ML passes neighborhood meeting ordinance

The Moses Lake City Council passed a new neighborhood meeting ordinance May 25, requiring developers with substantial plats, or those different from surrounding uses, built within or adjacent to residential zoning, to have a meeting with the neighborhood for input.

The Change.org petition against the Love’s Travel Stop, to be located just off Interstate 90 at Pritchard Road, has more than 8,000 signatures, said council member Karen Liebrecht. If such an ordinance had been in place beforehand, the situation could have been avoided.

“Those people felt that they don’t have a voice, and those people felt that their neighborhoods have been compromised,” she said. “I feel like we wouldn’t be in that situation right now had we had the neighborhood meetings, so I’m very much in favor of them, and I think that our citizens deserve that notification.”

The planning commission has discussed the ordinance since February, initially holding a public hearing on April 15.

At that time, community members had concern over the cost burden to developers holding the meeting, a desire to limit the types of development that would require a meeting, ambiguous definitions of meeting requirements and logistics of how they would occur.

At a second public hearing prior to May 25’s vote, the ordinance met similar challengers.

As currently written, the ordinance would invite all residents in a 300-foot radius to the development to attend the meeting. This might not be a big enough area, said council member Dean Hankins.

These meetings would likely occur rarely, said community development director Melissa Bethel. Because of this, the 300-foot requirement can stay on the ordinance and city staff can monitor the meetings and adjust in the future, if necessary.

The new ordinance is an added burden and cost to the developer, said Moses Lake resident Mark Fancher. Additionally, some of the ordinance’s terms, such as what constitutes a “substantial” infill, is still arbitrary.

“He’s not wrong, but by the same token it’s one of those things, you know it when you see it,” Bethel said.

A hospital or a strip mall near a residential area would be substantial, she said. A townhome or apartment likely would not.

The ordinance serves to broaden communication and community input for new developments, she said.

“Not all applications require a hearing or require a notification,” she said. “This would catch those that didn’t fall under that.”