Neary-Sighted

Just real quick, for those who read the post about Pacific Highway: here's an update about Ponders from The News Tribune. For those of you interested in a different telling and far less nuanced description of the story, check out this brief from a Seattle paper.
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Greetings. This past weekend was about the first weekend since I felt really whole after I got what they vaguely describe as 'walking pneumonia" back in February. It was great to be out and about. We certainly fell behind in this blog, so let's do some catching up:

PACIFIC HIGHWAY: Tonight's Lakewood City Council meeting at 7 p.m. *may* be when the council makes the decision on alignment and the width of Pacific Highway between Bridgeport and Ponders. The overall goal is to reshape the road and widen some lots to allow for bigger and more varied businesses than what's there now.

You can read about the novel idea of changing the road to three lanes, based on a successful road in Fife, at this original posting, and then the update from the time we commissioned design studies is at this link.

We've since looked at designs that show a real attractive three-lane road on Pacific Highway, and larger lots on probably the railroad side to allow for more businesses and the creation of new jobs. I'm not entirely sure if we will make the final decision tonight or not.

COUNTY EXECUTIVE: Here's just one of many updates you will read this year about the election for Pierce County Executive: candidate Shawn Bunney's thoughts about economic development. As I have written before, even though Lakewood has its own locally elected government, the race for who will lead Pierce County government will be crucial. Pierce County government can make life easy or hard for us. And the way Pierce County government is set up, the county executive is pretty much like an emperor. So the post is crucial. The election this year will be crucial.

Just off the top of my head, I can think of three reasons that the Pierce County government can help or hinder Lakewood. And these only involve one important, but unglamorous part of county government, the sewer system:

1. Ask a developer about doing business in Lakewood, and you will often hear a lot about the sewer permitting system, which is controlled entirely by the county. How the county permitting system works with the city is crucial to economic development.

2. If we want to put more bathrooms in Fort Steilacoom Park, or something like a farmer's market in one of the barns, we will need to run a sewer line into the park. The county decides how much it charges for hooking up sewers, and the last cost estimate I heard was pretty large. It would be awful if the county charges too much for something that would be of such regional benefit; the new county executive will presumably have a say in such things.

3. And finally, construction will begin on a sewer line to Tillicum that will dramatically change that area. As you can already tell, county government runs the sewer system, and we need to hope its folks will continue to cooperate with Lakewood on what's sure to be a very, very complicated project.

I plan to work on questions that you might to ask a county executive candidate. You will probably meet several of them, as the race is sure to be a dogfight. Here's just one recent update on the race from The News Tribune. More to come.

GAMING UPDATE: The nonpartisan and always informative group Lakewood United will host a forum at 7 a.m. on Thursday, May 15, at Burs, during one of its regular sessions on the proposed gaming initiative. Former City Councilman John Arbeeny will be speaking on behalf of the initiative to ban minicasinos; yours truly will be speaking against it. A minicasino manager was scheduled to come in case there were questions about gaming itself, but he had to cancel. So I have a message into Lakewood United about whether they want to find someone from that industry to come speak or not. I plan to speak more about the importance of limiting government, as I am no expert on gambling; so it would be good to have someone there in case questions come up about minicasinos themselves. So I'll let you know how that turns out.
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If you were like me, you had to wonder why your electricity went out on the nicest day, so far, of 2008. The News Tribune has an explanation. I had a project to work on, and so had to drive quickly to my office in Puyallup to get electricity while pondering the mysteries of Tacoma Power.

Funny enough, yesterday was the day that our ancient cherry tree set to bloom. So I had already been thinking quite a lot that morning of Tacoma Power. My loyal readers, both of you, will recall that it was Tacoma Power's pruning group that went through our yard and savaged the property, especially that tree. As I have said at numerous times, if this group was in charge of trimming trees throughout the city, we would have to change the name of our community from Lakewood to Lake.

The excuse at the time was that trees can jump and even branches far below a power line pose a threat to Tacoma Power (I can't honestly say that Tacoma city representatives put it quite as directly as I just did). Every spring, I look out at the poor tree, still majestic though more than halved in size. And I ponder the damage that arrogance, fueled by the twin powers of arrogance and monopoly, can do. That residual feeling of violation is one of the the things that fuels me as an elected official. We who are supposed to serve a greater public good must always remember that government can, in big and small ways, change property and lives without caring or asking. The ability to do that, alone, is cause for reflection and concern.

But yesterday, Tacoma Power did get energy restored within a couple hours. So let's conclude on a note of gratitude. Tacoma Power crews would probably have rather been doing something else on a lovely day; so let's give thanks for hard working men and women on the front lines who keep our cities going.
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In order to get this up quickly, I will borrow wording from the city manager's report, which some readers probably get separately. The Army brigade that was officially adopted by Lakewood, the 4-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, begins returning from Iraq next month after 15 months there.

The city is seeking your help in giving them some extremly simple comforts to come home to.

The 4-2 has about 2,000 “unaccompanied” soldiers, the technical term for soldiers that have no immediate family to come home to at Fort Lewis. As a simple gesture of “thanks,” the City, through Councilmember Helen McGovern, agreed to coordinate 2,000 care packages for these young warriors.

Citizens are asked to bring the packages (about the size of a shoebox) to any receptionist at City Hall. Arrangements can be made for pick up by calling 253-380-6720. Staff will coordinate transportation to the brigade’s rear detachment at Fort Lewis. The packages will then be placed in individual barracks rooms.

Suggested items:
 Packaged crackers and cheese
 Energy drinks, juice, bottled water, soda
 Discount coupons to movies or for pizza
 gift cards, calling cards
 goodies-gum, candies, chips, granola bars, etc.
 towel/washcloth
 toothbrush/toothpaste/mouthwash
 shampoo; deodorant; razor/shaving cream
 bars of soap; foot cream
 candles-they miss good smells
 nail clippers/files
 a personal note of “thanks”

Separate yet also sorta related: A citizen who has been seeking homes for animals, many of whom belonged to soldiers, is looking for help adopting them out. If you might be interested in helping, please call Melody at City Hall (253) 589-2489 for more information.

