SEQUIM — Oddly, the Olympic Discovery Trail brought the locomotive to a halt.
That train is also known as the comprehensive plan, the guiding document for the next 20 years of development in Sequim.
It was headed toward final adoption by the City Council on Monday night after 15 months of revisions, 41 council, Planning Commission and Citizens Ad Hoc Committee meetings and a forest of written comments from agencies and activists.
But Councilman Paul McHugh saw that his recent comments, which had gained full council approval, hadn’t made it into the plan.
He’d discussed them at last Wednesday’s study session, they were recorded in the meeting minutes — yet they were nowhere in the body of the plan.
His comments?
McHugh wanted “completion of the Olympic Discovery Trail through the city of Sequim and its urban growth area” integrated into the plan’s transportation goals.
Found in an appendix
After some thumbing through the thick document, other council members and Frank Needham, the plan’s principal author, found trail completion listed among the projects in an appendix.
But McHugh wanted it spelled out in the plan’s transportation goals, too.
After several minutes, Needham indicated that finishing the trail would be added to the goals list.
In a much shorter discussion Monday, the council also added to the plan the goal of completing the city’s sidewalk system, with links to the Olympic Discovery Trail.
Councilman John Beitzel made sure Needham also added a clause about maintaining existing sidewalks as well, since some date back to the 1930s.
Unanimous approval
At last, the council voted unanimously to adopt the comprehensive plan update for 2006.
As they gave their ayes, the members applauded themselves, and Andrew Shogren, a Citizens Ad Hoc Committee member who has been critical of the plan, clapped, too.
“I’m glad we have a comprehensive plan for the 21st century,” Shogren said, adding that he looks forward to seeing the council make good on the plan’s goals and projects.
The plan is available free on the city’s Web site, www.ci.sequim.wa.us, and at City Hall, 152 W. Cedar St., for $21.75 — though the Olympic Discovery Trail and sidewalk completion clauses may not be added to those versions just yet.
