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2017 Elections/Politics & Government

A Conversation With Everett City Council Candidate Alex Lark

by Ben Crowther @BenCrowther on July 25, 2017

Last week I spoke with Alex Lark, a candidate for Everett City Council, Position 2. Alex serves on the Everett Planning Commission and in the United States Army Reserve, and works full-time as Philanthropy Manager for Housing Hope, a local affordable housing non-profit. He’s challenging Jeff Moore, a two-term incumbent, architect, and political insider whose father, Bill Moore, was the longest serving mayor in Everett.

While we did not issue endorsements in his race, Alex was passionate about sharing his views on urbanism with our readers. In our conversation, we discussed vision zero, the future of Paine Field, and the biggest problem facing Everett. Read what he had to say below:

First, tell us a bit about yourself. What is your background? What motivated you to run for Everett City Council?
My background has a decidedly un-urban beginning. I grew up on a llama farm in Mount Vernon. After high school I went to the University of Washington and studied political science and geography.

When I graduated I packed my life into two duffel bags and moved east to Washington, D.C. I worked in Congress until my boss, Congressman Brian Baird, retired. After that I became an advisor to the Korean Government at their embassy in D.C. I helped plan presidential visits, which was extremely interesting, and monitored defense appropriation bills in congress. After a few years there, I joined the Army and became an officer in the United States Army Reserve. I work for an affordable housing non-profit called Housing Hope, where we help families and children experiencing homelessness. I also serve as a planning commissioner for the City of Everett.

I was motivated to run because I see an opportunity to help make people’s lives better, and these people need of an advocate on the city council. Everett families are working hard and playing by the rules but they don’t have people working hard for them to tackel the real issues our city is facing like affordable housing, transportation, and protecting our quality of life.

Do you consider yourself an urbanist? If so, what does being an urbanist look like as a city councilmember?
Absolutely. I think the city is humanity’s greatest invention. It is such an incredible catalyst for human potential and achievement. You can change people’s lives with a better built city. Cities give us the tool to make a greener more prosperous world built on a foundation of equity. We are not quite there yet, but cities are an excellent vehicle to get us there.

For me, I would love to see Everett as a multipolar city, with large urban villages, a rich transit ecosystem, and excellent pedestrian connectivity. But we need to also learn from our partner city to the south. That means tackling affordable housing as the city is growing to ensure that Everett families aren’t priced out and new families can afford to move here. It also means that we need to support our police and fire departments by fully funding them because as our city grows, they also need to grow. Our city budget needs to reflect a real commitment to the safety of its current and future residents.

What is the biggest problem facing Everett today? What is your plan to solve it?
Our entire region is facing a housing crisis and Everett has a key role to play in addressing that issue. Everett needs to grow and diversify its housing stock. There are many ways to do this, but here are several that are a priority for me are: lifting the burdensome floor area ratios and height restrictions in downtown Everett. Build it and they will come, so I say let them build. I also want to explore the creation of a community land trust. This was done in Burlington, Vermont. By decoupling the land from the building we have a flexible tool that can help us increase the diversity of housing stock and prices points. Condominiums that can be bought or built by families.

I really want to look into putting together a sweat equity homeowner program. We can work to find ways to let families build homes in lieu of a down payment. We can help families get on the path to building generational wealth. In Everett, it is especially critical that we find ways to help our citizens build wealth because currently 40% of Everett families are low-income. I also think it is critical that we do this soon before land prices rise beyond the point of feasibility.

A common concern among voters about Sound Transit 3 was the long timeline. What, if anything, should be done by Everett to speed up the implementation of Sound Transit 3?
Yeah, I am not too excited about the timeline either. I think the first step before we move ahead is to start the conversation with our residents. Speeding up construction of ST3 will require a concerted effort and we need to make sure that we as a city are ready for all that entails. I for one believe that this is a conversation we should have because the benefits of increased connectivity to Seattle are very much worth it. In the meantime though there are other things we can be doing to get ready for ST3 or to begin increasing that connectivity. I think that also segways into your next set of questions…

What else can be done to improve public transportation options in the city?
Oh awesome, it segwayed perfectly. I love it when I can stick the landing. I think what will make Everett competitive is making sure we have a reasonable commute time to downtown Seattle. We need to find ways to create dedicated bus rapid transit routes between the two cities. BRT is inexpensive, flexible, and effective.

