The Wallingford Community Council will hold an Urban Village, Seattle 2035 and HALA informational meeting on: January 20th, 2016, 7:00 – 9:00 PM at the Good Shepherd Center, 4649 Sunnyside Avenue North, in the Chapel on the 4th floor.
The Wallingford Community Council wants you to know of major changes proposed in our neighborhood. Mayor Ed Murray will soon finalize recommendations to the Seattle City Council to revise the basic planning laws that govern what can be built on your and your neighbors’ property.
Mayor Murray has teamed up with developers and with advocacy organizations that promote housing density and want to change the way we live, all without a single public visit to neighborhoods like Wallingford that will be impacted. Their first step is changing the City’s Comprehensive Plan through the Seattle 2035 process, followed by zoning changes recommended in the Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA) plan.
Proposed “Seattle 2035” changes to the Comprehensive Plan would:
- Eliminate requirements to include residents’ input in changes to neighborhood zoning and other aspects of the Comprehensive Plan
- Make it much easier to rezone any property in or near the Urban Village from single-family to multi-family
- Eliminate specific zoning types within the Urban Village from the future land use map
- Again permit “skinny houses” and houses built on sub-standard lots
- Remove protections for trees and goals for more trees
- Permit more development on steep slopes and in environmentally sensitive areas
- Eliminate parking requirements for apartment complexes while still allowing all residents to own cars and get RPZ permits
Mayor Murray’s “Grand Bargain” within the HALA panel of developers and advocacy organizations would:
- Change all single-family zoning within Urban Villages to multi-family zoning
- Change multi-family zoning to favor apartments and condos over town homes
- Greatly increase the allowed heights and size in multi-family zones (from 3 to 4 or 5 stories) and in commercial zones (from 4 to 5 or 6 stories)
- Push out locally-owned small businesses that cannot afford the higher rents in new mid-rise mixed-use buildings
- Accelerate demolition of existing affordable housing by creating new incentives for developers and raising taxes on properties that are not redeveloped
- Replace affordable housing with top-dollar houses and apartments, with only 5 to 7% of new units reserved as affordable
- Create new legal loopholes for developers
- Make these changes despite City studies confirming that existing zoning is adequate for predicted future population growth
Will a representative from the City be in attendance?
That’s the key question, I think.
The meeting will not have an official representative of the Mayor, Council or the Planning Department in attendance. We will have a short presentation by Greg Hill, the chair of the Land Use committee of the Community Council, to explain just what is going on. We will then have an open and extended question and answer period. In addition to Greg we will have Catherine Weatbrook, co-chair of the City Neighborhood Council (http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoodcouncil/). to answer your questions. After the Q&A you could make a speech if you wish. Following the meeting there will be an opportunity for various folks to self-organize into any committees they might want to form to support or oppose the proposals.
Can residents of Wallingford attend this meeting and have a vote?
I cannot attend this meeting, but I would vote no on all of these proposals. Does the Wallingford Community Council approve of these changes? How is it that the Mayor has the right to change a neighborhood without the votes of the neighborhood?
No, the closest we had to a vote has passed, in the elections last fall, and as usual we didn’t make much of our opportunity.
The meeting is primarily for folks who live in the Urban Village boundaries but any resident of Walllingford can attend.
The reason the Mayor will ram thru these developer friendly zoning changes is to repay them for campaign contributions (bought & paid for) for past & future elections &/or illegal “swag”. I believe the City Council will have to approve any such changes & hopefully they’re be more honest & responsive to all voters desires?
I wouldn’t be too sure of that, Mike. Too many useful idiots here voted for developer-funded Rob Johnson for District 4. As a reminder, Johnson made very public his intent to tax all of us in proposed HALA upzone areas not based on the current assessed value of our land and structures like our SF homes, but on the FUTURE value if that structure is a multilevel BUILDING that COULD be built there upon approval of the upzone.
Now why would Johnson want to single us out for such unfair treatment? Not to fund vital city services, but to “encourage more density.” You know, to build more affordable housing ;-). Oh, and since the city is doing away with on site parking requirements, I’m sure all these newcomers in microhousing apartments on either side of our homes will all bike and bus everywhere, right?
