Browse >
Home / Archive: September 2009
New 1:55 p.m., Sept. 28
Someone went around posting fictitious parking tickets on cars in the Tree Farm area the evening of Sept. 22. Police said they believe the prank was provoked by an influx of parents parking at Inglewood Junior High and its surrounding streets for a student curriculum night from 7-9 p.m. The suspect would be guilty of impersonating a police officer, which could result in a year in jail or a substantial fine, according to police.
Read more
New: Sept. 26, 2:30 p.m.
The Duthie Hill Mountain Bike Park isn’t officially open yet, but Project Manager Mike Westra said enthusiasts are welcome to check it out.
“It’s not officially open, but we’re just not kicking people out,” Westra said.
Westra said the first phase of the park would finish by the end of March 2010, with an official opening in April. Read more
New: Sept. 25, 4:18 p.m.
Bring questions about the planned Issaquah Highlands hospital campus to a question-and-answer session with Swedish Medical Center officials.
The session is from 5-6:30 p.m. Oct. 19 at Sammamish City Hall.
During the first phase of construction, crews will build the office building and outpatient center. Hospital executives said the initial phase would open in summer 2011. A second phase with 80 hospital beds is scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2012. The second phase will eventually expand to 175 beds. Read more
New, Sept. 24, 3:26 p.m.
Lake Washington School District voters might see a bond and a levy on their ballots in February 2010.
The Lake Washington School District has scheduled six meetings, including one at Eastlake High School from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Oct. 7, where Superintendent Chip Kimball would review some new funding options. The district plans to talk to residents about proposing an operations levy, a capital projects levy and a new bond measure. Those additional funding sources would impact the 2010 school district budget, according to Doug Eglington, the district’s school board member from Sammamish. Read more
Bravo! Dinner and Auction next week
The Sammamish Chamber of Commerce’s annual fundraiser is set for next week, and dozens of items are up for auction.
Among the auction items:
u Tickets to the 2010 U.S. Senior Open Golf Championship at Sahalee Country Club
u A five-night stay at ski resort in Jackson Hole, Wyo.,
u Seven nights at an inn in Puerto Rico.
u A pedicure
u A wine basket
u Piano lessons
To review a full list of what you can bid on, go to www.sammamishchamber.org/Bravo-2009-Auction-Items.519.0.html.
The dinner will start at the tail end of the last Sammamish Farmers Market of 2009. The menu will feature local, farm-fresh foods.
The fundraiser has three purposes. It helps the chamber support local businesses and non-profit organizations by sponsoring meetings and classes. It helps pay for the Sammamish Farmers Market.
And it pays for recognizing local DECA students and funding DECA scholarships.
Auction items are available for almost all interests and pocketbooks.
Tickets to venues across the Seattle area are for auction and local artists have donated original paintings and photography.
Tickets are $25. The event is for adults only at 6:30 p.m., Sept. 30 at City Hall. To purchase tickets, visit www.SammamishChamber.org.
New Sept. 23, 1:48 p.m.
Bravo! Dinner and Auction next week
The Sammamish Chamber of Commerce’s annual fundraiser is set for next week, and dozens of items are up for auction.
Among the auction items:
- Tickets to the 2010 U.S. Senior Open Golf Championship at Sahalee Country Club
- A five-night stay at ski resort in Jackson Hole, Wyo.,
- Seven nights at an inn in Puerto Rico.
- A pedicure
- A wine basket
- Piano lessons
To review a full list of what you can bid on, go to www.sammamishchamber.org/Bravo-2009-Auction-Items.519.0.html.
The dinner will start at the tail end of the last Sammamish Farmers Market of 2009. The menu will feature local, farm-fresh foods.
The fundraiser has three purposes. It helps the chamber support local businesses and non-profit organizations by sponsoring meetings and classes. It helps pay for the Sammamish Farmers Market.
And it pays for recognizing local DECA students and funding DECA scholarships.
Auction items are available for almost all interests and pocketbooks.
Tickets to venues across the Seattle area are for auction and local artists have donated original paintings and photography.
Tickets are $25. The event is for adults only at 6:30 p.m., Sept. 30 at City Hall. To purchase tickets, visit www.SammamishChamber.org.
The Sammamish Plateau Water and Sewer District officials refused to let bureaucracy stand in the way of a needed program.
Good for them!
Sammamish is renovating the Sween house — formerly a private residence behind City Hall — in order to turn it into a temporary youth counseling center.
Currently, youth in need of extra support must travel off the plateau to seek it.
We can’t help but wonder if the lack of access discourages some from seeking the help they need.
We are very supportive of the efforts to bring these services closer to the children and their parents.
For those who think the city would not need a counseling center if parents would just take care of their children like they did in the good ol’ days, we have two things to say.
First, the good ol’ days weren’t as good as you remember – youth needed help then, too. Society simply hid the problems instead of dealing with them.
Second, if the problem really lies with the adults, then we need to help break the cycle and teach the younger generation to be better future parents.
The city, recognizing the need, decided to offer the vacant Sween house, but there was a problem.
A sewer and water district policy would require the city to connect the house to a sewer line in order for the project to go forward.
