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Annual Comprehensive Plan Amendments of 2015 - Planning Commission Hearing
Recommended Action
Move to recommend approval by City Council of each and all amendments as described below.
Report
Issue:
The Growth Management Act provides that the City of Olympia can amend its Comprehensive Plan once each year. Pursuant to the procedures set forth in Olympia Municipal Code 18.59.030, this year the City Council forwarded three proposals to the Planning Commission for review, public hearing and recommendation to the Council. These proposals include an update of the Waste ReSources (solid waste) section of the Plan, a set of revisions of the Transportation system maps, and a property-owner proposal to amend the Future Land Use and Zoning maps related to property along Capital Mall Drive.
Staff Contact:
Todd Stamm, Principal Planner, Community Planning and Development Department, 360.753.8597
Presenters:
Todd Stamm, Principal Planner
Proponents:
David Smith, Project Engineer, Olympia Public Works Department
Keith James, Inland Capital Mall LLC of Spokane, WA
Ron Jones, Senior Program Specialist, Olympia Public Works Department
Background and Analysis:
The Washington Growth Management Act provides that, subject to certain exceptions, a local Comprehensive Plan can only be amended once each year. Chapter 18.59 of the Municipal Code establishes Olympia’s specific process for such annual amendments. It provides that: (1) proposals may be submitted by anyone at any time without charge; (2) the City Council is to set a deadline for proposals to be considered in a given year (March 2 was the deadline for 2015), and City staff is to review and present all preliminary proposals to the Council to determine which should move forward for formal consideration by the Planning Commission and later the Council.
Ordinarily the annual Plan amendments process extends for over twelve months. However, because the major “Imagine Olympia” Plan update was not adopted by Council until December, the time-frame is more compact in 2015. The Commission’s public hearing is scheduled for August 3, and the Commission is to make recommendations to the Council in September to provide the City Council with sufficient time to consider the proposals and make final decisions before the end of the calendar year.
This year, the Council selected three amendments for further review:
1. Update of the Waste ReSources (solid waste) aspects of the Plan
2. Update of the Transportation 2030 Maps of the Plan - regarding certain local streets
3. Amendment of the Future Land Use Map for a portion of the Copper Trails property bordering Capital Mall Drive concurrently with a zoning map amendment within this area.
The first two amendments were initiated by City staff. The last is proposed by the private property owner, Inland Capital Mall LLC (also known as Inland Group and Inland Construction). On June 15, 2015, the Planning Commission received a pre-hearing briefing regarding these proposals. Copies of these three proposals are attached.
Olympia Municipal Code 18.59.040 states that:
At a minimum the Planning Commission recommendation and the Council decision should address the following:
1. Does the proposed amendment or revision maintain consistency with other plan elements or development regulations? If not, are amendments or revisions to other plan elements or regulations necessary to maintain consistency with the current final docket that will be considered by the Planning Commission and the City Council?
2. Is the proposed amendment or rezone consistent with the goals of the Comprehensive Plan?
3. Is the proposed amendment or revision consistent with the county-wide planning policies?
4. Does the proposed amendment or rezone comply with the requirements of the GMA?
The City’s Comprehensive Plan is available on the internet and linked to this staff report. The County-wide Planning Policies are attached for the Commission’s consideration. Each of the proposals is analyzed in turn below.
Waste Resources Update
The Growth Management Act requires that Comprehensive Plans like those of Olympia include, “A utilities element consisting of the general location, proposed location, and capacity of all existing and proposed utilities, including, but not limited to, electrical lines, telecommunication lines, and natural gas lines.” Detailed guidance is provided by Washington Administrative Code 365-196-420. In addition to private utilities, the Utilities Chapter of Olympia’s Comprehensive Plan addresses the City’s drinking water, wastewater, storm and surface water, and “Waste ReSources” programs.