I wouldn’t be too sure of that, Mike. Too many useful idiots here voted for developer-funded Rob Johnson for District 4. As a reminder, Johnson made very public his intent to tax all of us single-family homeowners in proposed HALA upzone areas not based on the current assessed value of our land and structures like our SF homes, but on the FUTURE value if that structure is a multilevel BUILDING that COULD be built there upon approval of the upzone.
Now why would Johnson want to single us out for such unfair treatment? Not to fund vital city services, but to “encourage more density.” You know, to build more affordable housing ;-). Oh, and since the city is doing away with on site parking requirements, I’m sure all these newcomers in microhousing apartments on either side of our homes will all bike and bus everywhere, right?
The purpose is to get informed, organized and activated as a neighborhood. As residents of Seattle, we were not asked for our input. And if what the city proposes happens, we will continue to not be asked.
I encourage you to come on the 20th.
This is the beginning of the work, that we, as a neighborhood, are going to need to do to not only push back with things like “protect the trees” and “include us,” but to come up with community-based solutions. To get inspired, here is a link to what other U.S. cities have and are doing to solicit ideas from their community as part of their planning processes:
“Innovative tools for diversity, equity and inclusion in urban planning”
http://julianagyeman.com/2016/01/innovative-tools-for-diversity-equity-and-inclusion-in-urban-planning/
I’ll be first to criticize the city on land use planning (albeit from the opposite perspective of many here) but on this score there were in fact a ton of requests for input, many of which were covered in Wallyhood e.g. http://www.wallyhood.org/2015/11/final-seattle-2035-open-house-thanksgiving-lunch-at-the-wcsc/#gsc.tab=0
I went to the final open house at North Seattle Community College and spent an hour talking to Linda Sugimura, the Director of DPD. There was a presentation and then there were individuals there available to talk to individuals but there was not open Q&A. I gave Linda a great deal of input and she listened but I did not get any impression that my input would go anywhere. My input included concern about the “Grand Bargain” and the right for developers to build large developments with no parking.
Hi BK – the requests were for input on a plan that had already been created.
I think the problem is that our input doesn’t matter. They will take it but the decision has already been made.
Without any organized opposition, it has been easy to hear what they want to hear and proceed as they have been proceeding. Voices of individuals tend to fade into the background, without any organization to articulate a focused message. We’re late, but maybe not too late.
Your point is understandable. We have all experienced the loud, outsized voices of the people and corporations and politicians in support of these proposals. The money lies behind them. Here on Wallyhood see BK above who endlessly peddles his “point of view”, arguing relentlessly with everyone and anyone who resists his ideas. Even so, I do think it is important to speak up, join others and organize together. There is no other way. Without intervention Wallingford will very, very soon look very, very much like South Lake Union, Ballard, and the creeping coffinated curb to curb grey density these jokers slyly tout as urban environmental nirvana in Capital Hill, Fremont, Eastlake and all the other remaining but fast vanishing vestiges of modest, green, interesting neighborhoods.
Relentlessness in the cause of decency is no vice.
LU9.9 Establish low‐rise multifamily zones to accommodate various housing choices in the low to moderate density range that include walk‐up flats, townhouses, rowhouses, duplexes and triplexes, and cottage housing.
If the teardown behind us gets new life as a 3 flat instead of a million dollar house when the old folks who live there eventually pass on, all the time spent on comment threads and public input will have been well worth it for contributing to some small added kindness in the world.
Hey BK, would you object to an owner-occupied ADU or DADU on the property behind you? That can be built under current codes and actually helps the owner stay in their home instead of sending the money off to a slumlord in Nebraska.
Talk revolves around single-family up-zones creating massive amounts of new, affordable housing, when one 60-unit apartment provides more new housing than 20 blocks of single-family up zones… and we already have the zoning in place.
Gregf — quite likely that teardown couldn’t have an ADU because of parking requirements. Many in Wallingford are opposed to reducing off-street parking requirements. We can’t say we’re against big developments AND oppose other measures that improve desperately needed affordability and density.
Second: if we are concerned about out-of-state and -country absentee ownership and speculation, then let’s address that. It is a related, but different, issue to up-zoning.
Third: a 60-unit apartment building full of studios and one-bedroom units doesn’t provide diversity of housing options that allows families to move in.