In case you are wondering, the item about the soldiers has sort of a complicated history. The person has helped hundreds of soldiers by taking their pets, but the person did not have a kennel license for their neighborhood. So the animals are being adopted, thanks in large part to her amazing efforts ... but folks are needed to take some more cats.
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Lakewood has traditionally been thought of as a pretty libertarian place. It was the place you moved to, years ago, when you did not want to live within Tacoma and be part of a city. I have always thought of Lakewood as a sort of 'live and let live' sort of community. That does not mean it is as politically conservative as some folks think; it's fascinating we are one of the few places in the state to approve the recent transportation proposal.

This whole feeling of 'live and let live,' of course, colored the cityhood debates that began decades ago. Plenty of folks did not want additional government.What happened, of course, was that we learned we needed at least some additional government. And by now, most folks would say that Lakewood has benefited from parts of cityhood: the lack of strip clubs, the addition of dozens of police, the cleaning up of junked neighborhoods, the numerous improvements to streets and parks ...

Where the whole past and present come into conflict is when you continue to extend government. It fascinates me that 'my' little 'live and let live' city is considering two big government moves: telling people they can't gamble, and regulating breeds of dogs.

I originally thought of writing a parody column about how the anti-gambling folks are so persuasive, I now support extending government into new areas: banning French fries to prevent childhood obesity, and banning alcohol and tobacco to prevent alcoholism and cancer. The image of putting Lakewood city staff into Burger King to check the fat content of the super-sized meals would be a nice funny bit. And honestly, obesity is a huge public health problem that costs us a fortune as a society. But by writing such a parody column, I would do a disservice to the absolute sincerity of those who think a Lakewood ban on minicasinos would accomplish something.

Of course, it would not. A ban on minicasinos would only teach our youth that adults focus their political efforts on meaningless statements that make us feel better, but accomplish nothing in the real world except shut down legitimate businesses and throw people out of jobs. Gambling would continue. Heck, the entire state of Washington sanctions gambling to help pay for schools, of all things, via the Lottery. I drive past an "Indian casino" when going to work every day, and there are more cars parked there in the early morning than I have ever seen at a Lakewood minicasino. A ban on Lakewood minicasinos would be pointless.

But this is where big government - 'government as solution' - comes in. There are plenty of folks who think government can solve gambling, or can solve the problem of stupid pet owners, or what have you. And it's only fair for them to raise the question. We do look to government for answers in ways I just described ... through more police, through regulation of strip clubs, etc... Lakewood has and will do a better job of zoning for minicasinos. And there are enough complaints that we need to take another look at animal control rules. I don't think of someone like Councilman Ron Cronk as being a big government guy, so maybe it makes sense that he be the one to stick his neck out and propose a change to Lakewood's approach, much like it took Nixon of all people to go to China. Whatever the subject, it's thrilling that others in the community are going to take the city's new "initiative and referendum" system for a test drive.

So no more jokes. This is serious stuff. Let's find out how big Lakewood wants its government to be.
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Boy, we got some catching up to do, don't we? Bits and pieces...

Lakewood site on national radio: First off, thanks to The New Tribune blogger Scott Fontaine for a link to a National Public Radio broadcast about our own Galloping Gertie's. The story does not mention Lakewood, but oh well...

Big job: Creating and preserving jobs for everyone is a big dang deal. So this is big news because we know our city manager badly wanted to hire this person. This is from his report:

Ellie Chambers hired as Economic Development Manager: Ellie Chambers has been appointed as the City’s new economic development manager, to start on April 14th. She’s been with the City of Puyallup for almost 4 years as the assistant to the city manager for economic development, and she’s currently the president-elect of the Washington Economic Development Association (WEDA). She was previously with the Spokane-based Avista Corporation (formerly Washington Water Power Company) for 13 years, where she worked throughout Washington, Oregon, and Idaho in a variety of executive economic development positions. The position is a reclassification of the position formerly held by Joe Hannan who left to become the Mukilteo city administrator.

Speaking of economic development: Real cities look attractive. You see that as you exit the highway and enter cities, especially cities near Seattle. So the statement we make where Bridgeport meets Pac Highway near I-5 is significant. There is a workshop meeting this Thursday, April 3, at 7:30 p.m. at City Hall to review potential gateway artwork.

Election news: The man who represents Lakewood on the Pierce County Council, Dick Muri, has announced his 2008 campaign for reelection. From his statement: "Muri continues to focus on keeping government accountable through performance audits, balancing budgets with no tax increases, and streamlining the county criminal justice system to increase its effectiveness and protection of the public."

You'll notice I don't berate people in this blog about politics - well except for my own re-election last year - but I have known Dick a long time and could not possibly be impartial in this race. A vote for Dick Muri is a good investment in our future.
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Lakewood's city manager named a new police chief today, Assistant Chief Bret Farrar. I don't claim to know the man well, but in all the conversations I've had he has struck me as someone with a lot of common sense. When you look at all the things that can go wrong in police operations, you consider that having a chief with common sense is important So his appointment was happy news. I'm sure other candidates for the job also had plenty of common sense, but a lot of people know Bret in town. Check out this link to The News Tribune story.
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Hey, I wanted to ask a question I have been meaning to ask for awhile. I've occasionally noticed problems at the Tacoma Convention Center, such as the famous luncheon awhile back when no one could understand Tacoma's own mayor during a speech because of the sound system (and boy, was that embarrassing for everyone). I've also been at events where everything seemed to go just fine.

I serve on a board that makes sure the convention center spends tax dollars appropriately, and to be honest, there does not seem to be a lot of interest in our group. We only meet a couple times a year. There's never any general member of the public there. But let me throw this open to the readership: if you have been there, what do you think of the Tacoma Convention Center? Any stories to tell me, good or bad?
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Quick note for those of you with Lakewood-oriented calendars: The Parks board will NOT be discussing lake access (described in various posts below) at its next meeting this Tuesday. An enormous number of questions have come up about lot lines and property shapes, and the folks involved have wisely decided to do more study before more public hearings. So that's good ... but it also means the next hearing will be at a time yet unannounced.
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Lakewood will finally have its own, centralized police station to replace offices scattered throughout the city and a main building that county government is reclaiming. The new building will be between the Y and the bus barns on Lakewood Drive, across from Seeley Lake. We had the groundbreaking Thursday morning. That's me there between Chief Larry Saunders and Councilwoman Claudia Thomas.