We also need to make sure that we enrich our transit ecosystem within the city. Even excellent bus service cannot fill all the gaps. That is why we need flexible options to fill in the gaps. A bus can get you to the grocery store but a car2go or Lyft can get you home. That is why Everett needs, zipcar, car2go, multiple rideshare platforms, bike share systems, and frequent bus service. This diversity can augment bus service and provide people complete mobility. We will ensure the success of ST3 and any other intercity mass transit system if we have a rich transit network connecting people to them.
That and by creating alternatives to car ownership we can create reliable low cost transit for families that also reduces our carbon footprint.

Alaska Airlines recently announced plans to introduce nine daily commercial flights out of Paine Field. Do you support commercial flights out of Paine Field? What impacts, positive or negative, will they have on the community?
I do, connectivity is key in today’s economy. These flights mean tourists, business travelers, and investors won’t have to fight their way up from Sea-Tac to come enjoy all the great opportunities that Everett has to offer. Given the region’s growth and how busy Sea-Tac has become, a second airport makes sense to me. That and with the light rail slated to have a stop at Paine Field that means a lot of opportunity. However, as we build we need to work with the industry to do all we can to mitigate the noise.

Overall I believe the airport will be a positive for our community.

What are your preferred policies to bring more family-sized units to high density zones?
There are a lot of things we can do to help bring families to high density zones. I think we as a city need to look at the zoning and regulations we have surrounding condominiums. I think we need to look at what tools and incentives we can provide to developers to help mitigate sound transfer from unit to unit.

Ultimately we also need to allow for more building in strategic places throughout the city. By creating space for urban villages, as well as the proper incentives, we can allow the market room to create family units in denser areas.

I also want to work to increase our attached single-family housing stock as well. Townhome blocks are common throughout most of the county and provide the density and homeownership that Everett needs.

Additionally, it’s important to recognize that market driven construction will not necessarily cover all the housing needs for Everett families. That is why we need to examine creating a community land trust to facilitate the building of more condominiums, as well as sweat equity condominiums and townhomes.

Do you support allowing missing middle housing (e.g., townhomes, duplexes, and triplexes) in single-family zoned neighborhoods?
Yes, townhomes are essential. As I have mentioned numerous times before we need homeownership programs that meet density goals. Townhomes can do that. Furthermore, townhomes with English basements allow families additional passive income and increase their financial resiliency.

We can also look to sweat equity townhomes as well. Allowing for sweat equity helps families unable to save for a downpayment the pathway to homeownership. By utilizing townhomes we can add the density that makes redevelopment more attainable and transit more viable in the neighborhood. They are a proven path forward.

Would you support the adoption of a Vision Zero plan in Everett? Why or why not?
Absolutely, Everett is in a unique position because we have yet to implement a lot of the multimodal infrastructure that a Vision Zero plan addresses. By adopting a Vision Zero plan from the start we can make sure that from day one we are building safe, accessible and welcoming complete streets that accommodate multi-modal transit.

What can the City do to create a safer, more welcoming environment for people walking and biking?
We can make a commitment to making inviting and useable sidewalks. Too many of our sidewalks are too narrow and next to streets that are too busy. We can never be a city that fully utilizes buses if we continue to let too much of our city either not have sidewalks or have sidewalks that are genuinely unusable.

Sidewalks are simultaneously our cheapest mass transit option and most scalable public health program.

Everett has prioritized car mobility over the mobility of people. We need to set new standards so that as redevelopment occurs we have the sidewalks being built to accommodate the increased number of people.

Do you support re-organizing the City Council to be elected by geographic districts? Why or why not?
110% yes. There are so many benefits to districts. First off, it creates more opportunity for diversity on the city council. Traditionally underrepresented communities from traditionally underrepresented parts of the city now how a better pathway forward to sitting at the dias. Furthermore, by working to align, neighborhoods, districts, urban villages, and economic centers of the city you can create subdivisions that allow for neighborhood-level initiatives on economic and political issues. These sub-centers of the city can then act as semi-independent economic and political engines powering growth in the city. Furthermore, districts makes it more manageable to build a strong rapport with your neighborhood. Districts allows us to do the big, the bold, and the new ideas that ask us as a city to be brave, to take the lead in an inclusive way. That’s why I support districts.

Any final thoughts?
Everett is incredible. There is so much opportunity here. There can be even more with a fresh set of eyes pushing for new ideas. I want to serve the city of Everett because I believe in its people, and the incredible things they can create. I want to serve Everett because I believe in this city.

