By Kevin Hanson-The Courier-Herald
Needing an influx of cash to pay for additions to city staff, Black Diamond is turning to the giant lurking just outside its door.
The giant, in this case, is the Yarrow Bay Group. Already one of the larger developers in the Puget Sound Region, the company is in the early stages of creating housing developments that could add thousands of residents to the historic King County mining town.
The formula is simple, really. Yarrow Bay has both money and a desire to develop. Black Diamond is welcoming the development, but cannot make it happen without additional employees. And that requires money.
“They've been around long enough to know how these things work,” said Rick Luther, Black Diamond's longtime police chief and interim city administrator. “It wasn't too big a leap to recognize our needs.”
Luther said both the city and Yarrow Bay understand nothing will happen without an up-front financial boost. The still-sleepy city has been operating with a bare-bones employee roster, having seen several key employees depart during the past year or so. Things might hum along if everything stayed the same, but Black Diamond knows big things are in the offing.
By the end of the year, Luther said, new zoning regulations should be in place and an update of the city's comprehensive plan should be completed. It's anticipated public hearings will take place and the City Council will take action.
Then, the floodgates are expected to open.
Once the municipal paperwork has been completed, Yarrow Bay will be able to jump in with both feet.
To handle the anticipated demand for services, the city needs a full complement of employees. Most likely to be added, Luther said, are a city administrator, senior planner, senior engineer, finance director and, finally, a land steward. That final position isn't found in every community, but it's seen as important in Black Diamond, Luther said, where there has been “a long history of issues” involving the city and the environment.
The land steward, he said, “would closely monitor the effects of development. As you cut down trees, those things become an issue.”
Luther's goal is to see the fleet of new municipal employees brought on board by the end of the year. That's an ambitious goal, he realizes, noting that an outside agency could be hired to help with the selection process.
The city lacks the money to pay for additional workers, so a tentative agreement has been reached in which Yarrow Bay would put up money that would fund new salaries and benefits.
A system will be developed in which the developer will slowly recoup its money from fees charged to those who actually build the homes in Yarrow Bay's developments.
Yarrow Bay has indicated plans for two developments, Lawson Hill on the city's east side and The Villages on the west. Lawson Hills is seen as primarily residential, while The Villages is envisioned as a larger area complete with commercial and retail development. Luther said Lawson Hills could eventually include approximately 1,200 homes while the second development, off the Auburn-Black Diamond Road, could range between 2,500 and 3,500 units.
Given the amount of work the city still needs to accomplish, plus the hurdles Yarrow Bay would have to clear, Luther figures construction will not begin until at least the middle of 2009.
Kevin Hanson can be reached at khanson@courierherald.com.
