Politics of growth | Inside Politics

The three recent murders in Federal Way have reignited a dormant political argument by shifting the discussion away from public safety to growth. How much should the region grow and how should Federal Way leaders respond to the pressures of that growth?

The three recent murders in Federal Way have reignited a dormant political argument by shifting the discussion away from public safety to growth. How much should the region grow and how should Federal Way leaders respond to the pressures of that growth?

During the community debate on violence, the majority of those commenting felt Federal Way was growing too fast and blamed apartments and affordable housing units for crime, traffic and overcrowding in schools. Many said they voted for incorporation to stop, or at least control, the number of apartments King County had been allowing to be constructed in Federal Way.

It is surprising that none of our elected officials took the opportunity to explain the Growth Management Act and its implications on regional and local growth.

Several years ago, in an effort to manage growth in the region, a line was drawn east of Redmond, Issaquah, Renton and Covington that separated urban and rural land areas. Cities on the west side of the line, such as Federal Way, would absorb most of the growth. Areas to the east would remain rural.

The Growth Management Act was intended to guide future residents to existing services such as police, fire, EMS, streets and utilities while reducing sprawl, carbon emissions and traffic congestion. Urban cities would in-fill existing city boundaries, annex areas that were more urban, and would also grow upwards with multi-family housing units.

As part of that effort, more attention was focused on cities providing both places to live and jobs within the community. A major consideration was that many people still needed to move around the region for employment, sporting events, shopping and extended families. The vision of moving thousands of people every day up and down the urban core and from the Kent-Auburn Valley by rail and bus through mass transit resulted in the formation of Sound Transit.

For Federal Way residents who don’t work in Seattle, the payoff is just around the corner. Although, at $54 billion, it is an expensive corner.

This fall, the region will be asked to approve ST3, which will connect Federal Way to SeaTac Airport and Seattle in the north and to Tacoma in the south by 2030. It will connect with Everett by 2036. With global warming now a reality, not a scientific conspiracy, we will experience even more population growth as predictions are for our Northwest climate to remain moderate while other areas will experience an increase in temperature, flooding and hurricanes.

Despite the regional vision and planning in the four-county area, we still lack full understanding, and agreement, on how to pursue managing regional growth. ST3 is expensive, and the income difference between the wealthy and the poor is wider than ever, with the middle class slowly moving more toward the lower category. Debates about increasing the minimum wage are numerous but lack consensus, and the cost of housing is limiting residents’ options. Many high-paid millennials are choosing to work and live on the Eastside in the Redmond-Kirkland-Bellevue corridor where the median cost of a house is $760,000. Others are more attracted to South King County as housing is much more affordable, though it may require commuting.

Some of the small cities east of the line, such as Duvall, Carnation, Snoqualmie and North Bend, have already grown 18 percent above planned limits and would like to continue growing. If they’re allowed to grow, a lengthy and congested drive from North Bend to commuter rail in Auburn may not be far behind and will undermine the goal of managing growth.

Many Federal Way residents don’t want more apartments or affordable housing and believe them to be a source of crime. They also point to the cost of building additional schools. Others disagree with the crime conclusion and say the school district is planning for increased enrollments and preparing for additional building needs. City Hall has made much of several new businesses in Federal Way, and while some of the new businesses will provide higher wages, many continue to be low-paying fast food or service jobs. High hopes are placed on the development of the Weyerhaeuser property. Ideally, that development will lead to family-wage jobs filled by people who will also live here and spend their income here. But city government needs to recognize the business growth it has tried so hard to recruit brings with it new employees who need places to live, and Federal Way is one of the few urban centers that workers can afford to live in. For those not at the first community meeting, the most compelling speaker and star of the evening wasn’t an older adult from a single-family home speaking against apartments as a crime haven, but a low-income, apartment-dwelling 17-year-old Highline College student who was working two jobs to prepare herself for the future. She explained the rules and regulations her family and neighbors must follow to qualify for low-income housing, and she turned the conversational tide toward a more balanced discussion.

The spate of murders that were recently committed in Federal Way still haven’t been solved, and they remain a probable source of campaign contention in this year and next. But housing and growth have joined, rather than replaced, public safety as major issues for debate among incumbents and candidates. Recently, the City Council approved Mayor Jim Ferrell’s recommendation to place a moratorium on apartments for six months, citing an emergency need even though they couldn’t identify any particular emergency. Ferrell hinted at a potential apartment development as a reason to stop apartments.

The city favors growth as it provides jobs along with other benefits, even having a full-time economic development director devoted to the task. But they also seem to be responding to political pressure from residents who oppose the very apartments future job-holders and residents will need to live in.

Will city leaders really want the moratorium back in the public debate at the beginning of an election year?

These are serious issues for serious candidates. You can’t have it both ways, and you can’t play homeowners against apartment-renters or bus or train-riders against automobile drivers. Business growth means residential growth for employee housing, including apartments for the lower-paid or underemployed workers, and also for seniors who will vacate their single-family homes to future workers. It should also mean encouraging developers to build more upscale housing opportunities for higher-paid workers so they can live here and not spend their higher paycheck elsewhere.

The political debates and community dialog must rise to a more thoughtful level, and it must rise above the class distinction that was recently evident.

Federal Way resident Bob Roegner is the former mayor of Auburn. He can be reached at bjroegner@comcast.net.