City planners want to simplify development. Residents worry that retiring neighborhood plans means loss of vo

Outdated plan structure, with 434 subareas, contributes to zoning code quagmire

Before the City of Bellingham had a comprehensive plan, it had neighborhood plans: documents that laid out residents’ visions and goals for an area’s character, infrastructure, design and density.

Since being introduced in 1980, the number of plans has ballooned to 25, with 434 distinct subareas governed by different land use policies and zoning regulations.

To some residents, these documents represent grassroots community planning and neighborhood activism at its best. But others say the plans represent the power of being the loudest voice in the room, the privilege of having time to organize, and the expertise to toe off against local government. And city officials believe they represent an outdated and complicated form of infrastructure planning, now better represented by regularly updated citywide plans.

That’s what city planners told the Bellingham City Council earlier this year as they explained the intention to retire the 25 neighborhood plans as part of the once-a-decade comprehensive plan update.

Complexity and cost

Each of the 25 plans is due for an update, which would be a major lift for city staff.

Because of sweeping state legislation that enables more types of housing in what was previously deemed “single-family residential,” many of the concepts in the neighborhood plans are obsolete.

And much of the content in the plans related to traffic, pedestrian and bike networks, utilities, parks and other community infrastructure is redundant or out of date, having migrated to citywide plans.

The extra layer of zones and regulations in each neighborhood subarea present administrative challenges and are difficult for the community and developers to understand. Essentially, it takes an expert to parse the zoning code, long-range planning manager Chris Behee told council in May.

Ali Taysi is one of those experts. His company, AVT Consulting, helps developers navigate the city’s labyrinthine land use approval and permitting process. He believes the city has done a good job being proactive about state legislation and has made strides in cutting down red tape in the last five years, but he’d like to see even more simplification in the code.

He thinks that neighborhood plans, when misused, can contribute to the “balkanization of the city.” He’ll be happy to see the plans eliminated because he finds them to be unnecessary and thinks they create false expectations within neighborhoods.

“There are literally hundreds of little unique polygons, each with its own micro-regulations,” Taysi said. “It adds a degree of complexity that’s very hard for the layperson to understand.”

It also contributes to the housing affordability crisis.

“Time is money,” Taysi said. “The government can’t control the cost of labor or materials or lending, but the one thing they can control is time, and unpredictability in process generates cost through time.”

Not only does complexity burden applicants with additional expense, it costs the city in staff time when reviewing projects.

A 2023 state law requires streamlined permit review processes, and the law has teeth. As of January, jurisdictions have to partially refund application fees if they fail to meet permit review deadlines.

Last year it took, on average, 167 calendar days to process complex permits like subdivisions and multi-family housing developments, according to a 2024 city performance report. (The report didn’t include smaller housing projects.)

Mayor Kim Lund in her November 2024 housing executive order called on the development review team to identify roadblocks and reduce inefficiencies and complexity in the city’s permitting process.

Neighborhood plans valued for specifics

But the people who drafted those neighborhood plans believe the level of detail isn’t just red tape for red tape’s sake.

Before running for office, city council member Lisa Anderson served on the board of the York Neighborhood Association. York is one of the city’s older neighborhoods, with well-preserved historic houses and a strong group of advocates.

The neighborhood association has won funding to build and renovate parks, persuaded the city to install pedestrian safety improvements, helped drive the Samish Way Urban Village initiative and negotiated code modifications to enable new housing projects near downtown.

“The value of neighborhood planning is that the residents there know the intimate details of their neighborhood — what is lacking, what the attributes are,” Anderson said. “They can help guide the future of that neighborhood.”

Anderson is worried some subtleties may be lost when the neighborhood plans are retired. One example she pointed to: The Silver Beach plan discourages lawn planting because it attracts Canadian geese, which contribute to Lake Whatcom’s pollution problem.

“That’s a little section of the plan that doesn’t fit with broader categories,” she said. “Where do we put that community knowledge?”

City planners: Improve equity across neighborhoods

City planners say one reason for retiring the plans is to improve equity across neighborhoods.

“Cities are organic beings,” Bellingham Planning and Community Development Director Blake Lyon said. “They’re dynamic, always evolving and changing. We’re trying to make sure we have fairness and consistency across the city, while also adjusting and adapting to state law.”

Some of the plans are dozens of pages long, with granular details about community character and guidance for future city actions. Others are shorter and less detailed, and some haven’t been updated since adoption. The variability stems largely from which neighborhoods have historically had residents, mainly property owners, who felt empowered to advocate for themselves.

Tammi Laninga, an associate professor of urban and environmental planning at Western Washington University, acknowledged there can be resistance among community members to zoning changes that increase density or loosen restrictions in their neighborhoods.

Laninga recently led a cross-university course in which students helped the state Department of Commerce create a state zoning atlas where users can compare land use regulations across jurisdictions in Washington to find out where barriers to housing exist.

Students had to gather zoning information from city and county websites, then try and standardize all those disparate zones into more general categories. In the case of Bellingham, that took a long time, Laninga said. But she’s encouraged by the trend of simplifying codes.

“Some codes are so complicated they don’t even make sense anymore,” she said. “A code becoming simpler allows for a wider variety of uses in a bigger area.”

Laninga noted the Lettered Streets neighborhood is a “living example” of the coexistence of different housing styles and commercial uses — many of which were built before World War II but would no longer be allowed by current Bellingham code.

With the council’s passage of an ordinance in March that allows middle housing, such as duplexes and cottage courts, in all residential zones except in the Lake Whatcom watershed, the Lettered Streets example will once again be possible.

And in 2026, city planners hope to work on code updates that will allow small-scale commercial uses — like corner stores and coffee shops — in residential zones, a request they heard repeatedly from the public during the comprehensive planning process.

“People are recognizing and realizing — we need housing, and it’s really great if we can have services nearby,” Laninga said.

Anderson said that even though community members who have been very invested in their neighborhoods may have concerns about change, updating the city code is a “wonderful opportunity” to address Bellingham’s growing pains as it transitions from a small to a medium-sized city.

“Community isn’t always our houses or where our park is located — it’s our neighbors, it’s the people around us,” she said. “I think the housing changes on the way will create more opportunity for people to come into our community and contribute to that vibrancy that we enjoy currently.”

Bellingham residents can review the city’s draft 2025 comprehensive plan and provide comments via email to thebellinghamplan@cob.org. The Bellingham Planning Commission is holding a public hearing on the draft plan at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 18 in the city council chambers at 210 Lottie Street.

Julia Tellman writes about civic issues and anything else that happens to cross her desk; contact her at juliatellman@cascadiadaily.com.