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Medical Lake planner: land-capacity analysis shows room for about 293 housing units; steering committee moves forward
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Summary
City planner Elise Rodriguez told the Medical Lake City Council on July 1 that phase 1 of the comprehensive plan update is complete; a land-capacity analysis found capacity for about 293 units, and the city will begin phase 2 with a steering-committee meeting next week.
Elise Rodriguez, city planner for the City of Medical Lake, told the City Council on July 1 that the city has completed phase 1 of its comprehensive plan update and will start phase 2 with a steering-committee meeting next week.
The update includes results from two resident surveys, state grant work and a land-capacity analysis. Rodriguez said the first survey, the “pulse of the community,” received 77 responses and the related communications-preference survey received 101 responses. “The vast majority” of respondents agreed with the draft vision and mission statements, she said, and many highlighted the city’s “small town feel,” more downtown businesses and concerns about growth and crime.
Rodriguez said the city used two state grants — a climate-resilience grant that funded the hazard-mitigation and crisis-communications work and a periodic-update grant for required deliverables — and that the state accepted the city’s deliverables and issued the grant payments last week. “The state was completely happy. And we got all our money last week,” she said.
On the land-capacity analysis, Rodriguez said the county and state assign population allotments to jurisdictions; Medical Lake was asked to plan for 244 people over 20 years under county methodology that used 2010–2023 trends. After excluding constrained lands, applying a 30% market factor and using the Office of Financial Management household-size figure of 2.54 persons per household, Rodriguez reported an estimated capacity for 293 housing units — roughly 744 people — in the city’s developable land inventory.
Rodriguez said the result shows the city can accommodate the county’s 244-person allocation but recommended the city retain portions of its urban growth area (UGA) to contribute to regional housing needs. “Right now it’s 500 acres. We want to keep 200 acres,” she said, and also noted potential lands east between the city and Silver Lake to help with water, sewer and transportation connections.
Rodriguez also said a UGA south of Lakeland was removed from consideration because it is too distant from sewer and water. She told the council the project will continue under an 18-month periodic-update grant and that staff will circulate the full summaries and the land-capacity report to council and the public.
The council did not take formal legislative action in this meeting; Rodriguez said the steering committee will convene next week to move into the concept phase of the update.
