terms of like what's going to reduce the amount of polluting acreage into the Watershed it's going to be the development which is actually reducing the number so it's like you just have to believe in the science or the policies in place that those are actually effective at doing what they say they're going to do I gotta point out too that property is developed already the impacts of the soil disturbances that you know those issues that are concerned the property is developed already so we're talking a redevelop vment of the property to current and modern standards with these um you know higher Environmental Protections with the storm water regulations but then also with the native vegetation protection area that is would be 30% of that property as well so you know we we look at this as what is there today and we have development today with extensive lawn areas um with one of the highest phosphorous loading estimated areas in the city redeveloping the property would then bring bring in the 30% of that property would be placed in a forested condition with conservation easements and engineered storm water mitigation

systems to then filter the phosphorus from any of the other developed areas so we we look at at least I do I look at what's there today and where we could be in the future I'm just curious is there any kind of public private partnership between the city or planning or in the Silver Beach neighborhood association to let Property Owners know it's probably been going on I'm just not aware of it that they could have a hand in helping has that been an ongoing concern that we have some ways of mitigation and maybe some funding if they would be willing Property Owners yes and and that's that's referred to as the homeowner incentive program or the hip program and that's a program that's been active for many many years and the city and the county have both done that we've done a number of projects in Silver Beach R A and J Jason can speak to that in Greater detail but that allows for an existing property owner to remove those pollution generating surfaces and replace them with like grass area replace it with more native vegetation the city helps pay for those things that comes with an obligation from the property owner to put easements in place to protect that public investment for the long-term future so there are a number of programs that existing homeowners single family homeowners can take to reduce their impacts for those properties that are developed that are currently in the Watershed so that program is in place that's the hip hit program and we do sorry um we send out

newsletters about that hip program all the time we have mailing lists um we do welcome to the Watershed packets we send out Watershed wide information packets about all things relating to the health of Lake Wacom and so that that information is hopefully widely available to all the property owners there's also if I might add the uh the rather stringent uh Watershed window requirements so October through end of April time frame you're not allowed to uh do any excavation or turn a shovel of dirt and we we take those very seriously to minimize the impacts to the lake uh during that winter time period uh even our own projects we tell ourselves no you can't you can't do that so it's uh so those two things in particular would apply to all of the existing single family homes that are outside of this individual question tonight but not to multif family at this time currently correct correct and and that's largely because of the scale of of the improvements right and who owns them right if you have a condu Association or we working with one property owner or the association and and and the complexity of those larger systems is they're much more expensive orders of magnitude higher as opposed to taking grass and putting you know vegetation in now you're talking uh highly engineered systems and that's really outside the scope of uh many homeowners or condo associations I was going to try and bring us back to the original responses to questions section of the program if we still have

more um staff there are a few more we can kind of go through them too these are great conversations so I mean this is why we're here as to be talking about this so one of them was you know can funds from the land acquisition program be used to incentivize um updating storm drains and mandate the work be completed within reasonable time frames that's the homeowner incentive program it is funded out of um of the property acquisition fund there's a specific amount that is was earmarked by by ordinance that we could then use can taxpayers vote on how these funds are allocated the L Walker Reservoir is drinking water for Bellingham and 100,000 people um we vote for our council members and our electeds and you know the lake Wakka Management program that we showed and shared at the Joint council's meeting just um shortly ago that represents 20 years worth of work and planning and strategies and looking at the science and trying to find the right balance of how we're going to address and meet this tmdl we're in implementation mode now and so this has been Redevelopment has been our strategy to achieve these ferous red uctions on private property for many years now this isn't something new it we're implementing the actions that we had planned in the past and this was part of it was that properties will redevelop over time and then our rules will require them to put in phospherous mitigating features and measures to reduce and eliminate their impacts and says what other avenues have

been explored that both address the rights of the property owners preservation of drinking water and the bird placed on taxpayers by these Property Owners um The Avenues that we've explored are really outlined in our Lake Walker Management program that we shared and talked about the joint council's meeting um there's many actions and strategies that we employ to meet and addresses tmdl Redevelopment is just one of those pieces so we have a large tool set that we're using to address the tmdl capital facilities the homeowner incentive program education and Outreach whole slew of things Redevelopment just is one of those pieces but we are reaching as you can see from the graphic that's up here we're reaching a point where we're treating so much area it really is those last pieces of private property along the shorelines that we need to implement these improvements we can't do it through Capital Construction just one another final thought about our drinking water treatment and protection of our drinking water City takes that extremely seriously that's one of our primary functions as a city you know police fire and safety drinking water uh that is that's not something we take lightly and and so there's mult multiple aspects of things we do to keep our drinking water safe and one of them is protection of the Watershed recognizing that people have been living in the Watershed since the 1800s uh many of the homes were built many many years ago these are not homes that were built in

the last 10 years right so so there are measures to address and protect the Watershed to the ability that we have to it on the other side of that is we have a very aggressive treatment system and monitoring system and testing system for the lake was mentioned at some point about PFA compounds I just want to mention that because that's topic of the day uh in many different areas uh this the EPA has just issued a landmark change in drinking water standards for the United States the state of Washington however is not subject is subject to the APA but our drinking water standards are not set by the EPA they're set by the Department of Health and in the state of Washington the standards for pfas were established prior to the EPA establishing their limits there's a difference between what the feds have said and what the state of Washington has uh but the difference is almost minuscule the state state limits State action levels were at 10 parts per trillion for certain PFA compounds the federal limits are at four parts per trillion and in terms of context a part per trillion might be one drop of water in 20 olympic size swimming pools so the difference between 10 and four is non-existent relatively speaking same time we're required to test per pfas we have done that in Lake Wacom and we have in every case to our ability to test the compounds we're testing for we have come up with non-detect so I mentioned that not that it's relevant to this particular conversation but that's the the

idea that we are are regularly and routinely testing for those things that we are concerned about getting into and drinking water we have done that for many years and we'll continue to do that so from a drinking water perspective there's protection of the lake there's protection of the source Aqua Source water and then there's the collection treatment and distribution side of things and that is one of the most stringent things that we do in the state in in the city and in the state of Washington we have historically been ahead of EPA and regulations for drinking water in the state of Washington we have always been compliant with those and have no ex no question that we will continue to be uh meeting our saate tring water standards and so when the water is coming out of your TAP despite the tmdl in the lake for dissolved oxygen the water is safe to drink uh coming out of our Taps okay any other responses from staff yeah if you don't mind I'll I'll address there's a um provision in here that talked a little bit about the medium versus low density in particular it was really trying to address whether or not some of the um additional considerations can be given to the income levels or criterias defined in House Bill 1220 um just for the general Public's benefit uh House Bill 1220 was something that was done in the uh 2021 legislature and it was the first time that the state of Washington identified housing targets uh per on a countywide basis um over the state of Washington and

so we have now uh a target number for watcom County that looks at how much housing needs to be developed uh by the year 2044 and at this point in time it is a it is a target it's not a mandate um but what the what house bill 1220 does is it also looks at the different income strata and breaks down that number based on uh these different income strata that's that's there one of the things that we're notably doing is part of the Bellingham plan part of the uh periodic update to the comprehensive plan is taking a look at those numbers and those income strategies and trying to develop the necessary policies that will need to be in place in order to help us uh achieve some of those targets and then typically through that process out of the policy setting generation is when you get into the actual code updates and implementation efforts that drive that different uh those different outcomes associated with it so to take a specific project or individual property and apply those um specifically on that is in in my opinion a little bit kind of out of sequence and we really need to make sure we drive some of those bigger policies and look at it in a in a more uh comprehensive Citywide approach because there may be some changes that look at how we want to do that across the city and what we want to drive so we we don't want to Discount the fact that we need housing Supply is absolutely a critical part of that but so is uh stability of existing housing units and uh the ability to Subs so

