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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Spokane Valley planning process confuses

A second meeting about citizen-led updates to Spokane Valley’s comprehensive plan quickly got confusing.

The meeting of the Spokane Valley Planning Commission Monday followed a standing-room-only session Thursday, where public testimony ran for nearly three hours.

It’s all part of a required update to the city’s comprehensive plan, which guides land use.

In this process, comprehensive plan amendment requests, called CARs, can be brought forward by residents without the usual update fee. It’s a way to increase public participation in the land-use process, senior planner Lori Barlow said.

She also noted that planning commissioners were not being asked to change the zoning of any piece of property, but simply voting on whether the request should be included in the comprehensive plan update.

Planning commissioners were expected to evaluate each request, take the public testimony into consideration and then decide whether to recommend that it should be included in the update.

Commissioner Kevin Anderson, who was chairing the meeting because Commissioner Joe Stoy was excused absent, opened the deliberation by saying he had concerns about the process.

“I have a problem dealing with individual pieces of property,” Anderson said, “because this is not to the benefit of society, it’s for the benefit of that one piece of property.”

Anderson said he’d rather see the CARs be part of the annual comprehensive plan update.

Commissioner Susan Scott wanted to know if the CARs could come back to the planning commission and if more public input would be allowed at a later time.

Doug McIntyre, a land-use planner with Van Ness Feldman, which has been retained by Spokane Valley to help the city through the comprehensive plan update, said the planning commission likely will see several of the CARs many times if they become part of the comprehensive plan update. At those times, public testimony would be allowed.

Anderson then asked what would happen if the planning commission didn’t recommend any of the CARs for inclusion in the comprehensive plan.

“Does it all disappear from the process?” Anderson asked.

Barlow said the CARs could come back depending on future planning needs.

“We are planning for 20 years and we are making provisions for 15,000 people who will move here during that time,” Barlow said.

At this point, the audience was growing increasingly confused. People talked among themselves, debating what was going on.

Commissioner Sam Wood got everyone’s attention when he said he wasn’t confused.

“This was the citizens’ opportunity to bring their individual lots forward,” Wood said. “Lots that may otherwise not have been considered, and now we have to decide whether to include them in the comprehensive plan update.” Both McIntyre and Barlow agreed and deliberations soon began.

Even with the planning commission mostly on track, moving through one amendment request at a time, it was still difficult for many in the audience to follow what exactly was going on.

People left as the parcels they were concerned about were debated, but few knew exactly what had happened.

“I don’t know what it all means,” said Dick Grove, who lives near a proposed apartment project on Fourth Avenue that he opposes.

Part of the confusion is because it is the first time Spokane Valley is going through the legislative comprehensive plan update, which it is required to go through by state law every eight years.

After the meeting was over, McIntyre said he could understand why it was confusing because the comprehensive plan amendment requests are different from the annual comprehensive plan updates residents are used to participating in.

“Perhaps we could have done a better job of explaining the process,” he said.