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Olympia council adopts urban‑village zoning changes, rejects larger grocery minimum and approves end to Briggs development agreement
Summary
The council approved amendments to the city’s urban‑village zoning (OMC 18.05) — including a clarification on how commercial acreage is calculated and raising the allowable height for mixed‑use buildings facing the town square to 50 feet — after rejecting proposals to raise the grocery minimum to 12,000 sq ft or allow subdividing the grocery requirement. Council also approved terminating the Briggs development agreement, removing a unit cap and allowing greater residential density to support commercial uses.
The Olympia City Council on Feb. 24 voted to amend city zoning standards for urban villages and to terminate the existing Briggs Urban Village development agreement, after more than two hours of staff presentation and public comment focused on grocery size, parking and infrastructure in the Briggs neighborhood.
Jackson Ewing, the city’s senior planner for community planning and development, walked the council through proposed changes to OMC 18.05 that staff said respond to shifting market conditions since the Briggs master plan was adopted. The amendments remove some office requirements, increase allowed multifamily share, set a minimum grocery size of 9,200 square feet (with a 50,000‑square‑foot cap unchanged), and change the phasing trigger for the village green so residential development in the core triggers construction of the plaza.
“Those proposed changes aim to maintain…
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