9/25/06STAFF REPORT
City of Yelm
Community Development Department
To: City of Yelm Planning Commission
From: Kathy McCormick, Senior Planner
Tami Merriman, Associate Planner
Grant Beck, Director of Community Development
Date: September 19, 2006
Subj: Comprehensive Plan Update -Response to Comments
Background
The Planning Commission held a public hearing on the Comprehensive Plan
amendment on August 21, 2006. At that hearing, the Commission received public
testimony from two people and from Commissioner Carlos Perez.
The Yelm Comprehensive Plan amendment includes joint policies with Thurston County
that must be considered by the Thurston County Planning Commission and Thurston
County Board of Commissioners. The County Planning Commission has scheduled a
public hearing on the plan amendments for September 20, 2006.
The purpose of this staff report is to respond to all public comments received to date so
the Commission may review the proposed amendments at it's special meeting of
September 25, 2006, prior to making a recommendation to the City Council. A second
staff report which reports on any comments from the Thurston County Planning
Commission hearing will be provided to the Yelm Planning Commission prior to the
special meeting on the 25~h.
Summary of Comments, Analysis, and Recommendations
The Comprehensive Plan should be updated to reflect that the actual construction of Y3
Loop will not be ready for another decade, at least.
The policies in the Comprehensive Plan which relate to Transportation are not project
specific and no mention of the SR 510 Yelm Loop or any other specific transportation
improvement are identified in the policies of the plan. This is appropriate, as the
Comprehensive Plan contains broad statements of policy and include objectives such
as connected streets, an impact fee strategy, establishment of levels of service, and
encouraging multi-model transportation.
The Transportation Comprehensive Plan does list specific projects that are identified as
being important to the overall transportation system in Yelm, including the SR 510 Yelm
Loop (identified as project Y3 in the plan). The purpose of the Transportation Plan is
not to schedule or prioritize projects, but rather to establish the transportation grid
required over time to support the growth projections for the City of Yelm, as required by
the Growth Management Act.
The Plan should have a separate section dealing with shallow ground water hazards.
The Comprehensive Plan currently contains policies for Frequently Flooded Areas,
which includes areas flooded through high groundwater. These existing policies formed
the basis for the City's Critical Areas Code update, adopted by the City Council in
November of 2005. This Code specifically regulates high groundwater areas and
prohibits any new building construction within a high groundwater area.
The existing Comprehensive Plan policies provide the foundation for current
development regulations used to review specific proposals. These regulations were
reviewed and praised by the Washington State Department of Ecology through a
community assistance visit in February of 2006.
The policies related to frequently flooded areas are consistent with the Growth
Management Act and adequately address high ground water flooding.
The City of Yelm should consider imposing impact fee's similar to what Pierce County is
reviewing.
The Growth Management Act authorized the collection of impact fee's, including traffic
impact fee's, by local governments. The City of Yelm has collected impacts fee's for
traffic mitigation from development since 1996 at the time the City's Concurrency
Management Code was adopted. This Code was adopted pursuant to the strong
transportation policies presently found in the Comprehensive Plan. These policies set
the stage for development of a concurrency management code that is codified at
Chapter 15.40 YMC, which presently requires all new development to:
/ Make on-site and frontage improvements.
/ Make such off-site facility improvements as are necessary to meet city standards
for the safe movement of traffic and pedestrians attributable to the project.
/ Make a contribution to the facilities relating to capacity improvements identified in
the adopted six-year traffic improvement program, in the form of a transportation
facility charge (Traffic Impact Fee).
Since 2004, the City has collected over $1,120,000 (1.12 million dollars) in Traffic
Impact Fee's. This money has been used for the local match to leverage grant
applications through the Washington State Transportation Improvement Board for the
September 19, 2006 Page 2 of 5
reconstruction of 103rd Street, the Stevens Street extension from West Road. to 1S`
Street, and the Stevens Street Connection between 15` and Edwards Streets.
The policies in the Comprehensive Plan related to transportation concurrency are
consistent with the Growth Management Act and are adequate to support the imposition
of traffic impact fee's.
