BAINBRIDGE ISLAND – Parts of Raymond Keeney’s story are still common today.
Keeney and his wife, Mabel, moved to Bainbridge Island in 1954. They appreciated the low-key lifestyle, the quiet and the high-quality schools. They thought it would be a safe place to raise their three daughters.
Keeney decided it would be a nice place to go home to after a day of work in Seattle.
It’s the kind of testimonial that gives a place national recognition from time to time, such as a recent listing in Money magazine as the second-best place to live in America.
It is also what inspires people to move to Bainbridge. The island’s population has grown from 17,227 in 1990 to 21,760 last year. The state expects it to swell to 28,660 by 2025.
Keeney has done his part to accommodate island population growth. He bought five acres near the southern shore of Eagle Harbor. Over the years, he has built four homes where there once stood one.
But Keeney’s story is hardly the symbol of growth on Bainbridge anymore. Nor is it the kind of growth lawmakers apparently had in mind when they passed the Growth Management Act in 1990.
Had Keeney subdivided in the true spirit of that law, 20 homes would stand on his five acres instead of four.
That’s just what the state requires of new growth in other cities. And islanders did, after all, vote to incorporate the entire island as a city in 1990, just as the Growth Management Act was stipulating the density requirements for cities.
The state rules, however, have not deterred Bainbridge from trying to preserve the rural character that made it so attractive to newcomers to begin with.
The city has required property owners to subdivide, as Keeney did, at lower densities. Others have been limited to only one home per 2.5 acres. The practice continues because no one has challenged the city’s development rules before state growth officials.
At the same time, construction crews are altering the Winslow skyline in a big way. In the island’s “city within a city,” work proceeds at a furious pace on the Harbor Square condo/townhouse project across Winslow Way from the ferry terminal, on the Island Crossings motel/condo complex on High School Road, and on the Vineyard Lane condos next to Highway 305.
The idea is that by providing for intense population growth in the core area of Winslow, the city can meet its growth requirement under state law without allowing denser growth elsewhere on the island.
The Winslow Tomorrow planning process is near completion, offering a roadmap for how to achieve this density and still make Winslow an attractive place to be.
Margaret Robinson, who moved to the island in 1995, grudgingly accepts the changes to the once tranquil village of Winslow.
“We lose the small-town feel, but that’s progress,” she said. “I sort of accept what’s going on as the way it has to happen.”
Whether the city is ultimately allowed to continue on that path may depend on work that state Rep. Sherry Appleton, D-Poulsbo, launched recently.
If successful, she’ll help Bainbridge earn state approval for flexibility in meeting the requirements of the Growth Management Act.
But if the effort fails, it is likely only a matter of time before a homeowner or developer challenges the island’s rules.
And if the challenge succeeds, growth could explode across the island in ways many islanders surely did not anticipate when they chose to take decision-making powers into their own hands 15 years ago.
‘An unusual situation’
It’s not so much the 1990 Growth Management Act itself, but decisions rendered by the Central Puget Sound Growth Management Hearings Board that could make Bainbridge Island’s growth strategy a tough sell if anyone were to challenge it.
The law stipulates that growth should occur in regions designated urban growth areas. Not all urban growth areas, such as Silverdale or Kingston, are cities. But all cities are urban growth areas.
When the law went into effect in July 1990, interpretations of how to meet the state’s new growth standards were legion. Over the years, other jurisdictions have tried to argue for density averaging, going super dense in one area and leaving other areas somewhat rural.
By focusing growth in Winslow, that’s exactly how Bainbridge is trying to do it.
The board has consistently said “no” to other communities. The rule is four units per acre on every acre that isn’t already designated open space, critical area, commercial or some other exception.
Bainbridge residents argue, however, that their city is different.
“We just have an unusual situation. Our urban growth area is huge,” said City Councilwoman Christine Rolfes. “Its governmental structure is set up like a city but its infrastructure isn’t.”
