Here is why the Seattle City Council is canceling a summer of comprehensive plan committee meetings

Monday’s planned meeting of the Seattle City Council’s comprehensive plan was canceled. Unfortunately, the canceled committee meeting is news.

A June Washington Court of Appeals ruling has reopened the environmental review of the city’s growth plan changes. Land use and comp plan committee chair Eddie Lin says the ruling has put the council’s next phase of changes for the plan on hold.

The Urbanist reports the delay will mean the “Centers and Corridors” proposals for new neighborhood centers and increased density along high-frequency transit corridors might not be completed until late 2025 or early 2027 at the earliest:

The Court of Appeals ruling affirmed a major loophole in a “safe harbor” state law, which had previously been believed to exempt zoning changes allowing more housing within urban areas from SEPA, finding that final actions are exempt but “procedural motions” like the issuing of a final environmental impact statement (FEIS) are not. That leaves the door open to challenges at either the Superior Court level or the state’s Growth Management Hearings Board.

The ruling likely cancels the entire summer of scheduled comp plan committee meetings, the Urbanist reports.

CHS reported here on the Centers and Corridors plans and proposals that will likely bring the hottest debate around future growth in areas like Montlake, Madison Valley, Madison Park, and Madrona.

The Centers and Corridors legislation “updates zoning in new growth areas identified in the Comprehensive plan, including: 30 new Neighborhood Centers, new and expanded Urban Centers, and transit corridors,” city officials say. The second phase of comprehensive updates focus on the 30 proposed Neighborhood Centers including Montlake, Madison Valley, Madison Park, and Madrona in the Capitol Hill area. The designation will “allow residential and mixed-use buildings up to six stories in the core and four and five-story residential buildings toward the edges,” according to one city summary. Once the neighborhood framework is in place, future Neighborhood Centers like Roanoke Park could be in play.

The plan is being championed by Mayor Katie Wilson.

Meanwhile, two cases challenging updates to the growth plan already forged by the council now have renewed life and are proceeding in King County Superior Court.

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