A few weeks ago, as many Redmond residents are now aware, our City Council voted to approve the signing of a development agreement with Group Health, the regional health care cooperative, which is preparing to dispose of its old hospital near Microsoft after relocating operations to a new building on the Eastside adjacent to I-405 in Bellevue.
The land the old hospital sits on is considered to be prime real estate. It’s situated close to Microsoft, the future Overlake light rail station, and the neighborhood’s commercial center.
The land is also home to some 1,100 plus mature trees, many of which are located on the perimeter, surrounding the hospital and the parking lots. The fate of these trees has become a hot topic around town after concerned residents began speaking out about a stipulation in the agreement that expressly permits Group Health or any subsequent owner to ignore important provisions in Redmond’s tree preservation ordinance, which would otherwise prevent some trees from being razed during redevelopment. I’ve heard neighbors ask how it’s possible that Group Health got permission to clearcut everything.
Well, as it turns out, last April, when the city council rewrote Redmond’s zoning code, it approved a clause which allows Redmond’s tree protection ordinance to be waived for development projects in downtown or Overlake, which are designated as the city’s two urban centers.
That’s what allowed city staff to prepare a development agreement with Group Health that doesn’t provide for the protection of a single tree on the property – in violation of the spirit (if not the letter) of Redmond’s tree protection ordinance, which begins with these two clearly-worded provisions.
From RZC 21.72.010:
“The purpose of this chapter is to 1) avoid the removal of stands of trees and significant trees in order to maintain the quality of Redmond’s urban environment; 2) protect stands of trees and significant trees to the maximum extent possible in the design of new buildings, roadways, and utilities…”
Another provision in the chapter provides a minimum threshold for protecting trees. RZC 21.72.060 declares, “In all new developments, including additions to existing non-single family buildings and parking areas, a minimum of 35 percent of all significant trees shall be retained.”
While the ordinance allows for exceptions, the agreement the city has signed with Group Health (which is now being challenged in King County Superior Court by Sustainable Redmond and former Mayor Rosemarie Ives, among other plaintiffs) is more like a nullification, not an exception.
City officials don’t see it that way, though. City staff stress that whoever develops the property will be required to plant three new trees for every tree they cut down, and that not all of the trees would be razed at once, because the city expects the property to be developed in stages. They note plans call for a small portion of the property (around 2.6 acres, of 28 total) to be set aside as a park – though there’s no guarantee that this park will contain any of the trees that stand on the site now.
Dennis Lisk, one of the city’s associate planners, told me the site would be difficult to redevelop if tree protection was made a priority. “We became convinced you couldn’t have both large scale tree preservation and all that other kind of development,” he said, referring to the site’s potential for new mixed-use, multistory buildings in the heart of Overlake.
City staff and a majority of the City Council may be convinced that protecting existing trees on the Group Health site isn’t feasible, but I’m not. I think we can do better than zero.
I’d like to see city staff reevaluate this site with a different mindset. Instead of assuming, for instance, that it will be necessary to regrade the property and put a road through the middle, what if city staff assumed that the people of Redmond want this property to be sustainably redeveloped – with tree protection as a top priority? Under that assumption, what are the possibilities for new growth on that site? That is the question I’d like to see answered.
City staff have acknowledged that strong sentiment was expressed in favor of preserving trees on the property in response to the public outreach that they did.
To me, that indicates the people of Redmond want the agreements their representatives sign with landowners and developers to reflect the city’s environmental ethic. And unfortunately, the deal that the City Council approved (with one lone dissenting vote, from Council member Kim Allen) doesn’t.
Andrew Villeneuve, a 2005 Redmond High graduate, is the founder and executive director of the Northwest Progressive Institute, a Redmond-based grassroots organization. Villeneuve can be reached at andrew@nwprogressive.org.
