King County cities are facing one of the most difficult community decisions municipalities have to make: siting a jail.
It is a vital public service and critical to maintaining public safety. Shoreline is proud to have one of the lowest crime rates in the Puget Sound area. Even so, last year we needed an average of 28 beds per day for people arrested or sentenced for committing misdemeanors in our city. Shoreline’s jail services are primarily provided through a contract with King County.
Now King County has announced that after 2012, there will no longer be space to house Shoreline’s or any other local cities’ inmates in the county’s facilities. This is due to the county’s projected increase in the felony population.
Consequently, all cities that contract with the county must replace those jail beds. Rather than plan for dozens of small, inefficient jails, Shoreline joined other cities in North and East King County (NEC) to address the problem, with the five largest cities (Principal Cities) leading the group. The Principal Cities include Shoreline, Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond and Seattle. The feasibility study by a consultant showed that building and operating one large jail was more cost effective than two small jails. For Shoreline, the difference in cost would potentially be over $1 million per year.
The Principal Cities then identified potential sites including at least one within their borders that could accommodate a large jail facility, and chose six to move forward in an environmental review process.
One of the six sites is in Shoreline at 2545 NE 200th St. Three sites in Seattle, one in unincorporated east King County and one in Bellevue are the remaining five sites.
The Shoreline site was identified because the property is large enough, publicly owned and available, does not require any parties to be displaced and is near regional transportation.
The next step in the jail planning process is to conduct an environmental review on each of the identified sites. The city of Shoreline will ensure the review of the Shoreline site, and all of the others, is comprehensive. The Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) study process will consider neighborhoods, traffic, stormwater and all other potential social and environmental impacts.
Residents are invited to two upcoming meetings to learn more and provide comments to be considered in the decision-making process. The first is a public forum on Dec. 11 to provide information, answer questions and hear comments. The second is a scoping meeting for the Shoreline site on Jan. 7 to take input that helps identify potential impacts to be studied as part of the environmental review process. Both meetings begin at 6 p.m. at the Shoreline Community College.
Attending these meetings or providing comment at the project Web site, www.nedmunicipaljails.com, ensures your comments are part of the record. Once the Draft EIS is available, there will be further meetings to gather community input.
The city of Shoreline is committed to providing you the information you need to participate fully in this process. Please visit the project Web site listed above or www.shorelinewa.gov for updates and more information as that will be the most effective way of getting complete and timely news.
Remember that it is still early in the process and all sites are still viable. The preferred alternative site won’t be identified until after the EIS study is complete in early 2010.
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