LAKE STEVENS – City officials have put forward a plan to nearly double the size of city staff over the next 18 months.
The plan was unveiled and approved at a special City Council meeting last week. The council also approved a 10-year update to the comprehensive plan, the guiding document for development.
Both moves are designed to help the city adapt as it grows both in size and population, officials said.
The city’s population grew to nearly 10,000 in January after the city annexed 800 acres along the north part of the lake. The Frontier Village annexation, if approved as expected, will add another 3,300 people, nearly doubling the total population from a year ago.
As a result, more city employees are needed to provide services, director of administration and finance Jan Berg said.
All city departments – planning, administration, police and public works – will nearly double their size.
A city administrator is not slated to be hired until January 2008, when the city will reorganize.
Currently, Berg manages the planning and administration departments, while Police Chief Randy Celori runs the police and public works departments.
“I believe we’re functioning exactly how we need to function,” Mayor Lynn Walty said in an interview before the meeting Thursday.
Walty, who has served as mayor since 2000, took on additional responsibilities in January 2004 after he retired from Boeing. Dave O’Leary, Lake Stevens’ last city administrator, was let go at that time.
In fall 2005, the City Council budgeted for a city administrator to be hired in 2006, fearing that Walty was spread too thin with the extra responsibilities.
But Walty, Berg and Celori convinced the council at a January retreat to allow the trio to manage the city.
Walty said the team works well together, and he fears bringing in a city administrator too soon would slow things down.
He admitted that the decision to hold off on hiring a city manager might be the undoing of his bid for re-election in 2007.
“The next months and year are horribly important,” Walty said. “My legacy will play out over the next year.”
All but seven of the 28 new positions are scheduled to be filled by December, to coincide with the anticipated November completion of the Frontier Village annexation.
Under the plan, at the beginning of 2008, each of the city’s four departments would have its own manager reporting to a city administrator.
If the hiring spree begins this month, as planned, the city will spend about $635,000 to cover the new positions this year.
Berg said she’s confident that the city is financially prepared to spend the money to provide the services.
“I’m comfortable,” she said, “and that’s rare.”
Several City Council members questioned how the city would accommodate the new employees, from providing desks to patrol cars for new police.
Walty said the plan for equipment and resources will come later. The first step is to give the OK on the staffing plan.
“We need to be able to move forward and then work out the details,” he told the council.
On Thursday, the council approved the plan. It will evaluate and review it every three months.
The council must vote to approve the money for the new positions when it next meets on Aug. 14.
Comprehensive plan OK’d
Also before the council last week was the city’s revised comprehensive plan.
Known as a “comp plan,” the document provides guidance to city planners for development.
The city last revised the document in 1994, long before Snohomish County expanded the city’s urban growth boundary, and before the city’s recent annexation drive, planning director Rebecca Ableman said.
Economic development is a focus of the update, she said.
The city outlines plans to build up the commercial areas in downtown Lake Stevens and Frontier Village, as well as the south lake commercial area where Lake Stevens Road crosses 20th Street SE and an industrial area off Old Hartford Road.
Several property owners asked for specific changes to the plan, two of which sparked a significant response from the public: the Mastro property on Grade Road and 26th Street NE, and Clock Tower Self Storage where Highway 9 and Highway 49 meet.
The council delayed approving the Mastro property, which was proposed for a residential subdivision, until a master plan is adopted for the downtown area.
They gave the OK for the Clock Tower property, restricting business use on the property to self storage only.
“This is a really neat place to be,” said Ableman, who joined the city earlier this year. “The growth and the energy around the city and the community coming together to become one.”
Reporter Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437 or jholtz@heraldnet.com.
Lake Stevens staffing proposal
The city hopes to add 28 new employees by 2008, nearly doubling the amount of city staff. The proposed positions include:
* Ten new police officers, including three sergeants, one detective, one traffic officer and two new patrol officers.
* Five new public works employees, including two crew workers, a crew leader, a parks worker and seasonal staff.
* Two additional planners and a building inspector.
* An information technology manager, an accounting tech and an office assistant.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
