February 23, 2007

Planning department continues work on EEHVS

The Evergreen East Hills Visioning Strategy process continues to move along, although very slowly. Since the task force finished its work last fall, the city’s planning department keeps working toward filling gaps in the project.

Last December, city council members voted for an environmental clearance. They also voted to complete the EEHVS process in March, but that too has become a thing of the past. Planning had asked to hold a couple of community meetings prior to any decisions to see how the final ideas sat with Evergreen/East Hills residents. Thus, council members voted to look at the matter again in March, hopefully allowing developers and planning to work out the gap between community, planning and developer estimates for housing.

In January the city’s Rules Committee, which reviews items for the council’s meeting agendas, decided to schedule study sessions over the next six months to discuss converting industrial lands and the proposed budget. In summary, prior to an agreement or a vote on the EEHVS, the council will discuss industrial land conversion and the general plan update.

Specifically, the Rules Committee wants the council to consider and hold study sessions on industrial conversion. In the past six to eight months, some council members, including Mayor Chuck Reed, have expressed concern that the city is rezoning too much land from industry to housing. Having jobs and housing together is an arrangement that the council said they see as the most positive for growth.

In addition, the Planning Department is working with Keyser Marston Associates to fill in EEHVS housing number gaps that were questioned during the December presentations to the council. Besides the amount of new housing, they want to determine the impact on the general fund and its relation to operations and maintenance in the proposed development areas. Another gap is the potential development scenarios and related ideas to contributing property by the developers to pay for additional transportation and amenity improvements.

The current plan is to determine the fiscal areas by mid-March. The two community meetings, originally scheduled for late January and early-to-mid February have been rescheduled to meet the current timeline and are now planned for late March and early April, although no actual dates have been set, according to Mike Mena, senior planner.

City council study sessions will follow in April with one on industrial conversion and a second on the Evergreen strategy. Mena said the planning department anticipates the council will hear and consider whether to approve development and the other Evergreen transportation and amenity proposals in early May.

–By Carol Rosen