we really need to hit it on all fronts um and not single out one specific property or pars on on that note this is a on the mfte this is slightly off topic but I was surprised to learn that 12 year is only available in Fair Barkley Urban Villages I knew the 8ye was only in let me clarify that the in Barkley and Fair Haven you can only use the 12E you can do 12E anywhere any Urban Village any Urban Village but you can in Barkley and Fair Haven you cannot use the 8year you can only use the 12 year okay okay I read the sentence you can read that sentence multiple ways um why not apply mfte to all multif family zones and that's certainly something that we can look at but part of what mft was really intended to do was to look at where we wanted to drive incentivized Urban Village to right and so when you look at the 8-year program in particular it was saying hey we're not getting that form of development how do we encourage or incentivize that to occur in these areas and these key locations where we want it and so that was really the impetus behind that and trying to drive some of those pieces as we look to the broader City and this is one of the things we're you know evaluating right now is okay why is the program where is it working where is it not working and that is both from a 8ye 12 year 20y year kind of uh option but also maybe geographically we're also trying to balance that tool with some of the things that we know are going to come under uh under consideration when we

get into uh House Bill 1110 in 1337 so now now we have middle housing and adus and what is what's that doing to our landscape and thinking about that bigger picture in terms of how we manage not only the housing Supply and affordability that we need but do we have the appropriate infrastructure and Facilities to support that and so that that's a a really important thing to think about when you get into the comprehensive plan and the kind of the totality of the impacts associated with it so that's why I really discourage kind of doing it on an individual basis and we need to get the bigger policies and the big bigger analytics behind that to make sure we can meet the expectations that we're setting for ourselves yeah lot of potential big opportunity but lots to figure out yeah um okay if is that all the initial question responses there there was two on the gentrification piece and I that's also part of uh a little bit of um House Bill 1220 wants to look at displacement where you have some of those particular units we know that when and I'm not I'm going to take this take a step back from Old Mill Village in particular when you get new construction the reality is is that new construction unless it's subsidized units is coming in at a higher price point than than the existing um that is a circumstance that we're aware of it's it's not something that we as the city you know can can control that is a a public Marketplace uh Endeavor but we are working on and we do have programs to

do housing stability and trying to work through some of those various issues but it is a product of the market that we can't entirely control you want to talk so last one here we'll just kind of round out this portion of the program there's a question about reforestation and restoration and how that can be built into the rezone proposal and in that fourth section of our staff response I talked about the process and the rules that apply and so uh again sort of going back to for any Redevelopment or new development in any of these multif family zones then that's when the regulatory requirements kick in and then there's that requirement to establish um you know that puges sound lowland Forest on property 30% of property so that rule is already in place for that to be done as a requirement um without the requirement it's not something that gets done unless it's enacted through homeowner incentive program um so just just be aware of that that's a rule that's in place that would be triggered if there were some type of development or Redevelopment um so we want to move through those as kind of our outline um and I guess just I would take the opportunity to say we're we're hopeful that we can at some point in the evening get to a point where you can make a a motion and a recommendation um we'd like to be able to continue the process with city council where we'll sort of have a repeat of what's Happening uh here which is a public hearing um and Then followed up I assume by by a work

session um and so we have that sort of timing in place so we're hopeful that we can get there this evening and we want to have more discussion to get you to that point where you feel comfortable doing that as kind of a an ending point this evening so thanks if I may I I feel a little remiss that I didn't mention on the gentrification issue that there are conversations outside of this topic that are where we're looking at other rental protection measures and other things that help to address those that are in crisis or in need so I don't I don't want to necessarily get into that great detail because it's not gerine to the the rezoning question in itself but um please understand that there are other things I don't want to make it light of the gentrification issue that is an issue that's really impacting a lot of people and we are trying to handle that issue as a as a standalone manner in terms of rental protections and um and having some of that stability issue so thank you I think you were uh reading my mind there flake and you know where my next question was going to be because I posed that question to you and you said you were looking into it with the RCW what we spoke about before so we may have some negotiation tools possibly with developers and to say would they be willing to have certain rental units there that are aable longterm and so but I I'll look forward to your further development in that area questions comments from Commissioners yeah um well first thanks for all

of the work um I appreciate that there was some thinking around a moratoriums that there was time to consider and um and I was thinking back to when the homeowner incentive program was being developed and there was a lot of research and um like uh surveys of existing homeowners in the neighborhood in in the Watershed um about adoption and I remember it being like those homeowners on the lake in particular are really challenging because they really love their big Lawns right on the water um and so getting them to to make those kinds of shifts and to put bark down instead of grass it's harder to play like volleyball on the grass or on the on the dirt so um I know what a challenge it is to get people to to make these shifts um from like thinking about that old research and um and what a blessing that anytime they want to replace their driveway or any of those things that it triggers that to force them to do the right thing and so um it's we've seen it work on properties around the lake that they um you know want to do something put in you know do those development improvements and we're seeing improvements the in the in um water quality out of that and then I was reflecting on um we had brought AP herd She's the author of the carbon efficient City uh to Bellingham many years ago and we had this conversation around storm water and one of the things that um and this is sort it it applies in some ways to this but I know that it's not how the the rules work but if we think about it

in a in a broader context around really about like the carbon or the um in this case it would be the phosphorus emissions per person um so when you look at those giant houses that have maybe one two maybe five people living in them and they've got these giant yards in comparison to what the like per person impact would be uh on a multif family unit and so you know if we when we think about the um like the mitigations that a m a multif family project has to go through in order to um meet the same standard that a house on 5 Acres would have to make um and so they've got a lot more space to be able to do that kind of mitigation it's cheaper um and yet who's actually having a bigger impact um and so wanting to think about just like framing this a little bit in terms of this like carbon efficient City and in this sense it's like a storm water efficient city um and so when I'm I'm thinking about this and we can by allowing for medium density we're going to get more people living in more homes with less phosphorus um impact and to me that feels like a win um so it's it's the phosphorus efficient City by moving to medium density um and and having that trigger to be able to get those mitigations in place so um yeah that's my sort of thoughts on the issue so um a minute ago you said that we don't have any controls over the gentrification and the affordability it's got to be a voluntary thing but we do have a control and that is this zoning you know um this property manager has not

given any or property owner has not given any uh concession at all to keeping any of this housing um low income or Workforce housing of any kind um we not having any compliance with HB um 1220 so we do have a control that we can put in place in order to get something more for our community out of this project if I may respond I think I think you and I are approaching that that conversation from a different starting point and I and I think the primary difference as I understand it is we're looking at it from what's existing there now in the built environment versus what they are entitled to be able to do in the existing zoning and director Johnston tried to speak to this a little bit they have the right under the current zoning to build high density which has no cap well unless we make a change and so we put the moratorium in place to allow us a study and one of the things that the public um I say not entirely the public but portions of it have subet and say oh we should do it indefinitely moratoriums aren't an indefinite they have a they have a a shelf life to them we have to make a decision and Implement that decision and so when we talked about it that decision and frame that up for the council we said okay high is probably not appropriate nothing is not appropriate because that results in the taking and we have to address those those issues which are a whole another subset of the conversation so we're left with low and the medium low as Kurt has described does not result

