Tuesday, January 6, 2009 7:28 am
DENIED! Bank of America plans reversed by Kirkland City Council vote of 4 to 3
Posted by Rob Butcher on Wednesday, May 7, 2008, 1:26
At 12:37AM the gavel came down as the Kirkland City Council ruled in favor of CiViK in their appeal of the mixed use project on the Bank of America site map in downtown at the corner of Kirkland Ave. and Lake Street South map. This project was to be the second phase of the Merrill Gardens senior housing now topping out next door. The Kirkland City Council voted in favor of the appellant by a vote of 4 to 3.
How the city council voted
VOTING IN FAVOR OF APPELLANT
- Mayor James Lauinger
- Jessica Greenway
- Dave Asher
- Tom Hodgson
VOTING AGAINST APPEALLANT
- Deputy Mayor Joan McBride
- Mary-Alyce Burleigh
- Bob Sternoff
The stunning reversal of a project in the heart of downtown brings back memories of the Lake and Central reversal by Council after a battle with CiVik a few years ago.
The three witnesses for CiVik, Bea Nahon, Jim McElwee and Rob Brown gave rebuttal testimony against the project tonight. The majority of CiViK’s appeal was heard during the first half of the quasi-judicial hearing which started April 15th.
The ruling by the council found the application did not meet two requirements needed for the project to be granted a fifth floor:
- a bank is not considered to be a “superior retail use”, and
- building heights along Lake Street South are to be limited to a height of only two floors.
By chance, earlier Tuesday morning, SRM Development, was lauded on the front page of the Seattle Times for their Google project in Kirkland. But their luck ran out later that day when they were denied by the council. SRM will have the option of appealing the council decision in the Superior Court if they wish.
This fiasco shows just how much Kirkland needs to fix the problems with developing in downtown Kirkland. The rules are ambiguous and left open to too much discretion, interpretation and second guessing. Land owners face huge risk that their projects will be appealed — even when they follow city guidelines and regulations. Citizens cannot trust the city to follow its own rules and regulations — the same rules and regulations created to protect Kirkland’s citizens from poor planning and development.
SRM bought the property from B of A in good faith and followed every requirement made of them by the Design Review Board and then they still found themselves embroiled in an appeal — which they lost tonight.
What did SRM do wrong? Nothing. This is a problem with the city process. What did CiViK do wrong? Nothing — they found that the city was not playing by the established rules and said STOP. Why have rules if the city can ignore them?
Something has to change. This is no way to run a city. Schizophrenia cannot be de facto city policy. We need leadership from City Hall to solve this problem and sadly there is none to be found. This is a sad day for Kirkland. Let us hope our fair city can rectify this situation so that citizens can be assured the rules are followed and property owners can make improvements and in turn help to improve Kirkland.
What are your views? How can it be that property owners can follow the rules and then get the rug pulled out from under them at the last minute? Why must citizens file lawsuits in order to appeal poor decisions made by the DRB? How will this result affect the pending McCloud project next door? How can Kirkland straighten this mess out? Oh, the humanity!
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22 Responses to “DENIED! Bank of America plans reversed by Kirkland City Council vote of 4 to 3”
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congratulations to civik. they have fought so hard to protect kirkland from the developers and the city plans to put 5 stories in downtown. just like the old days of lake and central. now what? we need to clean out the design review board and start fresh.
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I heart DOWNTOWN Kirkland!!!!!!
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Schizophrenia is the perfect word for how Kirkland treats developers. Who would be crazy enough to want to build here ever again after watching what you did to one of the best builders around? They didn’t deserve this.
Kirkland will wither because of these actions.
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is this a new weblog? glad to see it. kirkland needs to hear new voices.
the city needs to learn that the citizens are who they work for. the ‘we know best’ condescending attitude portrayed is amazing and those who act that way need to be cut down to size. we need development. we need regulations. we need to work together. everyone wants a better city, so why can’t we agree on what that will be. some growth is good and needed. too much is bellevue. we need a fix.
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Who would have guessed that sleepy little Kirkland, Washington would have to deal with big city issues? Well! Sounds like Kirkland doesn’t know if it is a big city or a little one. Who is in charge of this place cause its time to stop having people suing the city. Kirkland needs development to remain healthy, people.
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Congrads to all that made this reversal possible! Keep the momentum going! Thank you for all your “hard” work!
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The city attorney advised the DRB that “use” cannot be a determiner for “superior” retail. The council ignored it’s own attorney’s advice and ruled that “use” DOES determine whether or not it is superior.
