Planning department seeks direction

Published 5:00 pm Saturday, August 19, 2006

The city steps up its efforts to find a new head for the department.

Building permits, land use regulations, code enforcement.

While crucial for a functioning city government, this is not the stuff that municipal dreams are made of.

But Director Larry Frazier’s exit from the city’s Department of Planning and Community Development this month has some islanders dreaming big about what his job could become.

“We need somebody who can soar,” said Councilman Chris Snow. “We need somebody who has that kind of capability to take charge of regulatory planning but who can also implement a vision.”

The word “vision” is used a lot by people who would like to see the director’s role expanded beyond the administrative and the regulatory.

In fact, the word was just incorporated into the job’s description.

“Our ideal candidate…should be visionary,” states a draft ad for the job, which Frazier leaves at the end of the month.

The description also lists desired attributes and service that stay “true to the vision for Bainbridge Island.”

According to Snow, the new director will need a forward-thinking approach to implement many citizen-based development initiatives.

“He’ll have to deal with Winslow Tomorrow, which is largely about changing ordinances and codes that take advantage of the visioning process,” Snow said of the downtown planning project now undergoing incorporation into city policy.

“I think that’ll be the next planning director’s primary focus,” said Councilman Jim Llewellyn. “They’ll be dedicated to the ongoing process of implementing Winslow Tomorrow. Somebody with the skills to do that will be a good fit.”

An interim director, veteran planner Jim Harris, has already been brought in to ease the transition when Frazier leaves.

“We’re having them overlap because of the sort of fast-paced place (the department) is,” City Administrator Mary Jo Briggs said.

Harris recently filled-in as the interim community development director for the City of Enumclaw. He also served over 30 years as Kent’s planning director, overseeing a $2 million budget and a population boom of 15,000 people to 70,000. Harris filled other temporary planning department and consultant roles after retiring from the City of Kent, including work for the cities of Arlington, Port Townsend and Spokane Valley.

The city will begin recruiting applicants to fill the full-time director’s position next month and will conduct interviews in late October and early November. The new director will take the department’s helm before the end of the year, according to Briggs.

The job requires, at a minimum, a degree in urban planning or a closely related field, seven to 10 years in a planning department and at least three years serving in a senior management position. Compensation includes a $85,000 to $105,000 annual salary, 12 days of vacation, 12 days management leave and 11 paid holidays per year.

Other council-requested additions to the job description include a greater emphasis on strengthening the island’s economic base.

Mayor Darlene Kordonowy said this additional duty marks an important change.

“We need sustainable economic development,” she said. “We need to think of ways to recruit and keep the kinds of businesses we want, (such as) farms, small businesses, environmentally clean businesses. We need somebody who understands the necessity of that.”

Kordo­nowy praised Frazier’s three years at the planning department’s helm. He worked to his strengths with great affect, she said, tuning up and overhauling the department’s inner-workings with improved management practices.

“Larry did an outstanding job putting a system in place,” Kordonowy said. “We needed to rebuild the (department’s) credibility and have it operate at a higher level. He put in a strong management team and strong new planners. The department’s operating on high level now.”

Snow also credits Frazier for getting the department’s house in order. With a firm foundation in place, Snow wants to see the new director take on a wider, more flexible view of planning policy.

“If you have a bureaucrat making sure all the T’s are crossed and I’s are dotted, it’s very difficult for somebody trying to make headway in changing ordinances,” he said. “Instead of a (planning) counter that says ‘no, you can’t do that,’ let’s have people that say ‘that’s a cool idea. Let’s see if we can make it happen.’

“We need to have in Larry’s replacement someone who has this capability and also the inclination to make things happen.”

And he or she will have to understand the unique complexities of an island city, said Councilman Bill Knobloch.

“We have an eco-structure that’s vastly different than any other city,” he said. “I’m very concerned because we have an island the size of Manhattan that depends on aquifers for our water supply and sewer issues. We’re at a critical stage with demand for housing, land use, growth. Larry did a hell of a job, but we’ve gotten to the point where we need an expert in long-term planning. (The new director) has to be a visionary.”

Other ideas

But the term “visionary” means different things to different people. Property rights activist Gary Tripp says the word has a ring to it, but he hears it at a different pitch than others.

A visionary director would “hold the planning department in check so planners don’t run off on self-appointed missions with their own vendettas and agendas,” he said.

The new director should stand up for land owners’ “right to use their property” as they see fit, rather than “imposing a vision of Aspen on Bainbridge Island.”

Sticking to the rights of property owners will help avoid legal battles which, according to Tripp’s scorecard, the city increasingly loses. The department, Tripp said, was forced to back down on numerous planning initiatives, including requirements for open space on private property, landowner fees to help support affordable housing and a ban on docks in Blakely Harbor.

“The city’s been on wild goose chases and stretched beyond what other cities have done,” he said.

It’s these legal setbacks that may dampen a new director’s vision, according to environmental activist Charles Schmid.

“It’s probably time for change, but big money’s at stake,” Schmid said. “The (city’s) modus operandi is lower legal fees. Those suing the city understand that. They’re watching the city decide not to defend itself.”

That’s why vision will have to come with a large dose of courage, Schmid said.

“We need a really strong planning director…who will give the city courage to implement plans rather than impede them,” he said.

Schmid, while supporting a new director’s eye toward long-range planning, said the department needs increased leadership in the day-to-day enforcement of city regulations as well.

“We need the city to say – when a tree (illegally) goes down – ‘God, we’ve got to get up there,’” he said. “Right now, they’re just saying ‘oh, we don’t have control over that.’”

Should it split?

Daily department management and keeping watch over land use across a fast-growing island, while also envisioning and implementing bigger goals, is a tall order for any director.

That’s why Councilman Kjell Stoknes advocates splitting the city planning department in two – one part to manage permits and short-term planning, and another moving forward with a long-range vision.

“The two are incompatible in my mind,” said Stoknes, who formerly served as the City of Tukwila’s planning director and as an urban planner in Kirkland. “The (legal) brushfires coming to City Hall regularly consume a lot of energy. I’d like to see a permanent center dealing with that, and permits and code enforcement and day-to-day things. For the (other) portion, I’d like to move more toward dreaming of the future, creating legislation and the public processes to make it happen.”

Other cities have planning structures similar to what Stoknes outlined, but most have much larger populations and larger city budgets. But Stoknes believes Bainbridge is ready for the big leagues of city planning.

“I don’t think we’re too small,” he said. “Actually, the amount of engagement this community has and the high expectations it has for its government, I think we should have separate departments.

“We’re dealing with so much. We’re dealing with a Growth Management Act that forces us to take population. We can’t look backward to who we wanted to be. It doesn’t work like that anymore. Unless we plan who we want to be, we won’t get there unless we get there by accident.”