Community still split over center?
October 8, 2008
By Ed Farrell
For Barb Pexa, the road from her birthplace on the island of Guam to her current home in downtown Snoqualmie has been an amazing journey, one that includes swimming for Guam in the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain.
This is park area on Snoqualmie Ridge would be the site of a new community center, should the effort gain approval during a Nov. 4 vote.
Decked out in a blue “Vote Yes Community Center” T-shirt, and alongside husband Sean Quinn – himself a former U.S. Olympic soccer player – Pexa hopes she represents a fundamental shift in what Snoqualmie Mayor Matt Larson referred to Oct. 7 as the city’s “split personality” evidenced by two previous failed attempts to pass a bond issue to build a community center.
In 2002, 86 percent of downtown residents voted against the city’s first attempt to build a center on Snoqualmie Ridge, while 52 percent of Ridge residents favored the bond. In 2006, 79 percent of downtown residents rejected a similar measure as 57 percent of Ridge residents were in support.
“We’re still seeking that 60 percent super-majority,” Larson said during the first of two town hall meetings, held at Cascade View Elementary on Snoqualmie Ridge, in which he outlined both the city’s financial picture and the upcoming Nov. 4 $10 million Community Center bond question. A second meeting was held Tuesday at Snoqualmie Middle School.
Both were billed as Root Beer Float Socials, with free refreshments courtesy of the Snoqualmie Falls Brewing Company.
Larson shared the stage with representatives from the city’s parks department, as well as the YMCA, which has been selected as a partner, and which will operate and manage the community center should voters OK the bond issue.
For supporters like Pexa and Quinn – and about 40 other similarly attired proponents – it is hoped that the third time is, in fact, a charm.
“We are downtown residents,” Pexa said, “and it’s true, there is a bit of division in Snoqualmie. But the fact is Quadrant (Homes, the primary developer of Snoqualmie Ridge) has collected $3 million for this Community Center … a center everybody in Snoqualmie will use. This is a great thing for this community, and it’s great that the YMCA is involved.”
During a prolonged question-and-answer session, which stretched the scheduled two hour meeting to close to three, many questions still remained, including the all important one: How much is it going to cost to use a YMCA-managed facility.
“The answer today is: I don’t know,” said Marcia Isenberger, the Eastside regional executive of the YMCA of Greater Seattle.
Isenberger said the Y is in the process of conducting a user survey of 400 random residents to determine the needs of the community. The results, however, will not be available until Oct. 10 – three days after the final townhall informational meeting.
What is known, according to Larson, is that a $10 million, 20-year bond would add 30 cents per $1,000 valuation to every homeowner’s annual property tax in Snoqualmie.
That amounts to $60 a year for a $200,000 home, $90 a year for a $300,000 home and $120 a year for a $400,000 home. Over the life of the bond, the owner of a $400,000 home would pay $2,400.
Bob Gilbertson, president and CEO of the YMCA of Greater Seattle, said it was hoped the results of the user survey would be available before the second town hall meeting, but that he was “reasonably sure” Snoqualmie residents would be offered Y memberships with no joining fee.
Currently, the YMCA charges as much as $125 for a family membership, with monthly dues also required, as well as additional charges for certain programs.
Users from outside Snoqualmie would have to pay full YMCA membership fees, as well as fees for any programs they wish to participate in. The exception to that would be that current YMCA members, regardless of their location, are always allowed at other YMCA facilities, Gilbertson said.
Larson attempted to keep the meeting light, particularly when he dubbed his “state of the city” portion of the meeting “the good, the bad and the ugly,” replete with pictures of Clint Eastwood and Ennio Morricone’s haunting score to the historic spaghetti-western movie of the same name.
The ugly, Larson said, focused mainly on the troubling global, national and regional economic outlook, as well as construction inflation costs of as much as 12 percent a year.
The bad, he said, was that new housing sales in Snoqualmie – long the city’s economic motor – were down 70 percent from last year. The result of that, Larson said, would ultimately be some staff reductions, as well as likely increases in city water and sewer rates.
“Snoqualmie has been in a slow, downward spiral for many years,” Larson said.
The good, Larson said, is based largely on the city’s success in sensing difficult times coming, and taking proactive steps to address them.
“We’ve been preparing for the cliff, and when the cash disappears,” Larson said.
Among those preparations, Larson said, was beefing up the city’s reserve fund, which now stands at about 30 percent of the city’s general fund.
Larson said the city’s reserves were only about 1 percent of the general fund when he became mayor.
Another was Larson’s announcement that utility increases – of as much as 6 percent a year for each of the next three years – would be required to keep up with the city’s infrastructure demands.
“If you want a good infrastructure, you must tend to it,” he said.
Larson used his portion of the meeting as a springboard for the community center presentation, and outlined the city’s efforts to understand the cause of defeat in the two previous bond attempts.
The mayor also insisted the city must move forward with the bond effort, even if it conflicted with another school bond proposal, which has been repeatedly cited by some residents as being a higher priority for the community.
“We’ve waited through three attempts,” Larson said of failed school bond votes.
At the same time, Larson produced figures that he insisted proved Snoqualmie residents would support both a community center and a school bond vote.
In the last three school bond contests, Larson said, Snoqualmie residents voted in favor of each by at least 70 percent.
With construction costs increasing monthly, Larson said the city could not afford to delay.
“Why wait for a school bond when these cost increases are killing us,” he said.
The YMCA’s Isenberger said she viewed the proposed partnership with the city as having “the potential to be a home run for everyone.”
And, she said, the YMCA was the logical choice to operate the center for the city because “we’re good at this.”
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