I have never been in a groundbreaking photo before - we ain't no big building government in Lakewood - but it was sure nice to be in this one. The 43,000-square-foot building should be finished in about eight months. It will be a fine home for the Lakewood Police Department.
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My regular readers, both of you, will recall that Walter brought out his heaviest hammers of words last fall when we learned the city was failing to properly staff our community policing units. These units are responsible for trying to prevent problems before they start or get worse.

So it's fair, good and in fact downright joyous to report that staffing is getting back up to where it should be. These folks will not only provide proactive policing, but also help with a citywide experimenting in bringing other government services to the community at the local level. Here's the latest report on the staffing for the six community policing district:

Neighborhood Patrol Officer:

District 1- John Fraser

District 2- Angel Figeuroa

District 3- Brian Wurts

District 4- Jeremy Vahle

District 5- John Fraser

District 6/WSH- Charles Porche

Get that? All six districts have an officer for neighborhood policing. This is outstanding!!! It was only a few months ago that we had two.

Community Service Officer:

District 1- Mike Miller

District 2- Courtney Nelson

District 3- Dawn McGinnis

District 4- Someone on the way

District 5- Sandy Stauffer

District 6/WSH- Melissa Wagner

So this means that five of the six teams are complete. The city's management deserves high fives for this.

Sometimes good news just stands on its own. So enough said. This is good news.
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Good morning, and greetings from the fourth floor of the Landmark Convention Center. I'm at a workshop hosted by the Association of Washington Cities. The workshop is about engaging citizens in government, and about particular tool, the performance audit.

Lakewood sent quite a delegation here: we also have council members Pad Finnigan and Claudia Thomas, and assistant city managers Jeff Brewster and Dave Bugher.

Several folks advocate for creating a performance audit system within Lakewood. Performance audits are supposed to measure, as scientifically as possible, whether a government activity is being done at the most reasonable balance of cost and service. Performance audits are an outside opinion by experts about whether government is working at its best, or what other options are possible.

One of my frustrations with public policy in Lakewood is that because we are a relatively new city, we do not have a lot of role models for how to do things. People, including me, often pontificate about how the city should do this or that, without having the personal expertise to evaluate whether something is effective or not.

This morning, we heard in a key not speech about how polls show something we already know: Americans are extremly interested in accountability. Accountability is the most popular word people want to apply to their government. So hopefully today those of us from Lakewood will get some good ideas about how to get citizens involved in the pursuit of better government and specifically accountability. I will keep you posted.

Right now, a bunch of loudmouths at the front table have diverted the presenter with a bunch of questions related to their own personal opinions about performance audits. I hate that; I always think you should let a speaker finish their presentation before diving into questions. So I will have my fingers crossed that she can do so. I want to hear how perfermance audits can not only improve government, but also get citizens engaged.
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Lakewood today is of course a very diverse place. But when it came time to do the Lakewood History Book, we had a heck of a time coming up with photos of much diversity before the latter half of the 20th century. So imagine our joy when we found out there had been a Buffalo Soldiers camp at the north end of Lake Steilacoom. What follows is a news release about an upcoming program - as far as I know, it's the most exhaustive presentation to date in Lakewood about the Buffalo Soldiers.

The release is from, and reads as by, the Lakewood Historical Society:

142 Years and Counting:
The Legacy of the Buffalo Soldiers

In commemoration of Black History Month, the Lakewood Historical Society is presenting “142 Years and Counting: The Continuing Legacy of the Buffalo Soldiers” at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 12, in the Council Chambers of Lakewood City Hall, 6000 Main Street SW. We are privileged to have COL (Ret) James Manning and other members of the Greater Puget Sound Chapter of the 9th and 10th Cavalry Association present the program.

He will discuss the rich proud heritage of the Buffalo Soldiers who have served their country since 1866. Contingents of the cavalry units participated in maneuvers in 1904 through 1912 in what is now Fort Lewis and Lakewood. The legacy continued to be represented by the 25th Infantry Regiment at Fort Lawton, Washington, as well as the 92nd Infantry Division, the Tuskegee Airmen and the Montford Point Marine Division in World War II. Artifacts and memorabilia from a private collection will be on display during the evening of the program.

A special exhibit, “Buffalo Soldiers: A Legacy of Honor” from the Buffalo Soldiers National Museum in Houston, Texas, will be displayed in the Lakewood History Museum at 6211 Mt Tacoma Drive SW, across from Columbia Bank, Feb 12-23, 2008, Tues-Sat, 10 AM-4 PM.
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The longtime chairman of the Lakewood Parks and Recreation Commission writes, with justification, to gently chide me about some of my word selection. I think I am guilty; when you write volumes of words for newspapers, you sometimes forget the power of a word. Roger Laybourn's note follows.

The upshot of his point is that when I say there may be a 'park' at a street end, it sounds like we are planning a parking lot, soccer fields, and a big signs that says "teen-agers come here to drink." In fact, the only concrete ideas I have heard - and again, these are just ideas - involve maybe a place to sit and to launch a kayak. Anyway, here is Roger's note:

Walter, the Parks Board has tried to clarify the idea of what to do with the street ends and what not to do with them. There is no plan to make parks out of any of them. Enhance public access to those where that is possible but not to turn them into parks. That misconception is at the heart of much of the anxiety expressed at the public meetings even though the statement is presented both orally and on the slide that states the purposes of the meetings. I hope this helps clarify the issue. I know it's a fine point but one that we've been trying to make since we started this series of meetings. Thanks for your interest and support. Roger
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Many of you will be aware that the Lakewood City Council has finally decided to confront the difficult question of what to do about public property that might or might not be used to improve access to the lakes. If you are unfamiliar with the question, my earlier column, while even yet more material on the subject, might be useful background at this point. And reader Travis Lauricella kindly made up a map of the sites awhile back.

The Lakewood parks board has been holding meetings to discuss what to do about the street ends that dead end into lakes. Right now, there is some vague language in official city documents that call for someday maybe somehow turning some of the sites into parks.

This council wants to let people know if particular street ends would never be suitable for parks, and whether any might be.

There are have been three public hearings and Wednesday was the fourth, focusing on several sites around Lake Steilacoom, Not surprisingly, there is a lot of stress at the meetings. Many people who live at or near the street ends have understandable visions of crowds showing up at their homes. You can tell from the edge in their voices that this whole process has unsettled a lot of neighbors. That’s never comfortable.

