Olympia City Council this week (Feb 3, 2006)

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Olympia City Council this week (Feb 3, 2006)

Submitted by emmettoconnell on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 11:56am.

This week on the Council

This is something that I'm going to try to do each week, a review of the Olympia City Council packet, which is typically available online each Friday here as a zip file.

This won't be a totally thorough or unbiased review, I'm mostly going to pick out things that I find interesting.

1. For the 18th and Fones Rd. improvement project to go forward, the city needed some property from developer Paul DeTray. He didn't want to sell, so they started a condemnation process, and now the city is willing to pay him $925,000.

2. What was Drew Hendricks photographing at the transit center? Interesting part of the Jan. 24 meeting minutes:

Councilmember Johnson reported Intercity Transit has revised its policy on photography and Drew Hendricks is no longer barred from the Olympia Transit Station property. He said the Board will be working on redefining and implementing regulations related to inappropriate behaviors at the Transit Center.

3. Work plans for all the advisory committees are in the packet because the council is starting its recruitment process and this is the time that they generally thing about what the committees should be for.

4. City manager pay may go up by $2,565 with a $4,000 performance bonus.

Sorry to TFI, who posted a co

Submitted by emmettoconnell on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 11:58am.

Sorry to TFI, who posted a comment on this when it was simply a blog post. I meant to put it in the Oly City Council forum. Please, if you want, comment again, and I'll comment back like I did and we can start all over.

Thanks man.

Submitted by Rick on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 12:01pm.

Thanks man.

The City tries to purchase pr

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 12:55pm.

The City tries to purchase private property, owner declines, now they go through condemnation process.

This is government at the best. They offer to purchase your property, you decline, they strong-arm. »

5th Amendment of the US Con

Submitted by emmettoconnell on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 1:14pm.

5th Amendment of the US Constitution: "...nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

For a public purpose, government, as agents of the public, can condemn private property. The purpose of this offer is to settle a lawsuit filed by DeTray in response to the city's condemnation process. The offer is more than the assesed value, and if anyone knows that side of town, there is a dire public need to improve roads there. Especially since there are more than a few developments being built just south of there.

I'm well-aware of eminent dom

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 1:42pm.

I'm well-aware of eminent domain.

I was going to ask which piece of property on Fones Rd. it was because, when I saw the offer, I was pretty amazed.

We discussed before, Justice Stevens was the author of the majority opinion expanding eminent domain to include economic improvement. Really, the City doesn't even need to use it for a road. They could simply say a Target is more of an economic benefit to the community than idle land and take the property.

The purpose of the property

Submitted by emmettoconnell on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 2:44pm.

The purpose of the property in the improvement project would be as a stormwater retention pond. If you go to the council packet they might refer to the exact parcel. Using geodata, you can find that parcel on a map.

Stormwater retention pond?Ok,

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 4:54pm.

Stormwater retention pond?

Ok, I thought his property would be used for widening the road.

How badly needed is a stormwater retention pond on Fones Rd.? Does this really serve the community?

Is it so bad that the City needs to start using what is probably, in my opinion, one of the more controversial portions of the Constitution?

I'm pretty firm in that eminent domain should be used only when absolutely necessary.

Drew Hendricks here. What ha

Submitted by DrewHendricks on Fri, 02/03/2006 - 10:47pm.

Drew Hendricks here. What happened was that early in December, on Friday the 9th 2005, to be precise, I was downtown at the Olympia IT center taking a complaint from a woman about the OPD. A typical Friday, actually. As I was speaking to the woman at the IT Center, a bald security guard approached the woman (who was surrounded by five friends of hers) and told the group that they would need to leave, that they were loitering. He pointed at a sign directly above their heads. It said NO LOITERING. He said: "Cantcha see the sign that sez No Loitering?" I was standing a few feet away from him, but he was staring past me as I spoke on a cellphone to the Shelton Correctional Center, looking for the woman's boyfriend. OPD had picked the B/F up, and was not admitting where he was, or whether he was still in their custody. (He was. They just had not booked him yet, 3 hours later...) I asked the guard if he could see the bench, which said "Sit Here." He glared at me, repeated himself, and then I repeated myself. He glared some more at me. Then he said I was tresspassing on HIS property! Ha! Then he ran off to get his boss. Quaking in boots ensued. Except no boots, and no quaking. I pulled out my camera. The boss arrived, and I got 15 minutes of the funniest stuff you're likely to see on TCTV sometime soonish. Sooner if someone in the community lends me a laptop computer which can edit digital video, hint hint. ;p Drew Hendricks Oly Copwatch (shameless plug) 870-3127 Oh, and they have said lots of stuff about changing the policy at the IT center regarding the loitering rules there. I have a different story from the managers there, they hate the homeless and they intend to keep harrassing groups of people at will, whenever their middle class sensibilities are bruised. We'll just see about that.

I have a laptop, a video came

Submitted by Rick on Sat, 02/04/2006 - 11:50am.

I have a laptop, a video camera, a lavalier mic, and a blog to post the video. You are welcome to use them all.

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