Gonzaga University Working With Neighbors On Master Plan

For the first time in Gonzaga University’s 108-year history, school officials are sitting down with neighbors to discuss campus growth.

The effort is spurred by a new city ordinance that requires institutions of 10 acres or more to have master plans adopted by the Spokane City Council.

No building permits can be issued to Gonzaga until the plan has gone through public hearings and is approved. Administrators hope to have a final document within 18 months.

The plan, which is supposed to anticipate growth needs for two decades, would be binding on the private university and must include its future boundaries and a listing of all property it owns in the bordering Logan neighborhood.

After approval, the master plan will replace individual rezone hearings. If a building is included in the document, development could proceed with just a building permit.

The planning will proceed in two phases.

First, the boundaries must be approved by the city Plan Commission and the City Council. Then, projects inside that area go before the city hearing examiner.

The university has embarked on a series of meetings with home and business owners to enlist their support. Property owners inside Gonzaga’s 20-year planning area have a choice of whether to be included in what eventually will be known as the university’s overlay zone.

If they refuse, the university could not designate that land for future development and would need to design expansion around it.

At a meeting last week, property owners were unsure what benefit they received from agreeing to be included in the overlay zone.

Ken Pelton, a city planner working on the plan, said the ordinance was meant to spur a more holistic approach to planning and give everyone increased certainty about institutional development.

“One of the things that is a concern for the neighbors is that uncertainty,” said Chuck Murphy, GU’s vice president for finance.

It also provides an incentive for owners who someday may want to sell their property to Gonzaga. Twenty-four parcels not owned by the university are inside the proposed boundary area north of campus.

If the university invests resources in planning, it would have more reason to purchase the property when it comes on the market.

Margaret Hurley, a former state lawmaker who lives in the neighborhood, said the ordinance made it difficult for neighbors to challenge a boundary line an institution puts forward.

“This doesn’t manage growth; it’s a growth facilitator,” Hurley said. “Anything done under an ordinance that’s that bad is going to be bad.”

Other owners of institutional properties on the North Side that are required to plan under the ordinance include Holy Family Hospital, Spokane County and the city of Spokane, which has its shop area on North Foothills Drive.

City Planner Andrew Worlock said the ordinance is meant to foster communication.

“Gonzaga is a good example,” said Worlock. “Every time they would come in with a project, the neighbors were reacting. They really didn’t know what was happening.”

The university has gone through two previous master plans, 1984 and 1989, but the documents were largely internal or in conjunction with the Logan Neighborhood Steering Committee. They did not require extensive public input, nor did they carry the force of law.

Under a draft proposal by university administrators, Gonzaga would include in its planning the northern edge of its campus along Hamilton to Sinto. The planning area would also extend east of Hamilton to the Spokane River and south past the Centennial Trail to Trent, currently home to a postal distribution facility.

Gonzaga officials said the Catholic university isn’t planning to grow beyond its current enrollment of 5,000 students, but additional space is included for possible student housing, athletic fields or other needs that may not be anticipated today.