For example, one person who lives near a street end asked, ‘What if kids are down there drinking and screwing - what are you going to do about that?”

On the other hand, another citizen said he had biked to one of the locations during the daytime to read a book, and been driven away from public property by an adjacent landowner.

The recent meetings have tended to draw a majority of people who are critical of increasing public access, since they are understandably motivated by their passion for their privacy and property to show up. However, in some cases, people who live down the street did show up; and there were exchanges about people who wanted to protect their privacy and people who want to be able to walk to the lake.

As I have written earlier, there are lots of other questions. There’s the whole question about whether the city can even afford to do much improving, which makes this whole process a little worrisome. One option is to sell some of the lots, presumably to adjacent homeowners, to pay for improvements at others.

To try to be measurable about it, the current idea is to look at each property and rank it by number to see what sites may be suitable for changes. That's what the meeting took a stab at Wednesday night. There are 11 categories that include the width of the street end parcel, how much of the area is useable, how steep the lot is, and so forth. A impossibly steep and narrow lot with no potential parking and other problems would get 1 point of value for a lowest possible score of 11. But a site that would make a perfect park would be 5 points for each of the 11 categories, or a total of 55. It’s unlikely any of the lots would be 55 since most are narrow or have other problems.

As the meeting went on approaching the third hour, it became pretty clear that the scale was more subjective than some people might have wanted. Very naturally, people who lived near the street ends were eager to request that their land be ranked as a 1. They were able to do so easily in various categories that were quite subjective, such as “how easy would it be to provide security for the site?” Who could know that, now, except by educated guess influenced by the tone of the audience?

In fact, as the evening wore on, the ranking of each park changed as the meeting moved to each specific site counterclockwise. People got much better getting sites ranked with 1s. The first lot to be discussed by the group, on Westlake, got a ranking of 34; by the end of the evening, the last lot was ranked 14.

I'm going to get ahold of the numbers and try to pull out some of the more subjective categories, and let you know how the sites might rank.

The good news is that there will be a lot more discussion. Staff will prepare more reports about individual sites, and the parks board will have a big discussion about them on Feb. 26. No decisions will be made without more discussion. There will be articles in the city newsletter about any proposal or increased focus before the whole subject goes to the City Council.

As I told the audience last night, if we do pick out some parcels for consideration for improvements, the sites will become the most studied, walked on and discussed land in all Lakewood.
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My regular readers, both of you, will know that the Lakewood City Council held a two-day retreat late last week. I actually had my laptop up and running most of the two days, but frankly, as an old newspaperman, even I could not identify a bunch of news to share in any sort of post-it-now-on-the-Internet sort of breathless way.

At the end of the day, the summary sounds strange to write. But here’s the news: The Lakewood City Council was united in deciding that we are in favor of what we are already doing. And if you follow Lakewood politics, that was not a given.

For those of you with an interest in politics, these were the keywords the council agreed on as a vision for the community:

Military
Diversity
Cultural
Safety
Good schools
Jobs
Recreation
Economic
Neighborhoods
Partnerships
Family
History
Activities

Frankly, you would have trouble getting anyone to disagree with any or many of those. So maybe it’s not meaningful except nobody put up the words ‘growth moratorium’ or many of the other words heard in various cities these days.

Here’s the meat of the matter. These are the priorities for the city, as recommended by the council:

The most votes:
Develop infrastructure of Tillicum, American Lake Gardens, Pacific Highway
Better prevention and intervention and suppression of crime

Nearly as many votes:
Neighborhood leaders/revitalization of neighborhoods
Work plan for ongoing capital projects
(Protect the bases future)
Validate vision through goal-setting through community vision process

And these each had two votes:
Cultural development
Take leadership role in creating relationships such as those with the school district
Performance audits

So what did the retreat accomplish? I think what it accomplished was exposing that our council, so bitterly divided at times, basically agrees on the big issues facing the city. And there are no strong proposals to move things in a radically different direction.

Instead, what we discussed was how to do what we are doing, but better. For example, nothing is as important as getting Tillicum and American Lake Gardens right. If we do them right, in partnership with private owners, these neighborhoods will be productive places to work and good places to live. If we squander this opportunity, the city will continue to pour tax dollars into patchwork solutions to problems.

So maybe the word ‘retreat’ was the wrong word. Maybe the word is ‘progress.’
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First of all - sure, while there were a few folks anticipating the final Harry Potter book, you are going to see some real excitement now that the Lakewood Annual Report is out. The report is for 2007, and you should definitely look it over for a comprehensive review of a lot that has, and will, go on. There is an enormous amount of detail for people interested in Lakewood. Check out the crime stats toward the end of the booklet.

Just a quick update on the last post below. The council voted to approve the interim rules for Tillicum, though understanding that there will be more discussions with the community and the planning commission, among others. I voted no, because I am concerned we are penning ourself in by firmly agreeing at this early stage to go for a 60-foot roadway the way called for in the regulations. The roadway is presently 40 feet wide, and the regulations call for taking 10 feet of the lots from either side of the road to get to 60. I think it's pretty early to make that call. It may well be that after further consideration, it might be better to take 15 from one side and 5 from the other, or something like that. But the council majority felt it was a reasonable decision to make now, and that's fair.

You know, my earlier reference to the planning commission reminds me of something. We have a shortage of applicants for the most powerful nonelected body in this city, the planning commission. That's actually sort of sad. It tells me either we are not getting the word out, or the people who want to volunteer are already volunteering.

If you have any interest in subjects like how many houses and businesses go where, you should either apply for the Planning Advisory Board or recruit someone else to. You can find the application for volunteering at this web site. Please don't be intimidated. Regular citizens like you and me volunteer.

Let me know if you apply, and I will keep you posted. The flip side of this is that usually, not everyone can be chosen. That's unfortunate, but it is good to throw your name into the ring. It's a call that you are interested in being involved, and everyone appreciates that.
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After a slow start to the year, Lakewood public policy roars back to life tonight at 7 in City Hall. Among the important questions is whether to extend a moratorium on several kinds of new development in Tillicum.

