Category Archives: Schools

MHA DEIS Comments Due by Monday August 7

We need you and your friends and neighbors to comment this weekend!

The Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) evaluates the Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program impacts on Urban Villages, and in multi-family and commercial areas throughout Seattle. Residents from many neighborhoods have reviewed and analyzed the DEIS. The results are available in the Comments folder and the Analysis folder.

Please view the comment and analysis documents, find the issues important to you, and email your comments to the City at MHA.EIS@seattle.gov or by using the online form. Submitting many brief comments is probably preferable to sending one long email. The more people who submit comments, the more seriously the City has to address the comments!

If you are overwhelmed or short of time, here is a suggested comment to make:

“The DEIS is not sufficient to represent all Urban Villages and the City overall. Each Urban Village is unique, with different housing types, cultural traditions, businesses, resources, and growth needs. This DEIS fails to recognize and examine these differences.

Each Urban Village and Surrounding Area needs to be analyzed separately, thoroughly and accurately via their own individual EIS.

Additionally, the DEIS does not address how the whole City will be impacted by the changes both in this DEIS and the other SEPA analyses combined. Seattle residents live in both their own neighborhoods and in the City at large, yet this DEIS has failed to analyze the impacts to both thoroughly and accurately.”

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Important Land Use Issues

1. Request an extension: MHA DEIS

The Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) evaluates the Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program impacts in Urban Villages, and in multi-family and commercial areas throughout Seattle. It presents three alternatives. The first alternative is to not do the MHA Upzone program. The second appears to be an expanded variation of what was presented at the end of the HALA Focus Groups and in the Urban Village Workshops. The third alternative presented is brand new, and is not based on discussions with the HALA Focus Groups or the Urban Village Design Workshops.

Please request to extend the MHA DEIS comment period! Released on June 8, 2017, the DEIS is 462 pages long and the appendices are 364 pages long. This is over 800 pages to review within only 32 days.

Please send your request to: MHA.EIS@seattle.gov, as well as to the City Council by phone, 206-684-8888, and/or by email: Lisa Herbold, Bruce Harrell, Kshama Sawant, Rob Johnson, Debora Juarez, Mike O’Brien, Sally Bagshaw, Tim Burgess, Lorena González.

Please submit your request to Mayor Murray:
http://www.seattle.gov/mayor/get-involved/contact-the-mayor

These documents may be viewed or downloaded from the City’s MHA Environmental Impact Statement website, or from copies in the EIS folder on the Wallingford Community Council (WCC) website. These are large documents! The main document is 50 MB, and the appendices are 95 MB.

2. Public Hearing: MHA DEIS

Attend the Public Hearing on the DEIS on Thursday June 29, 5:30 PM at Seattle City Hall. Open House at 5:30 PM; Public Hearing starts at 6:30 PM.

Request an extension to the MHA DEIS comment period.
Ask for clarifications on MHA issues.
Share your concerns on MHA impacts.

3. Submit comments: Design Review Process “Improvements”

Please comment on the proposed Design Review Process “Improvements” by Monday July 10, 5:00 PM.

Ask the Land Use Planner and all Council members to:

Leave the Design Review Process as is.
Direct city employees and the Design Review Boards to enforce existing design guidelines.

Growth without Oversight: Without the check and balance of inclusive design review, growth can destroy neighborhoods. With it, the character and quality of the neighborhood is strengthened when adding housing and commercial spaces.

Click here for WCC call-to-action and contact information for comments.

WallHALA Meeting, Tuesday June 20

Help Respond to the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for Mandatory Housing Affordability

The WallHALA committee is meeting this Tuesday June 20, 7:00 – 9:00 PM in the Wallingford Community Senior Center on the bottom floor of the the Good Shepherd Center, 4659 Sunnyside Ave N.

The City has released the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA). The agenda is to organize ourselves to study and analyze the DEIS, and to formulate responses to it.

We need your expertise to find flaws, oversights, adverse impacts, and inadequate mitigation solutions in the DEIS relating to land use, transportation, schools, storm water, tree canopy, the three alternatives presented for affordable housing, the public engagement process, and the opportunity index and equity analysis. We will assign parts of the study to multiple volunteers, in order to make the task more manageable. We encourage other neighborhoods to join us and work together on these tasks.

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Lincoln High School Community Meeting, Monday June 5

Seattle Public Schools (SPS) will be renovating Lincoln High School and it will re-open as a permanent high school in September of 2019.

A Lincoln High School community meeting will be held Monday June 5, 6:30 – 8:30 PM in the Hamilton international Middle School Commons, 1610 N 41st Street, with Rick Burke, Director SPS District II. Meeting topics will include:

Introduction of Ruth Medsker, Lincoln High Principal starting June 1 of this year.
Updates on high school boundaries. HS Boundary Task Force process and work-to-date.
Answers to frequently asked questions from prior meetings. Process and timeline for still-open questions.
Facility design updates.
Dedicated time for student Q&A. Bring your current HS student even if they aren’t Lincoln-bound to share their suggestions.
Opportunity for small-group networking to launch PTSA, Music/Arts, and Athletics community groups.

Director Burke will stay until 9:00 PM or later to meet with John Stanford International School families after the Ice Cream Social.

HALA Open House, Saturday April 29

Saturday April 29, 1:30 – 3:30 PM
Northgate Community Center
10510 5th Ave NE

The Seattle Department of Neighborhoods is hosting a Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA) Open House for NW Neighborhoods. All ages are welcome, so feel free to bring the kids. There will be complimentary food and beverages.

The Open House will feature maps detailing proposed changes to Urban Villages in the event’s specific focus region. Come talk with City staff, connect with your neighbors, and express your concerns with the City’s plans!

Click here for a short list of questions to ask the City.

The Wallingford Community Council (WCC) advocates redrawing the Wallingford Urban Village boundaries as recommended in the second page of the WCC Position Paper on Affordable Housing, Increased Density, and Livability in Wallingford.