All right, good evening and welcome to the December 10th City of Bellevue Planning Commission meeting.

This evening's meeting is held via hybrid format with both in-person and virtual options via Zoom.

Tonight's meeting is going to provide an opportunity for public comment during their oral communications portion of the agenda.

All written comments that have been submitted to prior submitted prior to 11 a.m.

today, Wednesday, December 10th, will be summarized into the record.

We have just one agenda item tonight, which is a public hearing.

The public hearing tonight is for the housing opportunities in mixed use areas, also called HOMA Land Use Code Amendment.

So now let's move on to roll call.

Chair Conlu is absent.

Commissioner Geppel.

Here.

Commissioner Via Vasis.

I'm here.

Commissioner Kennedy.

I know Commissioner Nilchian is absent, and as is uh Council Liaison Deputy Mayor Malikoutian.

I'm Vice Chair Lou and I'll be chairing this meeting since Chair Conlu is uh absent today.

So first off, uh can I get a motion to approve tonight's agenda?

So moved.

Second.

Second.

Any discussion?

All in favor say hi.

Hi.

Hi.

All right.

Any reports.

No, well, he's not here, so no reports for him.

Uh any reports from boards and commissions from you, Kate, or no?

Uh no reports from boards and commissions.

Great.

All right.

First thing, staff report.

Uh, could you provide us with updates to the meeting schedule for 2026?

Yeah, I've included in your meeting materials a draft schedule through March 2026.

And um, I wanted to highlight some of the um commission development items.

I've scheduled a further conversation about um the survey results for the second meeting in January.

And uh I'm talking with staff about the best way to implement um your suggestions.

So I hope that we'll be able to come out of that meeting with some items for improvement that I can implement in Q1 at the next year.

Um we also have um Puget Sound Regional Council coming to talk about their um centers framework, uh, which is kind of the framework that we're all planning in in the Puget Sound region.

And so I hope that that will be especially helpful for um commissioners that were not part of the comprehensive plan update that was adopted last year, which I know is many of the commissioners.

Um so uh that's kind of the highlights of the schedule.

Any questions for Kate?

Great.

Let's move on to oral and written communications.

Kate, could you provide a summary of the written communications?

Yes, I sent uh 13 comments that came in after the packet was published before 11 a.m.

today.

Um supportive of the changes proposed in the HOMA draft, although some proposed some specific changes.

There was more mixed comments regarding the changes proposed in downtown.

Um, but many of the people who submitted those comments are also here to um give oral comment for during the public hearing, so I will let them speak for themselves.

I also wanted to note that um there were quite a few comments that came in this afternoon that I haven't had a chance to um read through or forward to you.

So I will do that just sort of glancing at them.

Several of them are transcripts of what they're going to say during their oral comments.

So but uh as soon as I have a chance, I will um send those to you as well.

Any questions for Kate.

All right, let's move on to oral communications.

So we have a total of 30 minutes for oral communications.

Each speaker will have up to three minutes to speak.

Keep in mind if you wish to speak about the HOMA land use code amendment, please speak during the public hearing and not during the oral communications portion of this.

Uh staff liaison Kate will call on speakers in the order in which they have registered, either in person or online.

If anyone from the public has missed the 6 p.m.

registration deadline, you may still provide public comment if there's remaining time.

Uh for those of you on Zoom, please use the raise hand function or motion to staff that you are in person to indicate that you would like to speak.

All right.

There is a uh we have to keep in mind that there are rules adopted by city council limiting the topics about which the public may speak during our meetings.

Under ordinance 6752, the public may only speak during public comment about subject matters that are related to City of Bellevue government and are within the power and the duties of the planning commission.

Additional information about the rules of decorum governing conduct of the public hearing of the public during our meetings can be found at ordinance 6752.

And again, if you wish to speak about HOMA, please keep that to the public hearing.

All right, Kate, can you please call on our first speaker?

Yeah, we have one speaker who's signed up for oral communications.

Uh a number of people signed up for oral communications online.

I moved them all to the public hearing because the topic was HOMA.

So if you signed up online and I am not calling on you, you're talking about something that's not HOMA.

Um, just uh let me know.

Uh so the first speaker, the only speaker is uh Samir Master.

Uh yeah.

Please come up if you're speaking on uh are you speaking on HOMA or are you speaking broadly?

Okay, great.

And just make sure you tap the uh the button right in front of you to uh switch on the mic.

Go ahead.

Good evening.

Uh Samir Master.

Um I run a dermatology practice in the city of Bellevue.

Uh, we employ 25 people locally, and we are outgrowing our 6,000 square feet of office space on 116th.

And um, I understand that there are a number of uh uh individuals, developers that are seeking to convert one twelfth and one sixteenth to 100% residential on a number of parcels.

Um there's one parcel at the very north of 112th, uh, including 2233, uh 112th, um, uh, where uh they would like to take down two wonderful office buildings and uh make an entirely residential neighborhood.

That neighborhood would not be close to public transportation, would not be close to schools.

Um, and uh frankly, it's a very important corridor for patients to access medical care and to be close enough to the hospital to be close enough to freeway access.

Um, and those properties have sufficient parking.

Uh, in a given day, we may see between 150 and 200 people coming and going from our office alone.

Um, we have explored a number of options throughout the city of Bellevue.

And none of the downtown office developers want small users like us.

They want people who will take three to five stories of their building, each with 20,000 square foot uh plates.

Um, and I'm um sincerely concerned I've been looking in earnest for over two years for a larger space for us to move into when our lease expires.

Um, and uh we're having difficulty um doing that.

And so I would uh request that as planning goes on.

There are some properties even with a concomitant zoning agreement.

Uh the parcel that I referred to at 2233 has a concomitant zoning agreement, which uh excludes the potential for residential development there.

And I would respectfully request that the commission and then make a recommendation also to the city uh council that that CZA not be removed.

Um because uh if that gets removed, it gets removed for I think an entire 13 or 14 acre parcel, which would then immediately all become 100% residential.

And without that, we can't serve the residents and the employees in the city of Bellevue.

Thank you.

Do you have any questions for me?

Thank you.

Uh, we're not allowed to provide uh a conversation, but thank you for that.

Appreciate it.

Is there anybody who wants to speak about something that's not HOMA?

All right, I think that's the end.

All right.

So with that, uh let's move on to the public hearing.

Tonight we have a public hearing on the housing opportunities and mixed-use areas land use code amendment.

The planning commission will first open the public hearing, then the staff will present the proposed changes to the land use code.

Then the commission will ask for public testimony.

Uh similar to before, we will only allow three minutes and we will hear from everybody who has signed up online or in person.

Following the public testimony, the commission will close the public hearing and we will discuss our recommendation to the council.

Do I have a motion to open the public hearing?

So do I have a second?

Second.

All approved say aye.

Aye.

Great.

Let's begin with staff presentation.

So development services department code and policy director Nick Whipple and Senior Planner Matthew Minard will provide a presentation on the housing opportunities and mixed use areas, land use code amendment.

It's a mouthful.

Great.

Uh, thank you.

And good evening, commissioners.

Uh, we are here tonight to um ask you all to hold the public hearing on HOMA, the housing opportunities and mixed use areas.

Um, wanted to mention, in addition to Robbie Seppler and Matthew Minard being here.

Um, we also have Robin Zow in our Office of Housing that may be available upon request if there are questions that you might have as it relates to um MFTE code in particular.

So for our agenda this evening, we wanted to provide a refresher on the background for this project.

We'll spend some time discussing the affordable housing options that are included within the packet, the code that's being proposed.

And then we have broken off downtown specifically to give us some space to talk through that and then touch on the schedule.

So this evening, we're seeking direction to hold the hearing.

Following the hearing, the commission may make a recommendation on the LUCA, the land use code amendment to city council.

First, with some background about HOMA.

So HOMA is a land use code amendment that's aimed at encouraging housing and affordable housing in some of our mixed use areas.

This really originated as part of council's next right work initiative, where we were looking to unlock more housing opportunity throughout the city.

Part of that was doing some review of our zoning code, figuring out which standards might be inhibiting some of the housing development that we're wanting to see.

And then also really find the best opportunities to create more affordable housing opportunity.

That work was initiated in 2022.

And then in 2024, as you all know, since you worked on the comprehensive plan periodic update, the city updated the comprehensive plan.

And so another opportunity with HOMA was to align with the updated policies.

A lot of those policies speak to the same geogeographies that are included with HOMA.

So trying to leverage those opportunities to create more vibrant neighborhoods by investing more in our mixed-use areas.

This is a refresher of the geographic scope.

All the areas outlined in orange are the areas that council did include as part of the HOMA scope.

So this is most of the mixed-use areas throughout the city.

We are leaving out East Maine.

That was a code amendment that council completed in 2021.

Wilburton left out as you all just processed that amendment and council adopted it this past summer.

Bell Red, there's a separate land use code amendment initiative underway now, which you'll hear more about in Q1 of 26.

But everywhere else is being addressed as part of HOMA.

Refresher on the process.

So council initiated this back in December of 2022.

And it really advanced first as an interim official control that applied to just downtown.

And part of the direction for council was let's figure out some permanent code language for downtown, and let's also address the mixed-use areas throughout the city.

So downtown is really kind of where this all started and an important piece of the HOMA package.

The commission has held five meetings on this, including tonight's meeting.

And so looking forward to continuing this process forward with the council deliberation on the recommendation.

So now Matthew's going to walk us through the remainder of the slides.

Thanks, Nick.

So continuing on with process as part of this process, a major part of this process, a significant amount of outreach was done with the community and other interested parties.

So we did six informational sessions at the beginning of this process and then a couple in the fall.

So three of those were virtual, three of those were in person.

We found that we got much better attendance through our virtual presentation.

So both of the ones that happened in the fall were virtual.

We held meetings with groups and individuals as requested.

We have not turned down any groups or individuals to meet with us through this process.

Those groups are as diverse as development groups, affordable housing groups.

You can see the Bellview Network on Aging there, neighborhood groups, as well as some other interest groups like East Side Urbanism.

There are two affordable housing options being presented with this land use code amendment for planning commission commission to make a recommendation on.

The first option is option A, which would be a mandatory affordable housing requirement, substantially similar to what was adopted with the Wilburton Code Amendment.

So it would require 10% of any project with greater than or 10 or greater units to be at 80% AMI or 7% at 65 AMI or 5% at 50% AMI.

There is an FAR bonus for that affordable housing that has been provided.

That bonus is for every square foot of affordable housing provided.

You can exempt up to four square feet of market rate housing.

As we discussed at previous meetings, we do think that bonus alone covers much of the cost of this mandatory program.

With this, there is a fee-in-loo option that we are proposing, as well as a commercial fee.

I'll cover this later in the presentation as well, but we are also have added a land transfer option into this option A to allow developers more flexibility on ways to participate in this program.

I do want to be very clear that this does not apply downtown.

Option B would be a voluntary incentive program, which sets the FARs and building heights lower.

Option B would be a voluntary incentive program, which sets the FARs and building heights lower, and you essentially have to buy your way up to those equivalent maximums that would be in option A through the provision of affordable housing.

So you can earn 0.5 FAR for every 10 feet or yes, for every 0.2 FAR of affordable housing you provide, you can earn 0.5 FAR and 10 feet of building height.

In the lower density districts, that's going to be office, office limited business, neighborhood business, community business, you can earn up to one FAR.

So basically two chunks of that point to FAR of affordable housing.

In the higher density districts, it's going to be 1.5 FAR or sort of three chunks of that point to FAR.

And again, the maximums are equivalent to option A.

So through option B, you would get the same building height in FAR as you would through option A, you would just have to buy your way to get there essentially by providing that point to FAR of affordable housing for each chunk of building height in an FAR.

As I mentioned, there are a couple of updates to this between this meeting and the previous meeting.

Robbie has very nicely reorganized the chapter to make it more readable.

So it has moved from 2020 128 to 2015 in the code, which puts it in its own chapter.

As we have built out our affordable housing programs and our affordable housing capacity, this one small section of the land use code has become very large and confusing to work your way through and understand where each section that you would need to look at is located.

So we have moved it into its own affordable housing chapter and reorganized where everything is located to make it easier for both development community, development reviewers, and the public to understand and read through.

Robbie has very nicely in the notes of the strike gap also shown where all of that has moved from and where it's moved to in this new draft.

So that has been provided to you as one of your attachments.

So there's not a lot of substantial language changes in there.

It's just been reorganized with the same language.

We did close one loophole that was created through the Wilburton program.

The way the Wilverton mandatory program was written, if you had 10 or more units in a building, you had to provide 10% affordable housing.

What did happen in one case is we had a developer build several buildings with less than 10 units and therefore avoid avoid the mandatory requirement.

That was not the intent of the program.

So we have closed that loophole where now, if you have 10 or more units on a whole project, you have to participate in the affordable housing program.

And as I mentioned, we have opened the existing land transfer option to all of the HOMA districts.

So parties would be able to transfer land to the city to provide affordable housing through HOMA.

That land would need to be within two miles of the project.

And there are several criteria in the land use code, including making sure we get the same yields and that land essentially has value to us before we will accept that transfer.

So there are sideboards on that.

You sort of can't just transfer a useless piece of land or a land that's covered in water or highway embankment to us to meet that requirement.

We are recommending option A for adoption.

We know this does ensure the production of affordable housing to make sure that we meet our affordable housing targets.

As we've mentioned in previous meetings, the city has taken quite an aggressive stance and is looking to produce or maintain 5,700 new or preserved affordable housing units in the next 10 years.

So this will get us closer to that number.

We believe in the voluntary program, which is not shown to produce as many units in the past.

We do know that the comprehensive plan and public input has stressed the need for affordable housing throughout the city.

We think not only will this get more affordable housing, but that affordable housing will be more geographically distributed throughout the city versus a voluntary program.

It would also increase the consistency of the land use code between different land use districts.

That would essentially the program that applies in Wilverton would apply to the vast majority of mixed-use areas throughout the city.

And our economic analysis, as we presented at the last meeting, does show that this requirement would have minor negative impacts to residual land value, but that has been negated by the proposed FAR bonus for exempting market rate housing, which allows you to build more square footage of housing on your site than you would be able to otherwise.

So we are also proposing what is we are calling the community mixed use design district.

This is building off existing code.

It's currently called the community retail design district.

So this would apply to all districts except for downtown Factorio 1 and Eastgate TOD area.

It incorporates existing design standards from several of the retail districts.

That's going to be OLB, Oil B2.

And it looks at bringing not only those existing design standards, but some new standards around transition area setbacks.