The council will hold a formal hearing, so we will likely hear from some landowners, businesspeople and residents. The fundamental decision is whether the city needs more time to make decisions, or whether to temporarily adopt some or all or modified rules that are suggested by staff in their recent staff report:

- Limiting the height of buildings on the freeway side of Union Avenue to 40 feet high, instead of the 60 feet normally allowed in that commercial zone. The staff's thinking there is that it's better to have shorter buildings on the freeway side so people driving by can see the buildings on the lake side of Union Avenue.

- Restricting drive-throughs to only the freeway side of Union Avenue. This should be a lively point, since many drive-throughs are presently located on the lake side of the avenue. Staff's thinking for this recommendation is that maybe we want to encourage businesses on the lake side to be more pedestrian-friendly, and channel the busy driving areas to one side of the road. Should be an interesting discussion.

- Dealing with small lots by new design rules. This one is a biggie because how we deal with this is going to have implications for the rest of Lakewood. Regular readers of this column know that Lakewood is combed with turn-of-the-century lots that, if fully developed, would dramatically change Lakewood's character. Some of the lots are as small as 2,500 square feet, and somewhere out there are lawyers who are going to argue that such a lot is perfectly fine for a stack of condos. (well, or maybe just a house)

- Widening Union Avenue to 60 feet, to allow for more walking and biking options.

Bear in mind, NONE of this is final. The discussions about Tillicum will continue.

Meanwhile, two other subjects should also generate discussion tonight. One subject is whether to allow residents to park in the right of way for 48 hours, instead of 24 hours, after getting a notice to move their car. The issue here is folks who park cars and leave them there in the right of way. Obviously extending the time by 24 hours would give people more options.

And finally, the police are asking whether the council would be willing to require people who own a total of five or more rental properties to get a business license (the current requirement is for folks who own eight or more - either as apartments or a total of individual properties).

The idea is that if you do so, then police have greater leverage if someone is renting to a lot of criminals because police can approach the landlord about their business license. But of course people who have been renting properties for many, many years might join the council in asking a lot of questions about this one. What we can expect the police to say is that some of the smarter criminals are figuring out that they should move into smaller complexes in order to avoid police interaction with their landlord.

And really really finally, you probably already saw it, but there was a comprehensive review of another Lakewood police anti-crime program in today's News Tribune.
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Those of us who love Lakewood history will face some tough questions, and relatively soon. My loyal readers, both of you, know that the area occupied by Fort Steilacoom Park and Western State Hospital was once a British pioneer farm. It was then a U.S. pioneer fort established in 1849. So that's why I often tell people that these particular properties represent the most historic ground in the city.

Part of that history includes some of the grand old buildings of Western State.

Western State - and more specifically, the land management group of DSHS - is working on a master plan that would take down some of their older buildings. Before you panic, they have no plans to mess with the original fort buildings or the grand old main building.

But their plans do involve taking down some other older buildings.

Some, to be honest, I have trouble getting up a head of steam about. There are some small houses from the 1930s and 1940s that are starting to fall apart. The hospital wants to demolish them. I mention them because certainly some people might be accustomed to them being there. You can argue that their use by many, many patients makes them historic.

Here's an example of one of those. If you look the next time you will drive past, you will see a whole row of these guys:



I feel more passion about the old chapel building, which does indeed have a couple of old chapels in it that are still being used. Like the cabins, this building is also visible from Steilacoom Boulevard. Take a look the next time you drive past. If you are like me, you usually do not look around too much on this stretch of road because some moron is tailgating you because they want to drive 50 mph. But look for this building the next time you pass by:

The biggest challenge, though, is that the oldest and most historic building that would be torn down is hidden from Steilacoom Boulevard by the main building. It sits near the historic pioneer cemetery in which rest the remains of, among others, Idaho's first territorial governor. This building, known as the bakery, is simply falling apart.
We're not entirely sure when the building went up, but it is probably as old as the mortuary nearby. But at least there is no hole in the roof of the mortuary. Not so for the bakery. Below you will see a photo of me gazing at a hole in the roof that, on the day of our tour, was allowing large amounts of rain to get in.


What this means in practical terms, of course, is that DSHS has every reason to tear this building down because it is unsafe. Historic preservationists call this situation "demolition by neglect." You've probably heard of demolition by neglect occurring with some of the privately owned buildings in or near downtown Tacoma. In this, case though, at least in theory, there's a complication. We are not aware of any big buckets of tax dollars that DSHS has to throw at non-functional historic buildings that do not serve patients or staff. So here is our problem. Here is our question.

Do we, as a community, care about a hidden historic building surrounded by a mental health care facility?

There will be much more discussion about land use planning for Western State Hospital, so don't worry about any final decisions being made soon. In the meantime, I welcome your thoughts about what you think of any or all of these structures.
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I just fired this off to my email list:

News about Lakewood, January 2008

(Man, that was fast. Whatever happened to 2006?)

Welcome to 2008, everyone. And welcome to a new year of public policy in Lakewood.

Councilmembers Don Anderson and Claudia Thomas were sworn in tonight, as was yours truly. You have four years of us to look forward to. The council unanimously elected Doug Richardson as mayor and Don Anderson as deputy mayor.

To their credit, The News Tribune is launching into e-reporting in a major way so the paper can help fill you in. As an example of how news stories on the Web can affect participants directly, I myself learned Claudia Thomas did not plan to run for mayor from a blog posting earlier today. Now there's a story up already about our choices : http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/updates/story/248305.html

If nothing else, stop to read that last link. Yes, me calling Don Anderson a 'talented newcomer' to the council is like William Seward telling Abraham Lincoln that Lincoln has great potential. Hey, you try to sound intelligent to a newspaper reporter. What I should have said is that Don's deep experience on various elected and nonprofit boards has given him the experience to help lead our cantankerous cast of characters. Or something like that. What I most find effective about Don in the short time I've known him is his ability to quickly summarize and capture what's been said and then advance the subject.

We could use some disciplined discussions in Lakewood.

As an aside, the question of how we pick a mayor is one of the strangest that courses through Lakewood right now. If you have not seen it yet, you might check out my earlier blog posting on the subject(below) Maybe everything I wrote then is moot, but I still say Lakewood has more things to do than tie itself up into knots over who is mayor.

