Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Land Use Energy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Snoqualmie committee approves contracting plan and seeks up to $500,000 to study battery energy storage proposal
Summary
The FNA committee approved sending to council contracts and budget authority to retain experts (fire, plume dispersion, stormwater, water resources) to review a battery energy storage system application in the city's urban growth area, and discussed scheduling a moratorium public hearing—staff asked for up to $500,000 in appropriation authority funded from fund balance.
The Finance and Administration committee on June 16 agreed to forward to council a package of contracts and a budget amendment to support the city's response to a Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) application in the urban growth area.
City Attorney Dina Burke described AB26-032, which seeks authority to contract with outside experts and to fund outside legal work. Burke said the city retained outside counsel and had already sent comment letters to King County, Puget Sound Energy and the state utilities commission. To continue evaluating the application, staff proposed retaining Jensen Hughes for fire and emergency response and plume dispersion modeling, Lando Associates for stormwater and noise analysis, and RH2 for water-resource analysis. "We've identified subject matter experts, Jensen Hughes for fire and emergency response ... and RH2 for city water resource analysis," Burke said.
Burke asked the committee's permission to substitute a corrected Jensen Hughes contract in the council packet if minor changes are finalized before publishing. She also reported that the spring budget amendment set aside $50,000 for emergent land-use work and that $34,000 of that has already been invoiced. Staff requested an additional $150,000 for outside counsel and sought broader budget authority for technical studies; later budget discussion described a requested appropriation increase of $450,000 on top of the previous $50,000, giving an estimated total of about $500,000 for BEST-related work.
Council members emphasized that each contract would return to council for approval and asked for transparency on what studies would be performed. Council Member Washington said he was particularly interested in the plume dispersion analysis and public-health implications; another member flagged noise and wildlife impacts.
Separately, because the council previously adopted a moratorium, staff must hold a public hearing and adopt a work plan within 60 days (by July 25, 2026). Staff proposed potential public hearing dates (July 8, 13, 14 or 15) and suggested the July 15 date to give staff time to prepare. The hearing will include a staff presentation on the work plan and additional findings; any resulting RFPs and contracts will be driven by the adopted scope.
Next steps: the committee approved sending the contracts and a related budget amendment to the June 22 council agenda and recommended that council hear the moratorium-related public hearing and adopt a work plan within the 60-day timeline.
