Sammamish staff to publish draft Town Center plan and SEIS in June; housing, transit and affordability dominate questions

Matt Brammeier, deputy director of community development, told the Sammamish Human Services Commission on a detailed overview of the city’s Town Center Plan and a related code-amendment project, saying the city will publish a draft plan, draft supplemental environmental impact statement (SEIS) and a draft code in early June and aims to complete the adoption process by fall.

The plan area covers about 240 acres centered near Eighth and Fourth streets; Brammeier said roughly 89 net buildable acres remain after subtracting wetlands, civic property and recently built or planned projects. He said the original Town Center environmental impact statement (EIS) was adopted in February 2007, the plan followed about a year later and the development code was adopted in 2010–11. The original EIS evaluated up to 4,000 housing units but the 2007 plan selected a preferred option of about 2,000 units; Brammeier said just over 1,000 units have since been built or are planned, leaving roughly 944 units from that preferred figure.

"We are drafting a supplemental EIS and we are evaluating the impacts of up to 4,000 units," Brammeier said. He added the city is not proposing to increase the…