Seehuus I need to interrupt one more time. But you said we'd go to 8:00, now it's 8:15. Where you commissioners at here? I'm sure that some people here just came to give their testimony, too, so any thoughts? Suggestions, Commissioners?

Green I think we should go on to the public hearing.

Seehuus Bart?

Dalmasso Yeah, I think the public hearing. The people who came for that are getting tired and want to give their testimony. I agree that people Thai came to give their testimony should be allowed to. I don't think we're done with the question and answer session, though, and I did want to respond to Kelly's comments, or questions. But, yeah, I'm not opposed to having the --

Seehuus Are you suggesting scheduling another workshop? Is that it?

Green If the public hearing goes quickly, we could continue the workshop.

Kraut There ya go. If anybody's here we could continue it.

Seehuus How do you feel? Tom? Is that the way you feel? Go ahead and go into the --

Male That's the way I feel.

Seehuus -- and then if there's people here, go back into the workshop? Are you okay with that?

Beckwith I have to tell you, I can't be here on the 16^th. So if you have more questions of me, please do that tonight.

Female Can you stay, if we wait and do it after?

Beckwith Sure. I can stay as long tonight as you want. But I can't come on the 16^th, is my only problem.

Seehuus Well, I guess I’m going to do something rather uneth--what does the public want? What would you like to see? Do you want to get your testimony out of the way first?

Korn Let anyone who wants to testify, testify, and then continue on where we're at.

Seehuus All right. I guess that's what we'll do, then. Josie, you were right in the middle of something, were you not? Did I cut you off right in the middle of a question?

Fallgatter Oh, I lose my train of thought so quickly, John, I don't know. I'm sure I was in the middle of something.

Seehuus I'm sorry. I didn't --

Fallgatter No, no. No apologies.

Seehuus That wasn't my intent. I was just trying to follow procedure.

Fallgatter I appreciate that.

Seehuus Okay, The public hearing on the Sultan Comprehensive Plan is now open. This public hearing will proceed in an orderly fashion and I would like to ask your cooperation for following procedure. Everyone present will be given the opportunity to be heard. The Secretary will be recording what is said. Therefore, when you address the Commission, please begin by stating your name and address. Please speak slowly and clearly. Only one person will be allowed to speak at a time. The concern is that this hearing be fair in form and substance as well as appearance. Therefore, I would like to ask if there's anyone in the audience that objects to my participation as Chair, or any other Commissioner's participation in these proceedings? No? Has any member of the Commission has engaged in communication outside the hearing with opponents or proponents of this issue to be heard? If so, that member must place on the record the substance of any such communication so that other interested parties may have the right at this hearing to rebut the substance of the communication. The purpose of this hearing is for the Planning Commission to hear and consider the pertinent facts relating to this issue and to make recommendations with or without conditions. If we can -- I don't know if you want to go into background information. I think we're pretty well up on that. So I think if there's no objections, we'll go right into public comments. Is that all right? At this time the floor is open for comments from the audience. Please remember that this is a hearing, not a workshop or a question and answer period. In fairness to all in attendance, each person will be given the opportunity to address the planning Commission for an initial period not to exceed five minutes. If more time is needed, it will be made available for everyone, after everyone has had a change to speak. I'm requesting Commissioners to hold their questions until everyone is finished. Okay. Who's first? Please step up to the mic and state your name and address.

Mary Lowry [chuckles a bit at the number of microphones] God, this is like a press conference.

Seehuus Could you also spell your last name?

Mary Lowry Mary Lowry, L-o-w-r-y. [gives post office box in Sultan; lives on 124^th.] I'd like to urge the Planning Commission to recommend alternative zero, which really should have been called alternative 1. It's not a no growth option, and I think a lot of people are confused about that and they think it means no growth. Under alternative zero, the term as I understand it, we can expand up to a population of 10,000 from what it is now. And any way you look at that, that's large growth. That can't -- I don't think that can even be called low growth. And it's obvious to anyone sitting here tonight that we can't, we can barely handle what we have now. And alternative zero allows for what I think is healthy, responsible growth. And as Tom [Beckwith] mentioned, we can always add more later, but getting rid of it is just about impossible. So that's just what I want to encourage you to do, is to recommend that alternative to the city council. And let's just hope that they all listen.