I don’t object to living next to renters of any type, owner occupied property or not, because I don’t believe that renters (or people with less rather than more money in general) are an inferior strain of human being.
Or to put it another way, I am confident that there is equal risk that a neighbor who can pass the single family home wealth test might turn out to be a brogrammer or surgeon who happens a nut or a jerk as a teacher or plumber who can’t.
Only with the single family home wealth test in place the latter have no chance at living here.
Well put, BK. Maybe we can collaborate at Wednesday’s meeting on a pro-outsider Wallingford activist group that is accepting of density.
@PaulC I’ll be the one with devil horns in the Che Guevara t shirt 🙂
One point of clarification I missed that has come up a few times in this thread:
The two most expensive forms of urban housing are detached single family homes and tall apartment building.
The former because one home has to absorb the full cost of a plot of land, the latter because using concrete and steel and elevators etc etc is expensive.
Small scale wooden multi-family buildings are the most affordable form of housing.
(There are also some other ancillary benefits for people with less rather than more money – small scale landlords have more reason to value stability, good tenant relationships, and payment in kind versus an extra dollar of profit in their pocket than large scale landlords, for example)
Ahhh, but for a family, cheap single-family housing is one of the few options available. Most new housing is micro, studio, or one-bedroom… because those return the highest dollars per square foot to the developer.
Rather than toss out land use codes, it seems prudent to tweak the current code. Waive the parking requirement for ADU and DADU, create standard plans, facilitate financing. There is much that can be done without chucking the whole thing. It will be a one-way trip. Take baby steps instead. These things must be done delicately.
If I remember right, DADU policy comes up early in the HALA process, and it’s very important to get this right. Incentives yes, stealth townhouses no. They’ll want to drop the owner occupancy requirement, but something along those lines is essential to the concept. From the small lot experience, I suppose they’ll want to adjust size limits to provide 10 foot ceilings and 4000sq floor – i.e., lucrative, not affordable.
1,500 SF house on a 3,000 SF lot is $668k
How’s that SF 5K zoning working for affordability and “cheap single family” housing?
http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/1621-N-49th-St_Seattle_WA_98103_M13375-76587
As the article indicates, the proposals moving through Council could change zoning in Seattle’s residential neighborhoods in a way not seen for many decades. Past changes have focused on multi-family and neighborhood/commercial zones. These new proposals WILL up zone vast swaths of single family zones if they are adopted without changes.
The Fremont Neighborhood Council is also sponsoring a meeting to discuss proposed zoning changes. Date: Monday, January 25, 2016. Time: 7 p.m. Location: Doric Temple #92, 619 N. 36th St. (around the corner from Hotel Hotel). Geoffrey Wentlandt and possibly others from the City’s new planning department (formerly part of DPD) will make a presentation and ask questions.
For further info (when flyer/agenda is ready–focus is Fremont side), email me (toby at louploup.net). FNC site is http://fremontneighborhoodcouncil.org/
I encourage people to attend as many of these meetings as possible and to contact your new district council representatives with your opinion. East of Aurora is in District 4, Rob Johnson, and he is the chair of the Council’s land use committee. West of Aurora is in District 6, Mike O’Brien, past chair and now vice-chair.
Let’s be honest here: this isn’t just about making developers rich (even though it might). This is really about how we accommodate the massive growth that Seattle has and will see while remaining affordable and livable.
We can’t be affordable and livable if we take the San Francisco approach. And as there’s no new land being created the only option is more density. With that, is the only choice we want for new residents apartment canyons on our arterials? Or will we have a mix of attractive housing? And how do we ensure a range of price points so that we’re affordable not just for Amazon and Microsoft but also for teachers and students and small business owners and restaurant workers and construction workers and manufacturing employees.
If all Wallingford does is say “Hell No” to density (which is the basic tenor of comments on the blog and at the council meetings) then Wallingford will be effectively shutting itself out of the conversation and process.
Development and change are going to happen. Lots of it. The alternative is another Great Recession. Opposition to it won’t stop it. The real question is. Not How Much, but rather What Kind.
So, how can we welcome developers into Wallingford and make them successful building density that works for us?
Without that perspective on our efforts we’ll get crappy development and Seattle will continue to deteriorate into a haphazard mess of traffic and rising rents and F.U. condos for 22 year old millionaires.
