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Planning commission reviews economic development chapter, pauses pending city council direction
Summary
Commissioners reviewed redlined edits to the draft economic development chapter, discussed wording choices such as “encourage” versus “support,” and agreed to collect feedback before finalizing the chapter pending city council direction on contracting and strategy.
Members of the Liberty Lake Planning Commission reviewed proposed red-line edits to the city’s economic development chapter and agreed to collect commissioner feedback before finalizing the text in advance of a May 6 discussion with City Council.
Amy (staff member) told the commission the edits respond to Council direction last fall to scale back a contract with an economic development partner and to explore alternative ways to deliver services. “Last fall during the budgeting process, City Council decided to scale back a contract that we have with one of our economic development partners,” Amy said. “Staff is preparing to begin that conversation with Council on May 6.”
The commission spent most of its review on word-choice and emphasis. Commissioners asked whether terms such as “encourage” and “support” carried distinct policy meanings; Amy replied that the original plan used both words and that, in policy language, encourage generally indicates a somewhat more active role than support. Commissioners agreed not to change all instances of “support” to “encourage,” but to mark two specific places (policy items numbered 8 and 11 in the draft) as intentionally more active.
The group also touched briefly on content points visible in the redlines: the addition of “STEAM” (science, technology, engineering, art and math) to a list of workforce-education priorities, and a suggestion to revise a sentence that said economic development seeks to “increase the standard of living for citizens and businesses.” Commissioners recommended replacing that phrase with wording such as “improve the business climate” or “support business success.” Commissioner discussion produced an agreed edit to describe efforts as improving the business climate rather than increasing a business’s “standard of living.”
The commission directed staff to incorporate the suggested edits, hold the draft pending Council’s May 6 direction so the plan does not conflict with upcoming Council priorities, and return the chapter for another review. Amy said staff will perform a line-by-line review after Council provides guidance and that commissioners’ red-line feedback will be folded into the version shown to Council.
The commission did not take a final vote on the chapter at the meeting and treated the session as a working workshop to refine language before staff presents the draft to City Council.
