The City of Spokane is taking steps to unite its communities and create a more cohesive local government that is responsive to the inputs of each neighborhood.
Spokane City Council members discussed establishing a process to receive resolutions from the various committees and commissions during Monday’s Finance and Administration Committee meeting. Officials regularly receive resolutions and requests but do not have an internal process for responding.
The council has spent the last six months developing the process with citizens so the city can respond, and according to Monday’s agenda, this is the first attempt to test the process.
“One step of this draft procedure is to include resolutions and formal requests received from internal bodies and commissions in a council’s standing committee package,” Monday’s agenda said, “thereby formally placing the requests in the public record.”
The first items officially entered into the public record are three resolutions from the City of Spokane Community Assembly. Each resolution was approved by the Assembly last year, but because there was no internal process, they never made it into the city’s public records.
The first resolution of the assembly called on the city to reinstate the construction moratorium for Latah Valley, which Expired last year, which the Council already MayHowever, this only happened months after these communities had asked the Council to do so.
The second resolution also refers to the moratorium, but asks the council to update the city’s general fees that developers pay when building new housing developments. The fees were not Updated in over 20 years, causing Latah Valley to miss out on funds it could have used for infrastructure during the last moratorium.
The Assembly adopted the resolution calling for a change to the GFCs over a year ago. Although the Council took action to increase the fees, this only came into effect after the moratorium expired. However, with the introduction of a new moratorium, there is hope for Progress this time.
The last resolution entered into the minutes was adopted by the Assembly in November and called for transparency regarding the city’s traffic calming program.
The assembly is calling for more communication, semi-annual accounting reports on the funds and a commitment that the city will only use the money for traffic calming projects approved by the council.
“The idea is that everyone will receive a response that the town hall has received their resolution or letter,” said Giacobbe Byrd, town hall director, “and that someone from the town hall staff is working on a recommendation for (the town council) to take formal action.”
While the individual resolutions were not made public until long after they were passed by the Assembly, this process marks the beginning of a new dynamic that promotes collaboration between the Council and Spokane’s many neighborhoods.