The City of Yelm should charge impacts fee's other than traffic.
The City of Yelm currently charges developers all the impact fee's authorized pursuant
to the Growth Management Act, including:
/ Traffic impact fee's - $750.00 per peak P.M. Trip
/ Fire Impact Fee - $0.216 per square foot of building area
/ Park Impact Fee - If required open space is not dedicated as required by the
subdivision or zoning code, a park fee in lieu of dedication may be authorized at
a rate of $5,000 per lot that would have been dedicated as open space.
Yelm Community Schools have not requested the City adopt an impact fee and rather
relies on the State Environmental Policy Act to require mitigation agreements for
projects in Yelm that have impacts on School facilities. The current mitigation
agreements have been negotiated between the School District and developers at a rate
of $2,675.00 per single family dwelling. This is collected and administered by the
School District, although the City does not issue a building permit until the fee is paid.
Connection fees to public utilities are not 'impact' fees, but in Yelm, they are:
/ Water - $1,500.00 per Equivalent Residential Unit, presently calculated at 900
cubic feet per month.
/ Water meter - $300.00 for a standard 5/8 inch pre-tapped, pre-plumbed
residential meter.
/ Sewer - $5,569.00 per ERU + $145 inspection fee per ERU.
There is no 'impact' or 'connection' fee for stormwater, but the City has created a
stormwater utility district and charges properties at a rate of $2.50/month for a single
family dwelling and between $1.00 and $1.40 per acre for commercial and industrial
properties (based on the amount of impervious surface).
Finally, while Police impact fee's are not authorized by the Growth Management Act, the
City determined through the environmental review process that the Tahoma Terra
Master Planned Community would have an impact on police services and conditioned
the project to pay a Police mitigation fee of $310.00 per single family dwelling.
A typical single family dwelling would pay approximately $11,000.00 in impact and
connection fee's at the time of building permit issuance.
September 19, 2006 Page 3 of 5
It should also be noted that impact and connection fee's may only address a new
developments impact on the system. Thus, new development may not be charged for
the impacts of past development approved prior to the adoption of the Growth
Management Act.
The policies in the Comprehensive Plan related to concurrency are consistent with the
Growth Management Act and adequate to support the imposition of appropriate impact,
mitigation, and connection fee's.
The City is opening up new territory to pay for maintaining residential growth buf that
Yelm does not have an industry base to support growth.
While it is true that residential growth has outpaced growth of jobs in Yelm as affordable
housing and quality of life continue to attract new residents to Yelm, this is typical of the
process of urbanization as contemplated by the Growth Management Act as Yelm
grows from a bedroom community to a more sustainable urban center. The present
residential construction will begin to support additional retail and industrial
developments in the future.
The policies in the Comprehensive Plan related to a mix of residential, retail
commercial, and industrial land bases are consistent with the Growth Management Act.
The population projections included in the comprehensive plan are low.
City growth and growth patterns are monitored each year by the Thurston Regional
Planning Council and population projections are updated when appropriate. The
proposed population projections reflect the fact that, as noted above, Yelm is still
developing as an economic center and has not yet developed the base of employment
which would show up in the population projection model used by the Thurston Regional
Planning Council. For this reason, the City is including notes in the Comprehensive
Plan policies related to population that the Thurston Highlands Master Planned
Community is under consideration and may impact population projections. The City
also utilizes a longer term population projection timeline to plan for utility infrastructure.
Yelm is not consistent in the use of the bypass for concurrency purposes as it will not be
constructed within six years.
The Yelm Community Development Department has never used the future construction
of the SR 510 Yelm Loop to determine that any project in the City met concurrency
standards for the adopted levels of service. While all projects on the Six-Year
Transportation Improvement Program, including the SR 510 Yelm Loop, are analyzed
as part of a traffic impact analysis, only those fully funded projects are used for
concurrency purposes.
September 19, 2006 Page 4 of 5
This misconception was first raised through public testimony during the hearings on the
Yelm Wal-Mart, and although oft-repeated, it is simply not true.