The project steps back significantly establishing a REAL presence at Lake Street of only two stories in strict accordance with established zoning.
The 4 council members who voted against were simply swaying in the wind of latest public opinion. What they did was reprehesible, and probably illegal. They have exposed the city to significant legal liability.
No leadership. No predictability. And, were I the developer I would sue the city for the right to build.
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I’m surprised that it turned out this way. I know there is a lot of anti-growth sentiment on the city council, but I thought they’d let this project move ahead. Not only had it been approved at all levels beneath them., include three rounds of reveiw and modification by the Design Review Board, they were bound by these rules from the Kirkland Zoning Code:
“Unless substantial relevant information is presented at the open record appeal hearing that was not considered by the DRB, the DRB decision shall be accorded substantial weight. The City Council may reverse or modify the DRB decision if, after considering all of the evidence in light of the design regulations, design guidelines, and Comprehensive Plan, the City Council determines that a mistake has been made.”
This code was quoted by Planning staff in a memo included in the background information given to councilmembers before the hearing.
If they don’t want to allow to developers to run afoul of these things, then write firm rules. But they DO want developers to do nice projects, so they give them some rope. Then when any group of citizens scream, they tighten the noose.
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So are they just denied a 5th floor, or were they denied anything above 2? What about the other building development? The one that’s coming up next to Tully’s? It’s currently scheduled for 4 floors. I think it’s in appeal as well. Will it be limited to 2? Or does this ruling only set a 4 floor precident?
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“Why must citizens file lawsuits in order to appeal poor decisions made by the DRB?” Perhaps this is a semantics matter, but people deeming a decision as “poor” is not the same as standing on sufficient ground on which to base an appeal. Citizens are filing lawsuits to further personal, not community, agendas.
Downtown Kirkland is in a state of “every man for himself.” It feels as if no one and nothing is reliable. Does anyone care that there are lives and businesses being grossly affected by all of this? I am talking about people’s livelihoods and finances!
Exactly how does CiViK define a “vibrant” Kirkland? Massive small business turnover (continuing along the way of the past 10 years, or more?)? High commercial rents? Empty streets and sidewalks 9 months out of the year? Paltry business tax revenue for the city? More and more condos, resulting in an ever increasing reality of Kirkland as a bedroom community?
To compound on someone’s comment above, Kirkland is already withering, this will help speed the process. A sad day for Kirkland, for those who love Kirkland, not those who purport to love it.
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I see that all the shills for the developers are weighing in, so maybe a few of we unenlightened, misguided citizens of Kirkland should post comments of our own. Of course a city needs development to prosper (duh!), but that’s not what this is about. This involves responsible development, which the BOA project most certainly is not. CiViK is NOT anti-development in any way, shape or form … what it is against is developers running amok and ignoring the rules that have been established by local government.
A lot of the dialog at last night’s meeting was pretty much irrelevant, and the only council member who seemed to “get it” from the start was Ms. Greenway, who repeated time after time that her duty as a council member was to uphold the provisions of the comprehensive plan. That’s it, end of story. So there’s no justification for being angry at the four inidividuals who were brave enough to do what they were elected to do.
One final thought: the most brilliant comment of the evening came near the end from Tom Hodgson, who said (I’m paraphrasing) that it appeared as though the DRB simply wanted this project to be built and tried to find ways to make it fit within the guidelines of the Comprehensive Plan. I couldn’t possibly agree more.
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Congrats to CiViK! I’m not anti-growth, just anti-Bellevue. If I wanted to live in Bellevue, I would have moved there. Special thanks to the City Council for listening to the wishes of the citizens of Kirkland! We want no more than TWO stories all along Lake Street - change the zoning if you have to in order to be fair to both developers and the citizens! We want to see the views of the lake and the sky! We want to see the lake from the public walkway that used to be 1st Street. Keep Kirkland pedestrian friendly! We don’t want developers who are only interested in squeezing every last drop out of every square inch; they always want more, if you give them 4 stories, they want 8. Lake Street needs to be redeveloped, and a lot can be done with two stories. Let’s hope the citizens stand up to the McLeod project as well and it is rendered the same fate with the citizen’s appeal. Our message: We want you to redevelop, and you can dig as deep as you want for parking, but the citizens don’t want any more than two stories.
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Two stories isn’t economically feasible, so redevelopment won’t happen, which is exactly what a lot of citizens want.