Civics & Culture/HALA/Housing/Inclusionary Zoning/Land Use & Development

City Council Passes Central Area Rezones

by Stephen Fesler @safesler on July 25, 2017

On Monday, the Seattle City Council had a full agenda of rezones cross the dais. These included three separate district rezones in the Central Area, a site-specific contract rezone at 24th Ave and E Union St, and minor zoning amendments to two areas of Belltown. The City Council also adopted new design guidelines for Mount Baker Town Center and the Pike/Pine district.

Central Area Urban Design Rezones

Last month, we covered the proposed Central Area rezones, which focus on enhancing urban design and increasing development capacity at three neighborhood commercial nodes on 23rd Avenue. The nodes are focused on Union Street, Cherry Street, and Jackson Street. Baked into the rezones are requirements for ground floor activity, ground floor setbacks, upper-story stepbacks, and mid-block connections. The highest new building heights allowed under the rezones are 75 feet, though the rezones run on gradient of higher development capacity in terms of overall floor area and height. Some of the rezones will unlock new uses not currently allowed, such as retail where areas zoned SF5000 and LR1 become NC1-40 (a mixed-use zone).

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A technical correction to the rezone map for Union Street was made, which pulled out three parcels proposed to be rezoned to NC2P-75. The reason for this is that Capitol Hill Housing is seeking to construct a six-story building on the properties and was getting a contract rezone for the site to NC2P-65 during the same Council meeting anyway. The technical correction also modified a block of zoning east of 24th Ave on E Union St to include a Pedestrian designation on E Union St.

The Central Area rezones unlock mandatory housing affordability requirements for new development. Residential development will have to provide between 7% and 11% of units as affordable or pay $20.75 to $32.75 per square foot as a fee to the City for affordable housing. Commercial development will have to provide between 5% and 9% of total floor area as affordable housing or pay a fee to the City for affordable housing equal to $8 to $14.50 per square foot. As an area with high displacement risk, the requirements are considered to be in the highest band applicable within the city.

Adoption of the rezone ordinances makes a variety of changes to the Land Use Code beyond urban design regulations. These include things like increases in floor area ratio maximums, dwelling unit density, and building heights in the LR2 zones when subject to the Mandatory Housing Affordability program.

A companion resolution also passed to recognize and implement the 23rd Avenue Action Plan and Urban Design Framework. Those plans seek to implement specific strategies to create walkable, mixed-use nodes that reflect the rich community character of the Central Area, provide for a variety of housing options, and support existing and new local businesses. The resolution charts out specific goals and actions to be made.

These include things like supporting the Office of Housing’s efforts in the Central Area to affirmatively market affordable housing to area residents at risk of displacement, continue to support preservation efforts of the Historic Central Area Arts and Cultural District, and work with Africatown and other community stakeholders to identify and develop local programs and strategies for training and employment in the innovation economy. At the City Council meeting, Councilmember Lisa Herbold sought to make additional refinements to the resolution, which included:

Recital language recognizing “structural and institutional racism, including redlining, restrictive covenants, and other discriminatory practices that led to racial segregation and current racial disparities in quality of outcomes such as access to quality education, living wage employment, healthy environment, affordable housing, and transportation;”
Language recognizing that the “Mandatory Housing Affordability programs alone is not sufficient to fully meet the demand for affordable housing or to fully address displacement of vulnerable populations;”
An actionable goal to develop other strategies that can address “direct displacement, economic displacement, and cultural displacement;” and
A requirement for the Office of Planning and Community Development to develop design guidelines that “support the creation of spaces in the Central Area that are attractive to and functional for minority and locally-owned businesses, and promote public safety in the design of buildings and privately-owned public open space.”

Each of these passed and built upon other amendments that were added to the resolution in committee last week.

Capitol Hill Housing Contract Rezone

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Capitol Hill Housing (CHH) is sponsoring a six-story mixed-use development that will provide new affordable housing units to the Central Area. Located on the corner of E Union St and 24th Ave, approximately 114 apartments and 3,264 square feet of ground floor retail space will be constructed as part of the development. A rezone of the site was necessary to facilitate the proposal since existing zoning would only allows 69 dwelling units similar in design to those proposed by CHH. The development is proposed on the site of the former Liberty Bank Building, which was the first African-American owned bank west of the Mississippi.

The site-specific rezone of 2320 E Union St. (City of Seattle)

The rezone increases overall maximum building heights and floor area by going from NC2P-40 and NC2-40 to NC2P-65. The mixed-use zoning allows a 65-foot tall building and applies special Pedestrian-designation requirements to the property. Since the development is targeted at delivering affordable housing, the residential components of the project are exempt from the mandatory housing affordable requirements for residential uses since it would easily exceed them. The small amount of commercial uses are also exempt.

