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Tag: City of Spokane

Quality of Life vs. Quick Buck

Quality of Life vs. Quick Buck

One week ago, the Spokane County commissioners opted to gobble up another 6,000 acres of surrounding countryside to build more cookie-cutter homes and strip malls. Their expansion of the urban growth area (UGA) could end up costing taxpayers an additional $64 million. Developers and big-box stores are the ones who most stand to benefit.

Map of UGA expansion. Borrowed with the best of intentions from the Inlander's blog post.
Map of UGA expansion. Borrowed with the best of intentions from the Inlander’s blog post.

In his recent column titled “Growth vote unsupported by the math,” the Spokesman-Review‘s Shawn Vestal outlines some of the opposition to the UGA vote as well as the commissioners’ less-than-forthright approach to its actual costs:

The question of whether to expand the county’s growth boundary — whether to sprawl expensively or grow in a more concentrated, smarter fashion — has been an interesting case. Against the objections of everyone from Spokane Mayor David Condon to state growth officials to activist groups, county commissioners Al French, Todd Mielke and Shelly O’Quinn [have] voted unanimously to sprawl.

He references a less euphemistic blog post by Daniel Walters at the Inlander, “Spokane County really screwed up its Urban Growth Area math,” which in turn references a Spokesman news article on the subject.

This decision is something that will affect us at both the city and neighborhood levels.

Sprawl makes us more reliant on cars (thereby increasing traffic and pollution), creates more vacant retail stores and homes near the city center (a surefire way to speed neighborhood collapse), and costs more in taxpayer money in the long run (the additional infrastructure is expensive to build and maintain, and big-box stores draw more money away from the community than they put in). The arguments in favor of sprawl are hard to find — we’d welcome any in the comments.

One of the reasons people proudly cite for living in Spokane is its easy access to green spaces: “Just a 30-minute drive and you’re in the forest!” Urban sprawl beats nature further back, which means that 30-minute drive will eventually become an hour. With the commissioners’ approach to the UGA, over time that clever “Near Nature, Near Perfect” tourist slogan will simply become: “Near Wal-Mart.”

Comprehensive Plan Open House (Mar 13)

Comprehensive Plan Open House (Mar 13)

There will be an open house for the 2012-2014 Comprehensive Plan Review and Update on Wednesday, March 13 from 5:30 to 7:30pm. It will take place on the lower level of Spokane City Hall [map] in the City Council Chambers and Chase Gallery.

The open house will be hosted by the Plan Commission and will serve as a follow-up to the district meetings that took place last month. Preliminary findings and survey results from those meetings will be presented and discussed, in addition to the opportunity for those who could not attend the February meetings to take both surveys. Demographic data will also be displayed.

Comprehensive Plan Update, March 13 Flyer

Why is the Comp Plan important? Put simply, it affects every aspect of how Spokane will grow in the coming years. If you don’t want to be unhappy with the city’s development in 2018, this is the meeting you should be attending in 2013.

If you have any questions, contact Jo Anne Wright. Her e-mail is jwright@spokanecity.org; her phone is (509) 625-6017.

E-G Planning Meeting Tonight (Mar 7)

E-G Planning Meeting Tonight (Mar 7)

The Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Planning Group is meeting tonight (Thursday, March 7) at 6pm in Corbin Senior Center.

Please note that this date reflects the new meeting schedule on the first Thursday of every month. It was changed last month to accommodate more participants’ schedules.

There’s more planning-related news than usual this month because of several new or updated city- and neighborhood-level projects. Here’s a rough overview of the agenda topics:

  • Comprehensive Plan Update
  • Storm water runoff and sewers, a .5 billion dollar project for Spokane
  • City Council/Community Assembly discussion on neighborhood plans
  • CAN-PAC meeting review
  • Announcement of STA open houses for corridor upgrades

The planning group is always looking to include more participants who represent all facets of the neighborhood — so feel free to attend if you have an interest in mapping out Emerson-Garfield’s future. We hope to see you there!

Submit Your Traffic-Calming Proposals

Submit Your Traffic-Calming Proposals

Do cars tear down your street? Do you see a lot of reckless cut-through traffic on roads near your house? Is there a spot on a busy road that threatens the safety of pedestrians, cyclists, and other drivers?

Here’s the good news: You can do something about it.

Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council is soliciting neighborhood traffic-calming proposals to be implemented in 2014-15. These will be vetted, voted on, and then the top two (one residential proposal, one arterial proposal) will be passed to the city for consideration.

Traffic-calming proposals include anything from curb extensions to traffic circles (aka roundabouts), chicanes, traffic islands, medians, landscaping, and pedestrian crosswalks. You can see some examples of these in the images above.

The traffic-calming toolbox (PDF link) from the City of Spokane provides a lot of easy-to-read information about potential traffic-calming measures, including a short description of each one as well as pros and cons. This post from a street-scaping blog also has lots of ideas and images.

Unfortunately, the deadline is incredibly tight (it’s Friday, March 1), but that’s because word didn’t filter out of the city until recently — so you’ll need to e-mail your suggestions immediately to emerson.garfield@gmail.com. We’ll take care of the initial paperwork.

Please include the following basic info in your e-mail:

  • Your contact information
  • The exact location of the proposed traffic-calming project
  • Why you think traffic calming is necessary in that particular location
  • Which traffic-calming method (e.g., chicanes, pedestrian islands, roundabouts) would be most effective

Keep in mind that, if your proposal is selected by the city for further study, you might have to collect signatures from neighbors for approval. This is not nearly as daunting as it sounds. Although there’s always a neighbor who grumbles or is overly suspicious, signature-gathering here in Emerson-Garfield is usually a pretty pleasant experience, especially for universally beneficial projects like these.

And should you think that nothing ever comes of these applications, please note that Emerson-Garfield is currently under study for one of the most ambitious traffic-calming projects in Spokane — which was entirely proposed and advocated by residents.

Building Stronger Neighborhoods Meeting, Feb 25

Building Stronger Neighborhoods Meeting, Feb 25

There will be a meeting for the new Building Stronger Neighborhoods Committee on Monday, February 25.

This year’s top goal for the Building Stronger Neighborhoods Committee is to attract and retain membership in the neighborhoods program. At the upcoming meeting we will discuss the responsibilities of the Chair, Vice Chair, and Secretary and tentatively hold elections. If you aren’t interested but know of someone who might be, please forward this information and let potential candidates know about the upcoming meeting.

Here’s what’s on the agenda:

  • Meet & Eats Plan for 2013
  • Recap of the January 30 event that was hosted in Chief Gary Park
  • Discuss template for helping Neighborhood Councils host M&E events
  • Schedule Meet & Eats for at least the next 3 months
  • Trainings Plan for 2013
  • Discuss working with COPS to training for Neighborhood Night Out Against Crime events
  • Plan out the first 6 months of 2013 trainings
  • Follow-Up on District 81 Program
  • Discuss which neighborhoods have been contacted
  • Discuss elections
  • Nominations for Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary Position
  • If time permits and there are nominations, take a vote on each position

The Building Stronger Neighborhoods Committee is a subcommittee of the Community Assembly. It works to provide training and resources to neighborhoods to increase participation, identify and meet neighborhood needs, and build capacity. The committee meets monthly and works directly with the Community Assembly and neighborhood chairs to set annual goals and work plan.

The meeting on February 25 will run from 11:30am to 12:30pm and will be held at Fire Station 4, which is located at 1515 W. 1st Ave [map] outside of Browne’s Addition (accessible by STA bus routes #20, #60, #61).