The cost of that sewer connection would likely have made the whole project too expensive for the city to manage.
Luckily, the people at the water and sewer district realized that the social value of this problem was more important than strict adherence to policy.
For now, the counseling center can continue to use its perfectly good septic system.
If the Sween house takes on a more permanent role as a counseling center or the property is redeveloped, then certainly the city should plan to connect to the sewer line.
But for now, we are happy to see the different agencies were able to work together for the good of Sammamish youth.
The Sammamish Plateau Water and Sewer District officials refused to let bureaucracy stand in the way of a needed program.
Good for them!
Sammamish is renovating the Sween house — formerly a private residence behind City Hall — in order to turn it into a temporary youth counseling center.
Currently, youth in need of extra support must travel off the plateau to seek it.
We can’t help but wonder if the lack of access discourages some from seeking the help they need.
Read moreWhat took so long?
I applaud the decision to turn our “old” library into a teen/senior center but wonder why for years our council hadn’t taken the lead on this. We have one of the highest percentages of teens per capita in the nation but we have had nothing for them to do locally. It is too late for my older teens (we moved here in 1996 and they are now graduating from high school) but I hope the new center will give teens and seniors a much needed place to enjoy.
The council seems to have no problem paying for a new multi-million dollar city hall for themselves and a new $5 million “maintenance” facility but can’t seem to find the money to fund projects for our current residents.
Before the Town Center is built we should be looking at what can benefit the people who pay the taxes and reside here now, not future residents who will add more crowding to our roads and facilities and remove the trees, meadows and rural atmosphere that most of us moved here to enjoy.
I do hope the next election will bring in fresh faces to the council that will have a fiscally responsible agenda (no more $40 million unnecessary highway projects, $100,000 clocks, expensive restoration of unnecessary buildings, etc.) and give the residents what they can actually use — a community center and pool.
Steve Repanich
Sammamish
Letter writer is forgetful
John Galvin, in his zeal to tear down anyone and everyone who disagrees with him, gets his facts wrong again and omits key facts.
In his recent letter, he complains that citizens who were associated with Shout and Sing helped found the city with an objective of controlling growth.
He then complains about backers of the current council getting appointed to committees.
Heavens to Betsy, what a scandal! The Sing-backed candidates won the first and second City Council elections and guess what? Those councils appointed their supporters to committees. Guess what further? Don Gerend, Jack Barry and Kathy Huckabay were supported by Sing yet they supported appointments later of the people Galvin complains about.
One more guess at what that Galvin omitted. He’s a disappointed office seeker. He sought appointment to the Planning Commission a couple of years ago and didn’t get the support of a single council member.
Scott Hamilton
Sammamish
Parkway needs more lanes
I am a seven-year resident of Sammamish. Everyone who lives up here knows what a nightmare it is to commute up and down to get to the freeways, downtown Redmond or downtown Bellevue. You can leave in the morning at any time between 7 and 10 and you will likely be stuck in traffic that is backed up trying to get to Redmond Way/Fall City Road, or going down Inglewood Hill Road to East Lake Sammamish Parkway — and this was before the construction started.
When I heard that the parkway was undergoing reconstruction I was willing to put up with all the inconvenience in order to get, what I believed, was going to be two extra lanes on that road.
I was totally shocked to see that all the time, inconvenience and millions and millions of dollars was actually being put into sidewalks and planter boxes. I am outraged! We don’t need sidewalks and planter boxes — we need extra lanes. What is wrong with the city managers and planners? They obviously do not live up here.
Carolyn Sterling
Sammamish
New blood needed on council
I hope that the residents of Sammamish are on to the incumbents who are suddenly listening to the voters.
Notice, it is happening right before the election.
Be wary of those who hold positions on the Planning Commission, you will only get more of the same.
Vote in a new council with fresh ideas for the sake of your city.
Lori Barnett
Sammamish
Old information from candidate’s Web site
Time to update your Web site, John.
John James ran for Sammamish City Council in 2007. He lost to Nancy Whitten.
His Web site continues to show endorsements from that 2007 race. The Municipal League may have given him a high rating in 2007 but in 2009 they rate him as only “Adequate”.
His opponent in 2009, Erica Tiliacos, is rated as “Very Good.” I wonder how many of John’s other 2007 endorsements have changed their mind too?
Times change, people change. Election decisions need to be based on current information.
Erica’s current experience as vice-chairwoman and chairwoman of the Sammamish Planning Commission serves her well, to be a well informed, outstanding city council member.
Marianne Wilkins
Sammamish
By J.B. Wogan
Erica Tiliacos, 53, has cast herself as the experienced candidate prepared to ask the appropriate questions about a range of city issues on day one.
John James, 46, highlights his business background, especially in real estate, and says he understands how to make Sammamish a more attractive place to live: adding more local amenities.
They are vying for Position 1 on the Sammamish City Council Nov. 3. Councilwoman Kathy Huckabay is vacating the seat after 10 years.
While neither candidate is an incumbent, they both tout their experience in civic involvement.
