[0:27] roll,

[0:35] Margaret Boonell, here in Jacobson, here, here, Julia Nolan, here, that eraser, Angela Rosman, here,

[0:44] runny breath for absent.

[0:49] So it is time for items from the audience, if anyone has anything to see this

[0:55] thing before we get started.

[0:59] It doesn't look like online or in person.

[1:06] I think if we could get

[1:07] started with the first effort,

[1:14] and hello, I am chairing tonight, Rodney, is not here.

[1:19] Great, thanks, I can chair Rosman.

[1:21] Yeah, so the first item that is just an update on the housing dashboard.

[1:23] This is something that we launched a couple of years ago to make our efforts surrounding housing policy, a little more transparent to the community and to help us make better policy decisions around housing as well.

[1:33] And with that, I will hand it over to our senior planner, Scott Gooder, for the presentation.

[1:41] Oh, thank you for.

[1:42] Hold that.

[1:43] Liz, did you want to?

[1:45] Okay.

[1:50] Good.

[1:50] So this is a long overdue update to the housing dashboard.

[1:56] This was originally managed by another, another person that was at the city for so many years.

[2:05] But I'd love the city and we needed to find somebody to start updating it.

[2:13] I just happened to be the bad person, so I have worked for several months here just trying

[2:19] to figure out what was being put on this house in dashboard and how it was being updated.

[2:27] I gave you a brief overview of some key data points that we use here, generally they come from reporting requirements of the Office of Financial Management for population estimates and then are our coordination with King County and the affordable housing that we're tracking.

[2:57] with arch, as well as some King County assessor information.

[3:06] This dashboard also contains some kind of legacy data that's coming from, coming from

[3:18] And some of the information that they were pulling from the census data, but it has, you know, that's still probably some stuff that it will need to work on updating if we want to continue to showcase that information in the future.

[3:39] Really what you're seeing here is what we've been able to gather up to certain reporting

[3:49] periods, these range in between 2024 to 2025 based on the when the information comes

[3:58] into the city.

[4:01] So, some of the information is, again, being tracked by arch, some of the information we're

[4:09] scrubbing from, you know, the King County assessors, and some of this information is

[4:13] coming from us, as well as we're tracking permits that are being finaled in our city.

[4:22] Starting on the left side, you see this general, like total number of units that we have

[4:29] in the city as of 2024,

[4:35] most probably the couple of features that most people will look at is the housing supply by major housing development projects.

[4:45] This is actually probably the one feature that actually gets updated the most or should be updated the most.

[4:51] This tracks permits that are running through the running through the city

[4:57] that might be

[5:00] Let me see if I can actually get a that are in review or being issued, or have been identified as regulated affordable housing. So you'll see information on specific properties that we have here where you can track existing permits that are in review that might have a total number of units, a affordable housing,

[5:29] requirement that it's, you know, it's projected to supply some additional affordable housing.

[5:39] The dashboard also collects larger pieces of information related to a neighborhood.

[5:46] how many units that are in the in the in the in the neighborhood, what type of units there are

[5:56] how many affordable total affordable housing units that we have in the city are in this in this particular

[6:03] neighborhood and it just kind of gives you a sense of performance level.

[6:09] We've updated this

[6:11] affordable housing target is to start reflecting the new housing

[6:16] uh... are new affordable housing targets out to twenty uh...

[6:20] twenty forty four and this is really interesting

[6:23] but it's showcasing this but

[6:26] i guess it must it does

[6:28] you know expanded here

[6:31] i got a cramp

[6:32] that looks crazy

[6:35] so this is just kind of showing like where are

[6:38] our affordable housing targets are, this is just tracking, you know, our regulated affordable

[6:44] housing and you can see that we've selected, we've been tracking this since 2019, which

[6:54] actually is the first, first, this is the first, that's the first year that we start tracking

[7:02] under the new housing targets that are allocated to the City of Kirkland.

[7:10] I imagine this is going to be updated in the coming years to kind of reflect a little bit

[7:17] more granular, the granular detail that the county wants to track us, track our affordable

[7:25] housing targets based on income segments.

[7:29] So, this is just a more of a global kind of, this is what we're regulating, we're not telling you at what income levels are each of these units in.

[7:39] Some of them are below 50% into 30% AMI and some of them are all the way up to 100% AMI.

[7:50] So, we'll start probably thinking about tracking that a little bit differently.

[7:55] This is probably the most, the middle housing permits that we, that we are tracking is probably the one that seems to get the most attention on this dashboard because it really was tracking how well our new codes are working since their enactment in 2020.

[8:23] you can kind of see that there is indeed a lot more middle housing permits that we have been

[8:30] that we have been permitting since the adoption of our rules in 2020. So this is just kind of showing you

[8:38] what this data can kind of show us that we related to the performance level. This too will probably

[8:45] be updated because now we have many more types of middle housing typologies that we're going to be

[8:50] allowing, so we're going to try to start tracking a little bit more with a lot more

[9:00] refinement in that.

[9:04] The rest of this is kind of showing, you know, a percent of housing, and this is just

[9:11] really broad, broad, broad, what is single family, what is multifamily.

[9:15] The way this kind of works is everything that has been identified as single-family or single-family

[9:22] of accessory dwelling unit goes into the single-family bucket, everything else is going into

[9:28] the multifamily bucket, so that it does include our middle housing, so it's not really tracking

[9:33] that per se. We're working on seeing if we can tease out that a little bit more in our housing data,

[9:42] But this gives you a kind of a broad, broad brush of like how each of our neighborhoods are working.

[9:51] We might want to think about even looking at other areas where we've directed a lot of housing policies, like maybe tracking, you know, art.

[10:00] Urban growth centers in the same manner. Maybe our neighborhood centers where we've talked about, we have housing and land use policies around that.

[10:12] And then finally, this is just, these are just, you know, big numbers that we're throwing out which is reflects all the same information that's being tracked in these other tables.