This is, indeed, about misguided policies that will only make developers richer and do very little to help with affordable housing. Wallingford has already exceeded growth targets through 2025, just as we met the previous targets 15 years early. That growth all happened without any change to zoning and there is an insane capacity available for more growth, again without changing a thing. The Wallingford Neighborhood Plan specifically prohibits any upzones… because the capacity for enormous growth already exists.
Developers drool over getting access to single-family zones where they can build with no design review or SEPA constraints. Yes, someone may not end up with a million dollar home behind them, but they may see a triplex that sells for 1.8 million. These will NOT be affordable homes. Our affordable housing is found in the older and smaller properties – and those will be the first properties to be demolished because they represent maximum profit.
Do not kid yourself. There is no “emergency” requiring that zoning suddenly needs to be changed. The capacity exists to exceed all our growth targets many times over with the existing zoning. We do need affordable housing, which is present in our older, smaller starter properties. The policies being proposed will accelerate speculation for older properties. This is ALL about money.
You’re not obliged to swallow anything you despise. Show up. Speak up. Write your council members. Write the Mayor. And when someone does not perform as you wish, vote the sucker out of office.
There are no real “starter” homes in Wallingford. The cheapest I was able to find was $600,000. Our median is about $700,000. There is no “affordable homes” in our neighborhood.
So, how is it a bad thing if a developer buys 3-bedroom $700,000 single family house and builds a tri-plex on it with 3-bedrooms each where each unit sells for $700,000?
$700,000 wasn’t “affordable” to begin with. But nonetheless, we’ve just tripled the number of people who can get into a house in Wallingford at that same price-point.
My concern is that all the proposals do is drive up the cost per square foot to live in Seattle. When you take a 2400 sq ft home selling for $700,000 and turn it into (3) units selling at $700,000 the cost per sq ft just tripled. Speculation just drives up costs – to the new owners and for the taxes of all the adjacent property owners. THAT is the intent of HALA.
MONEY.
I emailed Rob Johnson, our new city council rep, inviting him to come and asking him if the bullets were in fact true. Hope he’ll be there.
And, yes, @Paul C, I completely agree.. It’s all about what kind of development.
I have lived in this neighborhood for 45 years, and there were apartment buildings and many other forms of of multiple dwelling units (legal or not) here long before I came. We’ve had townhouses added on both ends of my block (N. 47th St. between Woodlawn and Interlake), and they fit in really well I have really appreciated DPD’s responsiveness to neighborhood input on some of the more preposterous proposed developments in the neighborhood. (See Smith & Burns at 45th & Interlake, which now has brick facing that blends in beautifully with the former Lincoln High School; the future development at 45th & Woodlawn, which originally proposed to add 40-ish units plus ground floor retail with no parking mitigated by 30 bike storage spaces, and now will have 20 parking spaces. Or the new CVS at 45th and Woodlawn, which was required to retain the beautiful terra cotta trim from the existing building, as opposed to tearing the whole thing down.
Hi Janey
One thing to recall for all your examples: design review and the SEPA process created much of what you view as a success. It is my understanding that the current proposals would waive these reviews and rely on the “good faith” of the developer to simply “do the right thing”. Anyone involved in the small lot development fiasco may recall how much those developers cared about building suitable to the adjacent environment.
The Smith & Burns project is a stellar example of what can be done if a developer CARES about the environment surrounding the property and designs responsibly. I also suspect that there was a conversation with the neighborhood planning team inquiring about how to be a “good neighbor”. The covered sidewalk, the brick reflecting nearby Lincoln, the articulated facade to break up the mass, the open space and art, all reflect compassion and desire to be a part of the neighborhood (and is part of our neighborhood plan). Remember, HALA recommends removing SEPA and design review from the process. There will be less mechanism for this conversation to take place (or leverage for developers that do not give a crap) if HALA is implemented.
Actually there was quite a conversation – the neighborhood took it all the way to a hearing examiner appeal, over design issues around back of the building. I don’t know the details, and particularly no idea how the 45th street front design developed, but I agree it’s something that’s more likely to happen when the developer has real reason to respect (or fear, if you like) the neighborhood and the city’s design review. Which I understand to be relatively toothless already, compared to what it was a decade ago.