So that diagram you can see on the slide there would be the original proposed transition area, which would be a 25 foot setback with landscaping that's attached to the property line of any property line that is adjacent to a residential district.

So all buildings would have to be pushed back 25 feet, and landscaping would have to be provided between those two districts.

It's also proposing a 15 foot upper level stepback for those facades over 80 feet that face those districts.

We are also proposing to require pedestrian oriented uses in several of the districts that are intended to be neighborhood or community centers.

And that would require either 50 or 66% of the street frontage to have these pedestrian oriented uses within 10 feet of backup sidewalk.

There are some districts that this would not be required.

Those districts are going to be the two OLB districts and the office district, which were not intended to be those neighborhood centers.

There has been expressed interest to us from many development groups at this point to build townhomes without that commercial element.

We do think that commercial element is very important for these neighborhood centers.

And we have heard very strongly through public comment that these sort of retail elements that exist on the ground today continue to be important moving into the future.

So we have not proposed any changes to those requirements.

At the last planning commission meeting, the planning commissioners did request that we propose an alternative transition area that allows residential buildings that are no taller than the adjacent residential districts to enter into that transition area or be exempted from that transition area.

So we have given that to you as an attachment.

It's a standalone bit of language in the agenda memo.

It would essentially attach that transition area to the structure that is taller or has commercial uses in it rather than the property line.

We do think that having landscaping along the entire property line, more than just buffering the visibility of the building, also provides more sound attenuation and obviously more potential for landscaping in trees, which we do think are important.

So again, not representing or not recommending this option.

We do recommend the original transition area that was proposed as more effective transition area.

We've heard from the community, both through our process and through the comprehensive planning process that there are specific uses in the city that are much needed and maybe lacking throughout the city or are already in these areas that we do want to maintain in these areas.

So we are proposing FAR exemptions for those uses.

Most of these uses, other than affordable housing, are a one-to-one FAR exemption.

So for every square foot of this use provided, you would get one square foot of exempt FAR.

Those uses are affordable housing, child care, grocery stores, nonprofit businesses, affordable commercial space, and then a very small FAR exemption for open space as well if it's over 30% of the lot area.

There are a few updates to the code that are being proposed after the last planning commission meeting.

Something we talked about a little bit at the last planning commission meeting was exempting small parcels from the pedestrian-oriented use requirements.

So we are proposing that parcels under 20,000 square feet do be exempted from the pedestrian-oriented uses.

Again, this will facilitate small-scale, especially townhome development on these small parcels.

Running a very rough GIS analysis for these 20,000 square foot parcels.

It looks like there's about 70 parcels that would be impacted by this.

Not all of those are buildable parcels.

So it's not a huge number of parcels that would apply or this would be applicable to, but certainly there are some, and it's been expressed to us by the public that there are some that they would like to build townhomes without that commercial requirement.

Basically stating that they're too small to make both work.

We have clarified that projects can use fee and loo for the additional height in the office neighborhood business and OLB districts.

So right now, if you provide 15% affordable housing, you uh get essentially additional building heights.

It wasn't clear in the way the footnote was written that you could use the fee and loo that's being proposed through option A for that program.

So we have just clarified that you are able to use the fee and loo.

And there is a single departure right now in the code in our footnotes that allows you to exempt yourself currently from ground floor retail requirements in the neighborhood mixed use district.

If you are not on an arterial and you have topographic challenges, and you are not visible from the adjacent neighborhood, you don't have to provide that ground floor retail.

We are proposed moving that into the community mixed use design district.

So that departure would apply to all of the HOMA districts.

It is a very strict set of criteria, which I think you have heard through public comment as well.

So we don't expect this to apply to too many parcels.

It was really just designed to apply to those parcels that have substantial topography and are not on a main road.

There have been some nonconforming updates.

Robbie covered these at a previous meeting, but I'm going to hand it off to Robbie again to just give you a brief update on them.

Thank you, Matthew.

Good evening, Commission.

So by way of reminder, just what nonconforming code is it's the purpose of it is to transition projects that were built under old code into compliance with nude code.

Essentially, the policy is that you want the built environment to reflect current code and policy rather than old code and policy.

And so the way that the nonconforming sections work is and do this is they do this through a thing called proportional compliance, which basically means that over time, as the project is developed or the site is affected or invested in, you have to make a certain amount of improvements in order to start getting towards compliance with what the current code and current policy is.

So the policy decision for the council to make with your recommendation is how fast to have that transition occur.

What's in the draft before you is a very gradual approach based on what the city currently is doing in both Wilburton and the Bell Red sub areas.

And the way that the approach in the draft before you works is as follows.

The way you go through it is there are several off ramps to make sure that you're only being required to make investments and to bring something up in a code when it actually makes sense.

The first is there's kind of a dollar threshold you look at.

And the next is there's a limit on the maximum amount that you have to invest at any given time.

And so what that cap is is 20%.

So in summary, you look at the value of the alteration you're proposing.

You figure out what 20% of that is, and that's how much money you have to put in to build bringing the site or the structure into compliance with the current code until the next time that you come and invest in the project.

This was a council direction through the Wilburton Luca.

And I'd be happy to answer any questions following the public hearing.

Thanks, Robbie.

Um, so I'm gonna shift gears again to downtown.

So there are some minor changes proposed to downtown, including changes to the amenity incentive program as we've discussed previously.

Uh so we are including the FAR flexibility that was provided in the intern ordinance of control that launched this whole project, which means that projects in the perimeter overlay can move unutilized FAR within a single project outside of the perimeter overlay.

What we were finding downtown is that projects were not able to realize their maximum FAR in the perimeter overlay because of other form restrictions.

So allowing projects to move uh their FAR that they haven't used into less form-restricted districts where helping projects get off the ground.

Um, projects that provide 0.5 FAR of exempt square footage.

So that is a change from previous iterations of this draft and is changed back to what was in the intern ordinance of control.

Um so now what was originally proposed with HOMA is you had to provide 0.5 FAR of uh affordable housing.

What this would require is 0.1 FAR of affordable housing and 0.4 FAR of exempt market rate space as you get a four-to-one exemption through this program.

Um so back to the original uh proposal to the IOC, 0.5 FAR of exempt square footage if and you're in the perimeter overlay, uh, you have some form flexibility around lock coverage and stepbacks and building heights.

It provides a bonus for affordable housing square footage uh if not used as an amendment.

And this is actually a change that we've made to this draft.

So you can now use it for both.

Um and I'll talk about that in a moment.

And it does maintain the wedding cake, uh, which we've heard very clearly from the community is very important to them.

Um, so there is an update to uh both the amenity incentive proposal and this exempt FAR.

You can now use the same square footage of affordable housing to participate both in the amenity incentive program and the four to one exemption.

So essentially for one square foot of affordable housing, you would be able to exempt four square feet of market rate housing, and you are provided four amenity incentive points, which is essentially another four square feet of building space.

That was a request from the downtown development community uh before the last meeting.

So that change has been made.

As I mentioned, we've changed the 0.5 FAR exemption for that design flexibility to that exempt space rather than affordable housing square footage.

That was another request from the downtown development community.

We are also finding through our analysis, we're currently requiring uh 10% outdoor plaza to exceed your trigger height.

So basically to reach that maximum building height in downtown.

What we were finding is that uh projects were far exceeding their amenity incentive requirements through this requirement alone, uh meaning that that affordable housing uh bonus wasn't so much of a bonus because it was already being met in other ways.

So we have dropped that requirement to 7%, uh, consistent with the 7% uh open space that's required in the Wilburton area.

Uh the schedule for this, as you all know, this has been ongoing for quite a while now.

Uh we are at phase three, uh, first step of phase three, which is the planning commission public hearing.

Uh planning commission doesn't have to make a recommendation tonight.

You can make a recommendation tonight.

Uh, I will say if you are uh not going to make a recommendation tonight, we would like uh some pretty clear direction from Planning Commission about what they would like to discuss at future meetings, uh, so we can make sure that those meetings are streamlined and targeted towards what you all uh want to discuss.

Uh staff would obviously love it if you did make a recommendation this evening.

Uh, after the recommendation occurs, uh, the land use code would move on to city council.

Uh city council does have all final decisions on uh land use code amendments uh and would be the ones that would adopt the land use code amendment.

Once it has been adopted, it is then uh part of our code and would apply to these areas of the city.

Uh there are three decision criteria in the land use code for land use code amendments.

Uh those decision criteria and more details are laid out in the staff report that is attached uh to your agenda memo.

Uh they are that they are the amendment is consistent with the comprehensive plan.

Uh as we noted earlier, we do think the amendments are very consistent with the comprehensive plan uh around our housing goals uh and our goals for mixed-use neighborhoods uh being vibrant and walkable.

Uh, the amendment enhances the public health safety and welfare of the city, which we do believe it meets that criteria as well, uh, especially around uh sort of our housing crisis and our our deep need for more affordable housing, obviously promotes the welfare of the city.

Uh, and for many of the same reasons, we don't believe it's contrary to the best interests of the citizens and property owners in the city of Bellevue, uh, especially property owners in many of these mixed-use areas are also receiving a quite large upzone and FAR increase uh through these proposed changes.

So that is a large benefit to them as well.

Um, and with that, I will hand it back to you, Chair.

All right.

Thank you.

Uh yeah, thank you, Matthew.

Thank you, Nick.

Thank you, Robbie.

Appreciate it.

All right.

I think we are coming to the uh public testimony portion of this public hearing.

So as a reminder, the testimony must be related to the HOMA Luca.

So keep the uh the topics uh on topic or keep the testimony on topic.

Uh Kate, could you call the first person registered?

Sure.

We have um it looks like 34 uh people registered.

Um the first, so as I said, I compiled both the both of the lists and that they're in the order that they signed up, regardless of the of the list.

Uh the first person uh is Misha Rodart, followed by Deborah Deutsch.

And they are both in person.

Good evening, Planning Commission.

I'm Misha Ridardi, partner and real estate broker at Legacy Commercial.

I'm here on behalf of my fellow partners and ownership of 530, 520, and 400 112th Avenue, Northeast Bellevue, Washington, just across the street from City Hall.

Thank you for the Planning Commission for your hard work on this.

Legacy has owned in downtown Bellevue for generations.

In the past, the city has been a good partner, and we look forward to more downtown development in the future.

I understand that HOMA plan and the planning commission are being asked to consider will impose a new affordable housing tax on downtown development.

The new downtown zoning was only adopted in 2017, just eight years ago.

It included an affordable housing incentive program designed for downtown.

The downtown zoning was the product of many months of discussion and collaboration between the development community and the city.

Many projects move forward under the new downtown zoning, and many are still in midstream or early in the process.

At the moment, our property is at a standstill due to many external factors out of our control.

However, I do have concerns of the HOMA plan as presented.

Here are my concerns.

For my fellow owners and currently in development, if you change the rules in the middle of the game, these projects for these projects, you will send them back to the drawing board.

Many years and millions of dollars may be lost.

Why would the city adopt a new code in partnership with downtown owners in 2017, only to flip the script and change the rules a few years later?

If HOMA gives the rest of the city an upzoning in exchange for affordable housing, why not downtown?

Just imposing a new affordable housing tax without providing benefit will increase costs and jeopardize new projects and existing projects.

In the past, the city has been a good partner, and they would count contact and have an open discussion and lots of outreach.

Why has no one called us?

And why are we left to be in the dark?

If I may, my recommendation, take downtown out of HOMA, and downtown needs its own separate process.

Tell the city staff to start an outreach program to all of us owners and developers in downtown in 2026.

We are willing to work with the city on this as we have in the past, but the city needs to call us first.

My phone number is 425 4604373, and I'll be expecting a call.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next speaker is Deborah Deutsch, followed by Brady Nordstrom.

Good evening, Planning Commission.

My name is Dipper Deutsch, and I've lived in Newport Hills for over 44 years.

And tonight I am here to express my strong support for the adoption of HOMA, not only for my neighborhood, but for the benefit of all current and future residents of our city.

I'd like to address two points this evening.

The first is affordability.

If adopted as proposed, HOMA will be a giant step towards fulfilling the city's promises of housing for wide range of incomes.

In my career, I worked in Bellevue in both the YMCA and the Bellevue School District.

And it became quickly apparent that working families whose income placed them below the medium and above the poverty level experience significant challenges with housing and finding houses, especially since their income level did not qualify them to be eligible for financial supports from established programs.

I believe HOMA would directly provide additional opportunities by increasing the supply of housing options.

I fully support the staff's recommendation of option A for the MFTE program update and want the city to maintain its existing MFTE programs and expand them.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Brady Nordstrom, followed by Jessica DeBarros, who is virtual.

Greetings, Commissioner.

Oh, let me adjust this.

Greetings, commissioners.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Brady Nordstrom, and I'm from the Housing Development Consortium, and I'm also here to represent the East Side Affordable Housing Coalition.

We strongly urge you to support the HOMA draft A with a well-calibrated affordable housing requirement.

And uh just before I go into some of the rationale there, I want to clarify potential confusion.

Um, downtown is not proposing this policy.

Um my comments are directed at the mixed-use areas where this policy is being proposed.

Um, but based on the city's own findings and a pro forma analysis conducted by developers in our coalition.

But based on the city's own findings and a pro forma analysis conducted by developers in our coalition, we believe that this affordable housing requirement is not only the best option to create affordable housing, but that it will work alongside market rate development.

And this is once the market conditions improve.

The analysis shows that almost no projects or very few projects will pencil now, regardless of this requirement.

So we urge you to consider what will work in the future over multiple economic cycles and not a specific moment in adverse economic conditions.

And just some other points to consider.

In fact, the program being proposed by Bellevue is one of the lightest touch versions of this program that exists in our region.

And 80% of area median income in King County is basically $85,000 for an individual.

So this isn't typically what we think of when we talk about affordable housing, but this is still moderate waged people that it creates space for in the city.

So the negative impact of this policy is also very modest compared to other cost factors, hard costs, soft costs, land financing, et cetera.

And in fact, things like parking, interest rates, and rent levels have a much more significant impact on the development feasibility than this policy, which is supported by the upzone and the bonus and other development cost savings.

And further with the way to support this program, we strongly support MFTB MFTE being used to success um support this program.

Um this is outside the purview of the uh commission, but we urge you to pass a policy that will work consistently across what was passed through this commission earlier this year in Wilverton.

And finally, it's not consistent to say that some of these wedding cake things, buffer zones, and significant cost to development are important in these mixed-use areas and affordable housing is too onerous that um that that trade-off still exists with those things.

And this is especially when the affordable housing requirement is one of the smallest costs.