in any change because the land use economics are not there so if we want to drive that change whether that's the storm water or additional housing units the option really exists to do that Medium density that will get you additional units you're right that it doesn't mandate those to be offered at an affordability level but when again when we talk about the overall housing crisis it's not a silver bull we've got to look at it and I'll refer us back to kind of the 3 s's Supply is one of those it's not the end all be all solution stabilization and subsidy are the other two we've got to take opportunities when they present themselves and where they exist to do some of that stuff we know it's not the total conversation but we need to be able to afford ourselves the opportunity to begin broaching those when we can and this is an opportunity to look at addressing that in some way it may not be everything we aspire to or hope for but it will take us and as Jason said earlier it's a it's a it's a Continuum it's a process to get through those different things and that's what from a staff perspective we're looking at is an opportunity to take those incremental steps and get some level of improvement and address some of those issues as we continue to build that bigger conversation out through the comprehensive plan through the mfte through the inclusionary zoning and all of those pieces become part of that bigger puzzle and part of that broader conversation and I agree with you that

that makes sense for the whole of the city but not in the Watershed it doesn't make sense in the Watershed I mean I understand that this connected to development but it doesn't have to be we have chosen that and we've made those rules and we can change them we don't we owe the people of this town we owe them that this is their water Source this is 100,000 people and a a couple thousand people living in the Watershed who are not being good stewards and the rest of the city is having to pay for that we are paying 99% of the population here is paying for the lifestyle of some people sitting on the lake and we can make those changes we can we have the power these are not the laws of nature these are the laws of man and I'm just not seeing density in our Watershed as our solution Scott's got his hand up and then we'll come to Jed thanks Mike uh getting to what Barbara said uh there are two joint resolutions between Wacom County and the city county along with our Shoreline Master uh program that really puts you know the environment and our water quality first and foremost and to uh go with one density over another just for 150 housing units when so many other locations I see around the city uh you know quantity of supply of housing is left on the table and and so many other opportunities that I think our housing or our water quality is is just so important I asked a question last time we spoke about how many pounds of phosphorus were going into the lake now and how many pounds

would be going in after the proposal and believe it was somewhere in the 10 and then it was going down into the fours possibly but I was wondering about there were requirements specifically requirements of 0.15 and I was wondering if you guys could tell me the specifics about those pounds now and then in the proposal and then why it would not be required absolutely to get down to the 0.15 pounds at this time so the 0.15 lbs of phosphorus per acre per year that's actually the forested phosphorus discharge rate published in the tmdl a forest discharges phosphorus and that's what we're trying to match we're not trying to eliminate all phosphorus we're trying to match that forested condition so that's where that 0.15 pounds um came from and so what is it what do we estimate that it is now from this property from say the uh The oldo Village from The Old Mill Village site now these are estimates because we haven't seen an application and the estimates that we have are based on the existing development not any proposed development um our estimates are currently that the site is discharging 18 pounds of phosphorus per acre per year if they were to reforest put in the 30% native vegetation area and install storm water engineered filtering systems that would get down to um about 4.57 pounds of phosphorus per acre per year now we've converted this and we now have a conversation about effective develop Acres but this was you as we presented last time and as the qu question shared Jason

can and that that would be assuming that they meet the requirements that are proposed for the change in zoning regulations for storm water as applied to the development application that might come in no this is looking at the existing site the development that's there the lawn and the development that's there we analyzed how much phosphorus we believe is coming off and and then if you were to implement these mitigation strategies what it could go down to so so so if it's currently at at 18 MH with the proposed storm water regulations that would be applied concurrently with the approval of the zoning change then that reduction would be from 18 to four so in the absence of that change in regulation it would remain at the 18 but getting it from 18 to zero would require remove of of all the existing development on the site and retrofitting with a completely forested condition so and and this is the economics question so at we're not proposing High that's off the table which is what it currently is today at low density it would stay at four so regardless of what the density is the regulations will remain constant so if we go from 18 to four at medium or low density those that's where the economics comes in but there's no scenario that it's being proposed here that would take it from 18 to zero nor is there a proposal that would take existing single family homes and take them from developed to undeveloped condition that's the notion of the unwilling property owner willing to do

something so so the idea is that we're I mean we would agree that ideally in a perfect world we would have a 100% protected Watershed with no access would love to have that but we don't so we need to deal with the reality that we have today which is the property is developed today at some density it's allowed to go to high density we're proposing a change which will allow for medium density with storm reg regulations which would reduce it from in theoretically roughly 18 to four based on the analysis that might change the numbers but whether it's medium or low those regulations would go into place to control and mitigate that impact of new development it's also the the if I one one one final one final thought the current zoning at the high does not have a storm rer regulation that would apply to that so regardless of what we do we need to put those regulations in place to control the storm water for redevelopment whether it's low medium or high I appreciate that I'm confused about in the document on the page that's numbered eight in the middle and six on the bottom right lines 22 and 23 it says if the proposed changes were made new development in Associated impervious surface on this site would be required to meet the 0.15 pounds metric what am I misreading there in regard to the 18 pounds down to the four pounds Scott you're referring to the staff report from the hearing yes please thank you there's the number page eight in the middle of the page and then it's actually a

bottom right is numbered as six lines number 22 to 23 I'm just I'm confused about whether we would be required to get done a point5 pounds or is it just do our best and hope for the the best from 18 down to something no so I can I can at least address that so the way that single family residential development new and Redevelopment regulations are which is what we're trying to mimic for multif family um would require 30% of the property be in that conservation easement and then there is a limit no more than 0.15 pounds of phosphorus per acre per year can discharge from that property so if they mean we talk about multif family or a single family property either one of those Parcels would not be able to discharge greater than that 0.15 PB per acre because there is an area threshold per year and like I said to then that matches the forested discharge rate which is what the tmdl requires but we're only getting down to four so when do we get down to 0.15 or do we so the it's it's 0.15 per acre and that's the forested background number so if you have a completely forested site you will still have phosphorus coming off of it so there's no such thing as a zero scenario that that probably should read 0.15 pounds of ostas per acre per year yeah there's units that are missing from that it's okay so when you the four number is multiplied by how many acres The Old Mill site is is that what the discrepancy is here so what we've doneis um so our analysis actually looked at the lawn areas the

impervious surfaces the roof areas and we have different phospherous loading rates for those different surfaces and so it isn't just a like a blanket we actually have different loading rates from different surfaces and then we run that through what we consider one of the higher efficiency storm water filter systems and so you know we could look at all these different areas but the total that comes up is you know we go 18.2 and you have the opportunity by reforestation and filtering to that 0.15 PBS per acre per year um you could get it then down to 4.57 you would you'd be able to reduce it by 13.45 pounds per acre per year am I answering it no there's just such jargon here with all the pounds and then now we're going to effective develop acres and again this this is all based on a theoretical of something for an application we have not yet seen yet so so there's still once the regulations go into a place and and and the standard that we're setting for this development of this property would be the same standard that we would apply to other developments that is currently in place for single family home development so it's rather stringent this is not a uh we're not doing something less for this property that we would do for other properties within the Watershed um it is these guys will tell me if I get this wrong but it is more stringent than we would say outside of the Watershed Curt enlightened me to I think what you might be asking asking for is why are we saying 4.57

instead of the 0.15 pounds that's cuz the site is 35.4 acres in size so it's a 35 Acre Site so you'd be allowed 0.15 pounds per acre per year which is why that that statement needs to say 0.15 pounds of phosphorus per acre per year 0.15 time is for commissioner Jones does that answer your question then it does thank you Jed you were next yeah I um I guess it seems like that there's a lot of the most people who are public speaking on this uh topic are they seem to be mostly concerned that just population increase around the lake is going to equate to pollution in the lake and so I'm just wanting to kind of like I guess uh a lot of people with phds and things like that are basically concerned that population equals bad water and so I'm just wanted to get kind of your thoughts of like what are the risks of just more people in general um having around the lake just assuming we can look at engineering and say engineering is like you you know you write a number down we we do the science and we make it work um what are the intangibles that we think of here that just population is tied to with pollution and damaging our Watershed I think it's important to note that in this conversation we're talking about built environment impacts we're not talking about human behaviors there are a whole other topic of societal issues and choices that we could make that talk about human behaviors that we as a community aren't prepared to address we're talking about what we can address through the