[10:23] The last feature here is the total housing permits issue.

[10:28] This is reflecting information every year back to 2017.

[10:36] And this profile right here will change.

[10:42] As you, maybe I can toggle this.

[10:44] As we permit,

[10:48] I don't know if I can't see it here.

[10:50] I think it's a screen anyway.

[10:55] This shows you how in the permit, the years that we've been tracking permits finaled.

[11:10] From April 24 to April 2025,

[11:14] There's shows you the kind of mix of housing that's been permitted and that's what that's kind of showing and there's a toggle on a different

[11:23] I'm assuming this is what we're seeing here as we're seeing something that is

[11:30] that is being shrunk down and I'm not able to see the toggle but there should be a toggle back down here

[11:38] on the bottom and you can track, you know, what is our, what type of permits are actually being

[11:43] finaled in any given year since 2020's 2017.

[11:49] And so that's kind of interesting to say,

[11:52] you know, what are we actually permitting in those any given year. So that's pretty much the,

[12:00] the tour of this. If you have any questions or have any suggestions as to what you would like

[12:07] Maybe see you in an update to the housing dashboard.

[12:10] That'd be great.

[12:13] Commissioner Reiser.

[12:15] I just had a question on the numbers right below your map,

[12:18] or it says 22, 1K, single family, 21, 8K, multi-family.

[12:26] What are those numbers representing?

[12:29] So again, that's the kind of, in our housing trends,

[12:33] this is, you know, looking at total number single family again in the bucket of, of, of single family homes, plus, plus anything that's happening to you, that existing or what you're, that's existing, okay, these are existing, so this, these numbers right here, all add up to that 43.9k, which is actually this total right here, across the side, and then are, any numbers that you're seeing, and so,

[13:03] side of our housing, let's say, in the affordable housing targets,

[13:14] in our affordable housing

[13:15] page right here, and also in the existing housing supply of percent by neighborhood,

[13:20] also reflect that total of this 1600 affordable housing units that we have in our city right

[13:27] that we're all regulated and it would break down those by neighborhood at that point, like

[13:33] which neighborhood is actually supplying the affordable housing. So yeah.

[13:40] Commissioner Boonele. I think we had already chatted about this earlier. You know, I used to

[13:46] do the massing the permit data for the population estimates every year and I was always

[13:52] amazed at the number of demos that happened in Kirkland.

[13:57] And so I'm a little bit kind of wondering about that 718 units

[14:03] is that include demos?

[14:05] And I'm not sure if that's if it's such a big number anymore.

[14:11] But between 1988 and when I left in 2005,

[14:15] there were hundreds of demo permits every year

[14:18] that would significantly lower the number of units

[14:21] added to Kirkland and I think it's important that the public sees that and I'm always curious

[14:28] as to how many demos are happening. Yeah so the totals, the totals that are reflected

[14:34] here are the net new units rate but getting into that refined kind of information like how

[14:40] many demoed how many units were demolished in a given year and what type of unit was being demolished

[14:51] I was just in a given year, would be really important information to track.

[14:57] We do track that, we do, we actually...

[15:01] At the least the highest level, we track it. As you're aware, we give permit information over to the office of financial management.

[15:11] And so we track that information. We just need to tease out a little bit more from understanding what was being demolished at the end of the given point. We can pull that information out.

[15:27] We make a note to have you come back and share that with us when I think that's a really good question.

[15:35] Yeah, we definitely start tracking a little bit.

[15:40] I think we're going to track a lot more detail.

[15:43] King County has already asked us to start tracking a lot more information for their tracking purposes as well so we should be able to.

[15:51] Yeah, net new housing for year would be a really interesting one.

[15:54] Yeah.

[15:59] Commissioner Medea.

[16:00] Thank you.

[16:00] And sort of similar to that.

[16:04] Is there a way to track, like in which instances something

[16:07] underwent a lot split, or you know,

[16:09] a lot subdivision, and then new housing was put on.

[16:12] Even if the first step was demoing, so we can sort of see

[16:15] how some of these new housing policies are impacting net new

[16:19] little housing or other types of units.

[16:22] Now, we can definitely track different permit typologies, right, so we can track, you know,

[16:31] subdivisions and units on subdivisions and such.

[16:34] So, we can track that the way we would have the way I'm working with the IT department

[16:42] to track the more refined data is actually just track it at the permit level, like any new building permit that comes in.

[16:51] We start identifying, is this co-living, is this middle housing, is it attached, detached,

[17:00] stacked, how many affordable housing units are being proposed, what AMI levels, or are

[17:06] they're proposing it at, we can even try, I even have a box that I'm trying to track right

[17:14] now to see, you know, any particular program that might, that might, we want to track on,

[17:20] like our pre-approved data plan, so anything that we have pre-approved is that is that a program

[17:25] that's actually performing, and we can start tracking that over time, so there's some

[17:31] interesting things that we can start teasing out at a level, at a permit level, and we can

[17:36] track more at a, as they're moving through, that are a permit system that we might be able

[17:46] get a little more real-time data, because this stuff is just only put in the system at a quarterly

[17:53] and yearly level.

[17:54] Somebody has to manually put it in at this point?

[17:56] Yeah, I had to spend the last three months trying to figure out, well, what did our

[18:06] previous manager do, where were they getting this information, and how were they sorting the

[18:11] information, and so it took a while to crack the code,

[18:19] but.

[18:19] Commissioner Nolan.

[18:21] So just as far as things that might be interesting, and I know these may not be possible.

[18:24] So feel free to ignore me if they're not.

[18:27] But, you know, I'm always curious when we look at some of these numbers,

[18:29] is how we, as to how we compare to neighboring communities, you know,

[18:33] is do we have substantially more single family percentage-wise than say, like,

[18:37] baffled us, substantially less.

[18:40] So, I mean, to the extent that that's possible.

[18:42] And again, I know that likely enough is not, that would be really interesting.