As for the DRB trying to fit this project into the Comp Plan or any other regulations, that is their job! They tell the applicant what to do to make the project acceptable to them, the applicant makes changes and comes back, and eventually they work it out. It took 3 meetings, if I recall correctly.
In that vein, I thought the worst that the Council would do to the applicant would be to send it back to the DRB for more work. That was their third option, and that is typical of how the Council deals with issues.
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First off, I truly resent the “shills” comment, as I might too appear to a stranger on a blog as pro- development, but I am simply a struggling business owner who would like to work only 6 days a week to make ends meet, you people have no idea what it takes to survive these winters!
I wasn’t thrilled with the 5th floor of B of A but at 4 floors, it seemed a decent enough building, and I hate looking at the current one, so a net gain of aesthetics. But if you really think that Lake St can be redeveloped at 2 stories, you are living in the 80’s. Let’s say you’re McLeod and you have 2 properties worth $15-20 million combined. You can’t get that much more out of the property without a hugely expensive parking garage under it, and in the end, you will be collecting $50 per square foot on 50K sq ft instead of the current 130K. That difference is the whole reason the other side of the street looks like crap. It’s not going to make a landlord money to make a nice building, so they’ll just raise rents on what is by today’s standard, slummy retail.
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To “Do The Math” I would like to sincerely apologize about the reference to “shills.” It was tacky of me to choose that term, especially given that I don’t believe blogs should be used for name-calling, but rather for intelligent discussion.
Perhaps my indiscretion points to a key problem with this entire issue … that being that it’s highly charged with emotion on both sides. And, in part, that emotion probably stems from a lack of understanding, plenty of misinformation, and the tendency (at least on my part) to lump all developers into a single BAD category. I have worked in Bellevue for many years and almost want to cry when I see how development is destroying this city. Huge ugly skyscrapers are popping up everywhere, many of them built by out-of-town developers who couldn’t possibly care less about what local residents think, and many of the condos are purchased by out-of-town speculators, who again don’t really care about community impact. So, someone like me sees Intended Use notices going up in Kirkland, and the first thought is “Oh my God, here come those greedy developers to now reek havoc in our community.” Is that fair? Probably not. Is it cause for concern? Probably yes, because constructing 4-5 stories all along Lake Street will have a dramatic (and in my view, detrimental) effect on the look and feel of our downtown area.
And you are correct in saying that I have no idea what it’s like to live in your shoes. Having no experience running a retail establishment, I can only imagine how the lack of shopper traffic during the off months must keep you awake at nights. Let’s both hope that a compromise position can be reached. We definitely DO need redevelopment in Kirkland, but let’s hope it can be “reasonable,” whatever that may mean. Many concerned residents could probably live with three stories … but again, most of us don’t truly understand the economic feasibility issues, which is a big part of the problem.
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Well said. Maybe like to info sessions for Parkplace, we could all debate it in the KPC so that each side might better understand the other, then compromises can begin.
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Thank you to all for your comments. The exchange between ‘Carter’ and ‘do the math’ is an example of two sides stepping away from the brink and attempting to find compromise we can all live with. This is what we need more of in this town - finding common ground. Very good gentlemen (or gentlewomen).
Hopefully, all fair-minded individuals can agree on a few basic assumptions about development downtown. Let me take a crack at a list:
1. We can assume that the parties with opposing views from our own also want an economically vibrant and livable city as well
2. Kirkland maintains its small town charm with focus on pedestrians and human scale
3. We do not want downtown Kirkland to become another Bellevue
4. We do not want downtown Kirkland to be a dead zone which developers shun
5. We do not want downtown Kirkland to be a place where shops get boarded up and people do not want to live/browse/dine/play/recreate/gather
6. We do not want a situation in which citizens feel they must appeal development plans because they do not follow comp plans and city regulations
7. Development will not take place when there is high risk or great uncertaintay - Kirkland is high risk with great uncertainty
8. We do want to remove the high risk associated with developing downtown
9. If it is not economically feasible to build, it will not take place. For example, one story buildings along Lake Street may be your preference, but it is not feasible because the land costs are too high. Nothing will ever be developed and downtown will stagnate.
10. compromise and working together is the only way we can solve this mess
Right now developers would be crazy to risk money and time here. We all need this situation to be rectified. Those who want free reign to build anything they like need not apply in Kirkland. Try Bellevue instead. Those who do not want any development downtown are equally out of luck. Those are extreme positions and not realistic for downtown Kirkland. We need to be able to have sensible compromise on this issue. The extreme positions on both sides cannot prevail. The vast majority of us in the middle need to voice our opinions and fix this mess.
