New Olympia grass-roots group promotes full-scale, community-based, and non-local professional planning effort for downtown to begin in 2009.

author : 20/20 Vision Olympia topic : Olympia developement

by 20/20 Vision Olympia

20/20 Vision Olympia was originally born out of concern surrounding the proposed height rezone on the downtown isthmus.

Who is signing on to 20/20 Vision Olympia?

We are citizens who have entrusted city planners and decision-makers to care for Olympia, but who now believe that: (1) professional planning intervention for the downtown is essential; and (2) the proposed high-rise condominium development on the isthmus will degrade not only the historical aesthetic vision for our state capital, but also the present-day beauty and essence of our downtown.

What does 20/20 Vision Olympia hope to accomplish?

Olympia is blessed by its incomparable physical surroundings and its very caring and engaged citizenry. 20/20 is grateful for the myriad, Herculean planning efforts that have thus far shaped our downtown. However, before the isthmus question is resolved, we want our city council, ideally in partnership with our state government, to become even better advocates for our capital city by funding a planning, design, and implementation effort that would ensure that all of Olympia’s disparate stakeholders (citizens groups, elected leaders, governing agencies, and investors) will have the opportunity--starting in 2009--to work together to make a concrete and specific blueprint for a downtown that: (1) supports our merchants and businesses; (2) offers an appropriate level of market rate housing in a sustainable and livable setting; (3) addresses public open spaces, including the waterfront and state capitol campus; and (4) promotes an ever-higher quality of life for all Olympians.

To engender the trust of all our city’s disparate stakeholders, we believe the professional planning and design consultant/team should, for the sake of optimum fairness and neutrality, be based outside of Olympia. We further believe that their most critical aim must be to conceive a downtown whose physical legacy of beauty, timelessness, sustainability, and architectural integrity--and its uniquely creative spirit--inspire future citizens and care-takers of Olympia for several generations to come.

We look forward to a not-too-distant future when Olympia is widely acknowledged to be one of the most beautiful and economically vibrant cities in the Pacific Northwest--and one of the best places to live in the entire country.

www.2020visionolympia.org

MEDIA CONTACT

Kris Goddard

360.915.7303

kandjgoddard@comcast.net