Seehuus Anybody else?

Loretta Storm I usually speak from notes, and I have no idea what I'm going to say. So please bear with me. I'll probably ramble a bit. In the workshop we just closed, it was very clear that Tom Beckwith is a good man, knowledgeable, but what happens perhaps in theory and in some of the cities he works with, does not happen here. And to echo Josie's concerns and Ron's concerns, I'd like to add my voice in saying that if the capital facilities plan is done after an alternative is chosen, then I think the council [commission, not council], I'm asking the council [commission, actually] to do just what Tom Beckwith as an individual, based on the situation we have here, would do and that is to recommend the lowest growth scenario, or what we would call the "Prevailing UGA boundaries." Which we've been calling no growth, which, of course, is silly. The reason -- I would like to echo Mary Lowry's thoughts for the reasons for that -- I think most people in this town, no matter which side they're on at this point, would like to see things done professionally, by the book, without just throwing a dart at a map. Which is basically what Sultan has been doing. Since my husband and I have been involved in the last three years, there has only been one 6-year [capital facilities] plan done, and that's the road plan. And the only reason for that is so that we can go after the grants that we need. It's a little table, matrix with no detail. It's pitiful. It shows no planning whatsoever. But that's the only one that has been done in the last, I think it's been eight years. So I would definitely recommend the no growth. I know there were other things I wanted to say here… [chuckles]. Oh, okay, Tom had also mentioned that once the Council approves an alternative, the implementation devices will come back to the Planning Commission to review and recommend and decide. Is that correct?

Beckwith To draft and develop.

Storm Like the impact fees?

Beckwith Correct.

Storm Okay. That will never happen, unless that is put into this comp plan. The council -- excuse me -- the city administrator and the mayor, will take those types of issues, and as Kelly Korn said, "fill in the blanks," and it'll be transmitted to council to vote on. And that's what will happen. So I agree with Ron that we need to put RCW 36.70A.070 in neon lights someplace. Thank you for allow me to speak.

Seehuus Thank you.

Korn Kelly Korn. It's had to come up and give a statement when I haven't had a lot of my questions answered. It's hard to say -- I don't feel there really is an alternative to pick here, because as I said, you can pick from no action but you get the plan as it is. I don't know how you -- I, I agree with the vision of the more parks and the trails and all that, but how do you incorporate that in without expanding your boundaries? I would say to pick the No Action scenario, but I do feel the vision needs to be expanded on that. Oh, it is hard to come up here when you have some many things that you -- I had a lot of questions. I think that you should have had public workshops before you had the public hearing. It's hard to come up and give a statement when you haven't had questions answered, so I urge you to continue -- this workshop is really great -- continue the workshop and maybe have another public hearing, and people could give statements after all the questions have been answered.

Seehuus Thank you. Anybody else? Ray.

Ray Kistenmacher Since I didn't make a recommendation or preference last time -- Ray Kistenmacher -- I would definitely like to say that we should go with the No Action, because I think there's more than enough growth available in that. And even the most aggressive developer should be happy with those boundaries.

Seehuus Thank you.

Kirby Naff [Trout Farm Road] I guess I -- I think I know what I want to say, but I’m not sure what I heard. I think the Zero Alternative is best, but I think respect for the request of the city council and the city administration here, the plan, comprehensive plan be followed. That they not adjust or ignore [it]. And somehow get that across to them without sounding arrogant. It sounded to me like that's what's been going on. In '94, that growth management plan and in '95, they ignored it. I'm asking. And maybe you're not supposed to respond, but that's what I heard. And if that's what I heard, then I would like to send out word to the city council that the growth management -- or the comprehensive plan has to be followed. That's what the law says. And they're apparently -- if I heard right -- they aren't doing that. Thank you. Oh! I would like to have more workshops in the future beyond tonight and maybe another hearing, too. Thank you.

