CNA MEETING AGENDA
April 11, 2022 6:30pm
6:30 – 7:00 Neighborhood Reports
7:00 – 7:05 Boulevard Road Housing Update – Larry Dzieza
7:05 – 7:15 Reimagining Public Safety Session for Neighborhoods – Stacey Ray, Strategic Plan Mgr.
7:15 – 7:45 Home Fund Status – Darian Lightfoot, Home Fund Manager
7:45 – 8:00 Council Liaison Report
8:00 – 8:10 Tim Smith Report
8:10 – 8:20 Neighborhood Enrichment Committee – Larry Dzieza
8:20 – 8:30 Minutes Approval and Agenda Ideas
8:30 Adjourn
CNA MEETING Minutes
April 11, 2022 6:30pm
Present:
Helen Wheatly (CRANA), Martha Worcester, (Redwood Estates), Tim Smith (staff), Larry Dzieza (Nottingham), Stacy Ray (Olympia Staff), Darrah Johnson (Wildwood), Dana McAvoy (East Bay), Darian Lightfoot (Olympia Staff), Bruce Coulter (Northwest), Charlotte Persons (Bigelow), (Ryan Hollander (Southwest Neighborhood) Karen Clemens (Eastside), Bob Jacobs (Governor Stevens), Dontae Payne (Councilmember), Victor Minjares (South Capitol), Lisa Riner (Burbank Elliot.
6:30 – 7:00 Neighborhood Reports
Helen Wheatly (CRANA) reported on her updating of her neighborhood mailing list and succession issues.
Dana McAvoy (East Bay) reported low activity and hoping to pickup activity in the Spring. Picnic is still on for August.
Martha Worcester (Redwood Estates) just had a meeting and elected officers.
Bob Jacobs (Governor Stevens) resumed the neighborhood egg hunt after 2 years off. Hopeful to get in-person Board meetings soon.
Bruce Coulter (Northwest) working with a group (Triangle Asset Generation) about the Capital Mall Triangle subarea plan. They are asking to be included in the City’s efforts. There are technological issues regarding their website. Can’t do the things they want to do. Eastside is helping out with the webhosting and some plug-ins to WordPress.
Ryan Hollander (Southwest Olympia Neighborhood) Getting dues back up after COVID and setup a PayPal account online. Go on to Google forms and you can pay your dues. Recognized the contribution of Mark Toy who is leaving the area. Consolidating documents online and getting social media energized. His area is also engaged in the Capital Mall area and on a city committee interview for selecting the consultants for the project. Ready to restart live events. West Central Park is back on corner of Division and Harrison.
Charlotte Persons (Bigelow) City is meeting about a 17 unit apartment development along East Bay Drive.
Victor Minjares (South Capitol) planning a summer BBQ. Concern over development of Capitol parking garage, especially the height.
Karen Clemens (Eastside) working with Leland consultants on the study of neighborhood centers. City has approved an asphalt path near the Sprayground. Working with the neighbors for agreement to get the asphalt path built. The Armory success is making folks happy and the association deserves credit helping it happen. Kym Foley is looking at a wetlands funding project and Eastside is hoping that they will be selected.
Darrah Johnson (Wildwood) Membership meeting for May 12, may be in person. Neighborhood night out scheduled for August.
Lisa Riner (Burbank Elliot) Spoke about the use of the Mall by neighbors when the power goes out. Neighbors are enjoying gathering at West Central Park music events. Older neighbors are getting out more since COVID.
Larry Dzieza (Nottingham), first egg hunt scheduled and looking at doing a neighborhood garage sale and art show.
7:00 – 7:05 Boulevard Road Housing Update – Larry Dzieza
Larry shared that the council selected Habitat for Humanity after they revisited their criteria for the Boulevard project.
7:05 – 7:15 Reimagining Public Safety Session for Neighborhoods – Stacey Ray, Strategic Plan Mgr.
Presented slide deck presented the city’s efforts to reimagine our public safety system. She reviewed the project scope and the diverse membership from the community. Early on it was decided that neighborhoods need to be heard from. She urged us to fill in the Engage Olympia survey by May 12th.
Helen Wheatly asked if there has been much outreach to youth? Ray replied that they are working with the school district.
Victor asked what the goal is? Is there a whistleblower number to leave opinions anonymously? Ray said the goal is listening and learning and making recommendations for policy changes, not day to day changes.
Councilmember Dontae Payne said yes, it is about gathering opinions. A desire by elected leaders to ask first. He imagines the goal is addressing racial disparities and crime reduction and how it is handled. He also raised the work of the Social Justice and Equity Commission. There will be an investigative component. He responded to Victor’s question about anonymity and complaints and he is hoping that is something the Commission will be involved in.
Victor asked if it would have subpoena power. Councilmember Payne said he doesn’t know.
7:15 – 7:45 Home Fund Status – Darian Lightfoot, Home Fund Manager
Ryan asked how it supports low-income developers? Stacey said it is a drop in the bucket. For example, the family support center costs about $26 million. The Home Fund has contributed $2.4 million over 3 years.