Tiliacos has sat on citizen advisory committees for the City Council since the summer of 2004. Her resume includes sitting on a Town Center citizen task force, a citizen group studying the city’s Critical Areas Ordinance, and currently she is part of the Planning Commission.
James, who lost in the 2007 election to current City Council-woman Nancy Whitten, touts his experience in co-chairing a citizen committee that researched and proposed features for the 2008 parks bond. He said he thinks he understands why the bond failed and what elements of the bond were popular enough to warrant a revisit.
The community center
Both candidates were supportive of the council’s decision to buy the current Sammamish Public Library building — scheduled to be vacated by the King County Library System in early 2010 — but they have different ideas of how to use the building.
The council voted to purchase the building under the assumption that it would become a teen-focused recreation center. Tiliacos questions that decision.
“It’s not very safe for children and teens to be approaching the busiest intersection in the city,” Tiliacos said.
Instead, Tiliacos proposed that the current City Hall become the recreation center, while the library building could become a new city operations and maintenance facility.
“The advantage to that is that we’ve already paid for City Hall and it’s in the heart of the community,” she said.
In that scenario, the city would need to find or build a new office space for City Hall, Tiliacos added.
Tiliacos’ recreation center solution also derails the city’s current plan for an operations and maintenance facility on 244th Avenue. The city has already spent $350,000 in designing the building. It has budgeted $5.3 million for the total project, in addition to the $1.1 million it spent purchasing the land. The city has a construction start date for the maintenance facility in February 2010.
James differs from Tiliacos in that he does support using the library building for a recreation center, though he admits there are limitations to the site, including the single access point from 228th Avenue.
“I see that as an interim situation,” he said.
James said he would still like to see a more comprehensive recreation center built in a more central location, perhaps in the Town Center. But since such a facility wouldn’t become a reality for several years, the library building is a good temporary fix, he said.
James’ plans for a bigger recreation center dovetail into his larger vision of revisiting elements of the failed parks bond. He said he still believes the city needs the waterfront park at the north end of East Lake Sammamish Parkway, more open spaces, more trails and a lighted synthetic athletic field at Pine Lake Middle School.
He said he would also support researching ways to establish an aquatic center, perhaps attached to the recreation center, and another lighted synthetic athletic field at Inglewood Hill Junior High School.
Show me the money
Lyman Howard, city finance director, has warned that under the current funding model, the city’s expenses would outstrip revenues by 2015, if not before.
The city relies heavily on property taxes, impact fees from new construction, plus a real estate excise tax.
In terms of city finances, James is a strong proponent of adding more retail space on the plateau because added retail would translate into more sales tax revenue.
He was not in support of looking at other taxing options.
“I don’t think raising taxes is necessarily a good thing in a depressed economy when people are just trying to make ends meet,” James said.
Tiliacos said she isn’t convinced that more retail would be enough of a solution.
She would like to see the council set up a citizen committee that would collect ideas from the public and from municipal finance professionals on how to resolve the future funding problem.
She added that the committee should not become a scapegoat for the council: “The council does have to lead in this.”
Both candidates say they want the city to explore new ways of connecting to the public. James said he would like to see all City Council meetings broadcast on the city Web site.
In a similar vein, Tiliacos said the city needs to work harder at educating the public, especially when issues might affect private property.
“It would be good for people to understand what the total background is and what could change in the regulation,” she said.
Tiliacos said better public education would have helped smooth council-public relations during the council review of its Critical Areas Ordinance and its Shoreline Master Plan update. She said it also would have helped with the controversial 2.5-mile East Lake Sammamish Parkway project concept design, approved in January 2008 with a cost estimate (at the time) of $44.5 million.
The parkway
Tiliacos said she has had repeated conversations with residents while door knocking about the rationale for not adding more all-purpose lanes to the East Lake Sammamish Parkway. Residents tell her the added sidewalk, commuter bike lanes and turn-lane aren’t adding traffic capacity, she said.
But Tiliacos said that in discussions with traffic engineers, she learned that part of the thinking is to remove pedestrians and bicyclists from the parkway car lanes, thus improving the average speed and traffic flow.
“It’s not intuitive and people don’t understand it that way,” she said.
Not that Tiliacos is sold on the total parkway as it’s currently designed.
“I’m kind of reserving judgment to see how this particular phase turns out,” she said.
James also supports better public outreach, although he is more emphatic in his disapproval of the parkway.
“I would put a hold on doing more work on the project,” James said. He said he would go back to the public for ideas on how to improve the parkway. “I think there’s a disconnect between what the council has proposed and what the community wants and needs.”
Reporter J.B. Wogan can be reached at 392-6434, ext. 247, or jbwogan@isspress.com. To comment on this story, visit www.SammamishReview.com.
Erica Tiliacos, 53, has cast herself as the experienced candidate prepared to ask the appropriate questions about a range of city issues on day one.
John James, 46, highlights his business background, especially in real estate, and says he understands how to make Sammamish a more attractive place to live: adding more local amenities.
They are vying for Position 1 on the Sammamish City Council Nov. 3. Councilwoman Kathy Huckabay is vacating the seat after 10 years.
While neither candidate is an incumbent, they both tout their experience in civic involvement.
Read more« Previous Page — Next Page »