[18:46] And I'm also always a little curious too that, you know, we talk a lot about affordability,

[18:50] but it would be really interesting to say, okay, well, if we are seeing things bought sold,

[18:55] what our purchase prices are prices per square foot, if we're talking about rentals,

[19:00] what our rentals, just because again, that I think it just helps steer the conversation.

[19:04] Again, I don't know how hard it would be to get any of the status.

[19:08] So if it is incredibly cumbersome, I don't think it's necessary.

[19:10] But I'm curious.

[19:13] Well, some of the information, we've already collected and are housing inventory analysis, especially the comparisons with other cities,

[19:24] like actual rentals versus owners and, you know, that's that inflat level of information, I think that we would need to partner with, you know, like the University of Washington is tracking, you know,

[19:40] Some of that work already and they do an annual report but we can refine some of that data down to Kirkland if we can

[19:49] We can start working a little bit more in cooperation with the University of Washington

[19:53] I know they just came at they have a new housing future center that they just opened up which might be you know

[20:00] It's the kind of the Turner Center for Washington. So there'll be, I don't know, exactly what kind of partnerships we're going to have with them, but I've reached out to them already and expressed interest that we can partner.

[20:16] Thank you.

[20:19] One of the things that I've liked about this dashboard is actually breaking down my neighborhood and it made me realize that I think six out of the 13 or 14 neighborhoods spending on how you count it.

[20:28] our majority, multi-family, and I also want to add to the chorus of the interest in tracking

[20:35] demolition permits. When I record requests to the city's permitting database before I join

[20:39] the planning commission, and I looked at, I think, in the same time span that we granted like

[20:43] three or four thousand units, we granted permits for three or four thousand units, we granted

[20:48] demo permits for at least 600 or something, so it's not like it's not a massive difference,

[20:54] but as a sizable chunk, I mean, it would be useful to track it.

[20:58] And I know how difficult it is to parse that database.

[21:02] So I appreciate all the work that you've done and that you

[21:05] will be doing.

[21:07] That said, if we could track the, in particular, a number

[21:11] of bedrooms, there is interest, there's definitely

[21:14] interest in the public in terms of making sure

[21:15] that we're building units for families,

[21:19] as well as the amount of commercial square feet

[21:21] and the amount of residential square feet, residential square feet bedrooms, and the being

[21:27] processed for the same thing, but commercial square feet for sure. Even on the council,

[21:32] there's been concern expressed that we're losing our commercial areas, so be good to be

[21:36] tracking that.

[21:42] Anyone have any other questions? Thank you. And thank you for putting all the work

[21:49] into this. Like I know it's a lot, and I know we just asked for a whole lot more, but I think it's

[21:54] important when we're talking about, like, long-term planning, actually knowing what's going

[21:59] on, rather than just basing stuff on vibes.

[22:03] Yeah.

[22:04] This is something that also the state wants us to do so, and County is asking us to track

[22:10] this in data as well.

[22:12] So, we will definitely be updating this on a more regular basis, even if it was just this

[22:17] dashboard, we would be updating, we're going to be updating it on a much more timely basis.

[22:27] Thank you.

[22:28] And it appears that our next thing is the public hearing that I will.

[22:39] Did you have any?

[22:41] No, just, yeah.

[22:41] I just wanted to hand it off to Tony Levitt,

[22:43] Mercy in your planner.

[22:44] Yeah, this is a public hearing on,

[22:46] basically the regulatory side of the design review reform

[22:49] that is being triggered by state legislation.

[22:53] So this has been a really major effort.

[22:55] We've had many, many years of design review board review in the city and this is an attempt to keep the

[23:03] good parts of what we have with that design review process but conform to the state requirements that

[23:08] Tony will describe in more detail.

[23:11] With that I will open the public hearing and also note that in our agenda it says SB 1293 and it's actually

[23:19] the HV-1293, not that it's really important, but for anyone who feels the need to go look

[23:26] up the actual air-wow.

[23:34] Great.

[23:34] Thank you.

[23:41] And we have John Regala, our planning supervisor as well, I should have introduced one

[23:51] second

[23:51] here.

[23:55] Okay.

[23:57] So tonight's agenda, we're going to start with the staff presentation, then we'll go into

[24:03] I'm doing my presentation if you have questions along the way.

[24:07] Feel free to ask me.

[24:08] We'll go into the public testimony and then at the conclusion we will do a deliberation for the Plan Commission.

[24:24] So again, yes, this is based off of House Bill 1293.

[24:28] The RCW that is related to that is RCW with 36.708A630.

[24:36] It requires that the city apply only clear and objective regulations to the exterior design of new development that the design review process be conducted concurrently with the review of the permit and that the decision process for project permits and that the design review process is not include more than one public meeting.

[24:58] So, during our my life.

[25:00] Last briefing with you back in November. We did talk a little bit about the proposed process. So the council decided to have to hold the amendments for the chapter 142, which chapter 142 deals with the design review process. I'll go over that a little bit more here later.

[25:24] And then for your review is the chapter 92 amendments, the miscellaneous code amendments and then also design guideline amendments.

[25:38] So the chapter 142 edits that the Council did consider at their November 18th meeting.

[25:45] They held a public hearing to consider these changes.

[25:48] And again, that was focused on the design process.

[25:52] And amendments that they were considered included the establishment of the administrative

[25:59] design review process.

[26:01] It's actually more of a change to the administrative design review process and the establishment

[26:06] of different application types, basically ADR-1 and ADR-2 applications.

[26:12] They also based on some comments that they had received from a plain commission.

[26:18] They expanded the public noticing of that process to include residents within 300 feet

[26:26] Instead of joining a joining residents and additionally a part of that process

[26:31] They established the design review process. There would be reviewed by staff

[26:37] That includes minor variations like required yards

[26:42] height in the MSC2 zone, floor plates, and building

[26:46] separations in the TL-1A and 1B.