Um ultimately, this is a policy about people and building a bright future for Bellevue.

So we hope that you'll pass this policy that can include moderate moderate, modest and moderate wage workers, families, and aging adults, and for centering affordable housing.

So thank you again for the opportunity.

Thank you.

Uh, next we have uh Jessica DeBarros, followed by Valentina Veneva.

Jessica, can you raise your hand?

Oh, I see you.

Can you hear me?

Yes, can you hear me?

Yep, go ahead.

Okay, thank you.

Good evening, commissioners.

My name is Jessica Debarros, and I serve as vice president of policy and intergovernmental affairs with King County Housing Authority.

And I'm here to comment on HOMA.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

King County Housing Authority has a long and successful record working with the city of Bellevue on affordable housing solutions.

We own and operate more housing units in Bellevue than in any other city in King County.

That's 3,000 units that we own in Bellevue, and that constitutes 25% of our property portfolio.

As you are aware, commissioners, rents are very expensive in Bellevue.

And unfortunately, what the market can bear is a lot more than what a low-income household can bear.

So we really need all of the resources we can find to provide much needed affordable housing in this market.

As you consider the HOMA land use code update, please support affordable housing as your top priority.

I urge you to support HOMA Draft A with an affordable housing requirement and mixed use areas.

When land is upzoned, that adds value to the land and the developments on that land.

And the added value should result in greater housing affordability.

King County Housing Authority supports using a portion of that added land value to create more and deeper affordable housing.

Thank you for prioritizing affordable housing in the HOMA code update.

We believe that trade-offs are reasonable and worth it to support Bellevue as a welcoming diverse city that includes moderate and lower income workers and families.

HOMA represents the fulfillment of Bellevue's comprehensive plan vision.

And that includes bold new residential capacity and tools like affordable housing requirement.

And that will help Bellevue meet its ambitious affordable housing goals.

Again, please support code draft option A with an affordable housing requirement.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Valentina Veneva, followed by Ishaan Joe.

Oh, sorry.

Go ahead.

Hello, commissioners.

My name is Valentina, and I live in Crossroads Bellevue.

I fully support the staff's proposal to allow mixed-use development in more parts of Bellevue.

We moved to Crossroads because it was one of the very few locations in Bellevue where we could walk both the things we need, like stores, transit, and cafes, and to cool things like a climbing gym, a park, and a cinema.

But even in crossroads, if you look at the block where the mall is located, you can see how amazingly wasteful the whole thing is.

It is basically islands of one-story high street malls in a sea of parking.

And despite providing so many amenities, the block is actually not that nice to walk around.

So I'm very glad that the city is ready to change the set state for the better.

Like two things I really like about the staff's proposal.

First is bonuses for affordable commercial spaces and nonprofit businesses.

Again, in crossroads, I see firsthand how difficult it is to find a business that can afford to lose a large expensive space.

All the smaller shops are still there, but big change, big chains that went bankrupt closed their stores, and those are hard to replace, and this is also waste.

The only thing that worries me is that the city of Bellevue does not have a dedicated program that would help small businesses relocate when the properties are developed.

And the other thing is affordable housing.

In terms of that, I hope that you will go with option eight.

It does sound onerous, but Bellevue has a great MFT program.

And the recent report at the council meeting shown that it is well used by developers.

This will let the city get both more housing and general and more affordable units when combined with the MFT program.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Ishaan Joe, followed by Daniel Nygard.

Go ahead.

Welcome here.

My name is E.

I am the president of Imagined Housing.

We are the largest nonprofit affordable housing developer, operator, provider here in East King County.

We're based in Bellevue.

We were started in Bellevue.

On top of that, I've also been a Bellevue resident since about 2000s when my family moved here.

And my wife and I bought our house in Belleville in Newport Hills back in 2008.

So I have called Newport Hills home for the last 17 years.

I've seen a lot of changes.

Not all of it has been good.

I was living there when Red Apple was a grocery store when Bill Pace.

And I've seen a lot of small businesses have that tried to make the shopping center work that they have unfortunately been not able to because we don't have enough people.

Over the last few years, I have two kids who have gone through Newport Heights Elementary.

So I've gone to know many of the teachers and the staff at the school.

And we have seen kind of some of the struggles that they have faced, uh, whether it's teacher aids, lunch ladies, bus drivers, and we have seen them kind of leave the community because they cannot afford housing.

We just need more people and we need more housing.

Uh I wear a lot of different hats.

So it's kind of in my day job, what I look at is economic analysis of how to provide housing in homes for working families here in our community.

And I will say in all the different hats that I wear, I strongly support what the staff have put forward in terms of HOMA, both in option A and all the different pieces around the upzoning.

Um I cannot talk about downtown because we did not actually look deeply into downtown, but I am talking about the mixed-use areas.

I just want to highlight how Bellevue has done this successfully in the past.

Um, like I said, I've been here for a while.

I remember before Lake Hills shopping center is what it is today with housing and options and restaurants and small businesses, and it's a place that we enjoy going to.

Um I think that what the staff have put forward for HOMA has been a well-calibrated option.

I think it really kind of puts forward kind of the next phase of Bellevue to be able to provide housing at all economic levels.

It provides for a much more vibrant community where we can have small business, where we can have restaurants, where we can have a more walkable community, and it's a place where we can have kind of all the people that make Bellevue great, be able to stay here and be able to live here and call this great city home.

So thank you so much for your consideration and for all your time on this.

Thank you.

Next, we have Daniel Nygard, followed by Suzanne Baugh.

Good evening, commissioners.

My name is uh Daniel Nygaard.

My wife Cheryl and I have lived in the Newport Hills area for over 25 years.

So uh like the gentleman before us, we've seen many changes to our neighborhood, and uh, we'd like to encourage you to move forward with the uh the projects and plans that we're talking about here tonight.

I'd like to add my voice to those who are representing a large and growing number of neighbors in Newport Hills, Lake Heights, Greenwich Crest, Newport Shores, and other neighborhoods.

We're called the Newport Community Coalition, and we're here to express our very strong support for HOMA and the opportunity it represents for redeveloping the Newport Hills shopping center to bring it back to its former and even probably better state that it was in.

Our group has met with city staff.

We've met several times with the representative of the shopping center, uh, which is the ownership group.

We are all very excited about the vision they have for a future for the Newport Hills shopping center.

We've been trying for over 20 years to make the shopping center a place that we can all be proud of.

And uh several different developers have made attempts to upgrade the shopping center over the years, but uh we've been met with uh numerous obstacles.

We are finally at a point in time when we can actually make this happen, and we're so excited.

So we cannot believe that we're finally at this point.

So, provided that we move forward with the HOMA uh proposal to implement what is envisioned in the new comprehensive plan, we can make this dream a reality.

As a reminder, about 15 years ago, the City of Bellevue asked the ownership group of Newport Hills to conduct a feasibility study of the shopping center.

And uh what it should look like for the future.

And the ownership group agreed, and when finished, the study concluded the mixed use development with housing and retail was very appropriate for the site.

So we're we're kind of looking at the same options again.

We're excited for all that is to come for Newport Hills shopping center.

We're particularly excited about the ownership group's vision for the different types of housing, open space, gathering places, retail, and restaurants.

So this will create a truly walkable community with gathering spaces that we can all enjoy and we can be proud of once again.

I urge you to approve HOMA so that it can go forward to the City Council for final approval.

So thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Next we have Suzanne Baugh, followed by Ann Coughlin, who is virtual.

Good evening, members of the Planning Commission.

My name is Sue Baugh, and I've lived in Lake Heights for 35 years.

I'm here tonight to speak in support of the latest draft of HOMA.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

As I mentioned before, I've spoken with the city count with City Council members and staff since the 1990s about the need to redevelop the Newport Hills Shopping Center.

But tonight I'm here again to speak as a member of the Newport Community Coalition, which includes, as Dan said, residents from Newport Hills, Lake Heights, Newport Shores, and Greenwich Crest.

And it includes new and long-term residents.

We support the community the comprehensive plan as adopted.

We need more housing of all types.

We support the fact that most recent iteration of HOMA that is before you tonight.

And we also support housing that is affordable for teachers, nurses, policemen, police persons, police officers.

Want to get it right, firefighters, and our adult kids who might someday want to uh live in a neighborhood.

In particular, we support redevelopment of the Newport Hills Shopping Center.

As I have shared with you before, this is the third time that the Newport Hills Shopping Center has been involved in a redevelopment debate.

And twice the anti-development contingents adversarial efforts resulted in a negative outcome.

The Newport Community Coalition supports HOMA and the NB zoning, three to four floors with amenities and bonuses to get to five floors.

And as a reminder, contrary to what you may have heard, no one in our group and no one in the Newport Hills Shopping Center owners ownership supports seven to ten floors.

We also understand that a mixed use center includes retail.

In order to maintain a thriving retail center, additional customers are a must, which more housing in our neighborhood would provide.

It's time for our voices to be heard.

The Newport Community Coalition is here tonight to support moving forward with Homa, which will allow the redevelopment of the Newport Hill Shopping Center.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Next we have Ann Coughlin who's virtual, followed by Eric Paulson, who's also virtual.

Anne, can you raise your hand?

I'm not seeing a hand raised.

So I will move on to Eric Paulson, who will be followed by Kevin Wallace.

Um, Eric, I do see your hand raised.

Uh can you hear me, Eric?

Yes, as long as you can hear me.

Yep, go ahead.

Okay, thanks.

Uh good evening, Planning Commission.

Um, thank you for this opportunity.

Uh, my name is Eric Paulson.

I own the trailers insight that's located at the corner of 37th and 156th on the south side of I-90 in Eastgate.

The property is on a dead end street and is adjacent to a residential zoning.

And it is a site that should be developed one day with multifamily housing for the home updates.

That being said, we're a little concerned about the current commercial use requirement and departure criteria because it remains so restricted, and it'll continue to limit viable housing production, especially on challenging sites such as ours.

Uh, we recommend that the code be revised to eliminate the visibility test off I-90.

We know that everything is visible next to I90, but going 60 miles an hour plus doesn't really um always turn into retail business.

Uh, and we know that on our site on 37th, it's a dead-end street that probably wouldn't support any retail component.

Matter of fact, in 2019, when we purchased the site, we had owned Michael's Toyota and Michael Subaru, and we had the hopes of expanding our automotive footprint in Bellevue.

We reached out to three manufacturers who are currently not in Bellevue, only to be rejected by all three who claim that the site was just not viable for retail based on its location and its low traffic volume, which drops from almost 30,000 trips to 8,000 trips, just at that Texaco, a block east of the arterial.

It drops off even more significantly past that.

Again, we feel that the current departure criteria uh criteria negatively impacts our site.

And we ask that you widen the criteria to promote additional housing for the city.

I've also emailed uh a letter uh outlining a lot of our concerns, and you can certainly uh refer to that as well.

Uh thank you very much for your time.

Thank you.

Next, we have Kevin Wallace, followed by Ann Breshier.

I'm Kevin Wallace with Wallace Properties, and I have two project sites in downtown Bellevue that I've been working on for several years.

Um, neither of them are particularly impacted by what we're talking about tonight or what I'm talking about tonight, which is the downtown HOMA, the portion of the home ordinance that applies to downtown.

Um, the backdrop of this is the comprehensive plan for downtown calls for 14,500 units to be delivered in 25 years between 2019 and 2044.

Unfortunately, though, um, that would be about 580 units a year.

Unfortunately, that hasn't been what's happened in the first six years.

So now we're looking at about 700, 750 units a year in downtown alone, need to be delivered over the next 19 years to meet that target.

And if that target's not met, the region's not meeting its housing requirement, right?

So we just need to figure out how to supply more housing in downtown Bellevue as a starting point.

750 units a year would be like three Avenue Towers buildings.

The project on Bellevue A and 10th would be like three of those delivered every year.

Okay, so this is a massive need.

Uh the downtown HOMA ordinance has some carryover incentives that are good if you're providing affordable housing.

But for, you know, if you're using that affordable housing incentive, but for if you're not, what it basically does is put this affordable housing tax on all of the projects by requiring these amenity points that weren't required before.

And so in looking at that, while it's frustrating, what I look for is like, okay, how can we get some give for the gut, right?

And what I see as an opportunity is to do some tweaks to the code, and that's what it's in that memo that I provided that will make it easier to get through the permit process.

And it doesn't significantly change the buildings over what the staff provided in HOMA already, but it does make it easier, is things I've encountered and other developers have encountered that make it challenging to get through the code.

So we've had some good conversations with the staff about this just recently, like a couple days ago.

And I think there's some positive reaction to it that they need to go through and think about and get back to you.

It's too much detail to talk about in three minutes.

But what I'd ask is that we not move forward with a recommendation tonight, give us a chance to talk through this with staff, get their feedback on whether it flies or not, and come back to you with the revisions if they find it acceptable.

In short, section one is some a few tweaks, like nine tweaks to the existing home ordinance.

Section two is 11 things that are in the affordable housing code or in the downtown code that aren't in the home orders yet, and then a vesting request that allows people to opt in to the new code if they've already applied for the MDP.

And then the third category are about 20 things that we think are acceptable in the code that the staff has already put uh out, and and we think it's a good job.

So if you uh consider that and ask the staff to circle back with us to work it out, I'd appreciate it.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Ann Brashier, and um I can try and return to Ann Coughlin.

If I see several hands raised online, if you are not Ann Coughlin, could you lower your hand?

Good evening, commissioners.

Commissioner Kennedy, haven't met you?

The rest of you, you've seen me before.

And I don't need probably to tell you how important the Newport Hills shopping center property and its accompanying commercial properties are to our Newport Hills neighborhood, which I too have lived in for many decades.

Um the previous attempt at redevelopment that several speakers have referred to would have traded a shopping center, however decrepit and and needing a refresh as it is for a sea of housing, a sea of townhouses.

And that is why many, many, many Newport Hills residents and others opposed it.

So it's not just we don't want development.

It's that's not appropriate for our neighborhood.

We need to keep the shopping center a shopping center primarily.

So those of you who were here over the last three years, you've been in the comp plan process.

You saw there have been arguments about what density is appropriate for the center of Newport Hills over the DEIS over the comp plan itself.

Um, more recently, during the middle housing discussion, the conclusion that neighborhoods that are not served by transit, which our neighborhood is not and is not going to be, uh, should not be the targets of massive density.

So the decision, as I understood it, the decision in the comp plan was to keep the mid-rise low, I think it's no, it's low rise one.

There was a category, and the concept was that that was two to four stories.

That was what we all heard.

