City planning staff and consultants presented clarifications and edits to the draft comprehensive plan and accompanying development regulations during the Nov. 24 Anacortes City Council meeting, and they set a schedule for public review and a December decision window.

John Coleman, director of planning, community and economic development, summarized changes staff will publish Wednesday and solicited council direction on outstanding items. He said the comment period on revised text will close on Dec. 11 and staff hopes the council can consider and act on the development regulations and comprehensive plan on Monday, Dec. 15.

Key discussion items included transportation policy T1.19 (a proposal to remove language suggesting West 2nd Street be an alternate arterial), a proposed policy to explore a fee-in-lieu program for sidewalk construction to help close gaps, and edits to land-use policy 4.6 to broaden wildfire-risk reduction beyond only wildland-urban interface areas. Transportation consultant Chris Como advised striking the West 2nd Street arterial language to avoid converting a residential street into a through-traffic route; council consensus supported that change.

Planning staff also described development-regulation changes for small duplexes, including a new table row specifying minimum lot sizes and a gross-floor-area cap of 1,400 square feet per unit. Council discussed whether an R3 minimum of 4,500 square feet or a smaller 3,000-square-foot figure was appropriate and agreed to retain 4,500 in R3 following committee input. Staff agreed to clarify facade stepback drawings and bonus-density incentives in the published materials.

Council members raised a separate planning-related question about a police staffing metric in the capital-facilities element (1.83 officers per 1,000 residents). Staff said the number came from the police chief and noted concurrency language in Title 19; council members debated flexibility and acknowledged hiring and scheduling constraints for sworn officers.

Staff will publish the proposed changes and planning-commission recommendations, accept public comments through Dec. 11, and return compiled comments and recommended edits to the council for possible action on Dec. 15.