development CR IIA and the built environment and in that construct we can work with a Redevelopment scenario and we can say this is how much impervious surface area this is how we deal with roof drains this is how we deal with you know some of the roadway traffic but that's the context in which we're having this discussion and so we are doing our part to try to address those development related impacts we're not getting into the some of the other social and human human behaviors but I mean I have the same question as Jed replace population with unit count like does does how does unit count itself negatively impact TL um tmdl goals I think there's when you start and I think uh you know commissioner L mentioned this is when you get a efficiency when you get into some of those multifamily in other words on a per perata basis you're not seeing the the degree or the the height that you might see in uh you know a 5 acre single family home you get greater efficiencies uh that's one of the challenges that you get in any type of sepa analysis is that you often do like a no project scenario that's existing zoning that development if it doesn't occur in certain areas goes other places and you get increased vehicle miles travel you get other impacts that come along with that so the question becomes you know right now in what we're trying to address with the rezoning application is the ability to as as Eric Johnson had mentioned is to implement those storm water regulations where they

don't exist for multifam and again come back to that yes there is going to be an increase in uh human population in and around uh that area it is something that we know as a city that we have to to address Citywide and which areas and to commissioner plasket point it's like are there areas where we should not do that and other areas where we should we've tried to encourage that in our Urban Villages and along some of our transportation corridors um but that's part of why we put the moratorium in place is because we realized we had a high zoning that maybe was less than intentional and we're trying to come back and kind of rightsize that and there are different opinions uh on what that should be and unfortunately we put that on your plate like to chime in too uh Mr Jones brought up the shoreline master program and the shoreline master program gets applied to projects that are within proximity of the Shoreline Lake WAMS and Shoreline in the state and so when we see development and and the shoreline management act the shoreline Master programs our local version of a state law the shoreline management Act is based on three major tenants that are consistently balanced when we apply the rules in that document to development projects preserving areas for waterborne Commerce and navigation Economic Development that's one public access to shorelines of the state is two and Environmental Protection is three that's not listed in order of priority that's based upon a consistent balancing

that occurs when someone applies for a project so if we look at the Old Mill site for example there are substantial areas of grass and Lawn leading right up to the Shoreline if there is development proposed within 200 ft of those Shoreline areas then we apply the shoreline Management program and the rules that are in there and we have the ability to affect um the amount of vegetation that gets planted along the shoreline we are able to affect the amount of public access and what typically happens in those circumstances other projects that have a similar configuration is that um we focus on identifying where Public Access opportunities are the most appropriate while also providing some Shoreline um you know native vegetation being installed so we wouldn't expect that there's going to be a a stampede if you will of all the people from the units that are there now or in the future you know running into the lake and doing bad things we actually look at the way we can effectively program those areas so that those protections and specifically Public Access and and Environmental Protection are held in place the shoreline program also gives way to you know all these other rules that are app that apply so you know all all our hopes and and wishes don't hang solely on the shoreline program that's just one other element of our existing rules that gets applied is it possible that um we could put all this implements in um um when it's lit up and the 300 plus people that end up adding

being added to the property and their families and pets and cars and all of that could actually be a wash wash andless sure understand the question wash of that with the increased population all the things that we change um The increased population causing its own runoff own own different kinds of you know dog waste and you you know just people not knowing any better and putting down things in the in the grass around their around their little apartments or whatever however this configuration is going to look and um you know cuz we keep saying that we can't go in and stop people who have private property from doing whatever they want to those private properties so we may find that we do all of this and then an extra 300 people beat down all the native plants because of walking up to the water you know and not being respectful and they put stuff in the ground and they have their pets and they don't clean up after them we're looking at 300 more people in our Watershed that we can now not also control that this this is a question of you know human behavior as well right and so so that that particular question is kind of outside the the realm of the zoning regulation right so so how do we control people in general and whether that's true of is that true of this of these Parcels that are subject to so this is not just old M Village this is all of the parcels that are subject to the multif family zoning in in this particular area but this question of of human behavior applies to

everyone in the Watershed both who live there and who will visit that location and that is a concern it's a great concern to address that concern the city has very robust processes and education components to help inform the public as to best standards of Behavior Uh for pesticides on their lawns for maintaining their vehicles for cleaning the oil drips off of their vehicles when they and that's true of all of us who use and access the wed whether they lived there today or not but the behavior is something that we try to address through those educational efforts that we have one of those Educational Tools is the is the moratorium during the winter time for excavation we're aggressive in in in in pursuing and and enforcing that as one example another good example is the is the aggressive the city's aggressive AIS inspection quatic invasive species program for boats being launched in the lake uh we pursue that uh as a risk management tool to protect our Watershed um and that is uh actively staffed 20 seven days a week in in April through through the end of September and then it's actively staffed to a lesser degree through the winter months and manag to make sure that we're trying to prevent those types of activities that would come from poor behavior from people living in the Watershed but people visiting our community from far away so those those behaviors that we don't like to see I think are really separate from the idea of the only question and they're addressed by the

city through our education efforts and our codes and laws of of of behavior that we like to see in our community I I'll also offer um again not Germaine to the conversation or the item in front of you but there is an opportunity if and when we get to a project application through the site design and project work that we can look at ways to minimize impacts of some of those uh human behaviors so if the concern is for example increased number of people that might have additional dogs and dogs accessing the water there are ways to address that Shoreline and and and you know modify that access and do some of those things through a site plan specific effort and project review doesn't happen typically at the zoning level discussion but there are ways to address and identify and achieve some of those objectives keeping people out of wetlands keeping people you know those kinds of things off the shoreline we can we can begin to address those type of issues commissioner plasket I also wanted to you know you had talked about the concerns about you know maybe trampoline the native vegetation and all that the rules that we're proposing the storm waterer rules re require the just 30% native vegetation area it's protected with a conservation easement a 5year assurity bond and inspections over this 5year period as well as the city has in our codes the ability to enter onto that property and inspect the native vegetation area already we have those rules in place as well as staff then for the

storm water engineering aspect we have the exact same program for that it's a different staff person that specializes in these storm water systems so we have we have pieces in place that would ensure the vegetation that are is planted as part of these rules and then the storm water engineered systems that they're being maintained and we have the rules that allow us to enter the property perform inspections and then issue orders to repair or replace so we have protections for these proposed storm rules but we we've been saying that we can't go on private property you say that this this is this is different if I might I'm sorry to interrupt but but so when a a facility is installed we're required under our permit from the state of Washington what we call the npds permit to make sure that we're inspecting and maintaining uh storm water facilities that are engineered to prevent or minimize pollution so we have an obligation at that point to inspect those facilities which are intended and were required as a condition of permit that is substantially different than going on to private property say you now must do this so so the to to M to ensure those things are maintained and operated correctly to assure that that high level of protection that was when they were installed that is a condition of of that property so they agree when they develop the property to allow us to come in essentially and say we need to to inspect this and then correct Behavior to make sure that it's operating

to its highest standard that's quite a bit different than saying you need to now do something it's you've come to us with permission to build to build something as a condition of that you have to install this facility and by extension you now are subject to the city's ability to inspect and make sure that you are operating and maintaining and using it correctly that that's that's under the city's enforcement powers that we have to enforce that that's actually a requirement of the state for but that's quite a bit different than behavior and maybe I can change the conversation from o from storm water to another type of behavior that is that is uh a concern of all of us and that's traffic right so so let's let's separate the storm water pollution and let's talk about human behavior which is traffic and Electric Avenue and Alabama Corridor and up around Northshore Drive and that's a one of many locations in the city where people concerned about traffic volumes and speeding and collisions pedestrian safety that's true today so that's not going to change those concerns will still be there how do we change human behavior to get all of us to drive a little bit slower so whether there are new units coming into there or whether there are not that concern will still be present so how do we change that human behavior and if there are 300 more homes there people living there does that change the dynamic that we're still concerned about traffic safety it does not but that doesn't mean we