Now we turn around and the baseline in HOMA is five stories and maybe six with incentives.

So that's kind of scary.

Um I want to say to you that we've got the middle housing initiative and the co-housing stuff that's required by the state that's being processed and being digested.

There's already a four-townhouse project on a single family lot in Newport Hills.

Let's not rush for HOMA.

All of these properties are different, these little neighborhood centers.

Let's take our time.

We want to redevelop it, but we want to redevelop it right.

We don't want to trade our beloved shopping center and the commercial and recreational amenities that it provides for a big housing development.

We don't want to create unintended consequences.

The Newport Hills shopping center property is actually three parcels, two of which are under 20,000 square feet.

Are they exempt from the retail requirement?

Do we want to put the Newport Hills Chevron station out of business by cutting off its access to that parking lot?

So I just ask you to let's think about this.

Let's do the right thing.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um I'm not seeing Ann Coughlin's hand raised.

So I will move on to Jesse Clausen, who will be followed by Cindy Ju, who is virtual.

Chair Lou, commissioners, my name is Jesse Clausen.

Good evening.

Um, HOMA's goal is vital, which is getting the homes that Bellevue needs, but as drafted, it's not ready for prime time and it's not ready to move on.

I'm asking you to direct staff to make specific changes so that the code actually yields housing production.

First, now is not the time to require mandatory housing affordability in downtown or the mixed-use zones.

Market rate developers build most of the city's housing and they build only when projects pencil.

With today's construction costs and interest rates, many do not.

Requiring 10% of units at 80% AMI lowers achievable rent and further erodes feasibility feasibility.

In Wilburton, mandatory affordability worked only because the MFTE supercharger offset that cost.

If HOMA moves forward with a mandate, it must be paired with a commensurate MFTE supercharger.

Otherwise, we will get no housing in the short term, which is what we need.

Second, incentive zoning should be seriously considered, and the planning commission should request a table that shows you the differences between the two codes and what they could actually produce in terms of housing units and affordable housing units.

Third, modernize the mixed-use zones to optimize housing.

Many were drafted in the 80s.

If they haven't been amended since the 80s, now is the time to do them.

When are we going to do them again?

So now's the time to get them right.

There are a couple of things we want to make sure that you're focused on.

You've heard about the commercial frontages.

Um, the active frontage requirements are uh pretty uh extensive and harsh.

And you heard Matthew say that many of the sites, most of the sites will not be able to qualify for the departure.

We do not want to see empty retail in places where it doesn't make sense, like the Eastgate trailer in.

Um, so please focus on that.

The impervious and hard surface limits are very suburban in nature.

In Eastgate, there is a 60% limit on your impervious or hard surface that you can develop.

That is over one third of your site that you cannot develop as housing.

As an example, Seattle has no lot coverage requirements in those types of zones, and they are producing housing.

You should be looking at this.

Fourth, you heard Kevin talk about downtown.

Those changes should definitely be made as part of this uh code update.

And we should also include that pipeline projects are vested in downtown.

There are several projects that are have been in the pipeline for years, and they will be subject to HOMA without having any benefit.

You need to direct staff specifically to ask for vesting.

Um, finally, simplify the non-conforming provisions.

Um, they're very complicated.

We appreciate staff's work.

I would encourage you to read them for yourself and see if you can follow along.

Um, Seattle has uh a little bit uh less confusing non-conforming provisions, um, and I would encourage you to look toward those.

I'm gonna pass out my written comments um that I sat a little late today.

Thank you.

Next, we have we have uh Cindy Ju, who is online.

If you could raise your hand and um Cindy will be followed by James Brothers, who's also virtual.

Cindy, can you hear me?

Yes, can you hear me?

Yep, go ahead.

Thank you, planning commission members and city staff.

My name is Cindy Ju, and I'm with Heinz.

We are longtime investors and property owners in Bellevue and are the developers on the home district mixed-use project in downtown Bellevue.

I wanted to first thank the planning commission and staff for recognizing the importance of addressing critical housing shortage that we're facing in Bellevue and state that we're aligned in wanting to provide more housing for the city.

The city has been a great partner for us in the past, and we're looking forward to collaborating on our current project and future developments.

But the HOMA plan, the planning commission is being asked to consider will impose a new affordable housing tax on downtown development.

We're in the middle of our development process, and we've invested tens of millions of dollars into Bellevue and have spent the last five years working on the home district project through the pandemic.

The city is changing the goalposts in the middle of the game with this new HOMA plan, and it will have significant consequences on our placemaking project that has already faced headwinds from rising construction costs and a difficult real estate environment.

This isn't just a temporary blip in the cycle.

Construction costs have steadily increased for decades and will continue to escalate, making development harder.

The financial impact of the affordable housing tax on our project is in the millions of dollars and quite literally could be the straw that breaks the camel's back in a go versus no-go decision on millions of square feet of development, which in turn means millions of dollars of potential revenue that could disappear for the city.

We're not just talking about how many units this affordable housing tax will create.

We're talking about whether or not there will be any tax to collect if there's no development.

As an IOC project, we need to ensure that there will be provisions in the HOMA code that clearly state that these new changes are not going to affect our project.

While we understand that the intent of HOMA is to execute on the creation of additional units of housing, some significant changes that others have outlined need to be implemented in the plan to make sure the execution of the code meets its intent to create housing.

Furthermore, the timing in which this HOMA draft is being pushed through does not make much sense given the amount of changes that need to happen to create a workable plan.

It's critical to get this code right to make sure Bellevue gets the housing production it needs, and we have one shot at this.

We're asking the planning commission to delay recommendation of the current HOMA plan and to instruct staff to reach out to owners and developers in downtown next year.

We're willing to collaborate with the city on this as we have in the past, and we expect and deserve to have a chance to discuss this plan given our investment and our dedication over the years to Bellevue.

We appreciate everything that the planning commission is doing here and believe that we'll get to the best outcome for the city.

Thank you for your time.

Next, we have James Brothers.

If you could raise your hand.

Yes.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Go ahead.

Hi.

Yes, good evening, commissioners.

My name is James Brothers.

I'm an executive vice president at Westbrook Properties.

I'd like to echo the thoughts and thank both planning staff and the city on its thoughtful efforts to update the land use code to help transform underutilized properties to provide for more housing.

Our ownership entity purchased the woodlands at Bellevue, which is formerly the Boeing Eastgate campus in 2021.

The site is about 20 uh 45 acres just north of I-90 and is currently zoned OLB.

The site today is vacant and underutilized former office campus.

In short, a poster child of what HOMA is attempting to address with its mixed-use zones within the mixed use zones.

However, elements of the current HOMA draft are limiting because of restrictive and outdated suburban standards like caps on impervious surfaces, a lack of flexible departures, ground level use requirements, and certain elements of the mandatory affordability requirements.

We urge you to continue to support provisions in HOMA that remove the limit on the number of structures and dwelling units per acre.

We also urge you to remove suburban standards like impervious service and lot coverage requirements.

In the current draft, this is echoing a former speaker.

The 60% cap on impervious surfaces becomes a major limiting constraint.

The recent Wilburton updates eliminated these provisions and instead opted for a 7% open space requirement, which is much more appropriate for transit-oriented housing development.

Homeless should also provide adequate flexibility for ground level commercial and active use requirements and recognize that some of these areas do not have meaningful elements needed to support successful retail.

We support the recent draft update, exempting lots under 20,000 square feet from the pedestrian-oriented use requirements, but stress this exemption should be expanded to larger lots and allow for flexible departures in areas where retail doesn't make sense.

There is ample evidence in jurisdictions throughout the U.S.

that forcing retail into unsupportive areas is a major negative in that it challenges project financing, takes away FAR from residential development, and can create an effect a negative amenity and vacant ground level space and a downgraded pedestrian environment.

Finally, we'd encourage you to be thoughtful about the mandatory affordability requirements.

The scale of density increases in HOMA are much more limited than Wilburton, which paired mandatory affordability with transformative density allowance.

Thank you for your time and mic and consideration of these comments.

Next we have Linda Holler, who is in person, followed by Ian Morrison, who's also in person.

Good evening, members of the Bellevue Planning Commission.

My name is Linda Hallor.

My husband, Mark, and I have lived in Lake Heights for over 20 years.

I am here tonight to add my voice to those to my voice of support to those of the Newport Community Coalition.

We represent the four neighborhoods of Newport Hills, Lake Heights, Greenwich Crest, and Newport Shores.

And we're all very excited to see our neighborhood shopping center finally be able to be redeveloped.

I am supportive of adding housing and of making sure we provide housing for new young families and those folks who spoke during the middle housing issue who work in Bellevue but can't afford to live here.

I know you have heard the opposition voices who have been fighting the concept of a new shopping center for years.

I hope you will now hear our voices of support.

I support three to five stories.

I support new housing and housing that is affordable.

I support a shopping center that we can be proud of.

Our neighborhood deserves that.

Many of us in this neighborhood have worked repeatedly over the years to have our shopping center revitalized.

It is my hope that this time a successful resolution can be reached.

Thank you for your work on the planning commission.

And I hope that you will move home forward so that my supportive neighbors and I can finally see a new neighborhood shopping center.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Ian Morrison, followed by Ben Mickle.

Thank you, Commissioners.

Ian Morrison from McKella Hill here to talk about the shopping centers that are not Newport Hills.

Um I want to echo uh a couple of the comments that you've heard earlier today, where there's a lot of good work that's inside this Humma, and we appreciate the work that staff has done.

But in terms of some of these other shopping centers that have not been centered, shopping centers like Northtown on Bellevue Way, or as you just heard from the previous commerce, pieces out there of redevelop large redevelopment areas out there in Eastgate off of 156.

There was just a report released by the Lieutenant Governor about how do we convert shopping centers to housing.

And there was a great comment in there by Bellevue's own Nick Whipple that says these shopping centers are a great way to redevelop housing, to under to activate underutilized areas and bring property taxes forward.

So it's a win-win-win.

But the number one recommendation that was coming out of Lieutenant Governor's report that is coming into legislation next year is to reduce mandates on ground level commercial.

And so I echo the comments that we've heard earlier today that the departures, while we appreciate the departures and the ability for flexibility for small sites to have commercial relief on pedestrian-oriented uses.

There is more work needed to be done to allow flexibility for all sites because not every site can support 50 to 60% of ground floor commercial.

And there's also a report from Econ Northwest using 2020 data that vacant retail in areas that are not viable for retail when it is forced to be built into the project using 2020 data.

It was estimated that it cost each renter to subsidize that unit $25 a month in rent.

So on a 300-unit building, that's over $90,000 a year that those future renters are using to subsidize retail that is not viable and stays empty.

If you look at the Aurora Corridor, there is far too much vacant space.

And so we believe that there's a lot that is good in this HOMA process, but there is still more work to be done to dial in the flexibility so that we are not having an oversupply of retail in areas that cannot support it throughout the city because 100% of zero is zero.

If you cannot make projects financeable, you cannot have the housing that we want to hear.

I would also say that in some of these smaller scale shopping centers, the mandates, as you heard from Jesse Clausen, the mandates for affordability as opposed to incentives in small-scale retail centers, make it very difficult, especially if you have operating grocery stores.

One last part that I will say is we really appreciate the FAR incentives for commercial spaces, affordable commercial spaces in grocery stores.

But another area that requires more time and commitment is the language as it sits today, says that the developer has to sign a covenant that they will keep that grocery store forever.

And there is no flexibility.

And as you've seen with Albertson's and Safeway and the consolidations, making a commitment to that you have to keep a grocery store forever as the industry is changing, makes it really hard to finance and get those projects off the ground.

So we would ask for you to direct staff to hold this to continue to work on ground floor commercial commercial.

Next, we have Ben Mikkel, followed by William Leedham, who is virtual.

Hello, my name is Ben Mickel.

I'm a resident of downtown Bellevue.

At a previous meeting, I already expressed my strong support for the homework.

Uh tonight, I just want to emphasize the importance of quickly sending this Luca to City Council.

I think the staff has done a great job.

They've addressed your feedback.

Please move forward with a recommendation to city council tonight.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Um Bill, I see your hand raised.

Uh Bill will be followed by Yalda Hemidi.

Bill, can you raise your hand again?

I lost.

Can you hear me?

Yep, I can hear you.

Thank you.

All right, go ahead.

Uh, thank you, playing commission staff.

Uh, my name is Bill Ledham.

I'm a managing director at uh with Urban Renaissance Group or URG.

URG is an owner, manager, and operator of more than 10 million square feet in Puget Sound, including the summit.

And 333 high rises in the Bellevue CBD and Cascade Yard in the Eastgate neighborhood of Bellevue.

Our Cascade Yard property has an approved MVP with the city that will allow for the creation of up to 700 units in the Eastgate area.

Unfortunately, the HOMA ordinance in its current form will not lead to more housing production or redevelopment of suburban campuses such as Cascade Yard.

But URG does have some suggestions to improve the ordinance.

For example, impervious and hard service limits are outdated in very suburban.

For Eastcape, for example, the impervious service limits are 60%.

That is extremely low for urban development.

Our request is that staff should review each zone and significantly revise standards to enable efficient housing development.

We also have concern regarding non-conforming use provisions.

URG has several million square feet in Seattle, and there the non-conforming provisions are simple and work well.

We would suggest Bellevue incorporate standards similar to Seattle's.

Thank you.

Next, we have Yalda Himidi, who is virtual, followed by Adam Deba, who is also virtual.

Yalda, can you raise your hand?

Yalda, can you hear me?

All right, I'm going to move on to Adam Deba.

Can you hear me?

I'm trying to unmute.

Oh, okay.

Uh Yelda, can you hear me?

Is it Yelda or Adam?

Uh you can you are on the list first, so you can go first.

Okay.

Thank you.

Oh, wow.

Um sorry, I'm coming up.

Okay.

Hello, my name.

Um, my name is Adam Deba.

Um, I've called um Lake Hills and Crossroads home for the last decade.

I raised three daughters here.

Um, I'm the executive director of Africans on the East Side and a housing advocate in Bellevue.

Policy policy A is really crucial for our community.

As um uh as rents and home prices continue to rise in Bellevue.

Families across Bellevue are struggling to stay housed and stable.

This policy is not just a recommendation, it is a necessity for the well-being of residents who work hard, raise their children here, and contribute to this city every day.

In my work with immigrant refugee um immigrants, refugee and low-income families.

I see fourth time how many are being pushed out because they simply cannot keep up with the cost of living.

Policy A plays a vital role in creating protections, expanding affordability, and ensuring that equitable access to stable houses is here in Bellevue.