Let us all hope that from the ashes of the recent appeal of the B of A project, a solution will rise which will be acceptable for all fair minded individuals. Please let me know your thoughts. Am I off base? Did I omit something? Did I include too much? What say you?
Sincerely,
Rob Butcher
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All good comments except the reference to Bellevue. Only problem with Bellevue is no public access to the waterfront. Vancouver is a beautiful city of high rise buildings. Kirkland is too small to have high rise, street grid is too small, 4-5 stories are not high rise.
But I digress.
Our population in Puget Sound will increase by 1.7M people in the next 30 years. We will need responsible development in core areas served by transit, employment, goods and services and utilities. Density preserves open spaces, drainage courses, farmlands, forest land, uses less energy, building materials, water etc.
Cities need to establish zoning criteria and stick to them. The Kirkland code tried to give flexibility in the downtown zone where it does not in other zones. Unfortunately it created a subjective process. Seattle established zoning heights and then relies upon design review to administer the modulation of the building, its fenestration, materials and colors. Kirkland needs to do the same. Developers need to be able to predict the size of the buildings in order to determine whether or not to build. It’s like buying a house not knowing whether or not your entire family will be allowed to live there. Who would do that?
No wonder we have a problem.
Superior retail for more floors? Ridiculous. Just establish the height and make sure all retail spaces are superior. Who wants inferior retail spaces even if the building is lower? They were trying to create incentives where they aren’t needed.
Retail uses. If the City is going to say which uses are “superior” we could be in for a long slide on a slippery slope. They clearly don’t like banks, what about real estate offices, tanning salons (don’t know how they contribute to anyone as no one buys anything there except some ultraviolet rays). What would be next? If four people (Council members) don’t like it then landlords don’t get a tenant?
Good comments on development and how it works or doesn’t where only two stories can be built. Park Lane as two stories will not be redeveloped. The development could never support the required parking- so if we like it the way it is, which alot of people do, then two story zoning will keep it that way. It will continue to be a quaint area with retail turnover.
Of course this all affects property values so the folks who bought property in these core areas are affected the most. Most of them probably thought if they buy in a great location in the heart of Kirkland their values would most certainly rise or at least do as well as other parts of the city. Not necessarily. Again, zoning.
Yes, the current comp plan needs some work to make it more clear. And the staff does its best with what it is given as does the Design Review Board. I think the Council should listen to the experts that they’ve enlisted to make decisions and judgements. The Council members are not design professionals, land planners, architects, urban planners…unless someone has been in night school lately…
Would you buy a property and not know whether you could build a 100 sf shed or a 10,000 sf house? We all need predictability. Then we wouldn’t have appeals.
I think Rob is right on. This one will get resolved and hopefully we’ll learn something.
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We all want a vibrant, active streetfront oriented downtown. None of us want retail to have the turnover it currently experiences. But indulge me with some unemotional facts if you would.
Retail needs people. People means density and parking. FACT: It takes 3,000 residential units within a 15 minute walk to support 1 block of retail.
Density and diversity of use are the keys to vibrant, active, and economically viable retail. And I’m not talking chain stores.
Density in and of itself is not evil. It can be executed in such a way as to be very atractive. 4-5 stories is hardly dense. It is barely minimal to achieve economic viability for street retail.
Diversity activates a street with office workers during the day and residents at night and on weekends. And, density/diversity mitigates the seasonality of our current retail clients.
You may want vibrant retail downtown without density/diversity and parking. But you may as well wish that gravity did not apply. It simply cannot happen, no matter how badly we want it to.
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I don’t want Kirkland to become like Bellevue, but 4-5 stories is nothing compared to the skyscrapers they are throwing up in that town. What are they, 25 stories? We need clearly spelled out limits, not this flexible stuff that the Kirkland council members can individually interpret however they feel like. The vote was pretty much along the usual lines - the progressives were outnumbered by the anti-development members.
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[...] yet another stunning turn of events, last night the Kirkland City Council reversed its previous decision to deny the Bank of America application by a vote of six to one. Council member Tom Hodgson was the [...]
[...] pose these questions because of the continued blowback surrounding the City Council’s May 6 decision in favor of CiViK (the appellant) over SRM Development (the applicant) in the Bank of America [...]