+1 S&B did a great job
I see the hyperbole and lies to protect Seattle’s bigotry and classism are well underway!
Sarcasm noted. Many folks read HALA and take it as gospel. They do not recall that HALA misrepresented the area of single-family properties by including parks and schools in the calculation. They then compared Seattle to Portland areas, but used the area of farmland located within the city limit as the Portland figure. Why the need to misrepresent the facts? What else has been “cooked” for public consumption. Do NOT believe this stuff without checking!
The Seattle Times editorial on the subject (Sunday Jan 2) pointed out an issue I was unaware of: a lot of the potential for new residential development is in south Seattle, but developers want to build in the north. More lucrative. This is not the Times’ conjecture, they quote the outgoing DPD director. Why? You know why. White folks live here, and we have more money to spend in order to live here. Ironic in light of the HALA attempt to dig up ancient history to make single family zoning out to be a form of racism, and now it looks like their own motivations are founded on real living racism.
Or maybe they don’t want to funnel all of the development into lower-income areas and displace people of color. Or maybe they want to remove structural racism by ensuring that all areas of the city have non-racially-biased zoning.
I spit my coffee out at this one. Those developers are so prescient, so thoughtful and so involved in racial justice issues, it just breaks my heart.
sorry… imprecision there. I read donn as talking about Seattle DPD and the city reps involved in setting HALA, and not developers. Maybe he meant developers.
When property prices escalate like they have been, when land becomes precious, the poor and lower and middle income folks are the first to be hoisted as rents increase. Much of this has already occurred here. There is no way these folks can find their way back – the rents are and will be totally out of reach. All these charges of racism and classism are just hot air and red herrings and cruel invectives.
The folks who still own their homes are and will come under incredible pressure to sell, especially if these zoning changes take place. For some, their taxes rival their mortgage payments. Who comes knock, knock, knocking at the door? Big corporations and real estate development companies with the money and backing to buy up land and property. They are the big winners in this deal and they are the beneficiaries of these zoning changes, all the way to the bank and back again and again and again.
HALA boosters would have you believe that these changes are inevitable and you just need to get on board the density train. Their mantra is growth, growth, growth. They would have you believe that if you agree to live in a little bitty box in an urban highrise you will be saving a tree in the forest. But the folks with the dough are already going after the Growth Management Act boundaries. Their appetites are foracious. They do not care. They are not kind.
Ordinary people are the only ones who can put a stop to this. This city, this earth, this human community belongs to each and every one of us and we should ensure that it is, and becomes, humane, just, and on a scale that is actually and truly resource sensitive, environmentally sustainable and in partnership with nature.
http://www.amazon.com/Collision-Course-Endless-Growth-Finite/dp/0262027739
So, walkinroun, what is your solution? Without any zoning changes, we’re going through tremendous growth. No one is making more land. Nor more single-family lots.
So, exactly what are you going to put a stop to? Skyrocketing single-family home valuations? How would you do this? Zoning changes? Look how that worked out in San Francisco: with construction and zoning moratoriums home prices have just jumped even faster.
Are developers voracious? Yep. But is *growth* their fault? Nope. Growth is happening because the Seattle area economy is strong. Would you like to put the area into a recession? And then, when your neighbors lose their jobs, how will they afford their mortgage?
It is a fact that urban density + transit/bikes + walkable neighborhoods results in a smaller environmental footprint. So, for you, what does a “truly resource sensitive, environmentally sustainable and in partnership with nature” solution look like?
If we don’t like out-of-town developers and speculators from getting rich off our Seattle property and in the process exacerbating lack of affordability, then let’s address *that* problem.
But just saying “Hell No” to growth and density isn’t going to change anything other than one’s blood pressure.
Paul C. if you truly want urban density, why don’t you advocate for them building it downtown? If people want to enjoy urban living, why not encourage it? You have all the transit and bike lanes there that a good progressive would want. Or how about in the Interbay area? That’s a huge swath that could take in lots of newcomers. Why force it on neighborhoods that don’t want it, when there are plenty of suitable areas that do?
So, hayduke, you’re taking a full NIMBY perspective here? Let us zone Wallingford to preserve it for us rich white folk, and put other people (net new people, poorer people, etc.) somewhere else?
Second, are transit and bike lanes antithetical to your view of what Wallingford should be (regardless of whether we have *any* new construction or added density)?
