Tag Archives: Scott Hamilton

Moving on

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Dear Readers, 

It was May 2018 when I joined the Sammamish Comment as a deputy editor. This came almost a year after I  uncovered the City’s wrongdoing on traffic concurrency and independently went public with it.  Later that year, in December 2018, I took the reins from Scott Hamilton, who founded The Comment and made it the only media outlet covering city hall and city politics. The Comment informed and it was a watchdog of the city government.

Hamilton is a professional journalist and a phenomenal writer.  He also had years of experience in city hall politics as a former member of the Planning Commission, Planning Advisory Board and a highly involved volunteer in our city’s history. 

The shoes were big to fill. 

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Town Center Plan Flaws Ignored

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  • Glaring omissions in the Town Center plan regarding traffic forewarned 10 years ago – and ignored.

By Miki Mullor

Guest Contributor

Miki Mullor

During the recent moratorium deliberations by City Council, the Town Center neighborhood plan was brought into the conversation. The issues with traffic planning in the city, exposed during the concurrency debacle, were feared to also impact the Town Center plan. Calls to review the plan were answered with a response that the plan was done 10 years ago therefore it’s too late to review.  This implies a “statute of limitation” argument that if indeed there were issues with the plan, those should have been raised at that time and cannot be argued now.

However, recently surfaced documents from the time of Town Center planning in 2007 reveal just that – that serious problems do exist in the plan and those problems were raised timely – yet ignored by the city.

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Metropolitan Market project for Sammamish Town Center breaks ground

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MetroMarket Groundbreaking

Sammamish City Council members participate in the ceremonial ground breaking for the Village at the Town Center, anchored by Metropolitan Market. L-R: Mayor Tom Vance, Council Member Don Gerend, Deputy Mayor Kathy Huckabay and Council Member Bob Keller. Vance and Keller served on two planning commissions that created the Town Center Plan. Scott Hamilton, editor of Sammamish Comment, served with both on the two Commissions, also participating in creating the Town Center Plan. Click on photo to enlarge. Photo by Scott Hamilton.

The first commercial/retail center for the Sammamish Town Center broke ground this morning at the corner of SE 4th St. and 228th Ave. SE.

This is a major milestone in the history of Sammamish.

The Town Center plan was some six years in the making, involving five citizen committees and commissions comprised of about 70 citizens; City Councils spanning 2004-2010; and staff time to this day.

Hundreds of citizens participated in charets and public meetings over the course of this time.

The creation of the Town Center Plan truly began in about 2004. The area, roughly bounded by an area extending to the Mars Hill Church on 228th (the church lies just outside the northern boundary) to Skyline High School and Mary Queen of Peace on the north; and from the Eastside Catholic High School (which is outside the Town Center) on the East to roughly 222nd St. on the West. The Sammamish Commons is part of the Town Center Plan.

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