[26:49] Some articulation, standard reductions, and chapter 57,

[26:54] stationary plant standards.

[26:56] These were basically taken from the existing chapter 142.

[27:04] And then finally, it established a new alternative

[27:07] compliance process, which would be reviewed by the

[27:12] I don't know if that a little bit last time, but that's basically where the applicant is

[27:16] reposing something, some unique design or something else that does not comply with our

[27:22] design regulations, but it gives them an avenue to propose something that would be consistent

[27:27] with our design guidelines, and that would be reviewed by the design review board.

[27:32] Now that would be an optional process that they would go be going through, and we would also

[27:38] limit that to one meeting.

[27:45] So as part of this process, staff's approach with the project

[27:48] was to convert the existing design guidelines

[27:51] into regulations by ensuring that the intent

[27:54] and outcome of the guidelines were retained.

[27:58] We reviewed existing zoning code regulations

[28:00] to see if guidelines were already being addressed

[28:02] by those regulations.

[28:04] If they were not, we added or modified existing regulations

[28:08] to address those.

[28:09] We tried to limit the new systems of design regulations and looked to give applicant options as they looked to design projects.

[28:19] Finally, the new process will keep the guidelines in place.

[28:21] As I mentioned, they will be used by the decision maker as part of the design modification and alternative compliance processes.

[28:31] We showed this slide last time that I thought I would bring it back.

[28:34] So this is just an example of how we took guidelines

[28:37] for pedestrian oriented spaces.

[28:40] And we made edits to the existing design regulations

[28:44] to establish a new requirement.

[28:47] And so this is again, kind of an example.

[28:50] You see kind of a new, this was reflected in the packet

[28:53] that are in the new chapter 92, a new exhibit,

[28:56] kind of really show what we're trying to get

[28:58] with these pedestrian oriented plaza.

[29:01] So it's very obvious to an applicant.

[29:03] what we're looking for, and those.

[29:09] So I'm going to go over some of the kind of main sections of chapter 92 that we're making changes to.

[29:18] First, we're going to show the pedestrian or if the saw design requirements for this project.

[29:23] In this case, we found that the existing glazing requirements, which is 75% between two and eight feet, was too much.

[29:31] We had our consultant framework kind of work with us and looked at how other cities had approached this and they felt that this

[29:39] The glazing requirement was a little too much, but what we did do is so we lowered the the requirement to 60% and also made that

[29:51] Have to include they could include artwork as a treatment option so it just kind of gives the little bit more flexibility to the design

[30:00] Those pedestrian already facades.

[30:11] I did want to add. So I did, and you will know there notice there are some, there are some edits that needs to still be made within chapter 92. There are some references to figures that may be off a little bit.

[30:24] We did, we did, after we had sent out the packet on Friday, we did look at this and talk

[30:31] to a little bit about giving the applicant, well first of all I'm sorry, there should

[30:37] have been a crossing out of or facing a public park in the CBD. All of our public parks are

[30:43] surrounded by either a pedestrian or a street or a major pedestrian sidewalk. So that's not

[30:48] And that sentence was not needed.

[30:51] So we took that out.

[30:55] And then also we added a alternate design treatment option.

[31:00] So if the applicant wanted to propose something else,

[31:03] in that that meets the design guidelines,

[31:05] they would have that ability to.

[31:07] So that's one of the changes we're proposing with that.

[31:12] So as far as modulation is concerned,

[31:16] We're looking at what we wanted to do is look at first of all, a lot of our zones, especially

[31:26] like our CBD zone, have zone-specific requirements already for modulation.

[31:33] And so in those cases, we are not requiring any additional, and we're also, in that's, for example,

[31:41] the CBD one A and one B, they also have some multiple form requirements already that we've

[31:49] carried over into the new chapter 92. So you've got those situations and so again we require

[31:58] lesser no modulation when they've already got step back or set back requirements in that particular

[32:04] zone. In zones where we have no specific zone specific standards we give the the applicant the

[32:11] flexibility to select from a list of options.

[32:15] And also, again, there are some district-specific requirements

[32:19] that we have also carried over from the existing chapter

[32:23] in 1992.

[32:27] The first option, and I apologize to you.

[32:30] This was something.

[32:31] These two graphics ended up somehow getting merged together.

[32:35] So this is a little bit better clarification.

[32:37] So this is the first option for an applicant

[32:40] It's for building subject to modulation standards, and there are over three stories, and the building needs to be tall enough to accommodate a required upper level setback.

[32:52] The idea is that, for example, if you have a 60 foot right away, your building could potentially go up to 60 foot.

[33:01] This was something that framework had looked at, and it actually looked at some existing conditions within the city,

[33:08] and really saw that this is something that we've seen a lot where buildings, it's again

[33:14] a relationship between the street with and the building height. So this is one option they

[33:20] have. So for example, if you had a building that was 60 foot, I'm sorry, I'm in 60 foot right

[33:27] away, you could go up to 60 feet in height at the property line before you've needed to step back,

[33:33] that back then. Again, the zoning regulations would dictate how tall that building could be.

[33:41] But this is a case, you know, for example, if they had a building height that was over 60

[33:47] feet, this is an option that they have.

[33:52] Option two is allows a project to create a visual interest

[33:56] with change in reflient of all facades of the building, a join in a street or public park.

[34:01] These figures show the options that would be available under this option.

[34:07] Option three utilizes a per story vertical modulation to break up the building into smaller forms.

[34:16] It gives the applicant the flexibility to adjust the size of modulation as long as the area is met.

[34:22] For example, if you had a modulation requirement of 30 by 10,

[34:28] That would be 300 square feet so they could play around with that they could shrink it down to like a five foot modulation and only and then widen the width of that. So there's there's the the ability to do that.

[34:46] Option four is a existing upper story setback that we have in the existing code it just requires a 10 foot step back set back from the ground four facade

[34:59] Um, and...