Our community depends on solutions that create safe, accessible and affordable homes for all.

Policy A is a critical step towards that vision, and I thoroughly support this adoption.

And I also raised three daughters here.

And thank you very much for listening to us.

Thank you very much.

Uh I'll I'll return to Yelda.

Are you able to unmute Yelda?

Great.

I can return to you at uh at the end.

Uh next we have uh Sterling Yoon, who is in person, followed by Alec Nelson.

Is this does this work?

Oh, hi.

Hi, I'm Sterling.

Uh, and thank you to the commission for allowing us the opportunity to speak.

Uh, I would like to speak in favor of option A and its affordability requirements that are outlined in HOMA.

Uh, I think that it's high it's past time for Bellevue to match our neighbors and other cities uh around the U.S.

in kind of pushing forward our housing requirements.

Uh I I live in Somerset.

I'm a product of the Bellevue School District.

I went to Stevenson and went to Odo and went to Interlake, and the only reason I can still live in Somerset is because my family lives there.

Rate uh rents elsewhere, past in the uh elsewhere in the city of Skyarcid past the point of affordability for me and a lot of the other young adults who grew up here and uh wish to move back here, uh, start a family here and do all the other things that people in past generations living in Bellevue have been able to do on afford like on working class incomes.

Uh whenever I commute to like the Eastgate Park and Ride or I go shopping in Newport Hills, I see those inefficient spaces that uh previous commenters have all talked about.

And I think they're a great opportunity for uh Bellevue to kind of introduce more housing and make it so that uh affordable units are being built in those uh places.

I see like neglected spaces, I see opportunities for uh uh urban amenities and all the great things that a growing city like Bellevue deserves to have and that people deserve to have in general.

Uh obviously your staff uh and studies from elsewhere have already shown the benefits of density uh and affordable housing on like the utilization of like urban space, mass transit, and other amenities that cities uh should be developing.

Uh and I think I just want uh this commission to support people who live here as well as the small businesses who take advantage of these opportunities and make it so that future generations like myself included, but also people who might even be too young to come to these sorts of meetings can still live in a Bellevue of the future.

Thank you.

Uh next we have Alec Nelson, who's virtual.

Alec, if you can raise your hand.

Um that will be followed by Jack McCullough.

Alec, are you online?

All right, let's move on to Jack McCullough, and uh he will be followed by Jeremy Liu.

Thank you very much.

Chair members of the commission, I'm Jack McCullough.

Thank you for taking the time to listen.

I'm here to talk about the downtown tonight and just the downtown.

I've spoken a couple times to you before virtually on this topic.

I just handed out to you a list that I'd provided two months ago to you and staff of many of the downtown owners who I'm here on behalf of tonight, over a dozen who have developed tens of millions of square feet in downtown over the last 20 years.

Um they have a concern, some of which has been expressed before, but I think it boils down to a handful of things, and I'm just going to list them off.

Uh downtown doesn't fit into HOMA the way the mixed-use neighborhoods do for a bunch of reasons.

As Jesse Clausen pointed out, most of the mixed-use areas were zoned originally in the 70s and 80s.

Downtown was rezoned only a few years ago in 2017.

The ink is fairly dry on this.

And we have millions of square feet of projects that are in the middle of their permit process right now and that are not vested, and that we'll have to reconsider their permit structure if HOMA is passed and applies to them.

The mixed-use areas in the city don't have an affordable housing program, right?

That's why HOMA is here.

The downtown has an affordable housing incentive program that was adopted in 2017.

And it should be given an opportunity to work.

The mixed-use areas around the city are largely being provided in an up zone, as you've seen, right?

Significant incentives to compensate for the additional cost or the additional burden, if you will, of providing the important affordable housing.

Not the case in downtown.

A couple items mentioned by staff here that apply to the perimeter design district, which is obviously a small subset of downtown, and for projects that are using the incentive for affordable housing, again, a small subset.

But for pretty much everyone else downtown, what's happening is that as Kevin Wallace said, effectively a tax is being applied, and there's no compensating benefit in terms of density, which seems like it's the fundamental premise of what's going on here.

And I think finally, you know, uh, I mean, this is downtown is the living heart of the city.

It's it's what's generating so much of the tax revenue of the city, and the city has long had a special relationship with downtown.

You know, I would point out that um a different group in city staff is working hard on the Grand Connection, and we're hoping to get that done.

That's an important feature downtown.

And and the thinking is in a couple years, probably the city, a different group will be reaching out to these same owners, asking them to help fund the Grand Connection.

Yeah.

And I think they're going to say we already gave it the office.

Um, so I would encourage you either to take downtown out of Homa right now or defer the program so that we can work on this.

The downtown owners I've listed will sit down and work with you and with staff to get it right.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Uh, Jeremy Lou, I see your hand raised.

Uh Jeremy will be followed by Samir Master.

Jeremy, can you hear me?

Yes.

Yes, wonderful.

Yes, good evening.

Yes.

Good evening, and thank you to uh the planning commission for your dedication uh to thoughtful housing policy.

Um it's hard to out-articulate Jack, so I'll keep it short here.

Uh, my name is Jeremy Louis, and I represent Stanford Hotels.

We are the property owner and developer for the downtown Cloudview site at 108th and 8th, which is approved for two million square feet of office use and 400 plus residential units.

Historically, the city has been a strong partner, and we look forward to continuing that relationship.

Um, I think many others have mentioned that we visited the downtown zoning just eight years ago.

Our project is one of those projects.

Um, we see many beautiful new buildings as we point our eyes upwards, but there are also projects such as ours, which are in mid-stage uh in the pipeline, so to speak, and changing the rules midstream is not good for us, especially as we are reacting to a post-COVID world where office use is significantly impacted and believe that we need incentives to shift some of our commercial uses to residential, not disincentives.

And so my concern is simple.

The way that the framework is drafted creates a tax uh without generating any benefits for us and the downtown.

It seems that everywhere else they get benefits, they get density, but we don't.

Um, and and just to add to that, we are already challenged because the cost to construct housing in downtown with high rises is gonna be somewhere in the order of 30% more versus uh a wood frame building outside of downtown.

And so my recommendation is that you know we support the principle of affordable housing.

It is important, but please remove the downtown from HOMA in the existing framework.

And as you can see, there's plenty of us here who would be happy to get together and actively engage to craft something that makes a lot more sense uh for the city of Albia.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh next we have Samir Master, who is in person, followed by Tony Marice.

Okay.

We will move right on to Tony Maurice.

Good evening.

Good evening, commissioners.

My name is Tony Marisi, and I'm a resident of Newport Shores, and I've lived there with my family for the past 23 years.

I am a member of the Newport Community Coalition Coalition.

And I'm here to voice uh my support of the HOMA and opportunities it presents for housing, retail, and other amenities in the Newport Hills shopping center.

I have heard that there have been comments in the past saying that the Newport Hills shopping center is not important uh to Newport Shores.

And from my perspective, that's absolutely not accurate.

And I know others in our coalition uh would feel the same.

We consider the Newport Hills shopping center our shopping center.

We're excited for what the future could hold for the shopping center.

And currently we enjoy the restaurants, and we can hope uh that we hope that we can find a way for them to stay in any new development.

Also, I'm a realtor for the past 30 years.

I'm keenly aware of how expensive housing is and how unattainable it is for many people within our community.

Adding housing and affordable housing at the Newport Hills shopping center and any other shopping center in the city uh as called for in Homa as a way to help our housing crisis makes a lot of sense.

I hope you will move forward with the approval of HOMA so that our hopes and dreams for the Newport Hills shopping center can come to fruition as soon as possible.

Thank you for allowing me to speak this evening.

Thank you.

Uh next we have uh James Rivard, who is virtual, followed by Nicole Myers.

James, can you raise your hand?

Are you able to hear me?

Can you hear me?

Yes, go ahead.

Hello there.

Uh, this is James Rivard.

I am a partner with S Ferm Development.

We're a multifamily uh market rate developer.

We developed the maiden uh in downtown Bellevue.

We have uh another thousand units right now, roughly in the either under construction, uh including the Silver Cloud or at uh old Silver Cloud site, and uh but a total of about a thousand units in the pipeline.

Uh we also I'm a partner in SRM affordable housing, so we build workforce in affordable housing.

So we're we're uh well, I don't run that division, pretty conversion tenant.

And we recently built the uh workforce project nuovo uh over uh next to 405.

So we we participate in both.

Um really just three points here, real quickly.

And they they echo very much Kevin Wallace again or Jack's comments.

Uh it's very, very difficult to develop in downtown right now.

It's extremely expensive.

You can see that by the lack of projects that are under construction.

I think we're one of one or two right now that are under construction.

And imposing additional costs and requirements on downtown housing is exactly the opposite of what you need to do if you want to promote and develop the amount of housing that needs to be developed in Bellevue over the next 10 and 20 and 30 years.

So I don't think it's a very wise time to do this.

I mean, if the the market was booming and things were were coming out of the ground, uh it might make sense, but even then there should be an incentive and it shouldn't be a punishment, uh, a financial penalty.

It's difficult enough to get projects going.

So that's number one.

Number two, I will say that the city of Bellevue, we we work up and down the west coast is uh the the staff very responsive, they're very professional.

The city is very good to work with.

Um, but it it seems a bit rushed, and it doesn't seem to be to have included the outreach that I would have expected of the city of Bellevue to the developers and the stakeholders in the community, particularly in the downtown.

Uh with this new proposed with the new proposed assortments.

So I would encourage you to, I haven't seen what Kevin's proposed.

I'm sure it's it's smart and it's represented what we would all support.

But I would encourage you to review that.

I would encourage you to take some time to talk to the other stakeholders and to really figure this out because as Jack said, there's there's there's no incentive here.

You know, it's a stick, but but we forgot to carry it.

So uh there's there's got to be a little bit of a give and benefit to do this in the downtown.

Uh the last thing I might say is, and I'm not a developer in Eastgate.

We've looked at projects up there.

We've looked at projects up there, uh, but just to echo what what some of them we've developed about two million square feet of commercial space, both office and retail.

And it's all about location.

And you know, the maiden hasn't turned tenant over in 10 years.

Um very much other than CVS, which is along WART.

Oh, let's go.

Thanks.

Next we have Nicole Myers.

Heidi Dean, sorry.

Greetings, planning commissioners.

I had some concerns about the uh flexibility that Matthew mentioned for downtown.

Uh, when you have XS FAR, if you look at page 67, it looks like this is required to be used within a single project limit.

And I don't think that's adequate flexibility for some of the projects that may have XSFAR.

As we've seen with the recent uh pinnacle approvals, um, they receive an exemption and the tower spacing.

And, you know, looking at the example of the fires that recently occurred in Hong Kong, I think it is extremely important to think carefully about what tower spacing we allow to happen here in Bellevue.

Um, the tower that initially caught fire there was actually farther apart than some of the pinnacle towers are gonna be.

And um, you know, we have rules about how we're supposed to give exemptions for tower spacing.

It's supposed to be things that would not result in privacy impacts, which implies that there's at least one solid wall, but instead there are going to be windows facing windows and um, you know, 40, 41 feet apart, balconies 25 feet.

It's just so close together and at um a height that might be hard for the fire department to respond to, as was you know, one of the difficulties in their fire response.

Um, I think we can't assume that the excess FAR that is assigned as part of this really ends up on a different site, that they have a useful place to put it.

I think you should actually tailor the um allowances for FAR.

It's what we really think is realistic for a building using scenarios that like come up with an amount of open space that we're comfortable with that you know make reasonable assumptions about what is actually likely to be built so that we don't end up trying to after the fact flex the um form allowances.

Um I I just hope that um you all um maybe take a slower approach to this, as some of the um other speakers have mentioned.

I think you know, it is potentially something that has such a significant impact that um it would make sense to you know treat some of the subcategories separately.

Um I will say that as far as the um 20,000 square foot exemption for pedestrian-oriented uses.

I am in the camp of continuing to offer pedestrian-oriented uses for those neighborhoods.

I think um you can see some examples of smaller spaces, even on lots that are much smaller than 5,000 square feet, if we can come up with some examples of what that might look like.

And then, you know, maybe tailor the uh requirements to um promises about affordability, so that they're not necessarily creating as much square footage for retail, but that there is some guarantee that you know local community businesses that need our support will be able to find a place in this uh future for Bellevue.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh next we have Heidi Dean.

And after that, I'll see if there's anybody else that wants to comment.

Okay.

Um Good evening.

I'm gonna just start by correcting a couple of things.

Um, first of all, it's not been 20 years that we've been working on the shopping center.

It's been nine since the first comp plan amendment and rezoned um attempt.

Yes, the Heartland study of 2010 did recommend mixed use, and what was not mentioned was that the residential that was recommended was senior living and that we had an opportunity for senior living in 2019.

And because uh Rainier Northwest will no longer work with that buyer, we don't have a redeveloped shopping center at this time.

They are the problem.

They're the ones dragging their feet.

Yes, Rainier, along with other NB zone properties did ask for mixed-use mid-rise seven to ten stories to be the future land use map designation when the DEIS was released.

Commissioner Liu, you authored the community club's um letter opposing that.

Ms.

Deutsch raised her hands in uh support of that letter, and that did not go through.

So um I just wanted to point that out.

I did want to point out that the Newport uh community coalition is a relatively small number of people in our area that's put together by Rainier's paid PR consultant, Sarah Langton, who coordinates all their messaging.

And I also wanted to say that those of us who support or oppose a massive up zone of neighborhood centers are not anti-development.

And no matter how many times the NCC repeats that, it will never make that true.

So, and here, by the way, uh here's what no one's talking about, and that's that small neighborhood centers and strip malls are actually highly desired properties without housing.

Just a basic Google search reveals that.

Um one of the things I wanted to talk about is the housing bills, all the housing bills that um have passed in the last three legislative sessions had not happened when um the next right work kicked off in 2022.

So we don't know what the effect of those housing bills are going to be on Bellevue and its neighborhoods because the code amendments have just barely been passed.

We have no data.

We don't know what they're going to do.

So just one or two of those bills alone will have significant impact on the neighborhoods.

You put them all together and you're talking massive density.

Um, if that suite of bills works, there is actually no reason to move forward with HOMA at all.

Again, we have no data that says that we need this because this is a council initiated um uh land use code amendment.

And it is a choice for you to say to recommend no.

Um it only addresses the housing element of the comp plan and ignores the other elements.

So I ask you to please don't recommend moving forward.

Thank you.

I'm going to turn online, and if anybody would like to make comment on um that is attending virtually, if you would raise your hand.

I see one hand.

Are you able to hear me?

