Council members have more questions about requested street vacation

A proposal to give a quarter mile of city right of way in Greenacres to a developer was met with skepticism at Tuesday’s City Council meeting but advanced to a second reading so council members could learn more about it.

“This is a little bit larger than a 20-foot swath at the end of the road,” said Councilman Dick Denenny.

The city owns a 30-foot wide strip of land that could extend North McMillan Road to Euclid. Developer Ken Tupper has proposed an 85-lot subdivision between the right of way and houses near Joel Road and between Euclid and Buckeye avenues.

Two roads would lead into the development at Euclid and one road would connect it to Buckeye between Harmony and McMillan. Tupper has asked that city give up the McMillan land to accommodate the layout of the lots.

If granted, it would be the largest street vacation in Spokane Valley to date.

Street-vacation requests to date usually have involved small pieces of land at the end of streets or in places where the city is unlikely to use them as roads.

At the meeting, Denenny asked if the McMillan request was large enough to merit some form of compensation to the city for its land.

Other conversation at the dais surrounded the testimony of a homeowner before the Planning Commission whose house on Buckeye would be directly in the path headlights and traffic coming out of the subdivision.

Two people testified against the turnover Tuesday. Mary Pollard said a new road empties onto the street right in front of her house, and that there is little the city can do to make the developer lessen the impact of the street location.

Larry Rider, an assistant Spokane Valley fire chief who said he was speaking as a neighbor, said that the vacation would increase the density of the project while further breaking up the area’s original street grid.

The council discussed whether the hearing examiner could change the subdivision plans to relocate its access streets, and Councilman Rich Munson asked if homeowners would have more say in how the subdivision is laid out.

Councilman Bill Gothmann said he didn’t see how the right of way, which borders the development’s eastern edge, harms property owners who want to build on their land.

The council voted unanimously to move the proposal to a second reading, but council members said it was advanced only so city planners could answer more of their questions about the project.