PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles City Council has awarded a pair of amended contracts for a municipal code update.
The council approved a not-to-exceed $50,000 professional services agreements with Madrona Law Group and MAKERS Architecture and Urban Design after a lengthy debate Aug. 4.
The two consultants will help the city update its 130-year-old municipal code.
“We were impressed by their different abilities and their different qualities,” City Attorney Bill Bloor told the council in a virtual meeting.
Madrona Law Group of Bellevue will conduct most of the code review, which had been identified as a council priority.
Seattle-based MAKERS Architecture and Urban Design will focus on the planning, zoning and regulatory aspects of the update, city officials said.
Representatives of both firms are scheduled to attend the Sept. 1 council meeting to begin the update process, City Manager Nathan West said in a Thursday email.
Council member Lindsey Schromen-Wawrin proposed a series of amendments to the contacts in the Aug. 4 council meeting, which adjourned at 10:38 p.m.
In a Thursday interview, Schromen-Wawrin said his amendments should not cloud the overarching goal of the code update.
“The big picture is that we’re taking 130 years worth of municipal code that has been patched together over the course of a century and now often doesn’t make sense,” Schromen-Wawrin said in a telephone interview
“This is an opportunity for us as a city to say ‘Let’s clean this up and have a municipal code that is easy to read, that makes sense to people.’
“That’s the big-picture goal,” Schromen-Wawrin added.
“It’s something that I hope that members of the public are able to get involved with over the next several months.”
The city will negotiate a second contract with Madrona Law Group to complete Phase 2 of the code update, Bloor told the council.
Bloor estimated the second phase would cost between $30,000 and $70,000.
Schromen-Wawrin, a constitutional attorney, proposed adding two bullet items to the scope of work in the Madrona contract.
They were:
• Eliminate all provisions of the Port Angeles municipal code that don’t readily appear to equitably benefit the health, safety or welfare of all the people of Port Angeles. When in doubt, throw it out.
• Suggest provisions for the Port Angeles municipal code that increase public health equity, community safety for the most vulnerable community members and general welfare towards a resilient, vibrant, walkable and livable city.
That motion passed unanimously.
Schromen-Wawrin then moved to amend the MAKERS contract to add council representatives to the selection of a stakeholder group and to involve council representatives in a key step involving preliminary concepts and recommendations.
“This is often one of those stages where major decisions get made, and we go down one direction or another,” Schromen-Wawrin said at the Aug. 4 council meeting.
“After those decisions, they’re presented for public review, and the public question is: ‘Do you like light beige or dark beige? Do you like your sidewalk 6 feet wide or 8 feet wide?’ Those sorts of things.
“I think it’s important for the council to have input at this big-picture concept stage as it’s narrowing down,” he added.
“Otherwise, we’re going to have no opportunity to influence some major directions in this.”
The motion failed 4-3 with council members Mike French, Charlie McCaughan, LaTrisha Suggs and Mayor Kate Dexter voting no and Schromen-Wawrin, Brendan Meyer and Navarra Carr voting yes.
French said he opposed the second part of the motion and would come prepared to share his ideas with the consultants at the outset.
“You have to time your moments for when you have input,” French said.
“I don’t think that we should micromanage the process because I think that we’ll get worse outcomes if we do that.”
Schromen-Wawrin then proposed another change to the MAKERS contract to adopt form-based code for the entire city rather than just the downtown commercial district.
“Form-based code can mean a lot of different things, and I’m concerned that if we’re only looking at form-based code in a single area of the city, we’re not using its landscape scale potential to really think though how upzoning works throughout the city,” Schromen-Wawrin said at the meeting.
Allyson Brekke, city Community and Economic Development director, said a form-based code for the entire city would be outside the scope of the MAKERS contract and the state Department of Commerce grant that will fund it.
Schromen-Wawrin amended his motion to adopt a form-based code for the city’s commercial zones.
That motion passed 4-3 with Schromen-Wawrin, Meyer, Carr and Suggs voting yes and French, McCaughan and Dexter voting no.
Schromen-Wawrin said Thursday the transect concept — a cross section of development extending from urban centers to neighborhoods to wilderness — was an “important part” of form-base code.
“That’s all about the connections between different zones instead of just looking at form-base within one of those zones,” Schromen-Wawrin said in a telephone interview.
“That’s why that was really important for me.”
After approving the amended contracts, the council voted unanimously to pass a third amendment to require council notification of any changes to the scopes of work.
Near the end of the meeting, West said it was a “very delicate thing for city staff to weigh in, in the middle of a council motion.”
“I realize that sometimes we end up on a side of that motion that’s not appreciated by the council members involved,” West said.
“But know that our intent is simply to speak our professional opinion …. Our intent is to have the utmost respect.”
In a Thursday email, West said only one of the council-approved amendments — the addition of six commercial zones for form-based code — caused concern.
“That said, staff has worked hard over the last two weeks to work with MAKERS on changes to the agreement that meet council desires and simultaneously limit additional cost to the city,” West said.
“At this time, we are very close to finalizing an agreement with MAKERS and hope to have it executed by Aug. 18. At this time, we believe we can attain a solution with no increase in cost to the city.”
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at rollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