Yes, I'm able to hear you.

All right, go ahead.

Um I appreciate that you are my name is Elizabeth Maupin, and I appreciate that you are looking at mixed-use areas.

My experience has been that these areas benefit from having greater security when there are uh residents living in those areas that might otherwise just be commercial and um that uh I have some notes here that I can't read that um after businesses uh include residences.

It's possible for people who are working in a business to live close to the business.

That's that really helps people with the commuting.

And I also found out that um if you make an exception to the requirement that the ground floor be uh commercial, we need some ground floor residential uh spaces for people with disabilities.

If they're on upper levels and the power goes out, they can't use the elevators, and some of them can't use the stairs.

So it's a safety issue.

If you could allow some use of ground floor for residential, even if there's also commercial on that level, that would be a real help to the disabled community.

And there may be some adjustments that need to be made, but uh I'm generally in support of the uh a project that you are looking at.

I don't live in Bellevue, but I've had a lot of experience working with communities that are looking at ways of including more affordable housing and mixed use.

So I'm just bringing you what I have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh, is there anybody uh in in the audience that would like to speak?

Go ahead.

Um, hello, my name is Heidi Show, and I live um in the condos and townhomes that are right behind the Newport uh shopping center.

Um my son, he's in fifth grade and has gone to Newport Heights Elementary, and my daughters have graduated from Newport High School.

My biggest concern is that um the last study, I think someone had mentioned it was 15 years ago, or maybe it was nine, I'm not sure.

But anyways, it's been a very long time.

Um and also the outreach for um what's going on hasn't really been um I I mean I talked to a lot of people in my complex and in the neighborhood, and no one really knows what that is happening.

Um in addition, I'm troubled with how this is going to impact schools, traffic, and the overall surrounding structure, such as water, sewer, internet and power, as well as pedestrian and bicycle access, the lack of parking and public transportation.

I do support redevelopment of the area as long as the retail space is kept and um the restaurants and the other businesses are included.

Um it's a space that is used day and into the evening.

Some places restaurants don't even open until four.

It is the community gathering place also with this redevelopment.

The residential units need to be a reason reasonable housing number for our neighborhood.

And I believe with a more recent development study, that would help immensely with this.

Um thank you.

Thank you.

Uh if there's anybody else, if you would raise your hand to go ahead.

And I've seen a lot of changes, and especially in downtown.

I'm really glad that you have create progress there.

I would fully support suggestion.

Um uh option number one.

I had no intention to speak today, but like I decided to voice my support and urge you to actually approve the suggestion and move it to council because housing create crisis is named crisis because it's urgent.

And while home maybe not ideal, but we can spend one more year, two more years to like figuring this out now.

But there are people who don't have millions of dollars who cannot wait and they have to move out.

And when you move out of the city, you like experience huge costs.

So like please think not only about like millions of dollars in development pipeline, but also people who are affected by this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I didn't really prepare for this.

Um my name's Ray Osburn.

I live in Newport Hills.

Um, I've been there for close to 25 years.

Um when I first moved there, um the shopping center was um it wasn't great.

The red apple was there.

Um sometimes you'd get spoiled milk.

Um, so it was kind of a mixture.

I'm sure it was struggling when we first arrived, and eventually it wasn't there.

Um, but what the shopping center really did have was a lot of small businesses and community organizations.

There was a dance studio, there's martial arts.

Uh I still go to the haircut place, although they're not open as much.

There's this affordability of businesses that that is there now.

Not that this is the way it should be because the place has been just completely mismanaged for so many years.

Um, I just feel that the current owner is just wants to get more money out of the project, and that's why that's continues to just go downhill and downhill and downhill.

And unfortunately, this Homa thing, it doesn't really address affordability for businesses.

Um, and it also doesn't really, it kind of ignores that the Newport Hills uh neighborhood.

It's an island.

It's got, I mean, it was annexed, it wasn't regularly a Bellevue community.

So they when they developed it, they put tiny little streets.

We have speed bumps going through our major arterials.

It's really hard to get people in and off when people cut through just to get off Cole Creek.

It's it's it's gonna be hard to really, you know, have big thriving, shiny businesses.

Um, and you put five stories um or even four.

It's there's gonna be so many people.

It's gonna just clog up the roads even more and make it just less and less livable, honestly.

Um, when I need to find someplace that's um affordable, you know, uh services and and don't want to go through the traffic jam, frankly, I'll just head towards rent and you know, I'll head towards a header other direction on on Cole Creek Parkway.

I feel kind of abandoned a little bit by Bellevue by having things like this where there's just so many, so many different um programs to really boost the affordability of housing, but not really recognizing what my neighborhood looks like.

That's that's how I feel.

Thank you.

I saw another hand in the back.

Thank you all.

Planning commission.

I I'm a 44-year-old resident of actually Delmore Woods.

My home is in the last.

Sorry, could you provide your name for the record?

My name is Gary Stutt.

Uh I live in Delmore Woods.

I'm actually in the last street before it enters uh Newcastle.

I've been in the home 44 years.

Umrigently Col Creek one way, either way.

I used to love going back and forth on that street.

Okay, have to avoid that.

If I want to get out of the neighborhood in the morning, which I don't necessarily have to, but on occasion I do business hours between buses, school buses, the metro line, and just general traffic coming through 119th Avenue, which is right through the Newport Hill Shopping Center.

It's a parking lot.

Um I'm I'm 83 two years old.

I don't have to go anywhere, whatever.

So I can plan my times around, whatever.

But uh seeing what's happened to Newcastle Commons, when I moved into that area, it was 54 acre property owned by Mutual Materials, which was a large brick plant on the West Coast.

And now that whole area with the between apartments, the condos, the single family residences.

Um, I can see what's going to happen to the Newport Hill Shopping Center.

And I really don't want that to happen.

Uh housing, yes.

And I look at four or five five or six story buildings, it'll just ruin the whole texture and whatever.

Um I'm not against housing.

I think affordable housing is important, and I my heart goes out to the young people today uh who want to live in here, live in that community, uh, which is a Bellevue is a wonderful.

I had a lot to do with the annexation at the time I moved in in 1981.

It was unincorporated King County.

Myself and about 20 residents of the area petitioned to annex to the city of Bellevue.

And I was so happy that that happened in 1992.

Um but I have nothing more to say other than I'm concerned about the traffic patterns and whatever else.

And thank you, appreciate your time.

Thank you.

Any more commenters.

I didn't plan to speak, but I um my name is Pam Raider.

Just wait till you get to that speaker.

Hi, my name is Pam Raider.

I live in Newport Hills, and um been there like 20 years plus, and I just I love living in Bellevue.

I tell you, my son, okay.

So my son just moved to Detroit.

He bought a place.

He grew up here, and none of his people could afford something.

He bought a place in Detroit, because he can afford that.

But it he would love to come back to Bellevue.

But I love living in Bellevue because it works.

I mean, that stop light going down the hill, that's amazing.

I sometimes live in Honolulu because my parents grew up.

I grew up there and my still in home there with my parents.

So I go back and forth, and the traffic there is just unbearable.

But I love living in Bellevue because you don't wait five minutes on a stoplight.

You have to hop in and it's so it just moves.

I never see a place where you could really speak about um your living situation and your and and speak to the city council.

I I think that's so wonderful.

I love living in Bellevue.

I just think everything works so well, and you guys really have worked hard to make it manageable.

I mean, going down that I know going down that um I uh one nineteen coal creek parkway, it can be a disaster, but it isn't.

You know why?

Because it's all organized so well.

It just moves.

I just wanted to say that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh uh any other speakers if you are online or in person, if you could raise your hand, Jerry.

I'm not seeing any more hands.

Great.

I think we've come to the close of the public testimony.

Is there a motion to close the hearing?

So moved.

Is there a second?

Any discussion?

All proofs say aye.

All right, I think we need a break.

Uh so let's do uh back in uh 840.

So it may be difficult to work things into that work schedule.

It's obviously also limited by staff capacity or capabilities.

And just note one more item that will be coming before the commission is downtown livability two point oh, and so that we'll be looking at downtown uh more holistically.

Um so that would be kind of another opportunity to look at the downtown standards.

Okay, thank you.

Um I have a couple uh I I think I agree with a number of the comments that were uh brought up today.

Ground level uses, I think the intent is great.

We don't want to have ghost streets, right?

But there's other ways to do it just than the other just on retail or storefronts.

Uh and it's it is causing some level of discomfort clearly with some of the stakeholders.

Um there's one in particular I wanted to ask you about.

Maybe I didn't understand it correctly.

Uh the applicability of affordable housing program.

Uh whenever you have 10 or more dwelling units, there's a provision that says also whenever you have a project that is more than 4,000 square feet.

Yeah.

So that effectively makes everything that's 4,000 square feet required to provide affordable housing, because if you do the math, it's like 400 square foot units, which are very small units.

And that's that particular line item seems a little bit excessive to me, but uh I I wanted to know if I'm uh reading incorrectly, perhaps, or if there's a specific uh context in which uh this happens that I'm not aware of.

So at least in the Wilburton context, the 4,000 related to commercial development, and that's how we qualify what's considered a major commercial project.

4,000 seems small to be labeled major major commercial, but that's just kind of the way that the department has been viewing the 4,000 square foot threshold.

Um, but it looks like we're having a couple people just verifying the language there to make sure it's really intended to just apply to that.

This is 2015 one one tent.

Yeah, so it sets out the criteria for what projects would apply.

So um there's essentially different sets of criteria if you have different project types.

Um so if you were to do something like an all residential project, it would be based on that unit count, I believe.

Um with other projects with have commercial, then you have that 4,000 square feet of commercial, which is also a trigger for the program.

Uh this is the same as what is currently required through the Wilburton uh, so it just apply for 4,000 square feet of commercial space.

Okay.

I might have misread that then.

Thank you.

That's that's uh uh that's good.

I think I'll I'll let everybody else speak and maybe we can get back to some details.

But thank you.

Yeah, we'll do a second round after this.

So there's more opportunity there.

Uh Commissioner Kennedy.

Thank you.

And I thank you for all your work on this.

There's clearly a lot of interest and um I also shared some of the questions that we heard this evening that that had gotten raised.

I wrote too many notes um to say in do we get three points?

Um but I think uh the first point I wanted to make is just we I think we received 33 comments uh here this evening um in writing plus more uh that we received after 1 p.m.

several commenters.

And I think it does seem like there are several questions around um a variety of the areas that both the downtown and the HOMA are um uh for mixed use areas are covering.

So I wanted to just ask a few of those questions.

I do think it may be worth follow-up on those items.

And I know that there is a desire to move this forward to the city council.

Um but I feel like maybe we we I share Commissioner Vale Levase's feeling that maybe we need some more time.

Um so one area that I wanted to ask about is um in the non-conforming use provisions.

I I'm curious, Robbie, were you able to do some comparative analysis to where what we see in other jurisdictions?

I know a couple different commenters this evening raised how Seattle, for instance, uses um deals with nonconforming uses.

Just curious your thoughts around how what's being proposed compares in those other jurisdictions.

Absolutely, Commissioner Kennedy.

So I have not done a comparison with other jurisdictions.

However, I have done a comparison among the city's seven different non-conforming sections that currently exist.

Okay.

And what we have in the draft is the most gradual transition from into compliance with current code.

And it's based on what uh this commission and also council just adopted in Wilburton.

Um so that was the direction going forward, but certainly can look into what Seattle's doing.

Great.

I've I would be curious, just because we had it come up a few different times, um, just to hear how that's being dealt with in other jurisdictions.

I would be I I would find that helpful and interesting if it's not a huge lift.

Um the other item I wanted to raise is uh in thinking about uh the feasibility analysis that we did and the analysis that went into option B.

Um I've I've spent a lot of time and asked a lot of questions around option A, but in the respect of option B, I don't have a lot of clarity around um how we came to the FAR bonus or allotment that is received for the point to affordable housing equaling uh 0.5 FAR up to a given height.

Where I can you just give a little bit more background that on how did we come to that and why it seems like a sufficient incentive?

I was struck by seeing comments on actually both sides of that issue, both from developers and affordable housing advocates, both kind of feeling like maybe option B isn't providing a sufficient incentive.

And I was curious why we can't do that through an incentive.

We have to do it in a mandate.

Is there a way to adjust that?

And how had you thought about it?

Why is this where we landed?

I guess.

Sure.

I mean, um, you know, we're trying to balance the bonus with the amount of what basically the bonus of with what the city's getting back for giving that bonus, right?

So um looking at our values of sort of floor area and square footage that we have through our economic analysis, which you all were provided, those numbers uh at the last meeting or the meeting before, I can't remember at this point.

Um one of the five.

Yeah, one of the five, one of the more recent of the five.

Um so looking at those numbers and trying to balance sort of that return um on investment, we'll say um, I think what we've heard from the affordable housing providers is pretty clear um comment in support of option A.

Um, I think what we've heard from the affordable housing providers is pretty clear comment in support of option A.

I don't think there's been much interest from the affordable housing providers in option B because we know both nationwide and and in the city of Bell that a mandatory program is going to provide more affordable housing.

Um, you know, we can certainly increase the bonus.

The more we increase the bonus, um, you know, the more the city is giving for what it's getting back in relation to affordable housing.

The more you increase the the bonus, the more effective a voluntary program is always going to be.

Um, part of the sort of creating parity between the two programs was to uh have them basically end at the same point.

So you're getting the same FAR and the same building height through both programs as maximums and not privileging one over the other by giving significantly more building height or FAR through one or the other programs.

Um building height is obviously also limited by other factors such as the comprehensive plan.

So there's only so far we can push that before we're not in compliance with our comprehensive plan.

So making sure all of those things are in balance when we look at this analysis using the numbers that we have through our economic analysis.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

I appreciate it is highly complex.

And I was trying to think through as we were listening to some of the comments, how these different bonus scenarios and as we did that feasibility analysis, which I do remember and really appreciated it, um, would affect uh kind of, you know, it seems like a lot of developers are looking toward these town homes and timber frame developments.

How could how does it impact that um kind of the six-foot or the six-story building versus like the 12-story building that would finally start penciling out again with a non-timber frame?

And how do we think about these bonuses in all of those different scenarios?

I think someone or a few different commenters raised this evening to really think through that feasibility analysis for different sizes of buildings.

And I was thinking that through as is have we have we thought about that?

And and then also thinking about that in different market scenarios.

Um, we are in a tough market now.

How does it compare today?

And I know we saw that in the analysis, but how would it be in a good market?

And I think that was raised by several um commenters this evening.