[35:00] Again, in current chapter 92. Option 5 is an upper story set back. With regard this, all stories above the third floor must be step back and average at 10 feet from the ground floor street facade of the building and a minimum of 5 feet. Also they would have, would be based on, I'm sorry, this is also based on some zoning regulations we have in some existing zones like the CVD and BCX. However, these are, these are the,

[35:31] smaller than what would be, not a lot smaller, but they're smaller than what would be required in those zones.

[35:41] One additional thing we're doing is, in CBD 1A and 1B, the current design guidelines,

[35:46] allow a building to can a lever over the sidewalk.

[35:50] If the city requires dedication or easement for sidewalk improvements,

[35:54] this regulation codifies this guidance to allow the planning

[35:58] official to approve this, so this would, again, go from DRB to planning.

[36:05] This is some of our just some examples of, so what we've done now is, so we've got

[36:10] the modulation, which are your big, your big kind of movements of the building, and then

[36:18] articulation are really the smaller elements, really, well, we kind of, in the existing code,

[36:25] we call human scale elements.

[36:28] So they see her things like horizontal definition

[36:31] on the ground floor, the addition of bay windows,

[36:35] balconies along the along the facades,

[36:38] covered entries, and window designs.

[36:41] So these are some of the options that they have

[36:43] to choose from to kind of address those facades.

[36:50] Attachment tube, the packet,

[36:53] has includes some miscellaneous code amendments

[36:56] that are needs to reflect the design review change process change.

[37:01] This includes multiple references to the DRB that need to be changed to planning

[37:05] official.

[37:06] And there's also some references of guidelines that need to be changed to regulations.

[37:11] Additionally, there are some amendments to convert existing guidelines to regulations.

[37:17] And a edit, we did find to allow a setback flexibility for properties impacted by

[37:23] easement restriction in the station area, this would be considered under the design modification

[37:29] section.

[37:32] That would be examples, example would be like if they had a utility easements that

[37:37] impacted the design of the project.

[37:58] So, as far as edits to the design guidelines, those are

[38:02] included as attachments through six in your packets. Amendments, these guidelines include revisions

[38:09] to the introduction section, and all the guidelines to reflect the changes in the design review process.

[38:15] Most of those, we'll talk about design review board using those as part of their review during the design review process,

[38:24] which is obviously changing.

[38:26] In the design guidelines for pedestrian-oriented business districts and totem-linked business district as well,

[38:32] Each design element has been updated to include an intense statement and step in issue statements.

[38:38] A discussion of the elements and the guideline.

[38:41] The design guidelines for the girl be business district have been updated to include a tense statement.

[38:46] And finally, the Northeast 85th Street sub-area do not need those in, and it's because they have an intense statement and design guideline structure.

[38:56] That was actually kind of the basis for all of our other guidelines we're using that one.

[39:00] because it was the most recent one, and it was kind of fit within what our consultant was

[39:07] looking at seen in other cities.

[39:14] As far as one of the major edits that staff is recommending

[39:19] is the repeal of the design guidelines for residential development. These design guidelines have been

[39:30] The guidelines only apply to the existing Rose Hill Business District 8 and Market Street corridor zones, one through four zones.

[39:38] The planned area 5C was re-zoned as part of the stationary work, so that is no longer a zone where it's applicable.

[39:46] These guidelines were originally adopted in 1997, and are intended to be used for a task or stack dwelling unit uses.

[39:52] Many of these specific guidelines have been now adopted as either designed or development regulations.

[40:00] Within the existing zoning code. The RH8 and MS-3, one through four zones are also subject to the design guidelines for pedestrian or in-busier districts.

[40:11] So any design modifications are alternative compliance requests.

[40:15] Would be for compliance with those guidelines.

[40:22] So as far as next steps, so we talked about this a little bit earlier.

[40:25] Also, in comments at feedback, you have for staff, we'll do public testimony, close the

[40:31] public hearing and then deliberation.

[40:34] As far as next steps in the process, once we have a recommendation, we will be taking

[40:40] that to the council, our plan is to take that to council in January of next year,

[40:49] and that

[40:49] concludes my presentation.

[40:52] So questions before we get to the public,

[41:05] then I think we can open the public hearing for

[41:08] public comment.

[41:11] Do we have a

[41:16] list hunt, come on up,

[41:24] I mean,

[41:29] it's a good evening commission and staff folks.

[41:35] I just, this is Liz Hunt from Kirkland, Kirkland resident.

[41:41] I'm just going to make one overarching comment on these changes.

[41:46] And that is that their, first of all, it was a ton of work to go through all of this and come up with regulations instead of guidelines, so I absolutely respect that work.

[41:57] My comment is more of a general comment, and that is that the state has tasked us with

[42:07] being less arbitrary, less subjective by providing these clear and objective guidelines for design.

[42:17] That's, I see that on the one hand. On the other hand, I see a number of

[42:23] design decisions being shifted from the design review board to the planning department

[42:33] and there instead of being out in the open and objective, you now have decisions being made

[42:40] opaquely behind closed doors and potentially subjectively or at least arbitrary.

[42:45] So, I'm not, I just see a difference there and a some lack of consistency in that approach.

[42:56] So, thank you.

[43:08] With that, I think I will close the public hearing and move on to deliberation.

[43:20] And I do just want to say to that comment, I don't think we have control over that.

[43:25] but that really has been a state-directed piece

[43:28] of moving this stuff from design review board to staff.

[43:34] So anyone else who is listening also, I just, yeah, go ahead.

[43:38] I will add that, so as part of the council's decision

[43:43] or council's review of chapter 142.

[43:47] So currently, any project that goes through our design review board

[43:52] is noticed and allowed people are allowed to provide common public comments.

[43:59] So those saved type of projects will now be under what we call our ADR1 application

[44:04] and it will be a similar public noticing process and additionally the expansion

[44:10] to more residents around the subject of their property.

[44:15] So there will still be a noticing process.

