Affordable housing
Consultants hired by the Seattle City Council report that Mayor Mike McGinn’s administration has asked too little from South Lake Union developers on the affordable-housing front. Those developers stand to enrich themselves, aided by zoning variances, with potential new high-rises that might reach 400 feet.
Fair enough — as long as increased affordable housing is part of the mix.
Kudos to City Councilmember and mayoral candidate Tim Burgess for pushing this issue to the fore.
The mayor is taking another look at the issue and has called for an advisory group to review and recommend updates to the city’s affordable-housing policies.
The last thing Seattle needs is a South Lake Union where service-sector workers who provide the residents’ needs can’t afford to live there. In addition, it would be nice if some of the Amazon and bio-medical workforce drawn to the neighborhood by day could live there, too. Regional commutes are horrendous enough.
Changes looming in the University District may provide a model on how a neighborhood, getting its act together, can accommodate density and still retain its character. A strategic plan is in motion there, driven by the arrival of light rail, slated for 2021, with some 12,000 projected daily boardings.
A broad coalition made up of community stakeholders — retail merchants, social-service workers, University of Washington administrative members, members of the faith community and community activists — are charged with working out the details of the community makeover over the next few years. Open space and affordable housing are among the key issues on the table. The city is very much involved.
Theoretically, this is the right way to plan for and guide change. The devil, of course, lies in the proverbial details. As this process unfolds, the rest of us can learn from the U-District’s hits and misses.
It’s too late for some Seattle neighborhoods, but not for South Lake Union.
The mayor must toughen up and ask himself what kind of city Seattle should be. Or, more to the point: Who gets to live here?
Queen Anne Book Co.
The much-anticipated opening of Queen Anne Book Co. kicks off this Friday, March 1, with a three-day celebration.
As we celebrate the return of a bookstore on upper Queen Anne, we would do well to remember that Uptown Queen Anne, with Mercer Street Books, has a beloved bookstore as well, and that Magnolia should be proud to have Magnolia’s Bookstore.
To extend that line of thinking a little further: We should be grateful for all of the businesspeople, entrepreneurial spirits and community supporters who define our neighborhoods. They deserve our support.