Technical Rezone Corrections in Belltown

Technical correction to the Official Land Use Map of Belltown. (City of Seattle)

When the Downtown and South Lake Union rezones were adopted in March, there were typographical errors in them for two areas of Belltown. The rezones changed the blocks from DMR/C 125/65 to DMR/C 145/65, which increased the maximum residential height limit but not the base maximum height limit. The City Council adjusted the zoning yesterday by increasing base maximum height limit by 10 feet to DMR/C 145/75, which has a base maximum height limit of 75 feet. This makes the zone consistent with the floor area ratio provision in SMC 23.49.011.A.1. The rezone correction also makes a minor adjustment to the applicability of the high, medium, and low mandatory housing affordability performance and payment map.

Revised Urban Design Guidelines

Two sets of new neighborhood design guidelines were adopted for Mount Baker Town Center and Pike/Pine. In the case of Mount Baker Town Center, the adopted design guidelines are entirely new. The guidelines apply to the growing station area town center, which follows the spine of Rainier Avenue from S Bayview St to S Walden St. The Mount Baker design guidelines identify how new development should respond to local urban form and architectural context. Typical with design guidelines, direction is also provided on a host of other design issues, such as public space, street-level interaction, and architectural approaches to construction.

View this document on Scribd

First adopted in 2010, the Pike/Pine design guidelines were created to reflect priorities of the Pike/Pine Conservation Overlay District, which was established a year earlier in 2009. Prior to that, the general Capitol Hill neighborhood design guidelines had covered the Pike/Pine area. The conservation district overlay seeks to promote preservation of the local character through sensitive designs in new development. The conservation district’s design guidelines are now in their third iteration.

The impetus for revised design guidance came from changes to the Land Use Code in 2014. These changes centered on language for departures from development standards within the conservation district. The goal of the changes was to allow more flexibility in developing design solutions that compliment and retain the architectural character of the conservation district. Thus, updated design guidelines were necessary to help implement those code changes.

Specific changes to the design guidelines include the addition of conservation district objectives, new design priorities in the neighborhood, and new graphical examples of character-responsive development.

View this document on Scribd

Events

Register Now For Urbanist Walking Tour – One Center City

by Scott Bonjukian @NWUrbanist on July 24, 2017

Join The Urbanist and our partner organizations for an on-the-ground look at One Center City, the near term plan to make Seattle’s downtown streets more safe and efficient for hundreds of thousands of daily travelers. The tour will focus on the transit and protected bike lane options for 4th and 5th Avenues and the Pike/Pine corridor through Capitol Hill. The tour will include a stop at Convention Place Station where Seattle’s most expensive real estate development, the Washington State Convention Center Addition, is planned. By accelerating the plan for transit tunnel buses to move to surface streets, the project is partially triggering the need for this multi-jurisidctional transportation planning effort. The tour will end at Kaladi Brothers Coffee, where discussion can continue!

We’ll be joined by Seattle Department of Transportation Director Scott Kubly. Participating partner organizations include Seattle Bike Blog, Seattle Central Greenways, Seattle Neighborhood Greenways, Seattle Subway, and Transit Riders Union.

When registering, please consider a donation of $10 or more per person to support The Urbanist’s educational mission. We are an all-volunteer nonprofit organization and our programming is free and open to the public.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER
When: Saturday, August 5, 10am
Where: Westlake Park, 401 Pine Street
Walking distance: 1 mile

Education/Land Use & Development/Plans & Policy

Mixed Bag Bills Could Weaken Growth Management Act

by Doug Trumm @dmtrumm on July 24, 2017

Late last month, the Washington State Legislature took rushed steps in passing two bills that deal with the Growth Management Act (GMA). One of the bills more widely allows construction of schools in rural areas–a decidedly bad idea–while another significantly modifies the approach to developing land capacity analysis reports for urban growth areas. In an earlier article this year, I explained why both bills were misguided as originally drafted. Most of the problems raised about the school siting bill are still true, but the Legislature improved the land capacity bill to be much more sensible and included useful sweeteners.

School Siting Bill

The school siting bill was resurrected as an entirely new bill in the Third Special Session of the Legislature after Democratic Governor Jay Inslee partially vetoed the original bill. Legislators successfully carved out special school siting exceptions for the Bethel School District in Pierce County, but that is as far as the Governor was willing to go when he signed it in April. The bill was loaded up with other provisions that allowed schools to extend sewer systems to remote rural school sites under certain circumstances. School districts could defray the infrastructural investment costs of sewer lines by allowing property owners along the sewer lines to hookup to them and pay a proportionate share over two decades.

