Snoqualmie Council seees retail shops as city’s savior
Published 2:51 pm Thursday, October 2, 2008
SNOQUALMIE _ The Snoqualmie City Council aims to
capture the tourist trade and boost the town’s economy by requiring 75
percent of businesses on Railroad Avenue to be retail-based.
This plan for the city’s future was revealed when the city council
and planning commission held a joint workshop last week to discuss the
ordinance that proposes the 75 percent rule. The proposed document
would also affect the town’s future business and physical characteristics by
establishing procedures and design standards for businesses and
historical buildings in the city’s historical districts.
Residents who attended the workshop on April 25 had strong
reactions to the part of the ordinance that proposes “special use” regulations for
the businesses on Railroad Avenue, between Newton and Northern
streets. These regulations would only allow 25 percent of non-retail businesses on
the first floor of businesses on each block. The goal is to have 75 percent
retail in that area.
Permitted first-floor uses include retail stores, restaurants, cafes,
taverns, galleries or museums, interpretive centers, railroad-related
facilities and any other similar businesses, according to the ordinance.
Non-retail businesses include personal, professional, service, municipal and
meeting halls.
In a nutshell, the council said they believe the city would prosper if
Railroad Avenue were lined mainly with retail shops. The idea is to attract
the more than half million tourists that visit the Snoqualmie Falls
and Snoqualmie Valley Railroad annually, and boost the city’s economy
with their tourist dollars.
Currently, retail shops in the commercial district make up less than
50 percent of the total businesses on each block, and that’s what council
members said they are concerned about.
“We feel that we would have a more vital downtown area if the
tourists have more to do than the railroad and the Falls,” said City
Administrator Gary Armstrong during an interview. “That would allow the
tourists to spend a day here instead of just an hour or two and we could capture
the tourist trade. Right now there is not much that would keep the
tourists here.”
Building and business owners, however, had mixed reactions to
the regulations.
Michael Kirkland of MK Property Services, which is one of the
non-retail businesses in the affected area, opposed limiting the number of
non-retail businesses that can exist on Railroad Avenue. He said he is not
convinced that a string of retail shops would be successful.
“The probability for success for an art gallery, for example, is low,”
he said. “The population here cannot support the retail that’s desired by
the city.”
Dale Sherman, who owns Sherman Tile & Interiors on
Railroad Avenue, said that he and his wife Susan bought and restored their
building to help enhance the area and hopefully attract other stores.
“Retail begets retail and office and professional kills retail. If we
allow professional businesses to take over, we will have an office park and that
is already starting,” he said, explaining that many successful small towns
rely on shopping tourists. “You don’t go to LaConner to get your hair done.”
Besides the 75 percent retail rule, the proposed ordinance would
also establish official committees to regulate the historic districts.
One committee is a design review board that will function as a
unified and locally based review body for the city’s historic areas. These areas
include the Meadowbrook and downtown historic districts, as well as
the landmark commercial district, which is contained within the larger
downtown district.
“The new board is called Historical Design Review Board and is
no longer the planning commission; it’s now a board comprised of one
planning commission member, one property owner from either of the two
historic districts and two citizens with demonstrated interest and
knowledge in historic preservation,” City
Attorney Pat Anderson said.
The ordinance also creates a Snoqualmie Landmark and
Heritage Commission — which consists of the King County Landmarks
Commission and one city-appointed member — as the body that will designate
historical landmark buildings for the city.
The board would focus on regulations and design standards in order
to protect and enhance the historic district because it is “necessary in
the interest of the prosperity, civic pride and general welfare of the people
of Snoqualmie.”
Although the city already has design standards and regulations
in place, they needed to revamp the procedures because of a glitch they found.
In 1997 the city adopted Chapter 15.26 of the municipal code
titled Landmarks. Anderson explained that within days of adopting the
measure, officials discovered that business and building owners would be subject
to dual sets of requirements.
“By adopting that [1997] ordinance, we had set up a
requirement that there be two separate and different reviews for the same
improvements,” Anderson said. “For
example, if the Shermans wanted to remodel the Sherman Tile building, they
would have had to go through the city design review process and they
would have to go through the King County Landmark process and get two
separate approvals for one project.”
The proposed ordinance would establish only one set of regulations.
Council members will review the comments from last week’s
workshop and make changes if necessary. But Armstrong said the council’s goal
is to approve some form of this proposed ordinance by summer’s end.
Mayor Randy “Fuzzy” Fletcher said that
the city already has an emergency ordinance enforcing the 75 percent
retail rule, but the new ordinance will replace that, when passed.
