2009/03/25 Council Agenda Packet

Planning Commission Meeting October 24, 2006 Page 2 Kathy Davis OliverMcMillan Presentation Paul Buss, Executive'Vice President, OliverMcMillan, stated that Everett was an impressive City to work with from City Council to staff to the quality represented by Everett Station; he felt that there was a tremendous commitment to quality in the community. OliverMcMillan is a 28 year old company and quality is the hallmark of their company. Mr. Buss introduced Shantelle Johnson, head of Marketing and Graphics; Kevin Haley, Development Director; and Bob Mueller, head of Construction. The motto of their company is making special places happen. Great places are about linkages; details; past and future; sustainable, soulful, and artistic; and come from passion, spirit, and experience. He presented slides of buildings that their firm has been involved with to show the details of what they anticipate for the Riverfront area. Kevin Haley, Development Director, OliverMcMillan, stated that the he will be presenting the planning principles for the site, the history of the site, initial thoughts that tie into a very conceptual plan which is part of the EIS package, their team, and next steps. Planning Principles We need to balance quality, stewardship, public access, smart growth, and sustainability—how do we develop the site along a railroad that was a mill, that was a landfill and make it work in the future? We will also talk about green neighborhoods. Some of the Smart Growth principles that we talked about is how do you combine green space in a variety of uses, to make sure that the space is pedestrian- and transit-oriented, protect the wetlands adjacent to the development, and create gathering spaces, community enhancements, and recreation improvements? US Green Building Council has developed a concept for what is a smart growth neighborhood —you want to be efficient with your location and here we have public transportation and the freeway— you want to be resource efficient and then it talks about being complete, compact, and connected; and environmental preservation; and how all that is integrated into the project. Mr. Haley provided a definition to sustainability explaining that they want to create an environment that will last and connect to other areas and how to design a development that enhances a community's sense of place, livability, and social interaction. We want to interact with the Lowell neighborhood, the Port Gardner neighborhood, and the Riverside neighborhood, and how do we integrate the environment into the project. He presented a slide of the South Lake Union project. For a "green" neighborhood, how do you deal with water, energy, natural drainage, indoor air quality, and innovation in materials and resources? LEED has three groups: US Green Building Council, The National Resource Defense Council, and the Congress for New Urbanism which have gotten together in the last few years and the LEED for neighborhood development is a brand new concept. So instead of just looking at"green" buildings, they are looking at the creation of a whole neighborhood that is "green." So the three groups have come out with their checklists and basically have produced a draft of what their requirements are going to be and the comments have been received. Two weeks from now in Denver there will be a US Green Building Council Summit where they are going to announce the criteria for a green neighborhood and set up some pilot projects for the next year or two. The development team is working on getting the Riverfront Redevelopment in that pilot program. Presented some examples of other developments in Seattle and Issaquah.