Third, a healthy and vibrant city needs more than housing. It also needs jobs. While there’s plenty of land in Interbay, there’s also a lot of businesses down there. Should we displace them all?
Or, fourth, are we tearing down Interbay’s older and smaller more affordable housing and replacing it with larger buildings? What makes our real estate more important than theirs?
Paul C, you said in an earlier post, “This is really about how we accommodate the massive growth that Seattle has and will see while remaining affordable and livable.”
Do you think the developers really give a rat’s a55 about creating affordable housing? Of course not. And you admitted as much in your response to Gregf when you said, “how is it a bad thing if a developer buys 3-bedroom $700,000 single family house and builds a tri-plex on it with 3-bedrooms each where each unit sells for $700,000?”
So then, if it’s really about accommodating the growth, there’s no reason why we can’t grow more in places like downtown and Interbay.
As for your absurd contention that this is really a racial thing, so you don’t want them to “funnel all of the development into lower-income areas and displace people of color.” Oh, but it’s fine to displace all of us “rich white folk?” Because that’s exactly what Rob Johnson wants to do with his tax scheme to “encourage more turnover.” Problem is, the people who can’t afford the significantly higher property taxes aren’t the rich, they’re the people who’ve lived here a long time and worked to make this place not just a neighborhood, but a community. But that’s not good enough for you guys, is it.
If having more concern for the quality of life of the people who are already invested in the neighborhood and who are raising families and taking pride in their home and surroundings, instead of those who haven’t even yet arrived here for high paying tech jobs makes me a NIMBY, then I wear that label proudly.
How about “having concern for the quality of life of the people who are making our neighborhood great by teaching our kids in the neighborhood schools and serving us in the neighborhood restaurants?”
Why yes, Paul C. We can just say no. We can say, that is enough. We can say, we must live within limits now, not later. We can say, children and families and young people and old people and modest people require green spaces, gardens, and space to breath. We can say that urban greenspaces support and nourish more than the human beings who live there, they also provide natural habitat for birds, bees, bugs, and other creatures who enrich our world. They cleanse and detoxify our environment, store the rains, release them in predictable and gentle ways.
Scorched earth density development increases resource use, increases product imports, increases urban heat, increases stress on public services, parks and urban infrastructures, overcrowds schools, strains water use, escalates power use and ultimately does not add up to the environmental utopia you density boosters aka developers tout.
We can and must choose our future carefully. Sacrificing our neighborhoods, our communities, our gardens and greenspaces to the sacred alter of the “economy” is a fool’s game. Take your head out of your gadget and look around. If not now, when? When the last salmon is eaten, the last redwood cut down, the last bee stings? Their scheme does nothing but accelerate the losses.
Walkinroun, You’re assuming that density equals 100% pavement. Looking broadly around the world, increased density leaves more room for greenspaces outside of the urban area. And denser development means more opportunities for more greenspace larger than 50×30 backyards. Example: what if our blocks were full a single 4 story apartment building surrounding an interior shared yard/garden (that is, like many cities in Europe). Or what if our density allowed us to convert one out of every 10 city blocks into a park?
Second, you seem to imply that low density is better for the environment, which study after study has shown to be entirely false.
Third, you’re seem to be assuming density done the Seattle Process way. That is, people talking endlessly while the density just grows up haphazardly without any commensurate infrastructure support. In cities that aren’t hobbled by the Seattle Process, they do things like build more schools, improve water/sewer, create parks, etc.
Fourth, I’m not advocating rampant growth for growth sake. But (until people stop having babies and/or stop moving here and/or the economy collapses) Seattle is going to be growing. You might not like this fact, but you can’t change the facts.
And so the question here is how to we create a city that handles the growth in population while maintaining affordability and environmental benefits?
NIMBYism won’t achieve those goals in Seattle any more than they have in San Francisco or Los Angeles.
I don’t think so, Paul C. My question is where and when do we draw the line. It is not a rhetorical question. At what point do we say the earth cannot sustain any more? Your examples are problematic, unsubstantiated and suppose that something might happen sometime somewhere to ameliorate what is already happening. Parks every 10 blocks? affordability? courtyard gardens? Those are pipe dreams and smokescreens that are not and will not happen – the money to be made on escalating property values and the cash cows of rental/lease incomes is too great and the owners too greedy. As many other posters far more schooled on these issues than I have pointed out, Wallingford set growth goals that have been met and exceeded. This movement is being engineered by those who stand to profit.