Specifically related to Wal-Mart, the Traffic Impact Analysis submitted by Wal-Mart's
traffic experts found that each of 44 intersections studied met the adopted levels of
service after the opening of Wal-Mart and before construction of the SR 510 Yelm Loop.
The conditions imposed on Wal-Mart by the City for off-site transportation
improvements, including the construction of a connection to 103rd Avenue, went beyond
basic concurrency requirements.
The Transfer of Development Rights program found at Chapter III -Land Use -Page
III-4 - E needs to be better explained.
In order to make the policy more clear, the following amendment is recommended to be
adopted by the Planning Commission (shown in bill format):
E.` Transfer of Development Rights Program
The City of Yelm supports the Transfer of Development Rights program to
support certain rural programs. Proper regulations need to assure_that such a
program is not counterproductive to urban goals and objectives of this plan. The
City and County have established acounty-wide Transfer of Development Rights
program, in which some portion of the density range within the C~ low-density
residential designation is achievable through the purchase of transferred
development rights rather than allowed outright. The objective of a county-wide
Transfer of Development Rights program is to support conservation of important
. long-term agricultural lands.~isteris
The language of the policies within the Comprehensive Plan should use "shall" and "will"
rather than "should".
Comprehensive Plan language generally uses "should" rather than "will" since
comprehensive plan policy is the foundation document for development regulations. It
is in development regulations where specific directive language is typically found.
Consequently, "should" is generally used in comprehensive plan policy, and "will" or
"shall" are generally used in implementation documents such as development
regulations. Another reason for this is that state law requires that action not be taken
that runs counter to Comprehensive Plan policy.
Recommendation
The Planning Commission should review each comment and provide direction to staff
as to how the Commission would like to address each issue raised during the public
hearing.
September 19, 2006 Page 5 of 5
Steve Klein
One thing that I would like to comment on is traffic, and I would like state that the
comprehensive plan be updated so that traffic should be adjusted to account for the fact
that is on record that the change of the schedule on the Y3 Loop will not be now
construction phase starting in 2013 and the first cars using the road are 2015. All of the
data that we talk about in these chambers here refer to traffic including a Y3 loop but
that loop is way down the road and all of the traffic issues that we have talk about that
mitigating the traffic and I think it should be on the record that that road in not in reality
for a decade at least.
Secondly, the Comp. plan should have a separate section dealing with shallow ground
water hazards. Two specific areas that were impacted were the properties immediately
downstream from the now under construction Wal-Mart site and the area upstream from
the Hawks Landing subdivision and the new Ridgeline School. Within the last year this
past winter the City of Yelm staff had to deal with a number of high ground water issues
due to rain water. The increasing rains that we have in the winter time here are not
becoming that out of record they are becoming the norm. These things need to be
adjusted.
Further, there was an article in yesterdays Tacoma News Tribune, I'd like to quote one
paragraph from it.
"Washington's Growth Management Act passed by the legislature 16
years ago to curb sprawl authorized local governments to charge Traffic
Impact fees to help their roads keep pace with the traffic generated by
new development. The law required local governments to ensure that
road improvements or other transportation fixes necessary to serve new
growth or made concurrent with or around the same time as that particular
development. If those traffic improvements are not made, local
governments may either reject the development that produces the swarm
of cars or lower congestion standards to accept even higher levels of
traffic. Other populous Western Washington counties including King,
Clark, Kitsap, and Snohomish have impact fees as do some cities. In
Pierce County developers make some contribution toward road
improvements but they're not consistent"
Pierce County is looking at impact fees for developers now as outlined in this article and
I would like to suggest that this has got to be an issue that Thurston County and the City
of Yelm is going to have to deal with as well. On April 29th in this very hall
Representative Tom Campbell sat here in a town hall meeting and specifically told
those of us that were present that traffic numbers that the City of Yelm used on the Wal-
Mart case differ from the State, numbers that he has. City Councilman Bob Isom got in
a big argument with him, and he told him that he'd be willing to present the numbers at
any time to City officials and see where they differ. I would like to suggest that given the
traffic situation that's going on here, that these things be looked at for updating in the
Comp. plan.