Wheatly asked about prioritization. Stacey says that they are looking at the criteria and the RCW requirements.
Martha Worcester related the problems of housing for seniors. People who have never been homeless and hard pressed for housing. Their housing is not stable.
Victor asked what a healthy vacancy rate would be? Stacey said 5 to 6% vacancy.
Helen Wheatly asked if people are being displaced faster than housing is being provided? If so, maybe more attention to displacement is called for. Isn’t this a regional issue in terms of vacancy rates? We can’t quickly build our way out of it, so we need to look at different metrics. Olympia has higher poverty and renter rates than other areas and those are linked.
Worcester said SHAG low-income housing for elderly got bought out by a corporation because it didn’t get federal funding.
Wheatly said that these corporations are raising the bar for renters.
Darian said that rent control is a very touchy issue. She recognized the concerns raised by the neighborhoods at the meeting and said we are dealing with the forces of capitalism and doing the best we can.
The goal was for five years to build 300 houses has almost been reached.
Darian agreed that the income limits used in Olympia don’t reflect the economic realities of Olympia.
Dzieza asked if the Oly Home Fund will now be coordinated with the Thurston County that just enacted a similar tax. Darian said yes it will be.
7:45 – 8:00 Council Liaison Report by Councilmember Dontae Payne
Agrees with Wheatly about the housing problem but that rent control is illegal in WA state. The city is in favor of looking at rent stabilization. On the Triangle plan; we are getting emails from neighborhoods and will continue to solicit the input from the community. Building electrification of city property is moving towards a decision.
Electrification is needed to meet the emissions targets.
Habitat says that they can get about 110 homes and target incomes 30 to 80% of AMI. They have 180 days to respond. Neighborhood Center, homeownership, affordability, senior housing were his priorities.
Updated us on work with WSDOT on homeless cleanup along I-5.
8:00 – 8:10 Tim Smith Report
Tim Smith shared his screen showing the matching grant submittals for council approval in May.
$23,000 is available and $11,314 requested.
Reviewed the housing construction projects in process. Affordable housing requires complex funding. The city also provides impact fee reductions.
Quince Street Village project is 1211 Quince Street, former Quality Inn site. Moving 80 tiny homes there. Approximately 100 homeless individuals. The city will issue a notice on the project to the neighborhood on April 14th.
Dzieza asked what will happen to the existing mitigation site? (It was not clear whether the 80 homes were a relocation or addition to the mitigation site’s housing).
Bob Jacobs asked what the financial impact to the city is when an impact fee reduction is approved by the City Council for a low income housing project. Tim Smith said he will get back to Bob about the question. Tim sent his answer by email as follows:
“The answer is that impact fees are typically one of several funding sources for capital projects to serve growth. An example of such a project is the Fones Road reconstruction project. Funding for that project comes from State and Federal grants, Transportation Impact Fees and other City funding such as REET (Real Estate Excise Tax). So if the total amount of impact fees is reduced because of a low income housing project for which Council approved an impact fee reduction, the funding is made up by other funding sources.”
8:10 – 8:20 Neighborhood Enrichment Committee – Larry Dzieza
Larry reviewed the Google survey he did about areas of interest
Larry asked for ideas on how to convene these meetings.
Bruce Coulter thought that a meeting, in person, as a retreat when we can get together.
Persons suggested outside when the weather gets better. She suggested a Doodle poll be sent out and get some dates for meetings set.
8:20 – 8:30 Minutes Approval and Agenda Ideas
Larry reviewed the sidewalk discussion from last meeting and the issue raised by Councilmember Gilman about treating sidewalks as an important part of a multi-modal transportation model and discussion by a Council committee that resulted in the conclusion that the city should revisit their sidewalk policies. Larry presented data from the city regarding claims against the city paid for injuries from sidewalk liability. He displayed claims paid totaling around $400,000 for claims dating back to 2016 (not necessarily the date claim was settled or paid).
Ideas that were raised with sidewalk maintenance cost sharing and liens against properties payable upon sale for repairing sidewalk repairs. Master contracts and city employees doing the repairs for things like sidewalk grinding was also discussed.
Persons pointed out that bad sidewalks discourage people from accessing bus stops and transit. Larry said that it is spot-on as sidewalks are a link in an intermodal transportation schemes and that they especially effect those too young, too old or too poor to have access to autos or otherwise unable to drive.
Judy Bardin pointed out that in some neighborhoods there are no sidewalks and the push to allow more street parking leaves people having to walk on the street and as it gets bumper to bumper parking it increases the danger to the pedestrians.
Agenda Ideas; Bruce like Charlotte’s idea to do a survey to get the committees going. Larry suggested an invite for an organizing meeting which was seen favorably.
Wheatly suggested Dani Madrone or TJ Johnson give a presentation on urban agriculture.
Bob Jacobs had ideas about sidewalks being expensive to fix when removing and replanting trees may be a better apporach.
The March minutes were approved.
8:30 Adjourn
Council of Neighborhood Associations 