Transportation/Vision Zero/Walking

Disability Rights Victory Means Curb Cut Deluge Coming

by Ryan Packer @typewriteralley on July 24, 2017

On Monday of last week, the City of Seattle settled a class action lawsuit in U.S. District court. The lawsuit alleged the City is currently violating the Americans with Disabilities act, based on the current number of intersections that are lacking proper curb ramps and the fact that many intersections have curb cuts that are substandard. Under the settlement, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will be required to build 1,250 curb ramps every single year, adding up to a commitment to install 22,500 over the next 18 years. The requirement to build starts immediately, with 625 new ramps by the end of 2017 counting to the quota. According to a 2016 survey, the city only has 27,253 curb ramps right now, so by 2035 Seattle will see its curb cut inventory almost double.

It is unfortunate that advocates for users in wheelchairs and for those with mobility issues had to resort to a lawsuit to get the City to act on its commitment to a wholly inclusive city, and the terms of the settlement raise pretty big questions on what Seattle’s transportation budget will look like moving forward with a legally required curb ramp quota to meet every year. Unless Seattle’s transportation department is able to get the average cost per curb ramp down, a much larger portion of the transportation budget will go toward those improvements than was anticipated when the city passed the Move Seattle levy, by a pretty significant magnitude.

What We're Reading

What We’re Reading: Company Town Planning, Pike Mural, And Unfunded

by Stephen Fesler @safesler on July 23, 2017

Company town planning: Could Facebook learn from the company towns of old?

The other bikeshare: LimeBike, a bikeshare competitor to Spin, is set to launch soon.

Cut for now: Some federal funding for transit got cut in a House committee budget vote, but probably will make it back into the final budget.

Ruston boasts culture: A $94 million Asian-Pacific cultural center project in Ruston appears to be back.

New ED: Cascade Bicycle Club and WABikes has a new executive director.

Not how that works: Elon Musk says that he has “verbal approval” for the untested and astronomically expensive hyperloop, but that just shows he doesn’t know how approval works.

Greenwashing: Anyone telling you that their parking garage is green is masking how very ungreen it is.

Pike mural: The future Pike Flats building will feature a mural, which is the same site that recently had a building with an LGBTQ mural.

Punitive bike taxes spread: In Colorado, there is a proposal for a bike tax modeled on the one for Oregon.

Strong nexus: Should Seattle follow suit with other jurisdictions across the state and institute impact fees on new development to fund new transportation, schools, parks, and fire and police facilities?

Pivot to transportation: Perhaps it’s time for Congressional Republicans to turn their sights from a terrible healthcare repeal to funding infrastructure.

Discouraging walking: Honolulu plans to ticket pedestrians for crossing the street while looking at a mobile device.

Lid I-5: Knute Berger profiles the effort to lid I-5.

Unfunded: The Washington State Legislature has ended its third special session with no agreement for capital expenditures for things like schools. Republicans were conditioning an agreement on passage of a near-repeal of a recent water rights ruling issued by the state supreme court.

Map of the Week: If you’re a driver in America, you don’t pay the full cost of roads through gas taxes, car tabs, and user fees–not even close.

Driving/Technology/Transit/Transportation/Video

Sunday Video: Can We Live Without Predictions?

by Stephen Fesler @safesler on July 23, 2017

Transit guru Jarrett Walker talks about how predictions of the future are often distracting and loaded when it comes to planning transportation networks. Instead, he says that geometry can show how transportation networks will perform now and in the future since geometry is a fixed variable. Walker also makes other points in his discussion, such as developing transit networks that focus on the liberty of riders to move about an area and that land use planners should be thoughtful in locating dense nodes and urban villages so that transit can effectively serve them.

Civics & Culture/The View From Nathan's Bus

Nathan Converses With His Colleagues, IV: Always Forever Now

by Nathan Vass on July 22, 2017

“I really like the artwork in this building.”

Sitting on the late night bus headed home, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Our base is famous for how awful its artwork is. There are comments you hear not infrequently–how best to eject the art from the premises, whether or not to deface it on the eve of retirement… my driver friend continued. “Like the pictures that look like the old TVs, where they look staticky. I really like those.”
“Are you being serious or sarcastic?”
“No I’m being serious! I feel like I shouldn’t like them but I do like them.”
“Okay. That’s good to hear, I’ll look at them with a new perspective.”
“No, I’m terrible at picking artwork.”
“It’s all good!”
“But I see those and I just think, my kids’ll never see that.”