2,570 more dwelling units in Sequim's future

2006-08-01

by DIANE URBANI DE LA PAZ
Peninsula Daily News

SEQUIM, WA-- Looking at this map is like standing on a hill, watching a herd of bison thunder across the prairie toward you.

The Sequim Planning Department map, titled ``current projects,'' shows 2,570 new dwelling units in various stages of development on the east, west, north and south sides of the city.

These are subdivisions and projects that have received preliminary or final approval between 2004 and the present, said Sequim assistant planner Joe Irvin.

Some are finished, like the 118-unit Vintage apartments on West Washington Street.

Others are in the lots-for-sale phase, such as Bill Littlejohn's 31-unit Sunrise Meadows on Sequim-Dungeness Way.

Thirty-eight residential projects spread across this map.

They range from the Fairweather subdivision's 90 units near the city's east entrance, to the 97 houses that will be Wellington Estates in south central Sequim, to the west end where Jennie's Meadow comprises 202 units.

Shown to elk team

It's an update of last December's projects map, and it's one of the visual aids to be used at the Dungeness Elk Working Team's Aug. 29 public meeting.

The map will illustrate how, as city leaders have said, that Sequim is for people, not necessarily elk.

``When you look at 2,500 units, that build-out is probably going to take 10 years,'' Mayor Walt Schubert said Monday.

``We're doing what the [state] Growth Management Act says we're supposed to do: provide housing in the city limits,'' he added.

The Sequim Comprehensive Plan update projects that the city's population will top 11,000 -- more than twice the current census -- by 2015.

The 16-year-old Growth Management Act, designed to avert sprawl amid such burgeoning population, calls for higher-density housing within city limits.

``I would prefer to be someplace that's living and growing, rather than someplace that's dying and fading away. I've spent time in small towns like that, and it's pretty depressing,'' said Mark Ozias, a member of the city Planning Commission and manager of the Saturday Open Aire Market.