The next step in determining building-height limits in downtown Edmonds is possibly being taken today, at the annual Edmonds City Council retreat.
The council is scheduled to meet Friday, March 18 and Saturday, March 19 at LaConnor, in Skagit County.
“Part of the retreat Friday will be to have a frank discussion about design guidelines,” Council President Richard Marin said following the Tuesday, March 15, council meeting.
Design guidelines, what they will be and how to get them, became a key point after March 8, when the council approved a comprehensive plan update that didn’t include specific building height limits in the downtown core.
Adopted amendments proposed by Council member Jeff Wilson removed references to specific overall building heights in the downtown area. Instead, the comprehensive plan calls for generally two story buildings but refers to incentives that could allow increased height. However, those incentives don’t exist and must be created in design guidelines that would be approved by the council.
At the March 8 meeting, Marin suggested appointing a special committee made up of council members, city boards, staff and residents to review and recommend design guidelines to the council.
Marin let the plan drop but suggested the council could consider the committee idea again at the March 15 meeting.
That didn’t happen.
The council quickly moved through its agenda, formally adopting the comprehensive plan on a 4-3 vote so fast that many members of the audience were heard asking, “What happened?” and “Is that it?”
Although the comprehensive plan was allowed 15 minutes on the agenda, the entire action took hardly more than 15 seconds.
The committee idea wasn’t on the agenda and didn’t come up until members of the public asked during the comment period.
Deanna Dawson explained the action to onlookers.
“It didn’t take very long because we’ve talked and talked about this,” Dawson said. Regarding Marin’s committee idea, “we probably will discuss it at the retreat,” she said.
One longtime council watcher, Ray Martin, accused the council of being secretive and using e-mail to conduct business as a “rolling quorum” before meetings.
“There’s nothing secret going on,” said Dawson, who has been losing side of many of the comprehensive plan votes. Referring to the rolling quorum accusation, Dawson said, “As far as I’m concerned, that hasn’t happened.”
Council member Michael Plunkett, another of the minority votes, said, “E-mail doesn’t mean private and it doesn’t mean a vote.”
After the meeting, Marin said he had talked to a consultant about his committee idea. Marin said the consultant, Mark Hinshaw, estimated a committee process would cost the city about $15,000. Marin said an alternative to using a special committee would be to refer the design guidelines issue to the city Planning Board for recommendations.
“As early as the end of May, we could see design guidelines,” Marin said.
Other items scheduled to be considered at the retreat include:
• Developing a common future vision
• WiFi initiative
• Getting from 2005 to 2025
• Public safety
• Economic development and land use
• Transportation vision
• Recreation and cultural vision
• Edmonds Center for the Arts
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