Wenatchee council reviews comprehensive-plan survey, asks consultants to draft preferred vision statement

At a Wenatchee City Council workshop, city staff and consultants presented the results of a community survey tied to the city’s comprehensive-plan update and offered three draft vision statements; council members gave feedback and asked the consultants to produce a revised draft for the council’s June 12 meeting ahead of a June 15 deliverable to the Washington State Department of Commerce.

The consultants and staff said the survey showed what residents “love” about Wenatchee — access to parks, mountains and water and the city’s scenic setting — and flagged top concerns led by homelessness and related community impacts. Steven Nguyen Schwander, with the Community Development Department, introduced the consultants and the outreach work and noted the team had completed the community survey and additional paper outreach.

The survey results presented by the consultants showed: homelessness and associated community impacts as the top concern (67 percent of respondents); 61 percent of respondents hoped homelessness would be infrequent and brief in 20 years; top strengths included access to parks and recreation and the city’s natural setting; and 51 percent listed a sufficient supply and variety of housing as a top 5 hope. The consultants also said they received an appreciable number of automated or low-quality survey responses and flagged that they had about 16 Spanish-language entries for separate analysis.

Consultants explained that state law requires cities to address supportive housing in land-use regulations and asked the council whether additional supplemental regulations should accompany supportive-housing developments. The survey option that drew majority support (over 50 percent) asked for operations plans that would address security and behavioral requirements for residents.

Consultant Jesse Hartman, identified as the project manager, presented three alternative vision statements for council review. Council feedback focused on three recurring topics: whether to include the word “safe,” whether to explicitly reference Wenatchee’s natural resources and waterfront, and whether the statement should mention visitors and tourism. Council members expressed differing preferences. Council member Linda Harrell said, “I think safe is a good thing to have in there,” and urged including language about tourism. Another council member, Myra, said she “gravitate[s] towards [the] first option,” which included “small town feel” and “multicultural community.” Several council members recommended blending elements from more than one alternative.

The council and staff agreed on next steps: consultants will draft a revised vision statement that incorporates the council’s input; the city clerk will distribute the draft to council members; the council will review a preferred draft at the June 12 meeting (package deadline June 5); and the city must meet a June 15 submission deliverable to the Department of Commerce. Steven Nguyen Schwander summarized timing to the council: “Our deliverable to the Department of Commerce is June 15.”

No formal vote was taken at the workshop. Council members described the preference-setting as a step toward a council-preferred draft to carry into the public-review phase of the comprehensive-plan update, not as a final adopted statement.

Background and context: consultants said the survey and outreach sought input on character areas, housing, transportation and economic outlook. Respondents rated parks and recreation, building scale and transit accessibility relatively positively, while walking access to stores and the quality of sidewalks and street trees had lower satisfaction scores. The consultants noted differences in responses by tenure (renters vs. homeowners) and by language; they also suggested the survey results would inform land-use, housing and transportation policies as the comp plan is drafted.

Next procedural steps include the consultant redraft, council review on June 12 and public outreach during the comp-plan adoption process; the council may amend the draft as the public process proceeds.