Thank you.
Jean Handley
I was reading all this again this morning and I think it was limited to housing and
population but it's so intertwined that I felt, as listed in page 70, "private property shall
not be taken for public purposes without due process and just compensation where
required. Just like the article in the TNT this morning, I think its appropriate that, that be
asked of developers and not citizens.
Pierce County is waking up to the storm they have created by not keeping up with their
development and their gonna pay a hectic price. Even Clearwood was discussing at
their annual meeting yesterday that 200 lots that they wanna open for construction, their
looking at impact fees instead of the 2,200 that they ask for now with a 100 lots left,
their looking at 6,000 dollar impact fee per house. That's Clearwood. If that little
community's got the guts then wear long pants, it's time to put on some long pants.
The other thing was on page 29 there's a sentence that says "this housing element
addresses the housing needs of the City of Yelm and it's UGA the goal of the City of
Yelm is to establish a baseline for evaluating the growth of the community and to assure
that adequate facilities are available to serve the needs of the community'. My concern
is that we're putting the cart before the horse, its like we don't have an industry base so
we're going to a property owner base, but we don't get the property owner base unless
we open up, like clearwood we're opening up new territory to pay for maintaining what
we've already begun, and I think that's backwards.
The other was that I hope these population figures are being addressed because with
the population boom here, there's no way that these figures throughout this document
are correct. 11,000, there's noway, that's preposterous.
The last one on page 71 labeled concurrency, "the availability of adequate facilities to
meet the public needs imposed on the UGA by any proposal requiring a permit or
approval by the City or County, all projects shall be reviewed to determine that parks,
schools, fire, sewer, water and transportation will be available or are to be planned and
funded within six years of the date of the project approval. Development regulations
shall identify levels of service and the plans have been implementing the concurrency
requirements. Where does that six years begin? Haven't we begun that, hasn't the
paperwork already begun for instance the bypass and its been six years that thing has
been up on the board here as long as I've been here and that's 18 years. So, I think
that there's a real quandary here and if I'm reading this properly, there an exception,
there's been development money through Tom Campbell and the federal government
have allocated only a portion of the ever growing construction cost for the bypass
whether that will be achieved or not I've had many conversations with Tom Campbell
and before he had said that all you need is the I-90 the 520 and who knows what the
Alaskan Way viaduct will do. And it doesn't matter what you've think you got for your
bypass, because if there's a crack that means Washington State needs money for any
one of those projects, due to winter storm, due to something happens of any kind, Yelm
will not see that money. There gonna stash that puppy away so fast your head will spin.
So, I don't understand the concurrency. If you've got it planned and funded within six
years of the date of the project approval haven't we already approved the bypass hasn't
that already been done? Where's the beginning, middle, and end. I just find that funny
cause certainly its been more than six years and certainly with the DOT's own website,
there's no ribbon cutting ceremony file 2016. Well, logic tells you that that's ten years
away. That's beyond six. I just think that there's a discrepancy here.
My point is that, so far the approval of 8,000 more cars on the roads with Wal-Mart
promising at least 8,000 more cars a day, there hasn't been a housing development that
the City Council hasn't passed. I thought that Wal-Mart would be barred because of an
environmental impact study and that never came about, so here we're looking at 5,000
homes over the next ten years and the EIS is still 18 months in the making but if the
same paradigm is going to apply to these developers, as it did to the Wal-Mart
developers, I don't see a problem with all of those homes passing muster.
So, if I may take a little tangent here, I sat there at those Wal-Mart hearings and it was
stunning to me the distinction I got from all those experts, Wal-Marts and ours, they
were just begging to give the Hearings Examiners the state of the art information.
These guys are highly educated, they're highly technical, they're engineers, they're
scientists, they're researchers and they love what they do. And to not have that come
out in testimony that the repercussions of which are gridlock and inadequate water
supply and flooding that we saw last winter and the previous winter since I've been
here. You know unanticipated events.