Waste ReSources (sometimes referred to as ‘solid waste’) encompasses collection services for residential and commercial garbage, residential recyclables and residential organics (yard debris, food waste and soiled paper), and educational programs that encourage waste reduction. The utility’s mission is “to lead our community toward a waste-free future.”
This section of the Plan was last updated in December of 2014. However, the update adopted by the City Council in December was based primarily on a proposal drafted by City staff in the spring of 2012. That draft was grounded in the more specific “Toward Zero Waste - Olympia’s Waste ReSources Plan 2008-2013” adopted in December of 2007. The City is now in the process of updating that 6-year plan. The proposed Comprehensive Plan amendments would both update the Plan with respect to the solid waste utility, and would align the Comprehensive Plan with the draft 6-year 2015-2020 Waste Management Plan.
As detailed in pages 21 thru 26 of the attached application, the proposed revisions would:
• Shift the focus from ‘evaluating’ commercial recycling, to ‘maximizing’ that component of solid waste services, regardless of whether the service is provided by a private collector or the City
• Bring the information included in the Plan up-to-date with respect to collection services and areas, and processing facilities
In the opinion of City staff, these revisions are consistent with other elements of the Plan, the goals of the Plan, and the County-wide Planning Policies (CWPPs), and comply with the Growth Management Act. For example, Policy 9.7 of the CWPPs is to, “Encourage the reuse and recycling of materials and products, and reduction of waste to the maximum extent practicable.”
Transportation Plan Map Revisions
Washington’s Growth Management Act states that the transportation element of local Comprehensive Plans is to include, “Identification of state and local system needs to meet current and future demands.” RCW 36.70A.070(6)(a)(iii)(d). As part of describing such future needs, the Transportation chapter of Olympia’s Comprehensive Plan includes a city-wide set of three “Transportation 2030” maps.
Transportation Policy 4.8 indicates that Olympia will, “Build new arterials, major collectors and neighborhood collectors based on the general location defined on the Transportation Maps in Appendix B. Require the use of the Engineering Design and Development Standards.” The current set of maps was adopted in December of 2014. As described below, the City staff proposes that these maps be revised to reflect a variety of related decisions that have been made in recent years.
Reclassify Ninth Avenue SE between Boulevard Road and Chambers Street as a “neighborhood collector” street instead of a “local access” street. (This is the block of Ninth east of Boulevard Road.) This proposal reflects a City Council approval in 2014 of a request by Medela Group LLC to so amend the transportation map in relation to a Future Land Use and Zoning map amendments that were then being considered by Thurston County. Thurston County ultimately denied those related requests and as a result Olympia’s transportation map was not amended. The City staff proposes that a neighborhood collector classification may be appropriate for this block of street regardless of the nearby zoning. This proposal is analyzed in more detail in the attached, ‘Ninth Avenue Amendment Report.”
Map a set of future streets within the Friendly Village Mobile Home Park. The Friendly Village Mobile Home Park south of Capital Mall Drive and just west of Cooper Point Road is now served by a set of named internal driveways. In general, Olympia Transportation maps do not call for significant new streets within developed areas. However, in 2008 the City of Olympia amended the Future Land Use and Zoning maps to change the classification of this site south of Capital Mall Drive from residential to ‘high density corridor.’ This change to provide the opportunity for commercial development made it more likely that this property would redevelop in the near future. The proposed Transportation map amendment would both reflect recently constructed streets in the area, and provide for an interconnected set of new streets to be built within this area if and when this property is redeveloped. The proposed street grid, as shown on the attached proposal, identifies approximate locations for major new streets with connections to the surrounding area at six locations. Additional local streets might be required upon redevelopment to conform to the street block requirements in the City’s engineering standards.
Add built westside streets to the map. Recent development has resulted in the construction of new streets connecting 5th Avenue to Alta Street, extending Seventh Avenue west of Kaiser Road into the Woodbury Crossing Village, and at Crestwood Place on the west edge of the Cooper Crest subdivision. As reflected on the attached map, the Transportation map would be amended to identify these streets as ‘existing’ instead of ‘future’ neighborhood collector streets.
