JC Harris For Des Moines, Washington
City Council, Position #2
A list of key events in the history of the Des Moines Marina beginning with 2007 Master Plan, which laid out the broad outlines of the current waterside and landside options. Water side topics include removing the Sling launch, passenger ferry service, dock and seawall financing. Land side topics include segmenting the floor into separate funds, public vs. commercial uses, connection with 223rd, paid parking, boat storage, retail and restaurants....
At this meeting, the council received, what I considered at the time, to be a fairly sensible plan for dock replacement. It kept the dock finances and the seawall separate and did not pretend to address big 'plans'. The City got yelled at because one method of financing depended heavily on raising moorage rates and raising fuel costs, both of which had always been below market rate. But that had always been intentional; the Marina had been intended as a public marina. What the boat owners failed to acknowledge at the time was that by now most people paying for moorage did not live in Des Moines....
For me 2013 is the most useful and fascinating year in recent DM history. And if I could, I would insist that every current member of the Council and all future candidates listen to this stuff (especially the April 6, ‘all options on the table’ meeting) and take notes. Introduction As you’ve perhaps heard many times,
... continue reading.On August 18, 2016, the Marina District was so overrun with visitors that your City Council decided to take immediate and decisive action! But then, only a month later, the City asked them to, ya know, maybe re-think that? It was all to do with one of these newfangled phone app games that all the kids
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Located just south of Kent Des Moines Road Pet Haven Cemetery 23646 Military Rd S. Kent, WA 98032 is one of those interesting spots you never knew existed. I took an interest recently when a cell tower was there and a local group began campaigning for the place to be given historical status. I’ll let
... continue reading.Introduction At the July 12 Port of Seattle Commission Meeting, Mayor Mahoney and Deputy Mayor Buxton spoke in favour of the Port taking the 14.4 acre slice of WSDOT land west of the current Des Moines Creek Business Park off 216th. You can watch their testimony and get my take on it here. That afternoon,
... continue reading.I almost titled this post “This is what a sellout looks like” But I restrained myself. 🙂 At the 12 July Port of Seattle Commission Meeting, the Port voted to proceed with the Item 10b (Des Moines Creek West Ground Lease.) (Presentation.) This is the scrubby forest land west of the FAA building on 216th
... continue reading.At Thursday’s meeting, I introduced an item of New Business. Basically an ‘undo key’ on Ordinance 1539 from 2012. Or to put it another way, to re-instate Ordinance 1407 from 2007. To be less confusing: We used to have a section in our building code (Ordinance 1407 from 2007) which required sound insulation in all
... continue reading.A common story I hear is that “Our downtown was always terrible! All the construction cranes since 2016? That means we’re (finally) moving forward!” But OTOH, here are a couple of budget numbers from 2008–right before the bottom dropped out. Note the Sales Tax revenue: Remember: that represents the money that people spend here. It’s
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