Ten months ago, Stanwood Mayor Dianne White predicted a “friendly little war” among communities competing for a potential University of Washington campus.
She got the “war” part right.
The thought of Everett winning the campus, if one is to be won, roils many civic leaders and activists of north Snohomish, Island and Skagit counties.
Their frustration is seeping out in ways that can only cloud prospects for getting the Legislature to anchor a college anywhere before it adjourns March 13.
White said as much as she wants the college, no decision is better than a wrong decision.
“I would rather have it postponed than incorrectly sited,” she said.
Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson doesn’t want that. On Friday, he sweetened the city’s proposal, offering to sell property for the proposed site for below its market value.
As he spoke to lawmakers, White was rounding up signers on a letter urging legislators to re-crunch numbers used by a consultant in ranking land around Everett’s transit center higher than property in Marysville.
They hope new math means new rankings.
The consultant, NBBJ of Seattle, copiously analyzed sites, awarded points for such things as size and location and environmental concerns. They weighted the different factors to give some elements greater importance than others.
When the million-dollar report with its dizzying array of calculations came out in November, Everett out-scored Marysville 179-164.
Within days, Everett’s proposal morphed slightly.
The consultant analyzed an Everett site with 31 contiguous acres. It turns out it is only 27 acres of noncontiguous land — about a 12 percent shrinkage.
Sound Transit owns 4 acres smack in the middle of the proposal site. It’s for parking, a good thing for a college. But the acreage should have been left out of the analysis.
So NBBJ re-examined the Everett proposal minus those 4 acres to determine if there was still enough space for a college. The expert said yes.
NBBJ didn’t readjust Everett’s score to reflect the shrinkage. Nor did it consider docking points for not being a contiguous piece of land — a criteria used to weed out properties at one stage in the selection process.
It leaves opponents wondering: If NBBJ knew before Nov. 15 what the public knows now, would the final ranking be the same? Would Everett’s transit center make the final cut as a noncontiguous property?
All this conjecture and controversy arrives as hearings are planned Monday and Tuesday on legislation to create a University of Washington North Sound in Everett.
“We know it’s coming late in the process but this is such an important decision,” White said.
For legislators, many of whom are asking themselves whether the state needs and can afford another UW campus, the letter could provide reason and excuse to wait until 2009 to figure out the answer.
Reporter Jerry Cornfield blogs on politics at Heraldnet.com. He can be heard at 8 a.m. Mondays on “The Morning Show” on KSER (90.7 FM). Contact him at 360-352-8623 or jcornfield@heraldnet.com.
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