EVERETT – The City Council voted to enact a temporary measure to require certain types of establishments, including churches, teen dance clubs and tattoo parlors, to get special land-use permits in order to settle downtown.
The last week’s decision is a temporary safeguard against possible “incompatible” uses of downtown space until city leaders can map out a clearer vision of what should make up Everett’s core.
Other businesses included in the moratorium are body-piercing studios, food banks, plasma donation centers, arcades, social service agencies, parking lots and “other potentially incompatible uses.”
City Attorney Jim Iles said that downtown Everett is in a “vulnerable, interim period” between its initial revitalization and a concrete vision for the future.
“Some of those uses … may be totally appropriate,” Iles said. “It’s not appropriate just to say they can’t be downtown. We don’t know that. They may be totally appropriate in certain areas of town or if there are certain things done.”
Reporter Jennifer Warnick: 425-339-3429 or jwarnick@ heraldnet.com.
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