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We will be watching the live stream (via the Seattle Channel) from Ravenna Blog HQ and covering the action in the space below. Readers may follow along (and make comments) during the live event, or come back later to read our notes. We will also embed the video of the meeting here once it is available.

SPOILER ALERT: The Full Council meeting agenda already includes eight of the nine Councilmembers’ votes (then Council President Conlin was absent from the December 14, 2011 Committee on the Built Environment meeting due to illness).

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UPDATE (12:18 PM): The Councilmembers present at today’s meeting of the Committee on the Built Environment have voted to move the Roosevelt Rezone (with the 65-foot-heights on the blocks just south of Roosevelt High School) forward to a full council vote. Full council vote likely to take place on January 17, 2012.

For more details about the vote and today’s COBE meeting in general, read our archived coverage of the meeting below.

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Tomorrow, Wednesday, December 14, the Seattle City Council’s Committee on the Built Environment meets to discuss and possibly vote on the Roosevelt Neighborhood Rezone (Council Bill 117379).

The meeting starts at 10:30 AM in the Council Chambers of City Hall (600 Fourth Avenue) with the Chair’s Report, then moves into 10 minutes* of public comment before the briefing on the bill begins.

We will be covering the event LIVE, right here, starting around 10:30 AM. Our notes will be archived here after the meeting, as well.

Recent Background Information

Just last week at another COBE meeting, the Committee discussed four different rough design options for the three blocks south of Roosevelt High School, before showing a preference (five of the eight councilmembers in attendance) for Option 2: A zoning designation of NC2-65 with over 25,000-square-feet of open space at street level.

You can download the entire design presentation by GGLO, “Development Standards for the High School Blocks,” in PDF format (5.03 MB) here.

An image of Option 2 from the GGLO design presentation. The view is from NE 65th Street, facing north toward the high school.

The next day, COBE Chair, Councilmember Sally Clark, summed up the rezone process so far and clarified her position on it on her blog.

Councilmember Bruce Harrell weighed in as well, on his personal blog. While he states his prefererence for design Option 2 at 65-feet, it was his “understanding that throughout the long process of neighborhood planning, the surrounding communities consistently made it clear that these three blocks should be protected from 65 foot heights.” Councilmember Harrell did not state specifically how he would vote, he did say that “[W]hat matters most to me…is that communities are ensured that their local government is truly listening to them when deciding how this city should look in the future.”

Then, today, a curve ball

Only yesterday, Publicola teased that Councilmember Nick Licata would be adding an amendment to the Roosevelt Neighborhood Rezone bill which would leave the three most contested blocks out of the rezone altogether. Today, Licata shared his position on the rezone on his Urban Politics blog.

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*Ha!

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Thank you for writing to me regarding the Roosevelt Development Group’s (RDG’s) proposed Comprehensive Plan amendment.  I’m sorry for the generic response, but this particular amendment generated a lot of emails. (Good job!)  This is the quickest way to respond to everyone.  Please email me back if I didn’t answer a question related to your particular comment.

Yesterday the Council voted to exclude RDG’s amendment for further consideration this cycle. This confirmed the proposal I made, and the Committee on the Built Environment approved, last week. Your near-unanimous community feedback and advocacy was instrumental in this decision.

As you know, the conversation regarding Roosevelt’s zoning future has become a bit complicated with 1) The zoning proposal from Roosevelt’s Neighborhood Plan Update  2) RDG’s Environmental Impact Statement work, and 3) RDG’s Comprehensive Plan amendment to adjust the Future Land Use Map (FLUM) and the Roosevelt Urban Village boundary.  Councilmembers have been able to engage in some of these conversations (1, 3), but have needed to exclude ourselves from others because of the “quasi-judicial” status (2).  It’s been frustrating to not be able to engage in a fuller discussion of zoning ideas. I appreciate your patience and understanding as we work through land use changes for Roosevelt.

To be clear, Monday afternoon’s vote isn’t meant to signify that the City Council isn’t interested in seeing zoning action taken in Roosevelt.  The new light rail station presents great opportunities for people to live near transit and for the broader community to enjoy benefits new development should be expected to bring.  Roosevelt has supported that vision by advocating for the best station location and for smart land use changes in the core around the station. The community’s neighborhood plan update, submitted in 2007, included rezone proposals working their way through review at the city’s Department of Planning & Development.  I’m eagerly awaiting delivery to Council. Concurrently, we have the environmental review of the RDG possibilities taking place and expected to wrap up next year. Ideally, full consideration of the neighborhood plan update zoning proposals and the finished EIS will shape a proposal for the RDG properties that meets the needs of all parties.

However, as chair of the Council’s land use committee, I know it won’t be that easy. Rising land values, housing affordability, demand for transit, demand for great parks, demand for safe, walkable, attractive business areas, and sustainability — Roosevelt, like every other neighborhood, struggles with all this and more.  I appreciate you taking the time to advocate.  Please feel welcome to write about this or any other city issue in the future.

Sincerely,

Sally

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From tomorrow morning’s Council Briefing Agenda:

2. Preview of Today’s Council Actions/Council and Regional Committee Reports

(All Councilmembers) 9:40 – 10:00 AM

And from the full Council agenda (meeting starts at 2pm):

Committee on the Built Environment

9. Resolution 31233

Identifying proposed Comprehensive Plan amendments to be considered for possible adoption in 2011, and requesting that the Department of Planning and Development and Seattle Planning Commission review and make recommendations about the amendments to the Council.

ADOPT AS AMENDED

(Clark, Bagshaw, Burgess)

There are presentations and public comments near the start of the meeting that may or may not include RDG comp plan stuff.

I’ll try to be around and available to live tweet both of these meetings (toddler willing).  You can follow along on the Ravenna Blog twitter feed here, whether you have an account or not.

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Thank you for your message about the proposed Comprehensive Plan Amendment for the Roosevelt neighborhood submitted by developers in the Roosevelt area.  Yesterday the Committee on the Built Environment voted unanimously to remove this amendment from consideration for the 2011 Comprehensive Plan review.  I am confident that the Full Council will agree with the Committee.
I look forward to a Roosevelt neighborhood plan implementation amendment coming forward in a future year with the participation and support of the Roosevelt community.

Council President Richard Conlin
Seattle City Hall
600 Fourth Avenue, Floor 2
PO Box 34025
Seattle, WA 98124-4025

I sent off an email to Conlin just last night, and received his this morning.

I still urge those of you who have NOT sent in your thoughts to do so. Contact information can be found by clicking the various Councilmembers’ heads here: http://www.cityofseattle.net/council/

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Received the following from Councilmember Jean Godden’s office (on Tuesday, I’d sent her the letter about opposing the Sisleyville rezoning):

Thank you for your letter expressing concerns about RDG’s Comprehensive Plan Amendment #8. As you may already know the Committee on Built Environment passed an amended version of Resolution 31233 which removed Amendment #8 from the proposed docket.

On Monday the full council will likely vote on the committee’s recommendation. It is my intention to vote in favor of the resolution as amended.

Thanks again for taking the time to share with your concerns. It is important for me to understand constitutes feelings on matters as important as this.

My Regards,

Jean Godden
Seattle City Councilmember

Let’s tally them up: Clark, Bagshaw and Burgess (the COBE committee) and Godden = FOUR for removing the RDG amendment.

Now, let’s see what we can do about those other five, shall we?

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