The Planning Commission wants to hear from you about the status of our neighborhood plans, and what’s happened since the plans were adopted in 1998. They had a meeting for the Central Area plan (and a few others) but it was last Monday and coincided with our election forum, and very few people turned up (3, I’m told!). We asking the City to put on a “make-up session” for the Central Area, Capitol Hill, 12th Avenue and Pike-Pine neighborhoods, which may happen in the next week or two (E-mail Barbara E. Wilson, Planning Commision Director, [email protected], to help make that happen).
In the meantime, you can take part in a “Virtual Meeting”, by going to http://www.cityofseattle.net/planningcommission/, where you can watch a video introduction, read the draft status reports for your neighborhood, and then answer the same questions that the participants in the actual live sessions answered. You’ve got till Wednesday, August 12th to do so.
Below are links to some background information, and the official explanation of the process, from the August 2009 Department of Planning and Development newsletter.
Background information:
- Neighborhood Planning Overview
- Public Involvement process
- 1998 Central Area Plan
- The Pike-Pine Plan
- The Capitol Hill Plan
- The Madison-Miller plan (part of the Central Area Plan)
- Recent information about Madison Street redevelopment plans
Please take a few minutes to read up on what’s happening in our neighborhoods, and tell the City your thoughts. Now here’s the City explanation:
The virtual meeting deal is picking up steam. The Planning commission got a big bunch from Ballard, and last count was over 450 citywide (compared to just under 300 at the actual meetings). What this means is that the City will have more to work with from the neighborhoods that speak up and may pay more attention to them. If you haven’t yet, fill out the questionnaire.
It’s an interesting set of materials and does not take that long to do. I watched the short presentation, and studied the summary document. I thought about what I think are positive developments in the last 10 years, what I think needs more attention as far as implementation of the plan or new things the plan might address, and what I thought of the materials. Then I filled out the survey, which is just a few simple questions with a huge amount of space for comment.