I just think that its time for Yelm to put on long pants and I just question the concurrency
here because I don't understand, what was the inception, when the beginning of the six
years? I just wonder if we're not making some mistake somewhere along here, That
was my point.
YELM PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES
August 21, 2006 4:00 P.M.
YELM CITY HALL
Glen Cunningham called the meeting to order at 6:30 PM
Members present: Glen Cunningham, John Graver, Carlos Perez, and John Thomson.
Staff: Tami Merriman and Grant Beck
Members Absent: Terry Kaminski -excused
Guest: Kathy McCormick, Thurston Regional Planning Council
Motion No.
Aaaroval of Minutes:
No minutes to approve.
Public Communications:
None
Public Hearing - 2006 Comprehensive Plan Update
Glen Cunningham opened the public hearing at 6:35pm and asked for a staff report.
Tami Merriman provided a history of the 2006 Comprehensive Plan up to date. The
Comprehensive Plan update includes updated figures on population projections,
Population projections, confirming the City of Yelm UGA, housing projections and needs,
amended language from the State GMA goals, updates to all comp plan maps, and
housekeeping items such as updating acronyms, clarifying the use of gross density, and
removal of short term growth boundary.
Glen Cunninoham asked for public comment.
Steve Klein spoke to the Council regarding traffic issues, suggesting that the
Comprehensive Plan be updated to account for the fact that the Y3 Loop will not
be now construction phase starting in 2013 and the first cars using the road are
2015. Mr. Klein also suggested that the Comprehensive Plan have a separate
section dealing with shallow ground water hazards. Mr. Klein quoted an article
from the August 20, 2006 Tacoma News Tribune regarding Traffic Impact Fees,
and suggested that the Comprehensive Plan be updated to include traffic impact
fees.
Jean Handlev stated that if private property is taken for public purposes, that the
compensation should be borne by the developer. Ms. Handlev also stated that impact
fees should be increased. Ms. Handlev states that it is wrong for new development to
pay for maintaining what we already have. Ms. Handlev disagreed with the population
projections in the proposed update, and expressed concern about the City's Concurrency
ordinance.
Cindv Teixeira. Nisouallv Vallev News, asked for clarification that the City does require
Traffic Impact Fees, and policies that the City follows for new development.
Yelm Planning Commission
June 12, 2006
Page 1
Grant Beck answered Ms. Teixeira's questions that the City has implemented Traffic
Facilities Charges since 1996, and discussed Concurrency regulations that the City
implements on all new development.
Kathv McCormick. Thurston Regional Planning Council stated that the Transportation
Comprehensive and Capital Facilities Plans are scheduled to be updated in 2007.
Carlos Perez inquired about changing the wording within the plan when policies state that
something "should" be done, to "shall" or "will".
Grant Beck stated that the Comprehensive Plan provides policies, and the Development
Regulations enforce the policies with what shall or will be done.
Glen Cunningham closed the public hearing at 7:OOpm.
The proposed update will go before the Thurston County Planning Commission public
hearing on in September, as the Plan is a Joint Plan with Thurston County.
Other -None:
MEETING ADJOURNED AT 7:05 P.M.
Respectfully submitted,
Tami Merriman, Associate Planner
Glen Cunningham, Chair Date
Yelm Planning Commission
Jwe 12, 2006
Page 2
City of Yelm
Planning Commission
AGENDA
Yelm Planning Commission Special Meeting
Monday, September 25, 2006
4:00 P.M.
Yelm City Hall
105 Yelm Avenue West
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Call to Order and Roll Call
Approval of Minutes
August 21, 2006
Public Communications
Email from Steve Klein dated September 3, 2006
Public Hearings: None Scheduled
Other
A. Comprehensive Plan Update -Review comments received during the
public hearing and from the Thurston County Planning Commission, and
provide direction to Community Development staff on any changes to the
hearing draft to recommend be considered by the City Council.
B. Principles for Sustainable Development with the Thurston Highlands
Master Planned Community - Review a draft definition for sustainable
development for endorsement by the Planning Commission and City
Council.
