The Kirkland City Council met on December 12, 2023, for a study session at 5:30 p.m. and a regular meeting at 7:30 p.m., adjourning at 10:29 p.m. The council addressed a wide range of topics including school impact fees, pedestrian safety, budget adjustments, a new low-income relief program, tree code amendments, and the future of the Houghton Village property. All votes were unanimous (7-0).
Councilmember Passable here. Deputy Mayor Arnold. Mayor Sweet. Here, thank you. Our study session tonight is on three topics. The first is a 2024 school impact fee update. The second topic is on the hundredth Avenue additional pedestrian crossing at Northeast 140th Street. The third topic is an update on the future of the Houghton Village property. We expect to reconvene our regular meeting at approximately 7:30. City manager. Okay, thank you, Madam Mair. So just a brief word about the study session. We didn't actually have a formal study session, as you know, we have a very long agenda tonight, it being the last council meeting of the year. So we actually, in this case, each one of these three topics then also has an action item on the business agenda later on in the evening. So we're gonna tee it all out for you and give you some background and ask for a little bit of direction, but the actual votes won't occur until later on in the evening. So our first topic is 2024 school impact fee update. Uh there are some questions that the council had about the impact fee ordinance in front of you. Uh, we've had a chance to work with the school district over the last couple weeks. Uh so I want to provide you some brief information and then uh several of the council members also have a resolution uh for your consideration that we'll also be talking about during this update. So uh then I'll turn it over to Alison Zyke, our uh deputy director of planning and building. Thank you. And uh good evening, Madam Mayor, uh Deputy Mayor and Council members. We have just a uh about four slides for you tonight that we'll cover briefly. Um and then I wanted to mention that we do have Brian Buck, the executive director of support services for the Lake Washington School District joining us via Zoom to answer any questions that council might have. So with that, I will jump right into it. Um just a little bit about how school impact fees work here in Kirkland and how we help the district collect those fees. Um the district does calculate the impact fee amount, and then the city updates those fees annually and they live in our municipal code. Um, per our interlocal agreement with the district, we collect those school impact fees for the district and pass them through. Um, the district's impact fee calculations set separate amounts for multifamily units for single family units, and then we charge those impact fees per unit and only for net new units. So if there's a four-plex replacing a duplex, we only charge impact fees for the two new units. Um, and with that, the impact fees can't be used to address existing deficiencies. They can only um address future growth or finance new capacity from that new growth. So we charge them on the net new units. Um, how the process has gone this year, just a little bit of a timeline for you. So the district adopted their annual six-year capital facilities plan back in June of this year, and then they request that we update our uh impact fee schedule. Um we were last here to talk to you about this on at your November 21st meeting at that time council deferred action to tonight. Um in December, we did work with the district um to get some additional information. Um, the district has included some information that's included in your staff memo for the study session. Um, and that included a link to their frequently asked questions about impact fee calculations on their website. So that's linked in your study session memo, and I also included um the web address for that on this slide. And then tonight we're here um to request that you take action on those impact fee updates. So, what are the impact fee updates for 2024? On this slide, you'll see what the 2023 impact fees were that we collected for single family units and multifamily units. As you've noticed, the 2024 impact fees are both reduced, both for single family and multifamily. So down to uh $5,149 for a single family unit, again, net new, and then down to $352 for each multifamily unit. If the council does not approve the updates to the impact fees tonight, the current fees would remain in place for 2024, but we anticipate we might get challenged on that since the 2024 fees are proposed to be lower. For this last slide to discuss the resolution that you'll be discussing later on, I'm gonna throw it over to the manager. Thank you, Alison. And also maybe maybe joined by the council members who worked with us on this resolution. So uh one of the issues that came up was obviously that very significant drop in impact fees based on the current calculations, and so both staff and council members had questions in the about um given the big need we have of schools.