“At what point do we say the earth cannot sustain any more?”
This has nothing to do with local zoning. This has everything to do with zero population growth as a policy goal (which I have supported for decades).
Making it harder for people to live here will not make any of the 7 ish billion people already on Earth disappear from the planet, and will do nothing to prevent that number rising to 8 or 9 or more.
It will just make people who want to live here who aren’t already owners or rich suffer.
If anyone reading this has become confused about what we’re talking about, please return to the top of the page, where it’s spelled out. You won’t see any call to say “no” to growth, but to HALA boosters it’s the same thing – if you like single family zoning, if you like moderate building heights, if you like adequate support infrastructure to go along with residential density, then in their eyes you’re opposed to growth. That’s their problem, not yours. There’s room for growth, and as visible evidence the cranes are all around us. There’s a lot of money behind that growth, and it will look out for itself, but a place like Wallingford depends on our will to defend it.
donn, I’ve read plenty of people here who are saying No to growth
I’m sure there are plenty of those people. It’s a side issue. The question before us, inasmuch as it’s brought to us by WCC’s summary, is not yes/no growth, it’s the developer give-aways in proposed city policies.
These policies won’t have much support among residents, so boosters like to shift the question to generalities – change, growth, density. Whatever. Look at the proposed policies, and decide if you have that much faith in the developers.
Paul, my view has nothing to do with “no growth”. However there is no absolutely no reason to toss out current code. The proposal does not pass the smell test. Why toss out single-family zoning in the urban villages when we have not even tried incentives for ADU and DADU, which offer the benefit of allowing longtime residents to stay in their homes? What change zoning in single-family neighborhoods when much more capacity for growth exists in EXISTING multi-family zoning?
Can’t speak for Paul, though I suspect he might agree, but how about “because the 1957 downzone was a terribly bad idea that has reduced affordability for no good reason?”
Here’s an old duplex in Wallingford that didn’t turn our neighborhood into a hellhole: http://1drv.ms/1kQrKW2
And here’s a very nice neighborhood a friend lives in (minimum lot size 3,000 SF like most of Wallingford was zoned before 1957): http://binged.it/1Jbz7Do
From my friend: “Immediately next door to us is a two family house with an attic that could be a legal third unit (the owner uses it as an office right now). Just past that are two three family houses, then a single family followed by a number of 2 and 3 family houses.”
BK, I do not understand your animosity to single-family zoning. It is but one of a diverse collection of zoning definitions. Wallingford has already exceeded its 2024 growth targets, as it did for the 2004 targets… all without a single change to current zoning.
Many lots in Wallingford are less than 5000 sq ft, even though zoned SF 5000. Subdividing a 4000 or 3000 sq ft lot makes no sense when similar capacity can be provided under current zoning as ADU and DADU in the single family areas, or far more efficiently via apartments and condos.
Your old duplex exists under current zoning.
The other multi-family homes that you cite all exist now, under current zoning. More can be built under the owner-occupied ADU and DADU standards. Again, under current zoning.
Opening the single-family areas to developer speculation will do nothing to improve affordability and will force hardship, in the form of higher taxes, on many who already live here.
The capacity for growth in Wallingford is immense under current zoning. Until that capacity has been tapped, why are we talking about rezoning properties and waiving all SEPA and design review, the only avenue available to mitigate “bad apple” developers?
The City cannot be trusted to manage an upzone. They promised us amenities in 1996 if we accepted growth targets which we met before the plan was complete. We again met growth targets ten years ahead of 2024, and still no amenities.
Some of us have upheld our part of the bargain with the City through incredible volunteer projects and fundraising to try to mitigate some of the growth impacts or to improve open space.. The City has been noticibly absent and has even worked against us at times.
Rampant, unbridled speculation is what reduces affordability, not the existing zoning, which can already accommodate ALL of the growth the City wants Wallingford to accept.
Fulfill commitments made in the first two phases of comprehensive planning before asking taxpayers to fill the pockets of developers, some of whom do not care a whit about Wallingford. Those who live and work here should have a say in how growth is accommodated and are perfectly just to ask the City to honor prior commitments.