[44:17] It's kind of similar to what we do for our other zoning permits, where we take in public comments and then we review those and consider those as part of our final decision.

[44:30] Okay. Thank you.

[44:33] I'm Mr. Midea.

[44:34] Thank you.

[44:36] In response to the testimony that this hunt provided, I will share with you that I initially before I saw the depth and detail in this.

[44:45] These set of options, et cetera, was afraid of how this would manifest, but I'm encouraged with that level of detail and the share number of options, or I made available to the applicant.

[45:00] So I'm hoping that when things do get executed, we can be proud of what that looks like.

[45:07] And to the gentleman's point, right, if there is, in some cases, going to be an opportunity

[45:12] for that one public comment, I would imagine if there was lingering concerns about whether things were

[45:18] made opaque or out of compliance with these options that we'd have that opportunity to hear those.

[45:27] But I do want to applaud you on the turnaround of this work.

[45:32] Again, I was afraid, but much more reassured at this point.

[45:38] I do have one question if you indulge me.

[45:41] And I, of course, I can't remember it was.

[45:42] I had something to do with the mandatory weather covering

[45:46] and then the additional space for the sidewalk.

[45:49] Like is that just like standard stuff that we do?

[45:51] Or is there any instance where we expect that that's going to actually make

[45:55] development difficult, because it's just not that space.

[45:59] Yeah, so the right away improvement stuff is typically dictated by the public

[46:04] works departments and based on your location of the property, the type of

[46:10] frontage it's on, that kind of thing.

[46:13] The weather protection is also something.

[46:16] There's a little bit of discussion in the design regulations, but then also

[46:20] there's within the existing, I think it's 105 talks about whether covering requirements

[46:28] and things like that.

[46:38] Thank you.

[46:40] I just want to clarify, so the staff is asking for a recommendation on basically all of

[46:46] the attachments, try to formulate a motion.

[46:52] Okay.

[46:53] So let's see if I get this right.

[46:54] I move that we recommend the proposed amendments to KZC chapter 92.

[47:01] The proposed miscellaneous KZC amendments, the proposed design guidelines for pedestrian oriented business districts,

[47:08] the proposed design guidelines for the Chom League Business District, the proposed design guidelines for the Eurobate Business District,

[47:13] the proposed design guidelines for the Northeast 85th Street station sub-area plan and the proposed changes to the design guidelines for residential development.

[47:28] I'll second it.

[47:33] I'll just say that I appreciate the work that staff have done.

[47:37] I remember when we were having discussions of, you know, clear and objective.

[47:41] It's not exactly clear and objective.

[47:44] And I appreciate how much work it takes to translate our definitely not clear and objective requirements into clear and objective requirements.

[47:50] And so I, on that I see this as a net positive and an improvement, especially on delivering

[47:58] a certainty for both developers in the community, but I am a little disappointed that

[48:05] the city has not chosen to use this as an opportunity to make further reforms and

[48:10] with this, the city will still be making our buildings. In my view, less aesthetically pleasing

[48:16] if you talk with normal people, more expensive to build, more expensive to live in, with higher utility bills,

[48:24] and ultimately just worse for the city, nonetheless, I'll be supporting this because I think it is still a net positive.

[48:32] Commissioner Nolan, I'll agree to you that I'm supporting it because I think it's a net positive.

[48:36] I will say that going through all of the different guidelines for the different areas, I was amazed at how incredibly complicated it is,

[48:45] and how different it can often be between, say,

[48:48] totem-like and downtown.

[48:51] And so, kind of second, Commissioner Jacobson's opinion

[48:54] that this is still very complicated and a little Byzantine

[48:59] and it would be probably nice at some point in the future

[49:01] if we could get even greater confirmation

[49:04] and uniformity across the city.

[49:06] With that said, I still see this as a huge step

[49:09] in the right direction.

[49:10] Sorry.

[49:17] Commissioner Medea.

[49:18] Thank you.

[49:19] I'll be supporting it.

[49:20] I do have a question with how we monitor success or opportunities to improve and tweak along

[49:26] the way.

[49:26] Is that part of our process?

[49:30] So one thing that the Council did request is regarding the design review board.

[49:36] They want us to check back, come back in an year and provide an update on how often the

[49:43] design review board has been used and to look and see if that changes may need to be needed

[49:50] there, and then, you know, I think there's, I know of some other house bills or Senate, yes.

[50:00] State bills that may impact some of the design review stuff, so we will probably be consistently looking

[50:08] at that and making tweaks to things. The other piece, too, is we're going to look to streamline

[50:16] our design guidelines and see if we can consolidate those. And so we don't have multiple documents

[50:21] That is a next piece that we're looking at too.

[50:29] I guess I will comment that seconding a lot of what was just said, but also reminding

[50:36] ourselves that with this specifically tonight this is kind of like the baseline middle housing

[50:42] stuff where this really has been directed by the state.

[50:46] So while I agree it is definitely a good step in the right direction as far as clear and

[50:52] objective.

[50:53] It's still very long, but ultimately what was done here was we have to make sure that it's done properly.

[51:02] But otherwise, this has been state directed.

[51:05] So there's, I think, less feedback and adjustment than a lot of the things that we see.

[51:15] That are we ready to vote?

[51:19] All those in favor?

[51:20] All right.

[51:21] All right.

[51:22] Opposed?

[51:24] All right.

[51:25] That passes.

[51:26] And we're done with the public hearing.

[51:34] Thank you.

[51:37] And then it looks like we have reading in approval of minutes,

[51:45] May 7th August 28th and September

[51:47] 20th.

[51:48] I'm going to take a second.

[51:50] I move that we approved in minutes for May 7th August 28th and September 25th 25th.

[51:55] Second.

[51:56] All in favor?

[51:58] I.

[52:03] Calendar of date.

[52:06] Yes.

[52:07] Thanks.

[52:07] I can share.

[52:08] Start with calendar of date and then talk.

[52:11] Yeah.

[52:12] I thought we could.