I’ll be picking up my newsletter again so you will hear more from me. You can argue I have been negligent. My mother-in-law returned from long travels this week and told me she was very disappointed that she’d had to hear from the neighbors, and not her son-in-law, that we have a new police chief. Well, of course, we don’t have a new police chief ... but her neighbors thought otherwise. So this story reminds me that without a local weekly paper that delves into all the minutiae of a city, emails like this one are important.

I need to send out some calendar information, because a lot of interesting events are coming up including the annual Martin Luther King Day celebration at 10 a.m. this Saturday at Clover Park Technical College.

In the meantime, to help tee up a New Year in Lakewood, here’s Walter’s list of some of the most important decisions and events to happen in 2008. That we know of.

1. New superintendent: The most important decision scheduled to be made in Lakewood is not going to be made by the City Council. The question of who will lead and manage the Clover Park School District is incredibly important to adults and especially the children. Pray for the Clover Park School District board, but first please pray that they get good candidates. There is a national shortage of good superintendents. Whoever takes Clover Park and Lakewood is going to have to thirst for a challenge.

2. New police chief: There will be a national search for a police chief to replace Larry Saunders, who this spring will be going to Iraq to serve our country in what has to be one of the most amazingly dramatic and brave stories of 2007. Since public safety is so important to this council and more importantly, to our community, this job will be very, very important.

3. New economic development director: Joe Hannan, our economic development director, left to be city administrator of Mukilteo. The economic development director has the important role of recommending how to keep jobs and grow jobs within Lakewood. The economic development director advocates for existing and potential businesses within City Hall and the community.

4. A chamber leadership program: I’ve written about this before, so the short version is that every other significant community around here has a formal community leadership program. These programs put 20 to 30 people through a yearlong series of activities and ‘graduates’ them onto the boards of nonprofit groups, onto city advisory committees, and onto schools boards and city councils. As part of my day job, I’ve become convinced that the big difference between Lakewood and places like Lacey, Auburn and Federal Way is that those places have thriving adult leadership training programs.

Just as a matter of process, I should note this is also not a decision of the City Council. I’m chairing a Lakewood Chamber of Commerce board committee that is looking into the question of how to start such a leadership program.

5. Tillicum: So we as a community are paying to extend sewers into Tillicum in 2009, with the potential of allowing some real improvements in the community. There is a development moratorium on right now that the council will discuss next Monday.

Will the council and city staff create land use regulations that allow for both the rights of private landowners AND the right of the community to expect the best possible employers and the best and safest housing? Or will Tillicum just rebuild a newer version of what's already there?

To my mind, this is the most lasting of the big questions facing our council. If we do this right, Tillicum could attract major businesses like hotels and nice restaurants, and a wide range of decent housing, that could last for decades after we’re all long buried. Imagine the wonderland that could develop at the edge of a major employer (the military) and sandwiched between the state’s busiest freeway and a beautiful lake. Improvement works to everyone's benefit, because the residents of Tillicum themselves want a safer and more livable community.

There’s a lot at stake.

6. Accountability. Perhaps partly because Lakewood is a relatively new city, many people are very suspicious of how the city spends tax dollars. To me, it's a matter of familiarity breeding contempt. In that case, though it seems to me that we should make lemonade from lemons. All the suspicion should give extra energy to those of us who don't think Lakewood is better or worse than anywhere else, but should find ways to demonstrate to citizens whether and how they are getting more services and the right services for their bucks. Once again, I commend anyone interested in this subject to the book, 'The Price of Government.'
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Lots of interesting articles this week, mostly in today's TNT. But first, for a worrisome chuckle, you should check out a story in Seattle Weekly about a new law familiar to people in Pierce County but probably news to anyone in King County.

Seattle Weekly has a story about the bill that is supposed to require counties to hold on to felons who are released from prison. You may recall that this was big news here in Pierce County, where King and Snohomish and other counties have been exporting their people released from prison for years.

Here's a line from the story: "An ex-convict, she was trapped in Tacoma by a new law that requires former prisoners to return to the county where they were first convicted, and stay there, while under Department of Corrections supervision, for one to two years."

Expect more stories and tales that will try to make the new legislation sound like a bad thing. Imagine what you would think if you live in Seattle, and this is the first you had heard of this subject: "The requirement to return prisoners to their "county of origin" is one little piece of the bill. Under that provision, newly released inmates must return to the county where they were first convicted—even if they've had multiple convictions since—regardless of where they were last living. It came about because of a pet peeve on the part of Pierce County, namely a feeling that Tacoma and its environs were a dumping ground for ex-cons."

You had to figure that at some point, people in King and Snohomish and these other counties would realize they would be seeing more felons because of the legislation. I think everyone has been a little nervous about what might happen when the other counties do realize they are being asked to keep their fair share; King County can outvote Pierce County in a heartbeat and could easily vote to send King County felons to Pierce.

The Seattle Weekly story puts a human face on the tale, and cutely uses a Pierce County victim to tell the story as if it was Pierce County that was being hurt. The short version is that felons want to leave the counties they came from because that was where they got into trouble. This same reasoning, of course, could be used to explain why every single felon in King County ought to be relocated to Pierce County, and nobody should fall for such reasoning. Since I worked in Thurston County for three years, I found the paper's story quite funny, because it is just entirely possible that the one felon will find out there are people in Thurston County who use drugs as well. I believe I saw one, maybe two such people, downtown one day. Anyway, check out the Weekly story, and be ready for other attempts to unroll the sensible legislation that requires communities to take care of their own.

But let's have a backup plan. If the reasoning does catch on, more and more people in King County will say that it makes sense to put a felon in another city far away from home so that he or she does not spend time with the 'friends' who got them into trouble. If that reasoning does catch on, our fallback position should be that every county - King, Pierce, Snohomish - and everyone else - simply authorize the Department of Corrections to put every single released felon on a bus to Portland. That way, the felons would be away from the 'friends' who got them into trouble, and crime will drop radically since the source of our problems is not our own individual choices we make, but the company we keep.

Right.

So anyway, on a more informative note, the TNT has tons of interesting news. There's an editorial with a completely different view of the legislation we just discussed.

The status of the Russell company is hugely important, because if Tacoma loses Russell corporate headquarters, it will cause a lot of devastation. Dan Voelpel got a lot of space to write a very detailed look at the situation; Russell is apparently going to decide by the end of next year if it will be moving its HQ.