Seehuus Is there anybody else?

Sue Shawger [to Tom Beckwith] Thank you for your clear, logical mind and the way you present things. That was very, very helpful to me. Thank you. I am urging the so-called No Growth alternative for all the reasons that have been stated and I won't restate them. Thank you.

Seehuus Thank you. Anybody else? Going once -- Oh, sir?

Paul Tortorice [lives on 132^nd Street, north side] I know that all of the popular opinion tonight is no growth, and I understand all of the reasons that were given, but I think that's a mistake. You can't just stop in time. We've got to continue growing, and I hope that we have leaders in this community that have a vision for the future, because we're not just living for now. It takes a long time to get the wheels moving in the right direction for growth. It doesn't happen overnight. And as most people are saying tonight, it needs to be done in the logical order, that makes sense both financially, physically [fiscally?] . But I think it's a mistake to vote for zero growth. We must be looking forward to the future, and I hope you'll consider that. Thank you.

Seehuus Anybody else?

Kraut How about a repeat? Since we didn't use much time?

Seehuus Sure.

Kistenmacher Ray Kistenmacher again. In response to that last comment, none of these options are zero growth. Option Zero is still allowing for very aggressive growth.

Seehuus Thank you, Ray.

Lowry I'm just backing up what Ray said. Zero is not no growth. Alternative Zero allows for a lot of growth, okay?

Tortorice This is not meant to be argumentative, but I don't know what zero growth means. I really don't. I don't know what you're talking about growing within this zero growth area. I don't know if there's a limit to that or not, but I think you need to expand horizons.

Kistenmacher Up to 10,000 people is --

Storm 11,000.

Tortorice Thank you.

Skogland [developer/landowner on 132^nd] With the zero growth, am I to understand that it would increase to 10,000 people over 20 years?

Beckwith Well, that's -- one issue is what are the urban growth boundaries. Alternative zero says the urban growth boundaries don't change. That's what's meant by no action. Under low, medium and high, the urban growth area boundaries would change and would allow more than what's allowed in the current UGA boundaries. And there's a difference in policies between the no action and the other three alternatives. The no action would leave the '94 Plan contents exactly as is. Any of the variations of 1 through 3 [unintelligible] of those would change the policies and has different capacities.

Skogland And I think I'm, if I heard it --

Seehuus Excuse me. I hate to interrupt here, but we're going to be going back into the workshop again, Margaret, and we're not trying to be rude, but we're kind of getting out of our procedure. We're just to take testimony right here and I'm sure Mr. Beckwith will be happy to answer your questions.

Skogland Yes, but what I was trying to get at is how many people per year are you looking at over the next 20 years? If I was understanding correctly, from 10,000 to -- what is our population now? About 3500. So you're looking at 6500 people a 20 years' time. That's about, what? Three hundred people a year. And it's not very many, if there's only, like, two or three people per home. So you're looking at 50 homes per year. That probably is not realistic in a world market. So I would look at something higher than that, from my own perspective because of -- when you break it down, how many would you be having per year? And as far as the urban growth boundary goes, I don't know that we really need to change it a lot. Maybe a little bit, but that can be adjusted as time goes on. I would think.

Seehuus Thank you. Anybody else? Okay. Any other staff comments? Anyone else in the audience that would like to add additional non-repetitive information about this topic?

Storm Can I ask a question? I would like to make a request as part of the hearing, or…?

Seehuus Don't make it a question. Come up and make a statement. I'm trying to follow the rules here, folks.

Storm Okay. Same address. [laughter] I just -- there's so much confusion about this no growth, zero growth, whatever. Several of us did make a request during the comp plan process that that change, that scenario be changed to #1, Alternative 1. And then it would be 1, 2, 3, 4 alternatives. And this was one of the reasons we had requested that. It's very difficult to work with. And my question -- my comment is, is that if it's at all possible at this late date to assign it a number, I think it would be beneficial for all of us, save all of us a lot of grief, if we could do that. Thank you.

Seehuus Anybody else? Going once? Twice? At this point I'd entertain a motion to close the public portion of this hearing.