It appears there won’t be a quick fix for Sammamish’s Ace Hardware quandary.

Kamuron Gurol, the city’s Director of Community Development, indicated to the City Council on Tuesday night that obstacles involving development of a new hardware store on the property between Northeast Second and Northeast Fourth streets might be too large.

“There are a lot of complicated steps and precious little time left,” Gurol said. “I don’t like to say this, but I don’t see how we can approve this proposal by the deadline we have.”

Ace Hardware’s lease in the Sammamish Highlands Shopping Center expires August 2013. Store owner Tim Koch has made it clear he would have to close the business due to high rents imposed by property owner, Florida-based Regency Centers.

Gurol told the council that the potential site, located near Mars Hill Church on the other side of the stream from the Washington Federal building, has several environmental concerns. Under current codes, the adjacent George Davis Creek and a Category 1 bog wetland both require 215-foot buffers with an additional 15-foot building setback.

“This site doesn’t appear to be supportive to that kind of use due to constraints,” Gurol said. “I don’t like saying it, but that’s what I see. Major codes and policy changes would be required in order to accommodate this use.”

While Gurol argued changing codes is the only way the land could be approved for construction, the applicant believes there is a way around the obstacles.

Land owner and developer Elliot Severson said an agreement can be reached through a Development Agreement — a contract that makes exemptions in land use agreements.

“The Development Agreement provides the city a great deal of flexibility in how to deal with process, regulations and time frames and they’ve been used very successfully in other jurisdictions,” he said. “We’re not asking the city to do anything that’s illegal, to do anything that they are uncomfortable in doing.”

Mike Walter, an attorney with Seattle-based Keating, Bucklin & McCormack, Inc., didn’t dismiss the idea that a Development Agreement could be used to bypass buffers and other environmental issues, but he said Sammamish would be in uncharted territory.

“You folks would be the test case,” he said.

Listening to both sides, the City Council unanimously voted to allow Severson’s attorney Charlie Klinge and city attorney Bruce Disend to discuss how a Development Agreement could be used for development of the land.

That was good news for more than 100 community members who turned out to support Ace Hardware at a Dec. 4 council meeting.

“We absolutely are more encouraged today with the status of the project than we were three weeks ago,” Severson said.