don't allow for that that means that when the development occurs there are things put in place to mitigate that new impact that would come out in terms of the number of new cars so are there in are there roadway improvements that need to be done are there offsite improvements that need to be done to mitigate that even if those are all done we still need to be concerned about human behavior about speeding driving too fast drunk driving driving while using our phones uh other things that result in those traffic collisions so that behavior separate from the zoning I think is really not gerain to the question of this is a zoning question philosophically if there were less people there would be less impacts but we would have less things and we would not live here either so the the notion of the built environment the regulations are put in place to allow those things to occur with the certain level of standard mitigation but that doesn't change how we behave with each other that's where the enforcement side of laws for speeding and for good behavior and enforcement onto requirements comes into play but that's not really a zoning related question I go back to storm water just for a second I know did a little bit of research I'm not a public works official so I'm giving you that caveat ahead of time but um one of it was a point was raised earlier about um storm water pollution coming from vehicles coming to and leaving the site and Electric Avenue from The Old Mill Village entrance

out towards Lakeway does not drain to Lake W Alabama does until you get to about the last two Alabama drains does not drain to Basin one either until you get to the very last part where the open space is all the storm water is intercepted and is sent essentially South towards um walk Creek so there is that sort of boots on the ground information that might be helpful in terms of um Now cars that go out Northshore that's that's a different story we've already talked about what facilities are in place around Northshore Drive but as far as where we would expect the majority of traffic to be going that storm water actually does not enter the lake from roadways for what that's worth and I could also address we want know how far we need to go with this behavioral issue but for L Wacom in specific part of our Lake Wacom Management program is very robust education and Outreach to Lake walkom residents because we're trying to create behavioral changes so we do have special programs and Outreach materials and documents and staff assigned to communicating to create behavioral changes in the lake wam Watershed focusing on water quality yeah don't have we need to say you know we do in fact I I'll keep going a little bit more you got me into this um so the other one is we also do a repeatable survey in the lake walkom Watershed right so we aren't just trying certain actions and activities to create those behavioral changes we repeat five-year repeatable surveys so that we can evaluate the

effectiveness of what we're doing and how we're trying to communicate and create behavioral changes so we track how many more people are picking up dog poop how many you know we we track and find that information but we also adjust and adapt our education Outreach programs if we find it's not being effective to cre create the behavioral changes we're looking for so there are unique programs for Lake watcom to try and address what you're concerned about are those behavioral changes yeah I guess I just I feel like we need to do something and it's like a question of like what is it it's like we could do nothing or not pass something and then we've got a moratorium that's going to expire which then brings us back to high density residential um we could reduce it to low density which I agree I think coming from the developer side of doing architecture and seeing you know that it is hard to make things pencil I don't disagree with the the thought that we would probably see less development um that way which then that becomes a question of is that good or bad is that what we actually want to do here is come up with something that then creates less development which then you know personally I believe that science is cor act in a lot of cases I mean I think the energy codes that we have actually make buildings that use less energy like I don't know just seems like um something that's real and so I mean I I tend to I mean even in the last meeting I think I kind of agreed more with what

was on paper than not um just in terms of feeling like that it would do more good to clean up some existing uh developments by developing them as opposed to having them sit and do nothing thing um and so I personally think that we should kind of do do something because I don't I don't think it's our place to hijack really what I feel like if doing nothing or not passing something I feel like is more kind of just like we're not going to do anything to try to keep development from happening because we don't believe in development because it's bad for the lake and I personally think that's more of a city council type of decision um ours is more kind of like look at the what's on paper and think do we kind of agree with it then the bigger you know deeper issues in terms of like philosophically you know human behavior that kind of stuff is like I mean that to me that's city council so that's just kind of my take on it we are The Advisory Board to the city council though that's they they take our recommendations into consideration that's why we're doing this if I could um I appreciate the situation that you're in it's tough right um this is not a typical planning zone or Planning Commission agenda item um generally if you get a rezone you know we're going to rezone a section um in the Columbia neighborhood it's flat you know some historic homes there um you don't have to worry about drinking water quality for the entire Community right so I it it's this I I can completely

understand what the challenge that you're having with this decision because there are so many other things that are going on and happening here that are kind of outside of your typical realm um that you're you're tasked with dealing with and so I think you have to go back and look at how many years we've been working on the lake walkom Watershed um then the water quality we're seeing progress on that we have all of these balances of other programs so it's zoning is just one component it's that one small piece of the pie when you look at everything that's happening with the lake Waka mhed you've got the acquisition program the hit program the enforcement um the capital projects um education there's so much more that's happening out there that's trying to or that is dealing with a lot of the things that you're struggling with right now so I think if you can trust by what we've seen in the science um because I know some of you definitely watched um The Joint Council meetings um so you can see we're we're making some progress right all of these things that we're doing it's making it better um and we're getting down to these last small pieces of of how do we deal with that and I completely understand the this notion of development is good or it can make it better right most people don't think in that that terms but when it comes to the Watershed taking a site that's non-conforming where we don't have any controls storm water is running straight into the lake now that is a really

bad situation and if you allow it to develop at some capacity it will be better than what it is now and I know that that's kind of hard to wrap your mind around um but it is the fact like it's it's one way of making things better yeah I'm going to say it's one way and there are other ways and I think that we need to explore those I'm not convinced that this is what we need to do and the other part of it is is when we go back to talking about human nature we're talking about this one property that's going to be developed and it'll probably change hands and then how much controls will we have then you know I'm saying that that we don't know what's going to happen in the future and we may find that this is this was a horrible mistake and I don't I just feel like our Watershed is more important than this and that we need to find an alternative way to deal with this problem we know that it's a problem and and again we the Waterway is a troubled Waterway and it's it's mandated by the state and the FEDS that we have got to fix that and there seems like there should be some power in that some way that we can go in and say look we know this is private property this is the last stage of us getting our Waterway out of trouble and we need to come in and there's there's some State and fed programs that can help fund this and this is the alternative we're offering you and and I'm not hearing any alternatives I'm hearing let's build baby build because we have a housing crisis and I don't

think that our Watershed should be sacrificed for our housing crisis and I don't think we have a housing crisis I think we have a Workforce housing crisis I appreciate that and I appreciate that uh perspective staff's recommendation is to apply the recommendation has outlined in the packet for all of the properties that are covered by that this is not an individual property uh and and we have responded to that I think adequately tonight can I make one more statement here I want to go back to this and the reason I want to share it is because if you look at each of these individual actions here for uh starting here for these and a lot of these other folks have been too folks out here in the audience have been um don't ever recall anybody saying that establishing a street sweeping program was going to fix the lake by itself uh or fixing storm water vaults or any of these other things it was never the intention to send the line completely off the top right hand corner of the page um it was these incremental steps and so we feel like it would be appropriate to add this like I have done right here actually and that's this to continue to move our trajectory up and over to the right um we heard from a lot of um community members and and for the record I did watch the last Planning Commission meeting because I was not at the one so um I feel like I watched it and I read all the comments I feel like I'm up to speed um and feel like I can vote on this um but we heard a lot of comments

