Tag Archives: City Politics

Debating the Community Center

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There was a debate Monday night over the pros and cons of the proposed public-private partnership between Sammamish and the YMCA for a $30m community center. The City Council authorized an advisory vote in the November election.

The election statement, and the pro and con arguments, appear in the King County Voters Guide here.

The City Council’s resolution authorizing the advisory vote is here.

As we’ve previously written (and here), we think an advisory vote is a waste of the $50,000 it will cost to hold it.

We weren’t able to attend the debate but it was video taped.

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Revisiting the “Notch”

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Sammamish is once again interested in annexing the so-called Notch. This post, which has a link within it to another post, explains my view about the Notch.

Annexing the Notch at the current R-1 zoning doesn’t bring anything to Sammamish. Annexing the Notch as R-6, in neighboring Trossochs, doesn’t bring anything to Sammamish, either.

The Notch should be annexed as a mixed use development patterned after Juanita Village in Kirkland. See the earlier post for descriptions.

Here’s more on why a Community Center advisory vote is a bad idea

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I previously posted why the idea of a non-binding advisory vote is a bad idea for the Community Center. Here are more reasons.

The non-binding advisory vote only truly “works” if the vote is affirmative. It doesn’t work for a whole host of reasons if the vote is negative.

If the voters reject the Community Center, the City won’t know why. Is it because the voters:

  • Didn’t like the cost, some $30 million?
  • Didn’t like the size–is it too big or too small?
  • Didn’t like the pool–is it too small to offer competitive swimming, or should there be one at all?
  • Don’t know what happens to the staging area for the Fourth of July fireworks, which is where the Community Center is supposed to go–where do the fireworks go when displaced by the Center?
  • Don’t like that 75% of the capital costs are being paid by the City for a facility to be operated by a private entity?
  • Don’t like the very idea of a public-private partnership?
  • Don’t know when the facility will break even? The YMCA at the July 16 meeting doesn’t have a firm projection when the facility will break even. The absence of a firm business plan is, to me, rather alarming.
  • Don’t like competing with the privately-owned Pine Lake Club and Columbia Club?

The City won’t have a clue why this might be rejected.

The voter’s pamphlet language hasn’t been made public yet but presumably this will be an up-or-down, yes-or-no vote. Will the public even have answers to their questions in order to make an informed decision? I consider this highly unlikely, so the citizens will be voting on an “idea,” not a business plan.

As I noted previously, this issue has been studied to death by the City. A Community Center has been talked about since the very first City Council (1999-2001). That’s 12 years, for Pete’s Sake. The City has plenty of information with which to make a decision. The Council should be able to make a decision.

But an advisory vote is a classic move by government to delay action and make no decision. When desiring to avoid a decision, create another committee–or go to the voters.

The election Nov. 6. No action of any kind will likely be taken until 2013–if at all, should the public reject this.

This is a a bad idea from the get-to. This is the City Council avoiding its responsibility. How disappointing.

Advisory election for Sammamish Community Center is a dumb idea

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The idea of having a “non-binding advisory vote” for the Sammamish Community Center is unnecessary and a waste of time and money.

The City Staff and City Council have studied this thing to death. There have been numerous public meetings. Money and time has been spent on professional consultants. Let’s get on with the decision-making. We elect the City Council to make decisions and policy. We don’t need more stalling and needless expense.

If the Council insists on having a vote, at whatever is the cost of doing so, make it mean something by having it binding. Having a non-binding advisory vote is just silly. We already have a Park Commission whose opinions and recommendations are often ignored by City Council. Having a non-binding advisory vote means the prospect is very real that the Council will simply ignore the voters and do what it wants anyway. Save the time and money: show some political courage and backbone and get on with a decision now.

Common sense on the Community Center

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It appears that common sense may prevail on the proposed Sammamish Community Center.

That’s the project, readers will recall, that last year was headed toward a $64m, 98,000sf extravaganza that would have been the biggest city community center in King County, according to some.

It would have been roughly 2 1/2 times the size of our City Hall at roughly seven times the cost of the building.

Note that now City officials are putting the price tag of City Hall at around $28m, “including land costs.” I think this is somewhat misleading, but I won’t argue the point.

We already own the land on which the Community Center will be built, the so-called Kellman property. This was purchased not so much with a Community Center in mind; affordable housing was one preferred use, a folly–but that’s another story. So the original Community Center concept at $64m was breath-taking. It got a lot of justifiable push-back from the public and some council members who were fiscally alert and not interested in a Taj Mahal. The City was also charging ahead alone rather than partnering with a private entity well-versed in operating community centers.

According to this article in the Sammamish Review, the City is now talking with the YMCA about a sharply scaled down project that is priced at $29m for a 64,000sf building (the City Hall is just over 39,000sf). Further, Council Member Nancy Whitten thinks the YMCA should deed over the property it owns near the Pine Lake Middle School as part of the deal–an idea I think has great merit.

Kudos to the City for coming around to considering a solution that wasn’t even on the table.