[52:13] Yeah, we could start with the calendar update.

[52:15] Acting chair.

[52:16] Rosemary.

[52:16] And then I'm just talking a little bit about upcoming officer elections.

[52:19] If that sounds good.

[52:22] So.

[52:24] Well, first of all.

[52:24] I wanted to mention that at the last council meeting,

[52:28] there were many, many planning and building items

[52:31] that were adopted by Council as a really,

[52:34] as a really, really heavy meeting.

[52:38] So it's still so tired from the meeting

[52:40] and I can't even talk about it.

[52:42] But the big items from planning and building

[52:45] were the adoption of the critical area ordinance,

[52:48] which the commission worked really hard on.

[52:50] So thank you for that, and then the Winita C-A-Rs, as well, the council adopted a version of

[52:59] those that I think reflected a lot of the input that, not all the input, but a lot of

[53:03] the input that the playing commission put into the code in terms of waivers, at least temporary

[53:09] waivers from high-performing building standards, flexibility in terms of housing requirements.

[53:17] They excitedly expanded your approach with commercial uses, but generally kept most of it, I would say.

[53:22] Building height increases as well.

[53:24] We're in the package of amendments that were adopted.

[53:28] So Kudos to the Planning Commission.

[53:29] I know that you folks worked really hard on that code, but that was adopted on Tuesday night by city council as well.

[53:35] And then the city council.

[53:36] On that too, I just want to, I was there until far too late.

[53:40] But I would say the biggest things were basically sunsetting as far as the exemption for inclusionary zoning and...

[53:52] Oh my god, let's see it.

[53:55] I'm performing building standards with a sunset at the end of 2029.

[54:01] The thought process there was that if we remove them, we can't put them back.

[54:06] So by putting them to the end of 2029 council member,

[54:11] Timchism actually asked that it

[54:14] he discussed, again, prior to that.

[54:18] I don't think that actually made it into the specific vote,

[54:22] but the idea is that by putting it to the end of 2029,

[54:26] they can look at it again without losing the ability

[54:30] to have those requirements.

[54:32] because once you take them away permanently, you can't put them back.

[54:37] And then I'd say one other big thing was that they put a retail requirement back on...

[54:45] What is that?

[54:46] 98.

[54:48] When we had suggested, just...

[54:54] When you'd...

[54:54] Yes, I was like, wow.

[54:56] Yes, it was a long day.

[54:57] It was a long day.

[54:58] But I would say those were probably...

[55:00] Hopefully the biggest things, there were some other minor amendments, but I'd say those were the biggest ones there.

[55:09] And, oh, a requirement that if a townhome development goes first, there's a $2 million bond, basically saying that the front part of the project has to go.

[55:21] just to allow for flexibility of starting with town homes but not ending up with town homes

[55:28] and then 20 years of just like a big empty. I think those were, and then otherwise really

[55:36] little stuff.

[55:38] Yep, that's all right. The only other thing I'll mention.

[55:42] Can I ask that $2 million bond? What does it cover? Say they default and you have to use that bond?

[55:49] What does it buy?

[55:50] Yeah, so it was, it was really made by the council distinct from the affordable housing requirements, so that that provision went through a couple iterations actually as council, you know individual council members were introducing amendments.

[56:04] It originally started as a provision that would allow the city to build an equivalent amount of affordable housing that would otherwise have been provided as part of that mixed use project, but I think.

[56:14] I've been like $20 million or something.

[56:17] Exactly, yes.

[56:18] So that would have been a huge amount of money.

[56:19] So I think it became a little more distinct than that.

[56:21] It became more of just a penalty to really encourage the developer if they're starting

[56:27] with townhouses to finish up with mixed use development by a certain time or else they

[56:32] would have to work at that $2 million.

[56:35] I ask because a totem lake, I've seen so many property owners and so many proposals from

[56:44] property from the early 90s to when it actually was built, and you just don't know what the market's

[56:50] going to do, or who the property owner is going to be by 2029. Yeah. That I was a little disappointed

[56:56] in some of that, but. Yeah, I think that was the intent of the of the regulations as Angela,

[57:02] acting chair Harozman mentioned the most of the incentives will go away at 2029, so that

[57:09] Yeah, if there is a new owner by then and or market conditions shift will at least revert back to sort of the standard zoning for the area

[57:18] The only other thing I wanted to mention for the meeting on Tuesday night is that the city council also adopted

[57:23] Is not something that the planning mission really worked on directly, but adopted the development plan for Houghton Village right, which is a city home property

[57:32] with the old PCC was

[57:33] That calls for a mixed use project there with a lot of open space and new connections to the

[57:39] CKC and so forth, so that was a good achievement also.

[57:46] In terms of the calendar, the calendar is actually looking fairly light and there's no more meetings in December right for the planning commission.

[57:54] So we have two meetings in January, January 8th and January 22nd.

[57:58] I don't think there's anything currently scheduled for those meetings.

[58:01] I think we were anticipating that there would be an officer election,

[58:06] And possibly that first meeting in January, if that's the interest of the Plan Commission.

[58:13] The Plan Commission rules and procedures say that the chair and the vice chair and any

[58:19] other officers deemed warranted by the Plan Commission shall be elected by a majority vote

[58:25] of the Plan Commission at the first regular meeting each may and may be reelected.

[58:30] So we're in a slightly different cycle here, subject to interest of chair rather for Vice

[58:36] Chair Rosman to continue serving as chair and vice chair.

[58:39] I think in the past they've expressed interest in not continuing to be chair and vice

[58:45] chair, you know, indefinitely at least until May, although, you know, that is completely up

[58:49] to them.

[58:50] So I think our proposal would be to have an officer election, possibly the first meeting of

[58:58] and you worry if that's the interest of the,

[59:00] if that's the interest of the planning commission.

[59:03] And I term out at the end of the month.

[59:04] Yes.

[59:05] So I, well, not be anything through May.