from um community members around the the state of the Old Mill Village now and that it's in disrepair and there's all these things and they're jacking up the rents are really high um and if that's true Redevelopment can help by providing healthier like today's building codes would help resolve some of those issues so when I think about action versus inaction in this scenar scario where the the rents are already like high right they're they're Out Of Reach um and if we don't do anything then things are going to just stay exactly the same and we're not going to see any solutions to whether the state of the the health of the housing or the health of the lake um so for that reason I'd like to make a motion to um adopt the city's recommendations to um for medium zoning uh for those areas of the lake wam Watershed did I say it right we don't have our cheat sheet in front of us um I know so there's two right there's the there's the medium make a recommendation on the on the zoning there's the recommendation on the revisions to BMC 1680 which are the storm water things that we would implement for residential multif family and the third one I believe is adopt the findings you have that right Kurt adopt the findings now I would just say the yeah the findings would be revised to reflect what we've done here tonight just so you know you restate your motion I think that if if you want the way to clarify it is to adopt the staff recommendation which includes the medium zoning the new storm

water rules and regulations um um and and the findings back yeah Sor thank you I um make a motion that we adopt staff's recommendations to um down Zone to a medium density and the new storm water regulations and third adopt the findings and facts is there a second second okay we have a motion on the floor to adopt the staff's uh recommendations for medium zoning and storm R regulations um as proposed in our packet further comments let's go back to Blake the moratorium remind me again and refresh my memory on when the deadline for the moratorium is in existence and then can that moratorium be extended July 10th July 10th of this year so we do have the uh Council has the opportunity to um extend the moratorium should they choose to do so now keep in mind they have done that already yes I know uh and so that option exist so what's in front of the council U depending on which direction you go tonight is if if the motion proceeds or any motion proceeds we'll certainly take that to the council um if you're not able to come up with a definitive position as a body then we will go back to the city council and basically say we have a a no recommendation for them to consider and the council will have to consider either whether to extend the moratorium and allow us to further address some concerns or whether they want to take the issue up themselves and in that case we would try to do our best to articulate both sides of the argument or the concerns that exist so can we add an amendment

to also recommend that they do the moratorium and do you know more due diligence on Alternatives you um we can amend so you would like to make an amendment to add what exactly I would like to add an amendment to for city council to um uh consider um extending out the moratorium and um and trying to find um another another Avenue for cleanup and storm water runoff and all of the other mitigations that we need um microphone yeah are you asking that the I'm asking Al consider a not look at all not look at development scenario but separate from development yes okay so want to make sure is there a second I'll second that um it's it's hard it seems like a different direction than the original motion but um it would be very confusing to have a recommendation that says staff's report as is and also go back to a moratorium um I'm looking for them to have the discussion they don't always have the discussion out of this committee that we have I think St I think city council has discussed the moratorium merits a number of times okay any other comments on the amendment to add a note about extending the moratorium and looking for alternative Solutions I'm just confused how those will go together and I you know to your point um I'm I'm curious like what what exhaustive things what exhaustive things are you going are they going to find that they haven't found through all of the research and all of the studies that have been done around Lake Wacom like the books are thick and I I'm just I

don't see that we're going to find new new options out there um for to trigger the work in these areas I might be able to at least my cons my uh answer to that Rose is that they didn't even uh have a discussion about the state or federal programs we don't have an answer to that why wouldn't a developer um want to not have to pay for these mitigating costs and it seems like that conversation hasn't been had and that's just one example Eric the if there were a request to the council and the council would direct that back to staff for further analysis of other programs would we have done that analysis that has been done we have looked at other options for this particular proposal and our recommendation would likely be the same and that is done uh in context of the entirety of the lake Management Lake wcom management program in partnership with the lake Wacom water sewer district with Wacom County with the city of Bellingham the state of Washington and the things that we are aware of as the experts in this particular area as a the storm water uh Mr Porter and Miss Rene lroy here they they are experts in the state of Washington these in these particular areas we are looked at as a leading uh advocate for storm water protections and for our habitat restoration the state of Washington is repeatedly coming to us and saying do more because we're do so well so in Lake Walkin we we have developed for the state of Washington as one example A New Media to treat runoff from roadways that

was developed with our staff so an additional recommendation to look at more programs we have done that I would argue and our recommendation based on all the things that we know in terms of how we manage the lake and try to protect the lake in responsive to to the tmdl in partnership with the county Lake walkom water district and the state of Washington are these recommendations so I would not expect to see if that were to come back to for further review that we would see a different recommendation with than what we have if there's a different recommendation that city council and the County Council and Lake walkom Water swer District want to revisit and re reconsider the entirety of the program that's a different question but under our current construct then then what we have under that management program is what we are recommending tonight a different construct doing something completely different would not be something that could be done within a short period of time that would be many many years of development as as was put up on the screen these things have been put in place since the early 2000s to try to correct the development that has occurred since the late 18 1800s from a water quality perspective in terms of our drinking water quality those measures are going to uh help control but we still have the other side of making sure that our drinking water is safe so that's also into play there but I would not expect to see a new program that would apply to all properties

within the Watershed not simply Old Mill Village and I think it's important to remember that we're talking not just one particular development site but all of the properties that this is covering by this change in zoning unlikely we see more development on existing other properties but the reality is that this is not single to an individual site and other programs to do more aggressive things on private property with unwilling Property Owners would entirely change the nature of the Lake walkom management program that the city City and the county and the district and the state have been involved with for nearly 20 years so with all due respect uh the result of that action if the council were to Entertain Entertain that and direct staff to do that would be the same result that we're recommending tonight which is to approve the zoning change from high to lower it to medium and add the storm water regulations that would allow for consistency of development in accordance with tmdl practices we're not proposing that develop we want development to get those things what we're saying is that without that development those retrofits will not occur you see the difference there is it's not we don't want to promote the development to get those things but when development is going to occur and it will occur at some fashion put those regulations into place to meet those overall standards you see if I understand you're saying if John company represents would say we're not going to develop

you wouldn't go ahead with these things of the knowledge you know already that you need there there' be no there'd be no mechanism for that to occur unless voluntarily they say we're going to do this regardless without any and they would not do that so so if if if if nothing occurs and the and and the and the zoning reverts to the high then there is no regulation for storm water controls so then if we create a moratorium extend out the moratorium moratorium even longer we can find ways to create that and I'm suggesting and what I'm saying is that the the that those we would not likely find something new than what we currently have so if there were to extend the moratorium saying find a different way the extension of that would be change the Lake wome management program to apply not to just this individual piece of property but all properties within the lake wam Watershed in other words go to existing property owners and say you have your house here on the lake now we want you now to take away your deck and your driveway and your grass and your lawn and make your house smaller because we want to preserve and protect the lake and The Logical extension of that is to remove your home is it not I mean if the goal is to truly protect the lake and to not have human impacts then the next extension is to say we're going to remove all development and we are not to that point nobody's said anything about removing homes or removing decks or anything like that we're talking about putting

in plants and putting in correct but but warm water catching but that's do do you require somebody to do something that they that they would not that to voluntarily do that they would not voluntarily to do that's when you get into that problem so the trigger under the tmale the management program says if if and when development occurs require things to make that to mitigate the impacts of that and correct for things of the past I'm trying to articulate I'm not trying to be dismissive but if there were a council directed to go look at more options that would fundamentally change how we approach the Lake Walker Management program and would not apply individually to one individual property but would need to apply to all so our recommendation under this scenario would be to reduce the zoning from high to medium and apply a regulation which will allow for reduction of the impacts that are currently seen from the 18 to the four using the development regulations that are outlined and called for in the tmdl as recommended and approved by the state of Washington I think there's one point I'd like to maybe provide a little Distinction on and that is the need for a trigger um when you have Land Development regulations you have vested rights which means that you are allowed to continue to operate under the codes and the rules that were in place when that construction occurred and there has to be a a trigger point or a mechanism by which you are now applying these new development