So I think also when we with the analysis we provided to you a few meetings ago, there was the analysis was provided in a better market scenario where the numbers are positive, showing you how much of a gap that makes with the mandatory program.

Uh, I will note that often um because of the way our building heights are, an incentive for additional building height for uh developments that are likely to build townhomes is not an incentive at all.

Not good.

Um you're probably very unlikely to get affordable housing uh in townhomes and very much unlikely to get any affordable housing in any ownership uh project through a voluntary program versus a mandatory program.

Uh I think we have seen almost no uh owner-occupied affordable housing units being created in the city of Bellevue without any sort of mandatory program in the past.

Uh Habitat for Humanity has been basically the only operator of those units uh in the city.

So uh there is certainly drawbacks to that voluntary program on the smaller side of the the building height.

Um, and it doesn't provide as much of an incentive for those types.

Okay.

Okay, my third category of questions had around downtown.

Um there were several comments raised around the affordable housing incentives in downtown being mandatory taxes.

Can can you explain whether this is a mandatory tax, which is distinct from how I was reading it and and how it is not and and why so many commenters feel like it is.

Yeah, sure.

Uh it is not a mandatory tax, uh, nor is it a tax at all.

Um, it is built in the exact same way that the amenity um program is for our current open space.

Um, so if you want to argue that this change is a tax, then the open space that we currently require is a tax as well.

Um it's not.

We give essentially the way the program works is you have a base building height and a base FAR.

And if you want to exceed either of those things, you need to provide us these amenities, which is why it's the amenity incentive.

Um, for each of those amenities, we give a certain number of amenity incentive points, which allows you to build that additional square footage above the base FAR.

Uh in this case, we are proposing to add affordable housing into that program and require that the first 25% of those points be from affordable housing.

So if you are to participate in that incentive, the affordable housing portion of that incentive is mandatory.

That program itself is not mandatory.

I will say that almost all of our developments use it because it is a quite beneficial uh incentive program to the developers.

Um it's it's certainly not mandatory.

You certainly don't have to use it.

It is certainly uh an incentive not a tax with the same square foot uh being allowed for the exemption program and for the uh amenity incentive point you're essentially getting eight square feet of market rate housing for every single square foot of affordable housing you provide which we uh think is quite a bonus uh contrary to what we've heard from public comment which is saying there's no bonus it's all stick and no carrot we think that's a quite large carrot um that one to four exemption goes up to 50% of the base FAR as well currently in the code it's one FAR with a ratio of one to 2.5.

So it is a huge expansion of that bonus and also uh an additional four amenity incentive points for every square foot of affordable housing.

I think where we're hearing the most concern from the development community um obviously taxing you know it's in relation to the fee in lieu it's for those projects that are in the pipeline which you've heard uh from from many of the commenters today that uh we're essentially requiring this fee for those pipeline projects um and that is where it becomes more of uh a difficulty for developers I will openly admit that as they've already designed their projects around this open space amenity incentive system uh and now we're saying well there's a new amenity that you're going to have to provide us uh we have committed to those developers that we would discuss exempting those projects that are in the pipeline uh from the HOMA requirements essentially they'd have to either choose to uh participate in the HOMA updates and get all of the HOMA updates or stick with the current code uh that's at the discretion of council um planning commission can certainly make a recommendation that council does discuss that it is not in the purview of planning commission uh we are not proposing to make any changes to the land use code to to that end um it's very odd for us to put specific projects into our land use code with investing language which becomes outdated quite quickly uh in the past we have exempted projects from uh updated code uh that's basically through the ordinance that council would adopt it would exempt those pipeline projects from uh the HOMA requirements you have anything you want to add uh if I could Commissioner Kennedy just wanted to also touch on some of the other carrots that were um offered up um because this has been a route or a comment that we've been hearing from the downtown community and we've been listening to them.

One of the major shifts that Matthew had uh noted in the presentation was a reduction in the open space from the 10% to 7% that was at their request and that is not something that applies just in the perimeter overlay.

I think there was some uh comments suggesting most of the benefit is going to the perimeter that actually would apply anywhere in the downtown um the parking for residential has also been reduced by 50% um and that's not uh through an affordable housing threshold being met so that's another big benefit and then we've also added in more flexibility where upper level stepbacks are required.

So there is of course the reduction that's consistent with HOMA when an affordability threshold is met but there's also a lot of flexibility on where they land that upper level step back regardless of whether there is affordable housing provided that was also in response to a lot of comments that we've been hearing about the downtown um and then there's other comments that we've also been hearing as of recent just as of this week um that we have also um kind of scoped already on downtown livability 2.0 as part of a larger discussion on some of the form changes that might be considered um and that the planning commission uh would want to discuss um and likely in relation with a bunch of other kind of uh form changes and adjustments that the um that have been on a list um since that 2017 update happened so just wanted to add in a couple other incentives that we threw in to help with this um change for the downtown that's really helpful thank you commissioner geppel yeah thanks for a great presentation this evening I have um I I think overall I think this is close um I'm leaning towards option A um at this point um and I I have two plus ones and I have uh and I have two points um so first the the plus ones I wanted a plus one um something that um commissioner basis um was saying earlier which um has to do with ground floor level usages I I mean the example for the Eastgate um trailer in is kind of a a concern for me um you know and how we how we address that because I I think if there's a burden from um there's a burden from uh um having retail space that's not um occupied um I would hate to see that um happen you know with um unoccupied space so that's one plus one I also wanted to plus one the the discussion you just had um with Commissioner Kennedy on the uh on the downtown um area because in my mind I I think what's being proposed is fair except for those projects that are in the pipeline and I I really am sympathetic to them and I would I I don't know how we do this as a planning commission if it's not within our purview.

I also wanted to plus one the the discussion you just had um with commissioner Kennedy on the uh on the downtown um area because in my mind I I think what's being proposed is fair, except for those projects that are in the pipeline.

And I I really am sympathetic to them.

And I would I I don't know how we do this as a planning commission if it's not within our purview.

I I certainly have a strong view that those that are in the pipeline should not be um should not be uh prejudiced by what we do here.

Um so um that's that's another plus one.

The other two pieces that I I think I'd like to get um some more input on our first on the um impermeable surfaces, because that came up several times, the 60% requirement.

Can you speak to that and whether that makes sense with the density that we're trying to you know create in some of these areas and why are we requiring that?

Sure.

Um, whether it makes sense is up for subjective opinion.

Um, but there are reasons why that has been required in the past, and there are certainly other mechanisms that we could get some open space uh as suggested by public comment, such as requiring open space.

Uh generally the reasons you would require some permeable surfaces is to uh manage runoff uh is a big issue, right?

So the more impervious surface you have, the more runoff you have, the faster the runoff moves.

So um it gets essentially pushed to the city stormwater system often, which burdens are uh utilities.

Um there are ways to manage it.

There are requirements that the city has for managing on-site runoff, and there's also requirements that the state has.

So uh at this point in time it's not as big of an issue as it used to be.

Um, you know, the other reason to maintain permeabus surfaces is sort of, you know, there's landscaping, there's trees.

So, you know, by having uh impermeable surface limit, you can't pave your whole lot.

So you know, there's pros and cons to that, obviously.

Um it does limit the space for development, it limits the size of buildings and it limits the size of surface parking lots.

The other uh hand on that is it does limit the amount of asphalt you're going to have on some sites.

So it will uh limit the amount of urban heat island effect you have.

It will also uh ensure that there is some landscaping open space on every site.

Um, I think we are are quite open to uh bringing back a different mechanism of of requiring that if uh planning commission wishes.

Okay.

And then the last topic, um, because I've just raised it several earlier meetings is just in the transition areas.

Um, and I I think I've gotten a lot more comfortable about the transition areas relative to you know, residential development.

I'm still a little nervous about um, especially those residential areas that are abutting, you know, buildings that are going to be 80 or 100 feet tall.

And I'm just wondering, can you help me understand, you know, how the the step back that you've proposed and the size of it really addresses that and and you know, one idea is, you know, should we be looking at maybe a little bit bigger step back, you know, like if it was uh a 30 foot step back with, you know, at 60 feet or something like that.

Because I'm just a little nervous about um the idea of people in residential areas who, you know, maybe they've invested their entire life savings in their house and it's their biggest asset, and then all of a sudden there's an eight-story building behind them.

And I and I know we want to try and maximize the amount of you know, housing we're trying to get, but I'm also just a little bit sympathetic to people who might get surprised um by that kind of development.

Sure.

Um so we're certainly open to discussions on the size of that step back.

The step back was proposed at 80 feet because essentially puts you above the end of the wood frame building.

Um much easier to put a step back in if you're building in concrete and steel than if you're building on wood frame, which uh much easier to put basically vertical walls.

Um it also impacts housing a lot more if we're gonna start interfering with those wood frame buildings, as we've heard, that's sort of the most feasible housing type at this point for for that apartment building type.

So that's the reasoning why it was set at 80 feet is to get it above that level.

Uh 15 feet uh essentially would add a little bit more sunlight, so you get that a little bit less shadowing impact.

Um, what that exact, you know, step back needs to be or should be is certainly something planning commission can make a recommendation on.

Um, you know, between the 25 foot uh setback, the step back, and then the setback on the other side.

So on the residential side, which is going to be generally somewhere between 10 and 25 feet, uh, we are starting to create a lot of distance between these buildings um with often very tall trees.

Um most of these uh shopping centers and other commercial areas are lined by these 80 to 100 foot tall trees.

So uh keeping that in mind too, when you start seeing 50 foot building separations, uh, the step back probably isn't as impactful as if that building was pushed right up to the property line.

That's helpful.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for the presentation and for uh keeping with us here.

I know it's getting late.

So I appreciate you staying and uh answering questions.

Um, you know, I'll echo a couple of these the points that the commissioners have made.

I think the uh the idea of uh, you know, uh recommending some type of vesting or you know, being a little bit more clear uh by the time we recommend to council of what exactly a vesting schedule would look like for existing projects that would be subject to this would be you know, I I think that'd be a great idea for us to have at least a proposal or an idea or recommendation for that.

Um I had a couple of questions.

Um, you know, one's a broader one and the other one's a little bit more specific.

Uh, you know, the what you're proposing is kind of a uniform, uh uniform uh uh affordable housing fee and loo across the board.

What's the impact to different levels of different types of development?

Like, are we going to see the biggest impact in low rise?

Are we gonna see the biggest impact in high rise from both a cost and also performance perspective?

I think you know, it's very our fee and loo is quite conservative on both regards.

Um the higher density zones, um, so that's gonna be those seven story and above districts.

The fee and loo is proposed as the same for the lower end of the Wilburton uh districts, and those building heights are pretty consistent between those two districts.

The HOMA districts don't have the same infrastructure in green building and other requirements that the Wilburton uh sites do.

So we think that number is quite fair and quite conservative.

Uh $10 a square foot is quite low as well for those lower sized um buildings.

We haven't heard from those developers particularly strongly that that fee and loo number is um too high or particularly impactful.

Uh, where we will see the biggest impact from any sort of requirement is those projects that are going to be the least feasible at this point in time.

What we're seeing through our economic analysis is that high-rise buildings are going to be the least feasible at this point in time.

They're just very expensive to build.

Um we also see more difficulty, or at least we hear more difficulty from the community, the development community on doing affordable housing and owner-occupied type units.

Uh on the other side of that, uh, one of our biggest affordable housing needs and a goal that's been repeated both in our in our planning processes and by our council is to try to find ways to have owner-occupied affordable housing units to build that equity.

So, you know, there's push-pull in each way, um, but we do think our numbers are very conservative, uh, even compared to surrounding communities and places like Seattle have much higher V and Lou than we're proposing here.

Gotcha.

And remind me again, are we proposing a commercial fee and loo or is that we are proposing a commercial fee and loo.

Uh, I'd have to pull the number.

I don't have another one.

Thank you.

1650.

The same as the Will.

Okay.

Um, yeah, it's the same as Wilburton.

Um, so that fee and lieu is basically consistent across the board.

Uh, and the fee and loo proposed for the not taxed, not mandatory downtown uh amenity incentive is $13 a square foot.

So also quite conservative, consistent with uh Wilburton, as many of the uh districts in downtown, which is gonna be like that downtown mixed-use district, is pretty similar in uh form and scale to uh Wilburton.

Got it.

Um I think I said this for Wilburton as well, but I'm not the biggest fan of commercial field and loo.

Um, I think we already have enough problems with uh creating you know retail space.

Uh so I, you know, that's something I'd I'd like for us to consider.

My my last point is um, you know, there were a couple comments around Eastgate and the development of Eastgate.

And I think people have some varied opinions on that.

I want to get your thoughts on the interaction between Eastgate development and uh BC's master plan.

Like is because I I kind of view Eastgate as like a almost like semi-accessible uh area for BC students and you know, there's potential there, but you know, I don't know, BC's master plan.

So, how do those elements overlay and interact?

And uh, you know, I guess what's the vision there?

Yeah, I mean, I can't really speak that much to Bellevue College's master plan.

Uh, we will be launching a code amendment sometime in the new year to update the zoning where uh Bellevue College exists now to um facilitate some of their master planning.

Uh, that was something that was identified as very important through the comp plan.

Uh, right now, that Eastgate TOD area is not really serving them.

Uh, for the most part, it is office buildings, and we're seeing very high office vacancy in that area.

So uh hopefully through some of these form changes and uh raising some of these restrictions, we can see more mixed use development in these areas, uh, which would hopefully provide an opportunity both for um businesses that would better serve the college, um, coffee shops, bars, those types of things, which we don't see so much down there, and then housing potentially for the students.

Uh, we know through some of the outreach that's been happening through neighborhood area planning and community development, who's working on the Eastgate uh neighborhood area plan uh that most of the Bellevue College students are commuting in.

Uh, I'm sure it would be great for them, and it would be great for us as a community in Bellevue to have more of those college students living in that area and in Bellevue.

So uh hopefully over time we can facilitate more of that development rather than these very suburban office type developments with uh very large surface parking lots.

And maybe just to clarify that that seems to be the incentive behind wanting some retail space there rather than just uh pure housing.

It sounds like there's a bit of a mix proposed for Eastgate in that I guess like you guys have incorporated the BC needs a little bit at least into the planning.

Yes.

Um, and as a TOD, uh we obviously want to make walkable communities as well.

Uh, I do want to note because we did have one public comment about the OLB area, the Boeing campus, and that basically to the south of that is zoned OLB2.

Uh, we are not proposing to require ground floor retail or pedestrian-oriented uses in those areas.