At 32 square miles, Bainbridge is the eighth-largest city in the state in size, 39th in population and 220th in population per square mile, according to the state’s Office of Financial Management. Its boundaries are defined by nature and won’t grow unless the city begins annexing Suquamish.
For now, the city’s growth strategy hasn’t been seriously challenged. That doesn’t mean it is completely popular. Keeney says he’d like more people to do what he did, saying he thinks more growth should happen outside Winslow.
“A lot of these people are like us,” he said. “Their retirement is in the property.”
Rolfes, whose term on the council ends in January, said any growth is the No. 1 source of complaints she receives. The developments in Winslow “are very visible symptoms of what people are complaining about,” she said.
But, she continued, that zoning is designed to meet the spirit of the GMA by pushing growth into Winslow while preserving the rural character most residents say they want in the rest of the island.
Becoming a city
It was that desire that drove the island to become a city in the first place.
Norm Wooldridge, who led the island’s successful incorporation bid in 1990, acknowledges residents are trying to “have the best of both worlds,” but says he thinks the city can do it while still honoring its commitment to taking on growth.
In April 1989, Wooldridge, described then by the Bainbridge Island Review as a “Thomas Jefferson clone” for his ability to listen more than he spoke, began what ultimately became a successful campaign to draw power away from Port Orchard and put it in the hands of island residents.
Wooldridge had previously lived on Mercer Island and didn’t like the way that island built out. He didn’t want to see the same thing happen on Bainbridge.
The threat appeared real. The Port Blakely Tree Farm company was running through the county a proposal to build about a thousand homes near Blakely Harbor. Though the company marketed its project as environmentally sensitive, many vocal islanders didn’t like that their opinions were only advisory as far as the county was concerned.
Opposition to incorporation came from the county, farmers and those who worried it would mean higher taxes and local incompetence in handling things such as roads and police.
And Winslow officials initially wanted nothing to do with annexing the rest of the island.
Alice Tawresey, Winslow mayor for 12 years, said at the time she didn’t see the benefit for her city, that incorporation would further threaten to make Winslow a “parking lot for the rest of Kitsap County.”
So the Home Rule group, including current mayor Darlene Kordonowy and island environmental watchdog Charles Schmid, decided to pursue incorporation of everything on the island that wasn’t Winslow.
Then Tawresey decided to not run for re-election.
In March 1990, a few months after taking office, new mayor Sam Granato said having two cities on the island would not be in Winslow’s best interest.
So in September, Winslow residents narrowly approved putting the annexation question on the ballot. In November, in another close election, islanders opted to make the entire island a city. The next year the city’s name was changed to Bainbridge Island.
Legislative fix sought
Islanders were warned that the GMA could backfire on Bainbridge. The law took effect in the July before the annexation vote.
Richard Ford, appointed by then Gov. Booth Gardner as chairman of the Growth Strategies Commission, said Bainbridge Island would become like Bellevue within 20 years if it incorporated.
Mike Ryherd, an islander, disagreed, saying the city would have a better chance of setting aside watershed, wetlands and steep slopes if it incorporated than if it relied on the county.
So far Ryherd has been proven correct, but it may take legislative approval to cement the deal.
Recently, Appleton asked legislative staff to create a bill that would allow all-island cities more flexibility in meeting GMA goals. Specifically, it would allow Bainbridge to continue using density averaging as its method for accommodating the growth the state says it must.
Similar measures for other jurisdictions have failed before.
Earlier this year, the state Senate approved a bill to give more leeway in rural counties, a bill that wouldn’t have applied to Bainbridge and ended up dying in the House.
Appleton said the island-specific legislation could pass if legislators see Bainbridge’s situation as unique.
But she admitted she can’t make any promises.
Her local Republican counterpart, State Rep. Beverly Woods, R-Kingston, said in April she’d favor such a measure.
To the man who helped spearhead the move to all island cityhood, it’s a positive step.
“We fully recognize that in a sense it is our responsibility to take on density,” said Wooldridge. “It should be our ability to put it where we want it and make it work.”
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