The Maple Valley Planning Commission is in the middle of discussing and revising the city’s comprehensive plan. Required by the state’s Growth Management Act, the plan includes a set of policies that outlines the future land use and the overall look and feel of the community.

The Planning Commission updates the comprehensive plan about every seven years with their recommendations, but the City Council has the final say in whether those changes are adopted. Changes can also be made to the comprehensive plan on an annual basis.

One of the changes proposed in this year’s plan update is to rezone about six parcels of land on the north end of town from its current designation of service commercial to a mix of medium and high density residential.

The land in question – approximately 35 acres – was purchased in conjunction with a lot more land in the late ‘60s by Lois Brandt and her late husband Harold, which is why it is commonly referred to as the Brandt property.

Brandt’s daughter, Cheryl Castagna, and her husband Bob Castagna manage the property.

According to the family, in 1997 when the property was under King County’s jurisdiction, it was zoned for single family home construction, not commercial purposes. In 1999, after the property was annexed into the city, it was zoned as multiple use in the city’s first comprehensive plan.

This allowed for both residential and commercial uses, which seemed like a pretty flexible option, Bob Castagna said.

However, this zoning designation turned out to be one of the least flexible options. He said as part of that designation they needed to have an entire master plan created prior to doing anything on the property.

“We had to design all the buildings, the signage…the lighting,” he said in an interview.

Jeff Potter of Integrity Land described it as “unrealistic and economically unviable.”

Then in 2012, Bob Castagna said they were approached by a company that was interested in putting an employment center on the property. With this in mind, the family asked the city to rezone the property to service commercial. But, after the zoning was changed, the deal with the company fell through.

“They were not able to come through with their end of the project,” he said.

Since then, Bob Castagna said, the family has had a hard time sparking interest in potential employers.

“There’s so much competition out there with those kinds of uses,” he said.  “We’re competing regionally against a lot of municipalities that have a leg up on Maple Valley…. Because of their existing infrastructure.”

As a result, the family turned their attention to the other side of development – residential.

Currently, the family is in negotiations with Curtis Lang of Curtis Lang Custom Homes and Potter, on a land purchase agreement.

If the City Council approves the planning commission’s recommended comprehensive plan, the land would be on track to become a mix of medium and high density residential uses.

Lang said his goal is to focus on building homes that would attract a retirement community to the city.

“Although it doesn’t seem like everybody’s plans line up the same, we all want growth,” he said.

Lang, Potter and Bob Castagna agreed this type of community would mitigate some of the concerns brought up by community members; overpopulated schools, more traffic and no daytime population.

Lang echoed Councilman Dana Parnello’s remarks he made at the March 9 City Council meeting – which was a joint meeting with the Planning Commission – and said multi-family complexes attract smaller families and therefore less kids.

“High density actually has a much lower likely impact on the school district,” Parnello said at the meeting.

In a phone interview Tuesday, Parnello said he believes the city should be cognizant of what homeowners could have reasonably expected from any development on properties adjacent to their homes.

“We need to have logical adjacency,” he said.

Councilman Layne Barnes, who serves on the King County Growth Management Planning Council, said at the same meeting the city has exceeded its housing target.

“They have certain targets for how many housing units should be built, and also targets for employment,” he said. “Those are the two major key elements. We are probably under the amount for employment…but we have exceeded our housing targets.”

Potter said an employment center would be a good fit for the city, but that is probably a few years down the line. He said in order to draw potential employers here, the city needs more rooftops.

Cheryl Castagna agreed and said the city needs more people so current businesses can grow.

Bob Castagna added that retirement communities bring a higher daytime population to the area, and less morning commute traffic when compared to an employment center.

If the City Council approves the Planning Commission’s recommendation to designate the property as residential and the subsequent rezoning occurs, construction of Lang’s plan for developing that property is still probably 3-5 years out, he said.

But, that plan also driven by the market, too, Potter said.

Potter, Lang, and the Castagnas haven’t gotten to the point of fine-tuning details of their plan. Hence, the types of homes on the 35 acres could range from townhomes, condos, apartments or a mix of all of those.