[59:13] Yes, just to be clear.

[59:17] But I know that we've had quite a bit of a new commissioners

[59:23] on the board in the last couple of years.

[59:28] And Rodney and I really just kind of stepped up to kind of keep things smooth as we had a lot of new faces here, I'm happy to help in any support role as desired.

[59:44] I know it is a lot to step into the chair and vice chair role, so depending on how folks are feeling, I'm happy to continue to help through the end of my term.

[59:56] so that we have time to bring somebody new.

[1:00:06] We're not doing anything tonight, but the goal was to at least have a little bit of a conversation tonight, so that we expect this coming.

[1:00:18] Thank you. I am interested in serving. I would very much appreciate if you would stay on as chair so that if I am elected I would have time to transition and get up to speed.

[1:00:34] And I would be interested in serving alongside Mr. Jacobson, if other of those combinations came to pass.

[1:00:44] I think no matter what,

[1:00:49] like, by May, it's going to have to be, or by April, really.

[1:00:55] And I don't know, Adam, can we do like an end of March election or something that supersedes the May?

[1:01:03] Um, just because I know we're in such a weird spot and it would be nice to get back on like normal track.

[1:01:09] Yeah, I think there's the rules and procedures I think are silent, but I mean, it seems to me that,

[1:01:13] you know, obviously if a chair or a vice chair doesn't wish to continue serving,

[1:01:17] you have an election to reappoint a chair to appoint a new chair and vice chair.

[1:01:22] So I think that would be accommodated within the rules and procedures.

[1:01:25] I think the planning should be good to decide when the next logical place is,

[1:01:29] is for the terms to start?

[1:01:31] Yeah, because if there is some interest in a transition,

[1:01:38] period, it would be nice to not have a transition

[1:01:41] and then two months.

[1:01:43] And then it seems like it could be agreed upon past when

[1:01:49] I'm around.

[1:01:51] In agreement to say, OK, the elections are happening in March

[1:01:56] or whatever, and then we don't do them again until the next May.

[1:02:00] so that it doesn't have to up and over and over again.

[1:02:04] Yeah, I think that seems consistent with the rules of procedure.

[1:02:06] Yeah. Okay. Just so we're fully aware and I'm not keeping on extra

[1:02:12] elections for folks.

[1:02:19] So, thoughts, all right, would we have an

[1:02:21] meeting just for that in January or? Yeah, unclear. I think

[1:02:28] it'd be Alice and Zykes out of the office for a little bit.

[1:02:32] So I think we will be sitting down over the next couple of weeks in figuring out if there are any items that we could serve front load for January, but it's possible, yes, if we definitely wouldn't have elections for a meeting in January, which is totally fine that we would have a meeting just about those.

[1:02:47] And there might be other special presentations or special reports that we could bring to planning commissions while just to make the time well spent.

[1:02:54] So we can do some more brainstorming about that, just so we're not having a meeting solely for officer elections.

[1:03:00] Well, and I think it would be nice if we had one or two minor things just because while the calendar is light for January and potentially February

[1:03:08] I know there's like a whole bunch of stuff that's going to come next and just because it's light now does not mean that we're not going to regret

[1:03:17] Taking advantage of that time. Yeah, that's right. And we're already starting work on some projects that are already on the work program like

[1:03:24] The program for religious properties, right, allowing for an incentivizing affordable housing on religiously owned properties.

[1:03:31] That's something that it might be ready to bring an update on in January.

[1:03:36] So Allison, I will sit down and try to figure out some items.

[1:03:46] I'm going to share a bone y'all.

[1:03:48] Okay.

[1:03:51] This may be, I've been in discussions.

[1:03:53] I guess with David Wallbreck, but I love the activity map on the web page and it's been

[1:03:59] at a commission I understand because of technical difficulties and I don't know if it's

[1:04:04] the same technical one for the housing dashboard, but I know I was going to tell you this,

[1:04:11] I know Liz uses it also and is there any chance it's coming back when I hear chainsaw's in

[1:04:17] my neighborhood, I can't look up to see who's doing this when they're not supposed to.

[1:04:21] And I really, I used it a lot and I want to get questions when I'm with my neighborhood group too.

[1:04:30] Thanks Commissioner Bonia.

[1:04:31] I appreciate that you look at that map and I appreciate that it's a resource to other folks in the community.

[1:04:36] No, I think there's actually quite a few people that look at it as a matter of fact I use it as well.

[1:04:41] So, yeah, unfortunately, that one is operated by a contractor or a consultant, so that's different than the housing dashboard and that it's not administered by us and I know our IT department is working really, really hard to get that back online.

[1:04:57] Okay, so it has a few children.

[1:04:59] Oh, absolutely.

[1:05:00] No, it is. We're actively working on fixing the bug that's messing it up.

[1:05:04] Then I won't mad you or David any. No, it's okay. We went back online to you though.

[1:05:10] I just wanted to add a plus one to that comment. The activity map is the main way to get access to what permits are being issued for housing without having to go through the whole process of making a public records request and knowing that you even can make a records request with the entire database. So it would be great to have that back in working again. Great. Thanks.

[1:05:31] I was just wondering, on the Winita, did the Michael site go through also?

[1:05:37] Yes.

[1:05:37] That was the 98th and 16th.

[1:05:42] On the 16th.

[1:05:44] Okay.

[1:05:45] Yes.

[1:05:46] Basically all the sunsetting and all the other things.

[1:05:50] Applied to both.

[1:05:51] Applied to both.

[1:05:52] Oh, and they would have to put in the trail.

[1:05:56] And all of that was also, like, they were very much in conversation with the owners of the different,

[1:06:06] like, figure out what would.

[1:06:10] So now we just wait and see if either of them decide to move forward or

[1:06:23] not.

[1:06:24] All right, comments from the audience, any other, nope, all right.

[1:06:29] Then I, and during this meeting of Planning Commission.

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KPC 12/11/2025

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