6. Adjourn
Next Planning Commission meeting
Monday, October 16, 2006 - 4:00 P.M.
Yelm City Hall Council Chambers
Enclosures are available to non-Commission members upon request.
It is the City of Yelm's policy to provide reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities. If you are a person
with a disability in need of accommodations to conduct business, or to participate in government processes or
activities, please contact Agnes Bennick, at 360-458-8404 at least four (4) working days prior to the scheduled event.
All Planning Commission meetings are audio taped. For information on obtaining a copy, please call the Community
Development Department at (360) 458-3835.
Grant Beck
Subject: FW: Challenge -- An idea whose time has come
Importance: High
From: Steve Klein [mailto:srklein@ywave.com~
Sent: Sunday, September 03, 2006 12:46 PM
To: Webmaster
Cc: Keven R. Graves
Subject: Challenge -- An idea whose time has come
Dear Mayor Harding, Yelm City Council, Planning Staff & Yelm Planning Commission,
In case you do not read the Seattle newspapers, here is an idea whose time has come.
What say you?
Don't you think Yelm could use a fresh approach as quoted below, as you continue to:
A. Approve more and more development; more traffic, more housing, more noise, more
pollution, more demand on our water resources.
B. Are on the threshold of 8,000 more car trips a day with the soon-to-open Wal-Mart Super
Center, in a town already gridlocked many afternoons.
C. Rely on a Y-3 Loop for traffic mitigation -- a road a decade away from fruition, if at
all.
D. Continue to herald your band aid fixes such as a center turn lane and a new side
street, without adding any extra capacity; same one lane in and same one lane out.
E. Allow a taxpayer-funded-LID and future road improvements to be borne by your citizens,
rather than having mitigation fees that take into full account all development generated
expenses that impact the city, which should be paid in full by the development.
E. Continue to permit Grade F to be the norm for some Yelm traffic intersections.
The Seattle Times reports in its September 2nd edition:
"State Secretary of Transportation Doug MacDonald wants to move beyond bureaucratese ...
to fresh ideas for solving transportation problems and is putting up $1,000 of his own
money to reach that goal. It's called the $1,000 Doug MacDonald Challenge, sponsored by
the national Transportation Research Board, an organization with the National Academy of
Sciences. The idea of generating new transportation ideas. from the public with a contest
came to him while he was sitting around one day.
'Every time we pay consultants, we get the same old ideas, the same old graphs and
charts,' MacDonald said. 'Maybe there's a better plan to get new ideas, so I decided to
make a modest personal contribution in hopes of stirring up interest. 'I am fascinated by
how we are going to get the public's enthusiasm about the fact we can keep highways moving
so we actually get more use out of highways. In a line of stalled traffic, you don't get
much production of the highway. Everyone wins when the lanes move."'
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?
slug=doug02m&date=20060902
To quote Nisqually Valley News Publisher & Managing Editor Keven Graves in his August 28th
editorial, "Give City of Yelm credit for credit that's due,"
this writer absolutely agrees. However there is much work that needs to be done to
accommodate all of the growth approved here. Let's not rest on our laurels while this City
is fast approaching a crisis with the convergence of traffic, water and quality of life
issues here.
Mr Graves states, "While the City of Yelm is often the target of criticism from various
factions of the community, there are times when "atta boys" are in order."
http://yelmonline.com/main.asp?Top=1&SectionID=27
This writer asks, "Why do city administrators & you complain that my comments and others
are negative, rather than seeing that all of us are in this together with a desire to
preserve this beautiful place we all call home and that we stand up and share, bringing
forth concerns, observations and ideas?"
We care just as much as you do!
Douq MacDonald certainly welcomes public input. How about Yelm officials?
This writer and his wife will hereby donate $1,000 to the City of Yelm with "the idea of
generating new transportation ideas from the public for a contest" to solicit enthusiasm,
ideas and input from our local citizens, along the lines of Mr. MacDonald's thoughts.
Do you accept?
Stephen R. Klein
P. 0. Box 1971
Yelm, WA. 98597
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