The city-wide moratorium on certain development will go on at least another six months.

The Issaquah City Council voted unanimously on Feb. 21 to extend the moratorium from March 6 to Sept. 6 after a public hearing on the moratorium was conducted.

The initial emergency moratorium was passed unanimously at the Sept. 6, 2016 council meeting and went into immediate effect for certain non-vested development projects.

The council declared at the time that a moratorium was necessary because development in Issaquah was not meeting the standards set by the 2012 Central Issaquah Plan; specifically this included the categories of architectural fit within the community, urban design elements, vertical mixed use, affordable housing, parking and visions for each district. The city has been using the time of non-development to address the six categories.

After hearing from over a dozen small developers at an October hearing that the moratorium was threatening their livelihoods and savings, the council amended the moratorium in early November exempting small projects consisting of four or fewer residential units or non-residential projects whose total floor area does not exceed 3,000 square feet.

Projects exempted from the moratorium according to the original ordinance include properties covered by development agreements; development having to do with public transit; public facilities like fire stations; public schools and Village Theatre; projects involving the sale and development of land owned by the city and public capital projects; remodels and tenant improvements; single-family homes on lots already vested through platting approvals; developments considered to be affordable housing, which are defined as being at least 40 percent comprised of affordable housing units; and emergency repairs or construction due to a natural disaster or similar cause.

At the Feb. 21 meeting, Director of Economic Development and Development Services Keith Niven updated the council members on the city’s moratorium work plan with a chart showing the city’s progress in each of the six categories.

Niven announced that the parking project would be completed by July, architectural fit and urban design by August, vertical mixed use and affordable housing by September and district vision by November. Niven explained that the district vision portion would take the longest because it involves public meetings with the community in April and community outreach between May and August.

“Because this one is mostly hearing about what the community thinks about these sub-areas within the Central Issaquah area, it’s a lot of public outreach, it’s a lot of talking to the community, and the community has so many different voices … this is why this one is actually the longest one,” Niven said.

Public comments brought different viewpoints on the moratorium.

Todd Baxter of Windermere Real Estate read a letter from David Hildreth, who was not able to attend the meeting due to health. Hildreth, who operated the Lake Sammamish Veterinary Hospital on Newport Way Northwest for 30 years, said he “had a buyer under contract” for the former hospital’s property, but is now unable to complete the sale due to the moratorium.

“My health is precarious and I would like to complete the sale of this property for the sake of my family … I am requesting an exemption for any properties that either had a pre-application meeting prior to the moratorium or were already under contract at the time of the moratorium,” Hildreth’s letter stated.

The council said later that the city would follow up with Hildreth to see if the property already qualified for an exemption.

In contrast, Steve Pereira said that with the work plan scheduled to run until November, it was “a no-brainer that we should continue the moratorium pause at least for another six months.”

Lindsey Walsh said that she was “concerned with the idea of setting a six-month timeline on this” when “the work that needs to be done to figure out what decisions need to be made at the end of that obviously won’t be completed.”

“I just feel that there should be more clarity there in looking at that six-month timeline and expecting to start at this point, considering we’ve already had that period previously,” Walsh stated.

Council President Stacy Goodman asked the city’s attorney, James Haney, if in September the council could extend the moratorium for a shorter period of time than six more months. Haney affirmed that this would be possible.

“I just want to acknowledge and commend the work that the staff has done already to come up with a work plan,” Goodman said. “That looks like a very simple chart, but that has had a lot of work go into it.”

“There are a number of people that are having a hardship due to this and I appreciate [the city] getting to it as fast as we can,” Councilmember Bill Ramos stated. “I think we’re doing that, but at the same time we have to do it right; that’s why we did this.”