 In September 2013, a one year moratorium was put in place for marijuana-related retail businesses in the city of Auburn. That year allowed the Planning Commission to study the issue, hold a public hearing, and finally make a recommendation to your City Council on how to move forward. On Tuesday night - without much ado - City Council voted 5-2 to approve marijuana-related retail to be located in Auburn. (read ordinance No. 6525) I will admit some surprise because during the workshop held earlier this year and the public hearing a little over a month ago there was very little public comment and at Monday's council meeting absolutely no public comment.
As it stands in Auburn, the state granted two retail recreational marijuana businesses here as well as authorization for with producers and processors in July 2013. We will continue to work toward making the best decisions for Auburn on this issue!
 Teen/Community Center Planning
Wednesday morning brought the architects that we will be working with on the new Teen/Community Center to city hall. We are so excited to begin the design phase of the next great addition to Les Gove Community Campus! In the very near future there will be opportunities for you to be involved in the brainstorming and I hope you join us (in the meantime, this week’s “What Would You Do?” will be dedicated to this). We’ll be scheduling the dates and letting you know when they are. We often hear that there isn’t enough for teens to do in our community. Your City Council and I are confident that this new “multi-generational” facility will help answer that need. The project has a cap of $9 million and we received $3 million as a grant from the State of Washington (huge thank you to Senator Joe Fain for his role in securing the funding!). The remaining funding was secured during the 2013-2014 budget, so there will be absolutely no financing involved. This plan is to have the beautiful and functional new additions open by Kids Day 2016!
 We continue to have monthly meetings with the Auburn Area Chamber of Commerce on subjects of interest for each of us. We take turns hosting and setting the agenda. This month we hosted at city hall and the topics included an overview of our upcoming biennial budget and discussion on how to help our local businesses with façade improvements as well as other opportunities.
We also meet with the Auburn Downtown Association and topics are often similar to those we discuss with the Chamber. Laura Westergard, Executive Director of the ADA (pictured above middle) is very active with the downtown businesses, and it’s always fun to meet with her and hear about the exciting events that are upcoming. Don’t forget the Autumn Art Walk and Wine Tasting tonight, Friday, Sept. 5th from 5-9 pm on Main St.
What would you do?
What type of programming would you like to see at the future Teen & Community Centers at Les Gove Community Campus?
What do you think? Please let me know.
For those that would like to see the feedback from previous questions, you can view that here.
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