Heatherwood West annexation drive starting anew

Published 7:38 am Friday, February 29, 2008

Residents of the Heatherwood West neighborhood just east of Jackson High School are looking at annexing to the city of Mill Creek again.

Only this time, the city will need to be a bit more conciliatory, some residents say.

Two residents of the area addressed the City Council Tuesday, March 23 regarding going forward with efforts to annex into the city. It is the latest effort by residents there to become part of the city of Mill Creek.

Heatherwood West residents most recently brought an annexation petition to the city in 1999, an effort that got 56 percent of the area’s residents to sign favoring joining Mill Creek. Back then, residents wanted to annex to have lower taxes and better services, particularly police, according to Attilla Kovacs-Szabo, who chaired the annexation committee in 1999.

That’s one reason why Lisa Hopp, who has taken a leading role in revitalizing the effort, wants to annex to Mill Creek.

“Our area needs the benefits of city services, especially law enforcement,” said Hopp prior to the March 23 meeting. “I don’t think there’s enough of a presence to deter cut-through traffic on our streets.”

Hopp was talking about an ongoing problem Heatherwood West residents are having with cut-through traffic from Jackson High School, as well as drivers seeking to avoid the 132nd Street SE-35th Avenue SE intersection.

Hopp and Trudy Lothyan, who also spoke before the Council, said the city needs to stop toying with the neighborhood and either annex it or not.

The City Council approved going forward with the process in September 1999, only to stop proceedings two months later because of financial concerns in part because of passage of Initiative 695 and the ensuing loss of tax revenues from the state.

Back then, the financial picture for the area, as provided by city staff, showed the area might be a drain on city finances. More recent studies, however, show otherwise, leading Council members to say they would consider annexing the area. Heatherwood West is bordered by the Mill Creek city limits on the south and east, by 132nd Street SE on the north, and by 35th Avenue SE on the east.

“We feel we’re being trifled with,” Lothyan said. “We’re not just (an annexation area), we’re real people with homes and families. My neighbors feel a tad used and abused.”

Hopp and Lothyan urged the city to reconsider the 1999 application, and requested waiving the annexation application fee, which is $700. During the 1999 movement, Pacific Topsoils paid the fee. It later joined the city in a separate annexation.

Without that accommodation, which Mayor Terry Ryan and city manager Bob Stowe said can be considered, the movement would die, Hopp said.

“It’s way too much work for me,” said Hopp, a stay-at-home mother who is expecting a third child. “They need to waive the fee.”

The decision to waive the fee would likely rest with the Council, Stowe said.

Council members, meanwhile, didn’t comment much on the petition. Ryan provided some background information for Hopp and Lothyan. Council member Mary Kay Voss was the only other one to speak on the matter, saying that most of the Council is in favor of annexing the area because the city is interested in annexing some areas east of 35th Avenue SE.

Lothyan summed up her reasons for wanting to annex to Mill Creek.

“The city makes decisions that impact our neighborhood, but we have no say in the decisions you make,” she said to the Council. “This is kind of a problem.”

Hopp said she has not yet talked to anyone from the Thomas Lake Shopping Center, the lone commercial area in the neighborhood.