Seattle suburb typifies tensions of development as region’s population booms | News

Seattle

SAMMAMISH, Washington – Growth and development have long sparked heated social and political debates on the plateau that stretches from Lake Sammamish to the foothills of the Cascade.

“Almost everyone shared a basic assumption about the new city: ‘Growth is bad, the roads are good,'” said a Seattle Times report on a Sammamish city council candidate debate. The year was 1999.

Cut to 2021 and it can feel like not much has changed.

Sammamish, one of the country’s wealthiest cities, is embroiled in an ongoing legal battle over whether it is wrongly blocking new commercial space, apartments and townhouses in a partially developed area called the Town Center.

The debate that rages on Facebook groups and local politics can feel like blood sports. The city’s former mayor is fighting Sammamish in court, and a city council member abruptly resigned this year. The themes reflect the past: rapid growth and concerns about lagging infrastructure like sewers, schools and roads.

This time the debate takes place against the stark background of climate change.

“We all have to face the fact that our children and grandchildren will not be able to live the suburban lifestyle we have without damaging the environment and the climate,” said Pam Stuart, a member of the Sammamish City Council.

“We have to change the way we live,” said Stuart. “You have to ask yourself: Can we do this if we continue to build large single-family houses in dead ends that need cars?”

As Washington prepares for its next wave of growth – 1.5 million people and 1.1 million jobs expected in the next 30 years – the struggle in Sammamish provides a case study into the delicate policies and delaying tactics behind the denser housing effort can encounter.

The Growth Management Act, passed three decades ago, requires certain cities and counties to plan for population growth and sets goals, including promoting affordable housing. Sammamish is within King County’s designated urban growth area, which extends from Seattle to the north to the coast, to the south to Auburn, and to the east to Sammamish and an area near North Bend. The incorporation of the city in the 1990s was a response to the early days of growth.

Stuart, who supports building more housing, is a minority vote on the council. Skeptics of the new development say that the city of 67,000 people could be congested without necessary infrastructure such as road improvements.

“What we are saying is that we will try to find our own house here and get it in order,” said Deputy Mayor Christie Malchow during a council meeting last fall on the county’s growth planning. (Malchow and other council members declined interview requests, citing ongoing litigation.)

“And then,” said Malchow, “we can build.”

“Sammamish is no longer calm”

When Sarah Hawes Kimsey heard her Sammamish roommates worry about traffic, crowded schools, and protecting the area’s natural beauty, “I say I think growth will take place whether we like it or not,” she said.

“The best thing you can do is stand in front of it … we can’t just slam the door behind the latest people to move here,” said Kimsey, who previously worked for the city and then blogged about the Sammamish policy headed.

Kimsey said she lost her Sammamish condo to foreclosure following the 2008 market crash and was struggling to find a rental apartment. “We need more options,” she said.

City plans for the Town Center, which were adopted in 2008, provide for a “wedding cake”: higher development in the center, tapering towards the edges.

Today two upscale apartment complexes and several commercial buildings are already finished and in use, but a number of measures in the town hall have blocked the next phase. Developers are planning commercial space, 300 apartments and 48 terraced houses. Sammamish is roughly 86% single-family homes, and the average home price is just over $ 1 million.

In 2019, the city council passed new rules for so-called traffic simultaneity, which are designed to ensure that local roads keep pace with the growth. Don Gerend, a former Sammamish mayor and member of the city council, called for the move and accused the city of using unrealistic traffic rules to block development. When that dispute went through a state hearing committee, the city passed a series of development moratoriums.

In 2020 and 2021, the Growth Management Hearings Board found three times that the city was not complying with the GMA. At one point the board asked Governor Jay Inslee to withhold taxpayer money from Sammamish.

The city council has lifted its most recent development moratorium under threat of sanctions.

But the fight will likely continue. Sammamish has requested an appeals court review and the city council has cleared the expenses for ongoing legal expenses.

Gerend watched in frustration. He sees the project as a place where empty nests can shrink and stay in the city.

“You really don’t see the big vision for the future of this city,” he said of the current council. “Basically, they want to close the doors to the city.”

Jason Ritchie did not wait for his term to end. The former city council member clashed with his colleagues over downtown and resigned in January. He says the opposition reflects “a sense of legitimacy”.

“What you have here are people who really dislike the city center and the kind of apartments that you think will attract the wrong people,” said Ritchie.

Outside the town hall, some residents are not aware of the details of the proposal but are concerned about further developments.

Ahmed Elmetwally said he moved to Sammamish after living in Seattle, Bellevue and Kirkland because he was looking for a homely feel to raise his children.

“If people want to live in condominiums, they can live closer to town,” says Elmetwally, who works in IT.

While Elmetwally said he feared the growth was too fast, he said he wouldn’t necessarily turn down more houses or townhouses that are being developed more slowly. Apartment buildings are another question.

“I totally disagree,” he said. “I feel like it is changing how Sammamish used to look, from a residential area to an urban area.”

The area is already feeling busier and more congested with traffic, he said. “Sammamish is no longer calm,” said Elmetwally.

Jane Simmons has mixed feelings.

Simmons said she moved to Sammamish because of a small town feel, but had difficulty finding a house that she and her husband could afford.

“All houses seem to be in the millions,” says Simmons, who works as a mountain bike instructor and looks after her two-year-old son. (Both Elmetwally and Simmons said they were unfamiliar with the ins and outs of the Town Center proposal, but talked about growth in general.)

Simmons said she wished there were more affordable housing but is cautious about new developments.

“With the population growing and all the commercial buildings going on, I don’t like that. I like the way Sammamish is,” she said.

“There are already a lot of people everywhere. It kind of feels like Sammamish doesn’t have that many,” Simmons said. “So I’d like to leave it that way. But I don’t want to stop anyone from living in Sammamish and enjoying it too.”

Next growth phase

With population growth, city and county governments across the region are facing similar issues.

It is estimated that King County will need an additional 418,000 housing units over the next 30 years. By 2050, the region’s population will be “older and more diverse, with smaller households than today,” which, according to the Puget Sound Regional Council, will increase the need for more housing.

In King County, it is estimated that less than one housing unit has been added to each new household in recent years.

The shortage is driving up prices and forcing people to live further away. Wealth is concentrated.

Some cities have absorbed more growth than others. According to King County, Seattle’s housing unit increased 23% from 2008 to 2017. Issaquah, Newcastle and Snoqualmie each increased their housing supply by 20% or more. At the same time, the housing supply in Sammamish increased by 10%.

Most of the new apartments in the region are customary on the market and still inaccessible for many. For example, the city center proposal will largely be a market price, with an expected 80 units for people earning 80% of the median income of the area, or around $ 65,000 for one person.

“Apartment buildings alone are not a guarantee of affordability,” said Alex Brennan, executive director of the nonprofit nonprofit organization Futurewise. But he added, “Without the ability to have some kind of apartment building, you won’t get more affordable housing options.”