2013/03/13 Council Agenda Packet

at this time. Maybe in the future City Council would consider this. With naming rights, names often change when companies change. Mark Soine: The other example in the city that is similar is when a significant contribution was made to the Everett Performing Arts Center and the conference room was named after Mr. Anderson. The Weyerhaeuser Room at Everett Station was named following a donation of Weyerhaeuser art work and funds to restore the art work from the Weyerhaeuser foundation. It is not uncommon for naming to occur where there are money connections. Barbara Lamoureaux: It just seems that since the budget is very short, naming rights are becoming more common. It seems like a good idea to me. But we probably needed to start a year ago on that idea. Dave Ramstad: Those are great comments. We are thankful to Council President Ron Gipson for having initiated a subcommittee this past summer that worked hard through the summer to re -write and update city's naming policy. City staff researched other examples of policies. This is just for public projects around town, not for private projects. This policy represents a lot of thought and work. Hopefully it will serve the city and the citizens well in the future. Paul -Erick Johnson: The original meaning of the word plaza is "broad street." I thought of some other names like "agora" which means "gathering place." That would make it stand apart from everything else. Dave Ramstad: I'd like to suggest the name "Wetmore Plaza." Wetmore Plaza is non -political. It's geographically correct. We hope to be drawing more and more out-of-town citizens to Everett for events and eventually purchasing houses and raising their children here, so I'm thinking if they are coming to a summer music series at the plaza, they are going to come up Pacific or Everett Avenue to Wetmore. They would not have to struggle wondering, "Where is City Plaza"? We don't' have a lot of information about Mr. Wetmore himself. He was an associate of Rockefeller and the Rockefeller funds that were invested to start Everett originally. He was very wealthy. He was a financier for the Northern Pacific Railroad. It appears that the Wetmores came from Cuyogoga, Ohio. There was a William Wetmore that founded the town which is somewhere near Akron. Charles W. Wetmore was the mayor there early in his life. He was the vice president of the American Steel Barge Company. There was whaleback ship named after him out of the Great Lakes, designed by Capt. Alexander McDougall We have McDougall Street in Everett named after him. Wetmore and McDougall were associates. If you research the name Charles W. Wetmore, you get more references to the whaleback than you do to the gentleman himself. The Charles W. Wetmore whaleback was the first such vessel to leave the Great Lakes, sailed to London, back to New York, around the Horn and arrived in Everett in December 1891 with all the machinery to build a whaleback shipyard here in Everett up on the Snohomish River about 16th Street. There are forums online about whaleback vessels because it was such an unusual design that wasn't used after a certain point. Unfortunately the Charles W. Wetmore had a short life; it ran aground in Coos Bay, Oregon, and was abandoned a year later. My suggestion is that "Wetmore Plaza" would locate the plaza for out-of-town people. I like "Theater Plaza" very much but that would be continually confused with the Everett Historic Theater. Paula McCullough: I like Paul-Erick's suggestion of "agora." It's creative and different. Gary Meisner: This comes from my marketing background. I believe that the name "City Plaza" is so generic that it could fit anyplace between Legion Golf Course and 128th Street, and it doesn't serve any branding purpose. Think for a moment what people are going to call it as a natural thing, let's get a 3