Finally, I personally found the stories about real estate sales to be extremely interesting because I used to work in newspapers and know there is more to the story that you might see in print. It is a truism that newspapers will never write stories about how to sell real estate or automobiles on your own, because newspapers get a huge chunk of advertising sales from real estate companies and automobile dealers. Years ago, in another state, I wrote stories about an auto parts dealer who had got arrested for something, and his boycott of the paper cost us a small fortunate in advertising. But we had to write the story because he had been accused of a crime. Newspapers have a choice about whether to write stories about how consumers can use alternatives to new car dealers and Realtors. And most newspapers don't.

So for the TNT to take on this subject showed a lot of courage. As it is, the story seems to come down in the right direction, namely, you get what you pay for. So I doubt if there will be a lot of backlash. But it still look a lot of guts to take on the topic.
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You would be amazed at the stacks of paperwork you can pick up if you run for office and try to do other jobs at the same time. We have a backlog, so let's try sharing some information in quick bursts. With more to come.

- If you missed the Bill Cosby appearance in Lakewood, it's now showing - and I mean that literally as I type this and watch it at the same time - on TV. It was filmed by Clover Park Technical College Television and will repeat at 8 a.m., 4 p.m. and midnight for the next several days. You can see it on channel 28 with Comcast and 89 with Click! Definitely worth watching.

I grabbed the photo from Picasa, from an album by Ben ... presumably Ben Sclair, and thanks to him for recording so many photos of the community.

- Next month, the Landmarks and Heritage Advisory Board will consider whether to declare the home at 11012 Interlaaken Drive SW as a city landmark. The formal designation would prevent any future homeowners from changing the building without the Landmarks board's OK. That is totally fine with the present owners, Becky and John Huber, as Becky is the president of the Lakewood Historical Society and John is the president's aide-de-camp. There are only a handful of buildings so designated, so it would be great to have one in the Interlaaken neighborhood so protected.

You'll recognize the house right away; it's the red two-story home set back on a forested lot and not that far from Idlewild Elementary.

The home belonged to contractor Fredric Cole Smith, who built it on what was then a 10-acre lot in 1914. Becky has a copy of Fredric's obituary from 1940. It's interesting that something the newspaper chose to emphasize in the obituary was that Fredric's father was Edward Slade "Skookum" Smith, an extremely prominent Tacoma businessman who worked for the Nothern Pacific Railroad. So the Smith house, now the Huber house, is yet another example of how Lakewood got built up by Tacoma's rich and famous (and their children).

- In one pile of papers was an amazingly detailed report on the 40-year history of Pierce College. There's a little bit of the info on the Pierce College Web site, but I will see if I can track down a PDF of this document, if you were like me and missed it in the mail.

There's a lot of interesting history and good photos, but what impressed me most were some comments about the future, namely, 2009: the report says that in that year, the college will see completion of a "$30 million Science and Technology Building ...featuring three pods connected by glass-covered winter gardens." And with a view of Fort Steilacoom Park, Lake Waughop, and when the weather allows, Mount Rainier. Wow!
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Hey gang, one of my wife's co-workers at Madigan is taking a class outside work where they have to write detailed reports about community subjects. Her group chose community policing, which certainly has Lakewood's name written all over it. But they need some survey participants to report on.

If you have a second, can you fill out this survey about community policing? It's anonymous and pretty quick (especially when compared to the infamous Neary surveys!)

If you want to forward the link to anyone, it's http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=tobc_2fiVCAGSVo2KYyplkvA_3d_3d
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One of the odd little byproducts of how the city of Lakewood developed is that every two years, people start to ask very earnestly, 'Who is going to be the mayor?' And they ask the question out of more than just idle curiosity. The seven council members choose a mayor and deputy mayor from among the ranks at the first meeting in January. The last two cycles, the council has had a couple of very bitter and divided votes on that question.

For those of you new to town, here's some background on why the question is exaggerated in Lakewood and comes up so often. First off, you have to consider the real role of mayor. The job actually differs from city to city even though the term 'mayor' stays the same. In some cities, mayors have real power. They hire and fire. In some cities, the mayor is elected directly as mayor by citizens. And the term mayor has a lot of mystique (think how often you have heard the phrase, "Mayor Guiliani...")

But Lakewood is typical of cities where a city manager actually runs the city. The elected council sets policy and supervises the city manager. The chief role of the mayor in such cities is to set the agendas for meetings and preside over the meetings.

Some cities rotate the role of mayor every year. In Lakewood, the city's founding fathers and founding mothers created a two-year term, elected by the council. For the first eight years, they kept electing Bill Harrison. Now, Bill is a great guy, and the city has a lot to be proud of for those eight years. But there were two unintended effects. The first unintended effect is that Lakewood did not get a lot of experience with having different candidates for mayor. And the second unintended effect was that by giving the same job to a charismatic guy for eight years, the council exaggerated the role of mayor.

Here's an example: Four years ago, when I ran for office, I asked a lot of people what they thought of the city. Maybe about a quarter or even a third of the time, people would respond by telling me what they thought of Bill Harrison.

People can do a lot with that gavel. The second mayor, Doug Richardson, was able to dramatically re-shape and improve how the council relates to the public and how city staff responds to the public. Our current mayor, Claudia Thomas, has used the power of the title, for example, to effectively create an arts commission and to get the entire city involved in the recent appearances by Bill Cosby. In both cases, Claudia and Doug used or use both the gavel and force of personality to wield real power.

But at the end of the day, the mayor has one vote out of seven on the council. Claudia got caught in this early on when she gaveled off a citizen who was speaking negatively about someone. I don't remember the exact vote, but a majority of the council overruled her because we let such people speak in Lakewood. It was a very healthy event because a mayor can't always be right; and by Claudia's gracious acceptance of the majority, we saw that a majority on the council can define a mayor's role to what is written on the page.

In summary, the role of mayor in Lakewood is exaggerated, and yet exaggeration makes the role more powerful than one would expect.

But that's enough on why everyone cares. Took awhile to set the stage, so let's keep moving. This month I've had a lot of people asking, for the reasons above and other reasons, 'Who will be mayor?' The last two sessions, there were pretty narrow and divided votes. It's wasn't fun to be in the middle of it. There were a lot of bruised feelings right when a new council was emerging from the gate and setting the tone for the next two years. And, of course, there's lots of interest because individual citizens have their favorites for the leadership positions.

