LAKE GOODWIN – Some came with questions and others came to vent.
More than 400 people packed into a community meeting hall late Tuesday to talk about three huge housing developments envisioned in their semi-rural area.
They also came to grill Snohomish County officials about those plans. It was standing-room only for nearly half of the crowd at the Lake Goodwin Community Club.
Some residents said they felt like the development plans had sneaked up on them.
“I think we’ve all been sleeping here,” said Lake Ki resident Rob Dietz.
Residents questioned County Councilman John Koster and county planning director Craig Ladiser about how the developments could affect the area – and raised numerous concerns.
The McNaughton Group of Edmonds is proposing to build at least 640 new homes – and as many as 6,000, possibly to go with a four-year university – in about 31/2 square miles of sparsely populated land north of Lake Goodwin.
The largest of these plans would create a “mini city” with its own homes, workplaces and shops – the first in Snohomish County since such developments were sanctioned by the County Council last year.
“The idea of McNaughtonville, the city, is driving even more of us together,” Ellen Hiatt Watson, who organized the meeting, told the crowd. Watson, who lives on Lake Howard, has started a Web site and is forming a group to oppose the developments.
Mark McNaughton, managing member of the company, said Wednesday that clustered developments provide a chance to shape the growth projected to come to the county. Rural cluster housing allows more homes to be built in exchange for building them closer together to preserve open space around them.
“Snohomish County has 300,000 people coming,” he said.
At the meeting Tuesday, residents didn’t believe that McNaughton’s plans would be the best way to shape that growth.
Over and over, they questioned how the area could handle traffic and whether septic tanks on the new homes could pollute groundwater.
“I also have a well, and I’m very concerned, as I’m sure everyone in the audience is, how that’s going to be handled,” said Dorothy McCullough of Lake Goodwin.
Environmental reviews will be part of the approval process, officials said.
Ladiser said the county is tightening its rules on rural clusters, but that it won’t affect the McNaughton applications already in the pipeline.
The company has also applied to build a “rural village” of up to 1,700 homes, which would supercede the rural cluster plan and would set aside more open space. A decision is not expected on this proposal until 2009.
“There is lots of time left between now and then to get an oar in the water and let them know how you feel about it,” said Koster, who represents the Lake Goodwin area on the County Council.
He was the only one of five councilmen to vote against allowing the rural village plan to be considered.
Ladiser said his staff recommended against the rural village request because of concerns about traffic and water supply.
The McNaughton Group offered to have a speaker at the meeting, but Watson turned them down. She said they would likely be invited to a later meeting.
“It’s an opportunity to pull together the community, to let them know we are a community,” she said.
McNaughton said Wednesday the company had a few people in the audience Tuesday to watch and listen.
McNaughton said the company plans to set up its own meetings with residents in the fall, beginning as soon as September or October.
At the meeting, Watson encouraged people to get involved and testify at the county at every opportunity.
“This is not a done deal,” she said.
Reporter Bill Sheets: 425-339-3439 or sheets@heraldnet.com.
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