PORT ANGELES – Port Angeles City Council members unanimously agreed to move forward with next steps for creating neighborhood associations.
The steps proposed by the Neighborhood Association Subcommittee include reviewing the comprehensive plan neighborhood review, a council resolution with principal focus areas, adopting a Neighborhood Association Handbook and establishing three pilot neighborhood associations.
Council member Brendan Meyer said in an email interview that these steps are “going to take some time and there are lots more discussions before implementation.”
Meyer said neighborhood associations are a place for people with similar concerns and cares to meet, plan events, develop the community and bring their concerns to the city government.
“We’re building a pathway for citizens to become more informed and for the city council to become more informed about their constituents,” Meyer wrote in an email interview.
Mayor Kate Dexter said neighborhood associations “give people an opportunity to have some framework for meeting their neighbors.”
Neighborhood associations are different from homeowners’ associations (HOAs), according to Meyer.
Meyer said HOAs are entities with the legal power to enforce standards, whereas neighborhood associations are voluntary and focus more on information sharing and community organizing.
To understand neighborhood associations and develop a plan, subcommittee council members Meyer, Drew Schwab and Amy Miller studied neighborhood associations in Vancouver, Wash.
Vancouver’s neighborhood associations focus on preservation of important buildings, safety, conservation and community.
Vancouver allowed neighborhoods to propose their own boundaries and adopt their own bylaws, which were then approved by the city council. However, Vancouver’s city officials said, in their meeting with Port Angeles officials, they would have preferred that the city was more hands-on about boundary creations and had mandated more unified bylaws between associations.
Vancouver utilizes a full-time staff member to manage the neighborhood associations and a $200,000 general fund grant for printing and event advertising.
To accomplish their goals, Vancouver neighborhoods developed Neighborhood Action Plans which provide a framework for goal achievement and addressing needs.
Vancouver also has police officers assigned to each neighborhood for continuity and relationship building.
City Manager Nathan West said when the subcommittee met with Vancouver’s neighborhood association representatives there was a lot of “neighborhood excitement [and] pride at their neighborhoods.
The subcommittee suggested implementing a scaled-down version of Vancouver’s associations.
“We’re not Vancouver, we’re not the size of Vancouver, we don’t have the resources of Vancouver,” Schwab said.
“What Vancouver has is awesome, and that is something we could grow into,” Miller said.
Port Angeles’ neighborhood focus should be inclusivity, conservation programs, emergency preparedness, citizen engagement and elevation of citizen voices according to Schwab.
They should also consider livability, public safety, community involvement and recreation, Schwab said.
Deputy Mayor Navarra Carr said the council should have equity at the top of their minds while creating neighborhoods and allocating resources.
“I don’t want to get into a situation where we have a set budget and are allocating it only to the associations that have more time,” Carr said.
Carr said there should also be a high community buy-in regarding where neighborhood lines are drawn to make sure they are not “unintentionally excluding people from being in a neighborhood due to external factors.”
Council Member LaTrisha Suggs said the council should be cautious of a situation in which one or two households don’t want to be involved in the neighborhood association.
“I just want to make sure that these communities aren’t used to create more divisiveness,” she said.
In an email interview, Meyer wrote that neighborhood associations were part of his last re-election campaign and it “resonated with voters.”
“I believe that people want a greater opportunity to contribute to their community and grow relationships,” Meyer wrote.
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Reporter Emma Maple can be reached by email at emma.maple@peninsuladailynews.com.