I think people wonder if we'll have the same bitterness over the term that begins in January and ends in December 2009.

The answer is, at this point, I am pretty sure it will be bitter and divided.

Here's why:

The council members quarrel a lot. And we have a lot of strong wills in Lakewood. I could be incredibly wrong - and if I am, I bet someone will tell us - but I don't think any combination of mayor and deputy mayor has the four votes they need to win in any sort of automatic way. Take a look at the individuals.

If you look at what we have now on the council field of seven, you have two original council members who already have been mayor and know the potential of the role, Doug Richardson and Claudia Thomas.

And, you also have the Lakewood CARES bloc, Ron Cronk and Pad Finnigan. Now, given how CARES did in the last election and their track record on the council, you may think it is odd I am bringing them up. But as I list names, do a little math in your head. Two votes gives you 50 percent of the four votes you need to be mayor.

I should quickly add of course that you've got Doug's former deputy mayor, Helen McGovern, you have me, and then we have our new member, Don Anderson.

So that's a total of seven chess pieces on the field that, unlike actual chess pieces, can move diagonally, forward and backward.

One of the bargaining chips that people have is the question of who will be deputy mayor. That was the role Claudia held prominently for those first eight years when Harrison was mayor. So there remains much mystique about the role. And if you as potential mayor can find someone to be potential deputy mayor, well, there again, you have two votes or 50 percent of what you need to get elected. And maybe that deputy mayor can bring in another vote or two.

Don't even get me started on the question whether all this should be going on without public discussion about the candidates and their qualifications. The vote just happens in January as if it came from nowhere. If the question has occurred to you, congratulate yourself, because it is a darn good one. But the problems are self-evident, and this posting is long enough.

So as for January: I suppose someone might announce in advance who the mayor will be ... but then that would also let citizens know who the slate will be and who they might propose or oppose in advance of any vote.

So will a mayor logically emerge before we vote in the first meeting of January? Could happen. But unless it does, people who ask me, 'Who's going to be our next mayor?' are in for a pretty long answer.
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Lots of people have been working on the question about what to do, if anything, with publicly owned street ends and other city properties that dead-end at the edge of a lake. I wanted to give you an update.

At the Nov. 27 meeting of the parks and recreation board, staff and volunteers put up different slides showing property lines and photographs for 14 different city-owned properties. Many individuals among a large audience discussed each street end, sometimes to enormous detail. It took about three hours to go through the slides and some interesting discussions. And while that sounds like a lot of time, most of us felt when the meeting was over that we had just skimmed the surface.

The staff put the PowerPoint presentation in PDF form on the city's web site. It's worth looking at if you are interested in this topic. One caveat: the information is preliminary because the process is just starting. If you see a building jutting into the street end, it doesn't mean someone built a structure into public property; it might mean the lines are wrong on the map. We heard at the meeting about a couple examples of this.

There's a separate file you can look at which has measurements and elevations for each of the sites. The same caveat applies. The idea of the measurements was to provide a starting point for discussion, not a detailed blueprint.

As you might imagine, lots of people were squirming during the meeting. These would be the folks who own homes next to those street ends - or their immediate neighbors. I don't blame them. Some people imagine lake access as being a picnic table where a couple could hold hands and watch the sunset. Some people imagine lake access as a small spot where someone might quietly slip a kayak into the water. But other people will imagine lake access as a place where gangsters can gather at night to drink and shoot into the air.

Obviously, nobody is particularly in favor of that last option. But you can’t necessarily blame people who have lived in quiet areas for decades for assuming the worst, particularly in the absence of solid information.

The question now is, will people listen to each other? Will the people who want lake access understand the concerns of neighbors who have lived in quiet and isolation for as long as decades? Will the people who live at or near street ends understand that the lakes belong to every one of us, and that makes the need for access worth some change?

And then there’s a whole question of cost. There are a lot of poor children in Lakewood who don’t live within walking distance of, for example, Fort Steilacoom Park or Lake Steilacoom. These children need parks and recreation too. You could argue that a lot of the kids who live near Fort Steilacoom Park have access to more recreational opportunities because they have more access to transportation options than kids who live in some other parts of town and whose parents don’t own a car.

In fact, after the meeting, I walked from the room wondering what would have happened if we had spent those three hours talking about a very different subject: ways to bring more poor kids in touch with parks.

But that’s sort of another subject. I should have said at the outset that the next meeting to discuss lake access will be 6 p.m. this Tuesday, Dec. 11, in the council chambers at City Hall. I will have to miss this meeting for another obligation, so if you go, feel free to let me know what you thought. Another meeting just about Lake Steilacoom, where the larger share of street ends is located, will be held in January. And it will take some time for recommendations to get to the council. You can get an overview of the process at this site.

As you might imagine, I took a lot of notes during a three-hour meeting with dozens of citizens present. I was going to share some notes about each of the 14 properties, but this post is already long. I’ll be sure to do that at some point. One thing I found interesting is that many of the street ends are much narrower than one might think by what we've all heard so far. For example, the two properties on Gravelly Lake are each only 25 feet wide. Both involve a steep climb to the lake that would make a mockery of any handicapped accessibility requirements.

So many of us at the meeting, including at least one proponent of widespread lake access, were mentally crossing those properties off our list for much further consideration. But that itself makes for an interesting question. Gravelly Lake is widely known as 'the place where the rich folks live.' Is it fair to consider expanded lake access at, say, Lake Louise and Steilacoom Lake just because by historical accident they have wider street ends than Gravelly Lake? I’m having trouble putting into words why this concept bothers me, but it does bother me.

I should quickly note that this is not the final word on the subject; future meetings may involve some brainstorming that might come up with possibilities even for the many narrow properties among the 14. I don't mean to close anything off, just to let you know what some folks might have been thinking during the meeting.

There is a lot to this subject. I’m just glad we all finally summoned the fortitude to consider these questions, instead of pretending as most of us have for many years that the street ends did not even exist. That's one good thing you can say about the current Lakewood City Council. I'm glad we are approaching this proactively rather than waiting for someone to float an initiative that might send people into a panic.

We owe everyone - whether they want more lake access or want no changes at all - the chance to explore these questions together as a community. We owe it to ourselves to come up with some answers.