A volunteer committee spent three years putting together a plan for the future of Island Center. Bainbridge Island city staff spent hundreds of taxpayer-supported hours helping them. But now that plan is going to sit on a shelf.
The reason: Planning the future of Winslow should have come first. At its recent retreat, the City Council decided the Winslow Master Plan has to be the priority, with planning for other areas coming later. “It’s putting the cart before the horse,” Councilmember Christy Carr said, adding the Island Center work was done out of sequence.
During public comments, three speakers asked that the work not be shelved.
“It’s somewhat demoralizing,” Scott Anderson said, adding many people worked extremely hard on the report and a lot of time and money was spent on staff and consultants. He said 20 years ago a similar plan was put together and shelved. “It’s hard for me to wrap my head around,” he said.
Asaph Glosser said the plan advances the vision of what residents want and how to get there. “Abandoning this process shows disrespect for the work that was put in,” he said. “It sets a dangerous precedent undermining the roles citizens play.”
Micah Strom said committee members listened to the public and included information on everything from environment and trails to multi-model transportation in an effort to “keep it looking like it does today.”
Councilmember Leslie Schneider, who ended up being the only one voting against shelving the plan, said the Island Center committee work should advance to the Planning Commission with recommendations then going to the council. Councilmember Brenda Fontroy-Johnson agreed.
Councilmember Kirsten Hytopoulos also agreed, saying, “We can’t throw it away.” She also agreed with Carr, however, that the timing was not right as more work should have been done on affordable housing and sustainable transportation before coming up with the Island Center plan.
Hytopoulos said if the plan is thrown away it will need to be done again in 10 years. Why not just connect it to the other plans when they are done? she asked. She then mentioned maybe not fully implementing it, but taking care of Bainbridge Gardens, which is in the plan.
One of the concerns about moving it on was the Planning Commission taking too much time on it, rather than working on other priorities.
Schneider discussed giving them a time limit – say the end of the year. “They have their chance to process it to a point then it comes to us,” she said, adding she wants to know what they think.
Carr said, “We need the Planning Commission to do other things.” She added it doesn’t make sense to move forward with a plan, “When we don’t know what we’re doing in Winslow or islandwide.”
She disagreed that it was a waste of time and money, and she has major concerns about housing density.
“There are valuable lessons learned from it,” she said, adding there doesn’t have to be results for a process to be important. “It’s not a slap in the face. Winslow has to lead the way – urban level growth with urban-level services.”
Carr did move forward the committee’s work on Bainbridge Gardens. “I’d love to see that business remain and thrive,” she said.
Deputy mayor Michael Pollock said the Island Center committee was divided itself on some issues. A minority report was even put forward. He liked Carr’s plan of “moving the good things forward and tabling the rest of it.”
Mayor Rasham Nassar also agreed, saying that along with housing density and transportation there also are concerns about utilities. And, she said the committee’s work “can be used at the appropriate time.”
A city staff summation says, in part: The Island Center Subarea Plan includes recommendations for land use alternatives, traffic calming, bicycle and pedestrian facilities, and trail connections. Approximately $130,000 has been invested. Work can be resumed at a later date. However, some of the components, depending on the duration of the suspension, would need to be repeated. The most likely tasks to be repeated are related to the transportation and public space improvements.
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August 16, 2021 at 03:30PM
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Island Center work put on shelf - Bainbridge Island Review
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