Replace Cooper Crest easterly connections. When the Cooper Crest subdivision north of 20th Avenue NW near Marshall Middle School was approved in the late 1990s, the City’s Plan called for the two new east-west streets in this area to extend easterly to Cooper Point Road. However, the Olympia Hearing Examiner concluded that pursuant to the City’s wetland crossing criteria, these streets should not be built as part of the Cooper Crest development. Nonetheless, they continue to appear on the Transportation map as ‘future’ streets. The proposed amendment would remove the wetland crossing portion of these future neighborhood collector streets. Instead each street would begin at Cooper Point Road and then curve north and south to 28th Avenue and 20th Avenue NW, respectively. This change in the map would generally avoid crossing streams and wetlands in the vicinity while retaining the traffic-dispersing ‘through street’ aspects of these future streets. (Note: Parkside, a proposed subdivision now under review, includes the southerly of these streets in this form.)
In the opinion of City staff, these revisions are consistent with other elements of the Plan, the goals of the Plan, and the County-wide Planning Policies (CWPPs), and comply with the Growth Management Act. In particular, the CWPPs provide that, “Local comprehensive plans will consider the relationship between transportation and land use density and development standards.” (CWPP Policy 8.1.a)
Copper Trail Amendments
In 2013, the City received an application from the Inland Group to construct 260 apartment units to be known as Copper Trail Apartments. This multi-family development has been completed and is located north of Capital Mall Drive between Cooper Point Road and Yauger Way. The project design added to the grid of streets in the area and created one block of undeveloped property bordered by Capital Mall Drive on the south, Alta Drive on the east, 6th Avenue to the north and Ketner Place on the west. Inland Group requests that this undeveloped block, together with a nearby triangle of property south of Capital Mall Drive, be re-designated from “Medium Density Neighborhood” to “Professional & Multi-family Housing” on the Future Land Use Map of the Comprehensive Plan and that concurrently the zoning of this 3.5 acre area be changed from Multi-family 24 units per acre to Professional Office/Multi-Family. This proposal is analyzed in more detail in the attached, “Copper Trail Amendment Report.”
In the opinion of City staff, this proposed amendment is consistent with other elements of the Plan, the goals of the Plan, and the County-wide Planning Policies (CWPPs), and comply with the Growth Management Act. Further, the associated change in zoning conforms to the rezone criteria of OMC 18.59.050 and 18.59.055. (See attached Copper Trail Amendment Report for analysis.)
Neighborhood/Community Interests (if known):
Notices of this hearing were issued and published in The Olympian on or before Tuesday, July 21. Notice was posted at the Copper Trails and Ninth Avenue sites on July 24. The solid waste amendment has generated little interest as it relates primarily to commercial customers of the utility. Interest in the set of transportation map amendments varies with the location. And, probably due to the location and context, the general public has thus far expressed little interest in the Copper Trail amendment.
Members of the Planning Commission are encouraged to visit all of the locations of the above proposals to become familiar with the sites and surrounding areas.
Options:
The hearing notices provided that written comments would be accepted until at least
5 p.m., Friday, July 31, 2015. The Commission may elect to generally or selectively extend the public hearing or written comment period, or both.
The City code provides that the Commission is to forward a “written recommendation” to the City Council. Following close of the comment period, with regard to each and all proposed amendments, including the associated Copper Trail rezone, the Commission may recommend that the Council:
1. Adopt the amendment as proposed.
2. Modify and adopt the amendment.
3. Reject the amendment, or
4. Defer the amendment to a later date.
Note: The Commission may, at any time, request additional information from City staff or any interested party.
Financial Impact:
The proposed change in policy regarding commercial recycling may increase costs commensurate with revenue. Proposed street map amendments are not expected to result in substantial differences in costs to the City overall, but may increase costs of specific developments. Due to the small scale, the Copper Trail amendment is not likely to have any significant financial impacts for the City.