Despite my best efforts, I can find no one in town who wants to see their monthly utility bill double from $200 a month to $400 a month in order to incentivize 3,000 more households to relocate to our community, but that is exactly the direction that the city is taking. City leadership has abandoned…
Anacortes’ new Comprehensive Plan appears to encourage the construction of thousands of new housing units. To do so, the City is considering reversing the long‑standing requirement that new developments pay for the utility upgrades they necessitate. If true, who decided this? Where is it documented? The rationale seems to be that adding 3,000 new units…
In Growth Management Hearings Board (GMHB) Case No. 0002c, Ian Munce and Evergreen Islands v. City of Anacortes, the Board addressed my issue as to ongoing, pre-existing critical area destruction in my immediate neighborhood by pointing out that AMC 19.70.040 as newly adopted simply prohibits such ongoing destruction. Pages 7 and 8 are attached for…
I guess we should have expected it, but it’s disappointing none the less. Since “affordable housing” is a critical issue for all our communities, it is now being used as a cudgel or enticement for what would otherwise be an unacceptable development options. For Skagit County, the implementation of GMA was particularly painful. We were…
Dear Mayor and City Council Your proposal for fee updates really needs more work, i.e. a cost recovery analysis for each permit type. The permit system needs to be financially self-supporting and not have development applications funded by existing ratepayers and taxpayers (as they obviously currently are). The public also needs to know well in…
Dear editor, I am 74, forming most of my views during the Vietnamese war, 3 political assassinations, resignation of President Nixon, horrible environmental degradation, and the Arab Oil crisis. For me, the future needed to use less energy and form rules to decrease ecological destruction, as did most other voters in this State. This was…
As house builder, past president of Skagit Habitat, and strong advocate for affordable housing (Bill) and John a past president of SHH, a City administrator for LaConner for 14 years, we comment below on the many failures of the Housing element of the CP. We sent the City Clerk for your review links to 2…
Letter to Council and local citizens, Councilman Walters dislike of public comment and due process is apparent in his aversion to a conditional use permit process for impactful projects marks a major departure from previous City Council members recognition that: ‘neighbors have property rights too’ design standards need to take into account existing neighborhood character…
