Planning commission studies area-assessment policies: commissioners back flexible 'missing middle' options, mobile-home preservation and an affordable-housing f

John, a planning staff member, opened the study-session presentation by saying the Planning Department had “done a comprehensive purging and rewriting of many of these policies” and that the session would focus on policies that “probably deserve further discussion.” The session reviewed a draft of area-assessment policies for the city’s comprehensive plan covering industrial-to-residential transitions, missing-middle housing, mobile-home parks, transitional housing, transit-oriented communities requirements, hospital expansion zones, and citywide affordable-housing tools.

The commission expressed broad support for policies that preserve optional pathways to higher-density housing near transit and commercial corridors rather than locking areas into single, low-density categories. Several commissioners urged keeping options open for mixed-use or “missing middle” development in industrial-edge areas near the Northwest Greenbelt and near Broadway, saying changing the comp plan to signal higher-density or mixed uses could enable privately initiated rezonings or targeted city strategies.

Commissioners and staff clarified the current zoning constraints: industrial (I) districts do not allow residential uses by right, so any transition from industrial to residential would require rezoning or other council-directed actions. John said the comprehensive-plan language would not itself rezone property: “It does not just carte blanche rezone property. This is what we use when we are evaluating zoning cases … we look back at this map and these…