standards in the single family zoning we use that trigger mechanism as 300 square feet of improvements and that's what triggers something above that if somebody chose not to do that and and kept it as status quo there's not a mechanism for us to go through and require that so there so regardless of what we're talking about we need we would need some level of a trigger to occur in order to enact something we couldn't just go impose something without that I think that the trigger is that 100,000 people rely on this water and that the state and the feds have said that it's troubled and we haven't gotten since since 2001 when we started this we haven't gotten it out of that troubled status I think that's our trigger I think that relying on this one trigger that someone may or may not develop to do that last bit is not enough we're not saying that it's enough it's one step along the way on a on a tmdl that envisions a 50-year implementation we're not saying that development of this IND indidual piece of property that again is not subject to one of several in this consideration it is one more step along the Continuum it will not solve all of the issues but leaving it the way it is doesn't solve it either so it it doesn't there's no single bullet you know there's not a single it's not a single Silver Bullet right it's it's it's many many actions that are need to be taken on the development side and and and and the allowance under the tmdl is the state said development can be a

mechanism by which you can retrofit causing a trigger to put things into place it does not ideally we would all prefer that the watered was completely protected and there was no access to it but that is not the case and the tmdl program and the W the approved Lake Walker Management program says that when development occurs apply regulations that lower the threshold to the 0.15 pounds of phosphorus per acre is the best recommendation of the science to meet the 50-year goal of the tmdl can I uh can I take a moment just well did you want to follow up on that because I just want to say one more thing I just think that I'm not debating the science at all I have 100% believe in the science I do I just don't believe in the trigger I think that we are better than that I think that we can do better than that and that's where my problem is and the challenge is that case law does not entirely support that position and I say let's go and have the fight okay because it's our Watershed I mean 99% of the population in this town is paying for the cleanup of 1% on the population who isn't changing their lifestyle right 99% including renters homeowners everything in between business owners in this town we're all flipping the bill for these people's lifestyle and I'm saying enough enough is enough I don't want to wait for them to develop I'm tired of waiting 2001 was when we started this that was when that that that one code that was in here was voted on or implemented I don't know when it was

voted on but it was implemented in January 1st 2001 right so 23 years we've been waiting for them to develop and we got one property that might out of all the other ones and I'm thinking it's time for us to stop sitting on the sidelines we know that the state will come in and because they're saying hey just let us in we will help you with this we have that as an option and we are standing in their way we're standing there on the sidelines saying no property rights but what about the property rights of the other 99 people in this town how come they get to have their property rights but the rest of us are flipping the bill okay I'd like to get to voting on the amendment but Scott you have your hand up one more question I just want to get back to the point that Barbara is not asking for a silver bullet and we're not asking any of us for uh too much or a revamping of a program that would take years but we are asking for balance U you know an example would be taking it to low density uh that would be one thing that the moratorium could look at it it's a it's a balance and we can take this to a whole another level because this is our one chance we can't do this again and we need to ask ourselves is this enough and did we ask to make it easier for the developers such as with the state and the FEDS to make this more reasonable for them save them money and to be able to get a better outcome for our community and I don't think we have left uh everyone Unturned on this one for you vote

I want to shift us ever so slightly back to our point of beginning as it relates to your your Amendment and the second and that is that Council established the moratorium and in November of last year they specifically told us that okay we need to see that analysis now so they're the ones that directed us to study medium and low and so we brought some information forward at the public hearing and through additional public comment and through our discussion here tonight and what we've said is that we've done that analysis you have forced us to look even deeper than we did initially which is what the process is meant to do and we provided that information and so the Amendments tricky because we we have done and further um augmented the analysis that they directed us to do in the first place so just keep that in mind if if if that's the if that's the move and that's the amendment and it goes forward well that's that's that's what we were directed to do anyways and this process has made our analysis even more robust I think okay there's an amendment to the original motion um which would add on um to our recommendation U encourageing Council to extend the moratorium and to look into other avenues to solve this problem uh we're going to go ahead and vote on that Amendment to the original motion uh all in favor please say I I all opposed the motion fails 33 so we're back to our original motion accepting the staff report as is further comments what I hear you seeing oh you went back

there was looking for the cup um what I hear you saying and maybe representative or all your colleagues is saying Hey Russ you know we have exhausted all ideas and Thoughts From a creative professional uh element we we can't think of anything else we put it all on the table we've left it all on the field for you we can't even fathom anything else this is the best we got that's what I hear you say collectively correct that's correct I think just I feel like that this we're looking at a a macro version of something when we're really like oh we're talking about one thing it's a piece of the puzzle that's working to help the Watershed and so it's like there's a lot of other things that people thought about that don't relate to this particular motion um like whether you bag your grass and take it off site you know things like that we're not talking about that but there's a whole lot of other things that people can do to improve the Watershed that are not on this vote and so I just I I feel like we're talking about like are we doing everything that we can do like there's a lot of other things that aren't even part of this conversation that we're doing and that should yeah but then there's also the the the you know is the Watershed improving from when it got listed from the point that it was listed till now and I think the answer is yes and so it's from the things that we're doing and so like I don't want to get lost and think that like what we're coming to a vote on tonight is like

a bad thing because we're not considering other things I think it's like it's one good thing that could potentially cause positive developments um in the future so like I don't you know that's these are not like exclusive of one another so I honestly don't think this would affect other developments in the future I mean maybe outside of this you know it won't um I think that the Watershed is special and I think that's part of the reason why this is so hard and it should be hard because it's our Watershed we screw this up this is it it's all we got we can't can't go backwards you know I mean we're we're spending all of this time trying to clean up after hundred plus years of mistakes and I just don't want us to to make another mistake that's my thing I think that I I I firmly believe that there are alternatives and we're not exploring them and I know that that you guys I know you guys are short staffed and I know that it is hard work and I know that you guys have put a lot into this but I just feel like there are some options we are just blind to right now well I'm inclined to in support the staff's um proposal as it is I think there's a lot of there's a lot of things we don't control uh there's a lot of limitations to what we can do we only have certain lovers and the the balance point you have selected is most likely to accomplish reducing storm water um phosphorus from this particular site um it sounds like this particular win if it works might get us pretty close to the

tmdl go um which is if I'm reading between the lines I think why we're seeing so many staff here tonight who put so much hard work into this is because this puts a little bit of a ribbon on a 25y year effort and not it's not the end of the road but it's a significant Milestone if we can figure out how to unlock this puzzle piece and what a staff has proposed is one way that doesn't guarantee but is likely to unlock this puzzle piece and we haven't heard anything else from all these professionals that has any chance of unlocking this puzzle piece besides the proposal before us so that's why I'll be voting in favor okay any other comments put on motion all right so the motion in front of us is Rose's original motion to accept the staff reports recommending um to council medium density zoning additional stormw regulations for multif family uh accepting the finding and facts of the um report all in favor raise your hand all opposed okay the motion fails 3 three we have no recommendation is there any other procedure I should consider In This Moment well I um we can we will take that recommendation forward um because of the timeline we'll essentially it's a it's a no recommendation um fails one of the things that I would encourage you to do because it seems like what you're struggling with is the high low density this is what I'm hearing from you right is you're struggling with that high low density um other opportunities out there what I'm would suggest is there's a couple

components here right there's also the storm water rules and regulations um if you don't want if we can't get to um you know a full recommendation on the the density question maybe we can get to a full recommendation on the storm water rules and regulations and so maybe there's a separate vote that could occur there I would really recommend and encourage you to do that if there's not a recommendation on the density please consider recommending the council that we at least adopt these storm water regulations that would apply to the property I like that I I think in the end I mean I thought coming into tonight council is going to decide the low vers medium our recommendation influences that but they're going to have their own set of feedback and they're going to decide that but I don't haven't heard any opposition up here to the stormw water adding the stormwater regulations to multif family components so does someone want to make a motion to that separate effect I will make a m recommendation to um the city council to adopt or a minute give me the paper all right uh I move to accept the the the um storm water regulations um and findings in fact and recommendations um contained therein in the in this report and um we'll forward the recommendation on to the city council did I do that is that right did I did I miss something in there yeah the findings of fact um I think I think what findings of fact okay yeah don't you don't want to adopt the findings and fact you just want to

