City of Newcastle -- Planning Commission Meeting of March 20, 2013
The on-going conversation about the Comprehensive Plan continued in the first hour of this meeting with all commissioners in attendance. One of the earliest comments from the Commission was about coming up with a more fascinating name for the Plan, as someone brought up the fact that Deputy Mayor Lisa Jensen had suggested this recently to generate more community interest about what's going on with it and how it should proceed since the drab sounding "Comprehensive Plan" didn't seem to do the trick. "Newcastle 2035" was one idea, "20 - 20" or something like that was another. N.P.R. has no idea what the significance of 2035 is as relating to all of this (a 20 year continuum after the 2015 date of the Plan?) or what "20 - 20" exactly signifys, other than perhaps "being focused." Speaking of community interest, at one point, the Commission haggled over the wording of how the city should enable volunteerism, and decided on something along the lines of the following, if not exact: "Newcastle recognizes the importance of volunteerism and encourages it among its citizens for the public good." Regarding other Plan business, the Commission didn't appear too fond of the "contract city" terminology (referring to Newcastle) that they said originated from the Council, which Community Development Director, Tim McHarg, said is meant to encourage public sector and government cooperation with other cities. At least one commissioner implied that Newcastle should strive to be as independent as possible, however, the Commission writ large appeared to swallow the "contract city" language in order to appease the Council lords (the italicized is non sequitur joshing by N.P.R.). McHarg also commented about Newcastle's storm water infrastructure, which he said is in the best shape that it has ever been in thanks to the Public Works Department and its director, Mark Rigos. The department recently completed a capital facilities management plan (streets, parks, storm water), according to McHarg. McHarg also talked about Land Use, which he said is the core of everything, but there were a lot of constraints with building land in the city.
Commissioner Jon Simpson spoke about an increasingly aging population, and thus the importance of accessory dwellings which were becoming prevalent (presumably meaning in society, although, maybe he was referring specifically to the city). N.P.R. isn't exactly schooled on this particular terminology, but its seems to conject some type of sub-housing that is a part of the main housing structure in some way -- a cottage in the backyard or something like that.
Commissioner Rob Lemmon brought up the issue of solar panels on houses -- which have invigorated green energy use and help the environment (N.P.R.'s non sequitur) -- and said that homeowners' associations cannot legally forbid or limit their use in Washington, but they can implement placement guidelines.
Planning official, David Lee, said, in so many words, that "Critical Areas" and Transportation would take up the lion's share of resources in resolving issues related to the Plan.
Planning Commission Chairman, John Drescher, began the proceedings by saying that the Commission should or wants to complete the Comprehensive Plan by the end of 2014. Incidentally, only two journalists were in the audience for the first hour, but the Commission wants more community participation in the discussion about these matters. So the clarion call of the Commission for this project may well be "Newcastlers, come now, come all!"
[revised and updated on 3/28/2013]