Many would say, “Give us some of the amenities that were promised in the last two rounds of growth first. Prove that yet more capacity is needed, that the current multi-family and low-rise commercial zones are inadequate, before asking residents to open single-family zones to development without prospect for review.
Are we still allowed to debate here? 🙂
@Gregf let me put the question to you a different way:
If zoning were to say:
On a lot of X SF you can build a residential structure of [whatever the current limits for single family home’s height, mass, and lot coverage are]
What reason would there be to add a restriction that it must be a single family detached home rather than a single family detached home, a duplex, a triplex, or a stacked flat?
I think gregf has the best view of this situation,and the most knowledge. My thought is that we are being thrown under the bus and run over by a mac truck at the same time
Wondering if anyone went to the meeting on Wednesday and if so, what was said/learned.
Based on recent performance, pretty sure the city will do what it wants regardless, but would be interested in hearing what they had to say.
Thanks
Something that just came back to me, from Catherine Weatbrook who contributed a couple of new insights. She pointed out that naturally affordable housing is old housing – I forget the numbers, but we’re talking about a couple generations, 50-100 years. And today’s buildings aren’t built to last that long, they’re done in 30.
So as we continue to favor this kind of housing, the naturally affordable stuff that has been paid for by previous generations dwindles away, and what’s left is only whatever we choose to subsidize. (Of course that isn’t the only consideration – there’s waste of resources, land fill, etc., but in the present context affordability seems to be the only one of these that anyone will stand up for.) We’ve known about the net loss of affordable housing in recent years, the Seattle Displacement Coalition has done a good job of bringing that matter to the public, but the building lifetime issue is a wrinkle on it that’s new to me. If we thought the buildings were going to last for a while, then we could hope that it just be a temporary setback, but instead it looks like this is permanent.
It was well attended – we packed the place – and came off pretty well, I thought. They went to some trouble to have video recordings of the proceedings, will follow up if I see that it’s been posted somewhere. I’d like to see it myself, having already forgotten some details.
The presentation itself may have had some impact, but as you surmise not enough to make a major dent in anything – without a solid followup. There was an effort to set up the conditions for that followup, but … we’re such a small neighborhood in the scheme of things, as to be quite irrelevant if we can’t tie into a broader effort.
Agree, donn. WCC did a great job of summarizing the history of the neighborhood planning process, the challenges along the way and the new challenges before the neighborhood. However, I noticed that several of the folks who seemed to most support the HALA upzoning proposals were also those who signed up for the Wallingford CC committee at the end of the meeting. I signed up but cringed to think about dealing in a neighborhood committee with the same people who are busy arguing (apparently everywhere they can) for upzoning. Do you know of any other groups of people who genuinely want to challenge the HALA upzoning and other developer giveaways that do tie into a broader effort?
No, don’t know of anyone who’s active. “Livable Ballard” was on it, but their site is months out of date. Other community councils, e.g. Eastlake, clearly share the same sentiments, but we seem to be taking the field alone right now.
I noticed that, too, with signups. WCC represents the whole neighborhood and would like that to mean everyone, so while of course it clearly is acting with broad popular support in this matter, it may be that a couple of career urbanists can take advantage of this openness to try to derail us. At worst I’m optimistic it won’t be a big setback, though. All we really know is that the signups are warm bodies, they are not necessarily policy experts to serve on some deliberative body that decides where WCC’s going.
Here is the YouTube playlist containing the videos from the Wallingford Community Council meeting on 1/20/2016 regarding Urban Planning. In this video, there is also the ‘controversial’ blurb from our elected official “Rob Johnson” and how he would like to encourage “Turn Over” in the neighborhood by raising taxes through a special ‘assessment’ of your property. Fascinating discussion that has caused a lot of debate.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLGb97uBKYY8n34ippOPqWM94b5AC7oXF7
If you want to get involved and make change (one way or another), be sure to register on the WCC registration page and choose “Urban Planning” as a special area of interest for future communications.
If you want to get involved and make change (one way or another), be sure to register on the WCC registration page and choose “Urban Planning” as a special area of interest for future communications.
Registration Page is here: http://www.wallingfordcc.org/p/email-list-registration.html