FW_ HB 1220 NextDoor post responseFrom:Tina Piety
To:Anna Patrick; Dale Couture; Diana Noble-Gulliford; Eric Olsen; Hope Elder; Jae So; Lawson Bronson; Tim O"Neil;
Tom Medhurst; Wayne Carlson
Cc:Brian Davis; Keith Niven
Subject:FW: HB 1220 NextDoor post response
Date:Wednesday, September 1, 2021 10:16:44 AM
Attachments:image001.png
2021-09-01 Planning Commission Agenda Packet.pdf
image002.png
Hello,
Please review the below comments from Ken Blevens and Director Davis’ response.
Tina
From: Keith Niven
Sent: Wednesday, September 1, 2021 10:05 AM
To: Tina Piety <Tina.Piety@cityoffederalway.com>
Subject: FW: HB 1220 NextDoor post response
Tina,
Would you please forward Brian’s email to Planning Commission?
thx
Keith Niven, AICP, CEcD
Planning Manager
City of Federal Way
(253) 835-2643
From: Brian Davis
Sent: Tuesday, August 31, 2021 2:11 PM
To: COUNCIL <COUNCIL@cityoffederalway.com>
Cc: Jim Ferrell <Jim.Ferrell@cityoffederalway.com>; MT <MT@cityoffederalway.com>; Keith Niven
<Keith.Niven@cityoffederalway.com>; Sarah Bridgeford <Sarah.Bridgeford@cityoffederalway.com>
Subject: HB 1220 NextDoor post response
Council,
At the Mayor’s direction, I am forwarding you a NextDoor post from Ken Blevens and my response
regarding HB 1220 the City’s proposal to put standards in place for transitional and permanent
supportive housing. I have also attached tomorrow’s Planning Commission packet, which includes
the minutes Mr. Blevens references as well as the staff report with the revised proposal. Please let
me know if you have any questions.
Thanks,
Brian Davis
Community Development Director
City of Federal Way, WA
Office: 253-835-2612 | Cell: 253-455-4082
Ken Blevens
View Pointe • 1 day ago
Stand Up Federal Way! Stop the Mayor and council from enacting SB1220. Here are the minutes of
the last planning commission meeting. It's shocking. The Mayor has directed Mr. Nevin to ask the
planning commissioners to recommend the council change zoning so that the city can allow for the
purchase of hotels and homes all over the city to house their projected number of over 1k (made up
number) homeless drug addicts from all over the region. Mr. Nevin stated that Federal Way is only
one of 2 cities that is pioneering this action. Other cities all over have put a memorandum on this
action because it would obviously impact their cities horribly. They knew very little and weren't
going to get any recommendations from the state until 2023. None of this makes sense for Federal
Way. Join us at the next planning commission meeting on September 1st to demand that the
commission not go along with Mayor Ferrell and Mr. Nevin. Even the city Mr. Nevin used to work
for, Issaquah, has put a moratorium on SB 1220. Demand that they recommend the council put a
moratorium on this and for the city to challenge the State mandates that are clearly bad for our city.
Then join us on September 7th at the next council meeting and demand that the Mayor reverse
course and the city council to put Federal Way first.
https://docs.cityoffederalway.com/WebLink/ElectronicFile.aspx?
docid=865849&dbid=0&repo=cityoffederalway
Brian Davis • First Avenue and 330th St
Hi Ken,
The Mayor discussed your post with me and asked that I chime in. I think your post and the City’s
proposal are actually trying to achieve the same thing. Allow me to explain.
First of all, the City is not changing local zoning laws to allow this housing type. That’s already been
decided by the legislature. HB 1220 states: “A city shall not prohibit transitional housing or
permanent supportive housing in any zones in which residential dwelling units or hotels are
allowed.” The City could take no action to prevent this or take every action to prevent this, it won’t
change the fact that this housing must be allowed in every city in Washington according to HB 1220.
Cities can, however, put regulations in place. These limits would provide standards for development.
Given that eliminating this housing type is not an option, I assume you would be in favor of seeing
controls and limits. This is the common ground that you and the City have. The question then
becomes how much control and limitation can be imposed. It can’t be so limiting that it becomes a
prohibition in disguise; on the flip side, doing nothing would leave us with just a rubber stamp in the
end. Where, then, is the sweet spot? The City’s original proposal said 0.5 miles from single-zoning;
after public input, we revised it to 1.0 mile from single-family zoning. The original proposal forecast a
need of 819 units after Red Lion and Extended Stay; after public input and reevaluation, we revised
the proposal to 198 units. We believe these revisions, with input from residents like yourself, are
reasonable and a good landing spot for this ordinance.
I hope this perspective from the City helps. And if at any time you or anyone on this post wants to
discuss with me, I’m happy to do so. My contact info is below.
A quick note on moratoriums. HB 1220 amended the RCW to specifically prevent cities from using
them against transitional housing and permanent supportive housing. We know of only one city that
enacted a moratorium, and that city’s own attorney went on record to say that if they get a new
building application for shelter or supportive housing during the moratorium, they would have to
process it. In other words, we too can enact a moratorium just to make us feel good, but it won’t
prevent transitional housing and permanent supportive housing from coming to Federal Way.
Thanks,
Brian Davis
Community Development Director
City of Federal Way
253-835-2612
brian.davis@cityoffederalway.com