Is that the we work area or is that um if so uh it's basically to the direct east of uh the Eastgate TOD area, there's uh hotels and there's some drive-throughs, and then the Bowen campus is sort of that large um campus complex, as recognizing that there are some areas in the city that are not um identified through the comprehensive plan and our planning processes as these neighborhood centers and may not be as well connected to the neighborhoods to support that uh pedestrian-oriented use or that retail on the site.

So we have tried to be relatively judicious with where we are requiring this pedestrian-oriented use to make sure that they are in these areas that are designed to support these neighborhoods that surround them.

Got it.

Okay, great.

I'm gonna do another round here.

Um, I think we also have a uh you know a recommendation to make.

So as you're going through your comments, please kind of indicate whether or not you're ready to make a recommendation now.

And if not, then we should be very clear about the directives that we want the staff to follow up with.

Uh so I'll start with you, uh Commissioner Basis.

So about the vesting and pipeline.

I'm not gonna expand on this very much, but I know we talked about it last session, and I know it was I don't remember, but I remember that the outcome of that discussion was that these price would be not subject to the new code.

So I would love to see maybe Kate maybe can help us or somebody can help us find out what we talked about because it's kind of odd that we're talking about this again.

Um ground level uses.

I think the goal really is to have frequent doors and windows.

We wanna have eyes on the street, and we wanna have we wanna avoid black walls, and we wanna make sure that those active uses overlap.

So you can have shops and retail things like that with cafes, but that doesn't mean that residential uses are inappropriate for this.

And that's just really gonna help.

I mean, it's clearly a thorn in in what is happening here with all the comments.

And it is good to have that overlap between residential uses uh and commercial uses at ground level.

They both can serve that purpose, and we should really look into that.

There's many cities in the world, like New York or Paris that have predominantly residential ground level uh spaces with clearly defined street edges that work very, very well at ground level.

Um there was a comment today about the consolidation of affordable units if it's being provided in projects that have both townhomes and apartments into the apartment portion of the prayer.

I think that makes perfect sense because townhomes they don't lend themselves to much flexibility.

You're bound by three stories under IRC or or more IBC, but you have just one unit.

I mean, no matter how tall you make it, you just have one unit.

So you're giving away a lot of square footage and a lot of developed land for a townhome if you're doing an affordable unit that you can you can also provide an affordable unit, an apartment.

So that makes sense.

That that comment really makes sense.

Uh a personal one that we also talked before was bike parking.

This buildings, especially now it is written, there's a lot of requirements at the ground level, including office commercial spaces.

There's some prominent entry, but there's also practical needs like trash and recycling.

These rooms take a lot of space.

Bike parking to be required at the same level with the same access as pedestrians, doesn't like that's gonna impose uh, and I've seen it.

It's gonna impose a big uh it's gonna impose a lot of trouble on resolving a ground floor appropriately and being able to include everything that is being required.

If the bike parking more than any other use is the most flexible one.

I mean, if you're taking your bike out of the building, you're going around the city.

You can certainly come into the building and take it to your unit, or you can take it to the parking and put it next to your car, or you can take it to uh parking space for bikes that is not necessarily in the ground floor, not necessarily next to the pedestrian entrance.

gonna impose a lot of trouble on resolving a ground floor appropriately and being able to include everything that is being required if the by bike parking more than any other use is the most flexible one i mean if you're taking your bike out of the building you're going around the city you can certainly come into the building and take it to your unit or you can take it to the parking and put it next to your car or you can take it to uh parking space for bikes that is not necessarily in the ground floor not necessarily next to the pedestrian entrance there's really flexibility there in unit parking which uh we discussed last time is definitely an option uh so when when you consolidate all the bike parking it just takes a big chunk of area and accommodating everything on the on the ground floor with that it makes it more difficult so that's uh one comment uh I think to just wrap it up I think there's a lot of very valid comments tonight I think the I think is very very close I think it's going in the right direction I think there's a lot of valid comments from uh public comment that I uh I believe we should address and if we were to make uh recommendation uh I guess I think we need more one more session on this uh if if that's if that makes sense yeah could you um uh provide more detail and like specific follow-ups that you like to see them from either referencing you know the uh the comments that we've received I'd like to uh I'd like to have staff uh coordinate with the stakeholders group so that they can provide answers to the comments that were raised today um I think uh somebody I think it was Kevin Wallace and Jack McCaulay so suggested I think that's a very legitimate suggestion uh at this point thank you uh one final comment sorry go ahead just to wrap it up I would have loved to see uh more uh uh a better option B my kids work better with incentives that with the mandatory requirements I I think also in this case it would have been very good to see uh we're saying the the outcome of both options A and B are the same but the baseline is not and it would have been great to see an option where incentive is given more priority but it seems like it's always being provided and kind of made so that we all choose option A which is fine too but uh this is just a personal note but uh besides that I think we're very close.

Thank you.

Thank you can I just clarify on uh two things uh one the the follow-up um there was I think 34 commenters tonight um when we're talking about responding to stakeholder questions I just want to be clear um what what questions those were and then on the vesting piece the best recommendation because we have heard pretty clearly from commission some interest in allowing flexibility for projects that are not vested to the code that HOMA would impact there might be things they are interested in taking advantage of so we've heard from you all to provide some option for them to jump in or stay out of HOMA um if they've already got a project in motion and so um because we are not um amending our vesting language um the best path forward would be for the commission when they're ready to transmit their recommendation to council to make a very fine point that that is a recommendation that's really important to the package that you're transmitting to council and then that will direct staff to incorporate that into the ordinance for council to ultimately decide whether they'd like to you know uh include that provision that vesting or not um so that would be the pathway to to get to that feedback that's why you haven't seen it back in code um but we have been listening um and we uh look forward to you all providing that direction when you're ready to make recommendation okay should I respond to yes so uh I mean there's a lot of uh specific comments in these letters uh uh from uh Kevin Wallace from uh uh uh call hill that are addressing item by item in the code I think it would be worth to sit down with them or sit down amongst yourself before review them I'm happy to discuss as well uh if it needs to but like in previous surfaces right like I I think I agree with that with the the comment uh a product like this multifamily housing with the previous surface at 60% is just not gonna just not gonna work out and all this the the intent is great but once you put it against reality and and and these guys that spoke today they're the ones that are dealing with this every day and they know 60% is not gonna pencil out because then your building's gonna be very small and then you have to also provide plazas and you have to provide all this stuff.

So kind of go through this see okay which which codes like the commercial code in Seattle doesn't have impervious surfaces requirements that the and it works right and in this case you have other elements that are going to limit the size of the building like FAR and uh setbacks and those are the limit and and maximum height though those are the the practical limitations.

So when we build in more limitations we're making it a little bit harder but 60% in previews it's it's almost residential level right we have 50% here in Bellevue and and it it creates a limitation on how much development you can provide.

And it creates a limitation on how much development you can provide.

Yeah, this is a lot more pronounced and multi-funded.

So I think going through these items would be very helpful.

I think uh so uh the Kevin Wallace responses, McCall Hill, and I think the plush committee were the ones, right?

Okay.

Um Commissioner Kennedy.

Um yeah, I I I guess I think I I'm glad to hear that we can uh recommend in our proposal to the council that there be an exemption for pipeline projects.

Still think that that's important to give people regulatory certainty and reliability.

Um so that's great.

That sounds like it doesn't need to delay our decision.

Um I am I I am also interested in looking at the comments that we've received.

In particular, it appears that we're getting comments on both sides of the issue around commercial space and those pedestrian-oriented uses.

So concerns when we think about certain neighborhoods around ensuring that there are commercial uses.

Um and uh I'm curious if we're striking the right balance between that sentiment and the sentiment of several commenters that felt like we would have empty commercial buildings on the ground floor.

Um I I think this is an amorphous request because I haven't had the time to go through and give the specific comments that we've received just this evening that are on both sides of those issues.

But I think it would be helpful to just look at it and say, yes, we have struck the right balance.

We've looked at the comments that we received.

It is still the correct balance.

And I think you have done a wonderful job of considering um the appropriate requirements for the given neighborhood.

Um so I uh I don't know that we're far off, but I think there were comments on both sides of the 20,000 foot exemption saying maybe we don't want it in our neighborhoods because we need those neighborhoods to have their cafe, and there were comments saying it's gonna be empty.

I'm on the side of a highway and no one's gonna walk by my highway.

And so I just think it's worth looking at.

So if there were one thing to kind of take the time to to look at that, look at the comments that we received and just ensure ensure that we're still striking the right balance.

Um there was one other uh specific.

Is that is that enough direction for you to go off of?

Okay.

Thank you.

Okay.

Um comment that I was making, but I can't read my scribbles.

Um I I'm hoping at the end of that review and looking at the comments that we've received that we're ready in the next meeting to be able to take a path forward and say we're in the right place with this downtown, we're in the right place with HOMA.

We can move forward with option A, we've got the balance right.

Um, and uh appreciate your your candor in taking on meeting number six, if that's possible.

Right, uh Commissioner Gebel.

Um yeah, as I mentioned before, I think we're close.

But I I think there was a couple of areas where I'd like a little bit more work and just to focus on those specific ones.

One is you know, the um the ground level uses, um, and just making sure that we're not um, you know, we're not creating ground level uses that are not going to be um occupied sufficiently.

So I think a little bit more flexibility um potentially in that space, particularly in areas, you know, like that um I-90 quarter example was pretty compelling for me.

Um so that's that's um that's one thing.

You know, a second thing that would help me is if we you know, when it comes to this um besting recommendation that we might make, a little bit more specifics on what that might look like um would be really useful.

Um, because I I do feel pretty strongly about that as being just uh a fairness issue for people that are in the process.

Um and I think the uh you know the the permeability issue, I think is worth looking at.

I I don't want everything covered with asphalt and concrete, but I maybe a little bit more flexibility, especially where we're looking at more um density would be um would be appropriate.

And then the final thing, and I just want to throw it open, you know, to the other commissioners.

Am I the only one who cares about the transitionary thing?

If if I'm the only one who cares about it, then maybe I don't want to, you know, make you go on a fool's errand to try and um come up with alternatives.

But I I it just continues to make me nervous because I just think about if an 80-story building went up behind me, I'd have a point of view on it, you know, or not 80 story, 80 foot tall building went up behind me.

I'd have a point of view on it, you know.

Um yeah.

So um and I I guess I'm seeing some nodding from other commissioners that maybe it's worth you know, looking at that a little bit more and if there's any other alternatives.

Maybe I I don't know if that's a you know something that could be done with the step back or anything else, um, you know, just to give people a little bit of uh um, you know, um comfort that you know their um their their light and the conditions that they came in to when they first bought their property or not totally turned upside down.

I mean, things will change and people have to accept that, but at the same time that's that's a lot of change to digest.

So just some clarity on that.

Um I mean, it sounds like what you're asking for is sort of uh alternative, maybe with a larger step uh setback or a larger step back.

Is that the type of alternative you're looking for or I'll be honest if if we were talking about if we were talking about like a five-story building and it was 60 feet tall, and we had the step, the setback that you proposed, I wouldn't be nervous.

It's just when you start getting up to 80 and 100 foot buildings, you know, that's that's a big difference.

Um, and that's that's and maybe you could say that's somewhat arbitrary on my part, but it's it's just a question of scale.

Um so that's that's that's my uneasiness point.

And whether you solve that through a slightly bigger setback or you solve it through a slightly bigger step back.

I don't know what's the best answer, you know, for purposes of trying to balance the considerations here.

Go ahead.

Thank you for bringing it up.

I I think I'm I'm generally okay with the transition, not the alternative, but original.

With not with one caveat, I think we should uh look at transitions.

Uh how do you say this?

If your house is to the south of the building, because the sun travels on the south here, and we want to make sure that it doesn't get shadow.

So if for buildings that are north of the residential area, we should consider whether that's set back or the step back need to be increased so that you have sunlight reaching the home.

I don't think we want to be in the shadow of a building for sure.

I mean, if you see it, that's part of growth in the city.

But especially for properties that are south of a building in a transition area, we should consider uh what the size of the setback and the size of the setback should be so that this building is not in the shadow.

That's I guess my is that enough direction?

Okay, thank you.

I just remembered what my scribble okay, go ahead.

I can wait till you hear you.

No, go ahead.

Um things just responding on the transition areas agree and plus one on just checking that.

So um as as amended by uh Commissioner Villevesis, I think that's a valuable thing to do.

I also just realized what my scribble was earlier.

So I would just add to the review.

Um the question I raised earlier on the non-conforming uses, just checking that against other jurisdictions and seeing if that percentage is in line with what we see.

If that's a very onerous request, then just kind of check check checking that in other ways to ensure that this seems like it is within reason, or just checking at least Seattle, something where we can kind of make sure that that seems like a reasonable um manifestation or if it should be adjusted given the comments that we received.

Um I agree on the comments that were just made around checking on the flexibility that we could have.

And so um before the next meeting, I do think reviewing some of the red lines that we received to see do we have sufficient flexibility um um built into that to enable uh what we're trying to accomplish with affordable housing and housing build out.

And then I just wanted a plus one getting a draft of the exemption language, um, if that's possible, so we know exactly what we're saying and what we're asking, and we get that in the right position.

We don't end up dealing things and can move quickly at our next meeting, would would be helpful.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Can I just uh just to manage expectations?

We would love to take a look at the Seattle um nonconforming code and do a comparison.

Um and what I would also love to do is follow up with that commenter and find out what specifically they enjoy about that code um so that we have a little more focus in that review and and then bring that back for your consideration.

Great.

Um I don't have too much else to say.

I think the commissioners have covered it.

Um, you know, I I think a lot of this uh I'm gonna plus one the vesting comment.

I think we should get at least some recommended language that we can then recommend to council.

Um I'll plus one on the uh the the analysis of the uh the transition areas.

I think that's worth uh taking a look at so that we maybe even visually just know what that might look like.

Um I don't know if you can do a rendering or something, but I think that would help us make a decision on that as well.

And uh you know, I also just want to make sure that we incorporate the two missing commissioners.

So, you know, I I'm leaning towards we um kind of table this for now, um, address it later uh and then uh give you an opportunity to respond to those some of the stakeholders and some of our comments as well.

Um so I guess we don't have to take a vote then if we're choosing to do that.

All right.

Great.

Um since we're not ready to make a recommendation yet, is there an approval of the minutes?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh vote to approve the minutes.

Second.

Motion.

Motion.

Uh any discussion?

No.

All in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All right.

Is there a motion to adjourn the meeting?

All right, is there a second?

Second.

All right.

Any discussion?

Nope.

All of Bruce aye.

Aye.

Good job.