Incorporation Group To File Notice

Sat., Feb. 19, 2000

By Lorie Hutson lorieh@spokesman.com (509) 459-5446

Ready for the city of Liberty Lake? Incorporation backers are. Proponents of incorporating Liberty Lake are filing a notice of intent to incorporate next week to officially kick off the latest effort to form a new city.

Liberty Lake 2000 members held a community meeting this week to gather comments about where the city’s boundaries should be drawn, what kind of government it should have and how to best preserve Liberty Lake itself.

They agreed to initially draw the proposed city’s boundaries to include the land around Liberty Lake, with plans to refine the city limits later in the process. The city would be home to about 5,000 people.

“We really need the help of the people around (the lake) because their voice really carries a lot more weight than the people who don’t live there,” said Shaun Brown, a member of Liberty Lake 2000 who facilitated the meeting.

The group was partially spurred into action over news that the Valley is considering another attempt at incorporation.

Residents said they wanted to move fast in filing the incorporation notice so Liberty Lake would not risk being drawn into the boundaries of a Valleywide city.

Liberty Lake 2000 let its first notice expire earlier this month without gathering the signatures of support it needed to bring the issue to a vote.

Their initial efforts stalled over the boundaries of the proposed city. Residents were concerned because the land around the lake fell outside the proposed boundaries and could not be incorporated unless it was designed urban. Residents worried that would allow dense development around the lake. Others opposed splitting the community in half.

This time, Liberty Lake 2000 wants to work closely with the people who live lakeside in drawing the boundaries. And they are researching whether there is a way to incorporate land around the lake without opening it up for dense developments.

This sidebar appeared with the story: MEETING

Liberty Lake 2000 will hold its next meeting on incorporation at 7 p.m. on March 1 at the Liberty Lake Sewer and Water District Building, 22510 E. Mission.

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