make a recommendation because the findings and fact include the medium so I would like to make a recommendation that we move forward to the city council as written for the storm water mitigation okay I did is there a second I'll second okay uh yeah the fting is in fact includes justification for the whole package so it would be too much um okay any comments so the motion is to um accept the storm water regulations and multif family um part of the original report and can I just get clarification so if this moves forward to uh city council without a recommendation around a zoning change is it presumed that the existing zoning like we're we're presuming the moratorium goes away and that the existing zoning stays the same the council will have the opportunity to consider whether or not to um extend the moratorium or whether to relinquish the moratorium um in order to relinquish it they would like to take an action on the density question that that we're setting aside tonight and so what we'll Endeavor to do is take a no recommendation forward to them and try to articulate the the the different concerns that were represented and discussed in in these sessions so that they have the the totality of of the issues that you struggle with so no recommendation does not preclude them from picking moratorium medium low whatever the menu items okay oh Scott Mike um could I ask staff what the benefits to communicating with the city council would be to make a motion to change the density to

low would that show up in their packet and make it more recognized if that was the case even if it was a three to three vote um if you if there's a if there's another motion that's put on the table about low and I I don't want to presume the outcome of that motion but but I think for sake of conversation if that also has a 3 to3 vote it would it would be we would represent the same they'll see the minutes of the meeting and carry all that forward in their packet so they'll see both of that but we'll we'll articulate that as the reason for the the mo the initial motion not passing so it's your prerogative that's the short answer I would like to make that motion then Mike is that it is this the time to do that no let's let's finish out the storm water one on its own sounds good and then after that we can entertain okay um so the motion is to uh recommend to council to adopt the storm water regulations in multif family all in favor all right that's unanimous the motion passes um Scott I'd like to make a motion to change the density from high density to low density okay is there a second second all right so the motion is to um change the zoning of multif family areas from high density to low density discussion without a developer can want to redevelop a site depending on the economics of it and this really comes down to economics of what was going to actually trigger them to want to do the thing that will employ the storm water regulations and we can't predict what the market is

going to be in the future but we know what it is right now and we and it's doesn't look like it's going to change particularly when we have a lovely water to look at so my my sense is that if the market is such that it needs medium density in order for these things to trigger um I don't I don't see a a future at least in the next decade where that those prices are coming down such that Redevelopment is going to be worthwhile for the for a low density so I'm looking for the things will actually trigger the storm water to work and for us to reduce phosphorus in the lake and that might mean that it has to be a medium density yeah I mean from all information we've received I don't see how this helps Lake Wacom water quality other comments what kind of what information makes it so that that can't trigger if somebody if if the economics are such that one won't do a project then it doesn't trigger then there's no project to trigger the improvements and so if we keep it at low density my concern is that that we won't have you know there there won't be the economics in place to make it worthwhile yeah and of with all due respect there that's one person's opinion is there fact to back that up only Theory yeah I don't mean to put my buddy John sit on the spot here but the company you represent when you take this information back possibly is that one of the things you were looking at at two years ago when you and I know you got a broken toe so I don't mean to make you come all the way

down here I apologize but but is that one of the things um the company you represent was looking at when you presented that to the city I think you said two years ago that that it would be medium you didn't consider low you already had high so uh was it medium or nothing or did you even consider in your as I say penciling it out a low density so all you turn the mic on please looked at that we've had an preliminary engineering estimate prepared for the site to what the costs are just for the phosphorus treatment that's $2 million that doesn't include traffic that doesn't include plantings that we've discussed with Steve on for the shoreline that doesn't include the reforestation it doesn't include all the work that needs to to be done to bring it before we get the permit do any work and imp imposing those preconditions on any your development we've looked at it the low density does not work we never considered the high density we didn't think it was appropriate for the site we think this works economically at the medium density does not work you won't see it happen at low density it'll be more in free turn by enhancing and rehabilitating the existing Apartments without any new apartments just within the four walls in the roof lines without creating that 300 ft we can do that and keep that 100 100 odd units and not have to do the storm water bear that $2 million cost or any of the other improvements that would go along with medium density so that's the economic tradeoff that

we examine it's not a non-built environment of low density versus medium it's what is The Return by investing in the exist Rehabilitation within the footprint of the existing units Market rents versus we might do otherwise may I ask why you you're still at the microphone uh if or why you have not looked into the governmental programs that might pay for this storm water mitigation by them instead of out of your own Pockets course it's not our obligation to look at that we've discussed with the city approaching a partnership city has not come forward I think when you look at the economics and it's referred to in the staff report I'm looking this way because that's where the screen is I'm not sure if we're seeing I ey uh it's implied I think at one point in the staff report that the funds wouldn't be there the city would have to come up with $2 million buy the acquisition rights buy the easements and they'd have to have the owner be willing to do that and I'm not sure that my client has has told me they're not willing to voluntarily just do that in the abstract that's what you're asking them to do in the abstract to commit to that without having any kind of concern Assurance of the development upside and they said we can take the risk at the medium you want to put low density in there but there isn't any corresponding commitment that or obligation I should say as the staff has said for the developer the property owner to do that we have more upside on the return on investment by

just rehabilitating those units within the four walls to market rate that's the reality of it so this is an opportunity to bring storm water enhancements to this site that's what we've said from the beginning this is the opportunity right now I have a question for you as well so you have this project you're looking at 400 units right of which 100 are existing yes all right so but you're going to net net 300 new yeah roughly and that's an increased footprint yeah the unique aspect of this I'm sorry I know you're going to get a question but I'm just going to layer in some other information there's a l lot of impervious surface existing on that site outside of the parking lots and driveways from The Old Mill we think it's from The Old Mill from that has been grown over with grass okay so my question is is do you guys consider so I would be a little more inclined to go with the medium density if I also knew that you were doing some of these units at 60% of Ami so we're not that doesn't work because that cost gets shifted back to the market-based housing you can't keep the affordable housing and bear all these costs at this site that's but there are programs there are programs that help that they don't subsidize these costs and they don't Rec allow the developer at this location it's this isn't the Waterfront this isn't my clients tell but they've worked with Mercy Housing to do something there my client support they've done something with Mercy Housing down on the waterfront I

understand the affordable housing programs it's not viable at this site with the economics and the costs for development at this that are going to with these unique storm water rules you can't recover that cost on the moderate or low-income housing that's the Dilemma of this site and it's not why it's not appropriate at this site personally I would encourage the city to look at sites that are appropriate for moderate and low and very low income hb220 urges communities to look at all income levels this isn't the site for it I beg to differ if you're sitting in our water shed okay then you can't fund you can't get to the storm water Improvement that's the trick all right Motion in front of us is to change the zoning and multif family this area from high density to low density any last comments okay the motion is to change the density to low low density m multi family zoning all in favor please raise your hand all opposed motion fails 3 three I think conceptually that's everything we needed to cover uh anything else staff is looking for on guidance to take to council that I can think of thank you for your time anything else for other business upcoming schedule I can just make one little plug um next week on Tuesday evening we have our uh Bellingham plan openhouse session that is talking about uh housing affordability uh and that's from 5: to 7 p.m.

and I believe if I remember correctly C SE home High School I believe yeah but you can go on to the engage Bellingham site and it has all the information for that so great um we will adjourn thanks everyone