Visioning process hinges on future city hall location

Published 2:00 pm Wednesday, June 7, 2006

POULSBO — City leaders including Councilmen Ed Stern and Dale Rudolph along with Mayor Kathryn Quade have expressed the need for a new city visioning process.

However, the blindfold that blacks out those desires won’t be lifted until the location for city hall is settled once and for all.

The issue will be on the Nov. 7 ballot as voters will chose between the current 10th Avenue site and a downtown alternative.

Bainbridge Island-base consultant NW Collaborations was unanimously selected by the city’s long-range planning committee to facilitate the visioning process, which could possibly lead into a comprehensive plan update, Quade said.

“It was hands down and everybody agreed on them,” she said. “They’re ready and willing and they want to get going.”

During the selection process, the firm stated that before the visioning process could begin in earnest, the city hall location had to be determined, Quade said.

“This is an opportunity to use them to help us get this ballot issue in front of the public in an unbiased manner,” she said. “It’s not going to be our staff putting out recommendations; it’s going to be NW Collaborations putting it out and it won’t be biased.”

NW Collaborations will work with consultants from Parametrix, which has an on-call engineering and environmental services agreement with the city that is being utilized for the municipal campus comparison.

The four separate contracts are all less than $5,000, giving the mayor the authority to sign them without council approval.

“What concerns me is that we haven’t scoped out what we’re doing here,” said Councilman Jeff McGinty. “Are we going to only look at 10th Avenue or downtown or is there any other thing we have to look at?”

Stern answered McGinty’s query by stating that it is 10th Avenue or downtown and new construction only.

“We ought to reaffirm that,” McGinty said. “I don’t want someone coming down six months from now saying, ‘I didn’t get my say.’”

After Quade took office in January, several community members raised concerns about the amount of public involvement in the November 2005 municipal campus decision as well as the location. This led to the creation of a blue ribbon committee to examine three alternatives: 10th Avenue, downtown and the Creekside Center on 7th Avenue.

The discussion came to a head at an April 19 town hall meeting, which, due to the number of residents who spoke out against the 10th Avenue location, was followed by a special council meeting.

The scope of work presented last Wednesday was developed from Rudolph’s draft, which was written after council voted to explore the blue ribbon committee’s alternatives.

Two more votes were cast at the first two council meetings in May with the final vote to explore only 10th Avenue and downtown with an advisory vote being placed on the November general election ballot.

“This ought to go to council for comments before we can start,” McGinty said.

“I think we made that decision at the last council meeting,” Quade replied.

The contracts give the consultants enough time to collect information and have it ready to present to the public by September, said Planning Director Barry Berezowsky.

In order for the question to be on the November ballot, it must be submitted to the Washington Secretary of State’s office by September.

McGinty then took issue with the economic analysis requested by Councilwoman Connie Lord.

“Is it going to be numbers, what am I getting from this study that I’m going to base my decision on?” McGinty asked.

Berezowsky responded that city officials won’t know what they’re going to do with it until they see it.

“As long as your confident council member Lord gets what she wants out of it, I’m happy,” McGinty said. “If we’re going to do this, we need to do it right. Maybe we should take a year.”

Stern replied that with the 5-2 vote at the May 10 council meeting, the council made it clear to the residents of Poulsbo that it would attempt to begin building during the next construction season.

“I feel that the line in the sand has been drawn by the council and, we’re going to look at new construction,” Stern said. “This study is going to get us to the apples-to-apples comparison that the blue ribbon committee tried to get at, but didn’t.”