HomeMy WebLinkAbout04-08-24 Public Comment - T. Inscoe - The Gutherie ProjectFrom:teri inscoe
To:Bozeman Public Comment
Subject:[EXTERNAL]The Gutherie Project
Date:Monday, April 8, 2024 11:03:55 PM
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Dear Mayor Cunningham and Bozeman City Council,
Please add my emphatic voice and those of the majority of my SCAN neighbors to thebellowing community chorus imploring you to reassert your authority and oversight of cityplanning & development and to urgently take a long, hard look at The Guthrie project as it iscurrently planned.
As a mother, grandmother, and 3rd generation Bozemanite, whose family moved here in the50’s, with deep roots at MSU and in the downtown community that I love so much, I standaligned with my aging neighbors and the young families in the Whittier School District whosequality of life and safety will be overwhelmed by the scale and nature of this project.
Please understand that I am all in favor of quality, appropriately located, affordable family andworkforce housing that adds true value to the community. We desperately need both inBozeman and Gallatin County! However, The Gutherie, at this Scale, in this particularLocation, designed short-term, transient workforce housing, so near an Elementary school, iswrong-headed in every measure.
Among many issues, of course, the lack of built-in parking is the easiest to argue against. It ispure fantasy to imagine a transient workforce that will not have vehicles. Even if tenants canwalk, bike or carpool to work, this is outdoor Mecca and people get out into nature in their timeoff. And, as we know from the homelessness issues in town, everyone has vehicles at aminimum. This project, without parking, places the entire burden of parking for its tenants onthe long-term residents of this neighborhood and city infrastructure/taxpayers, whilesomehow HBP is rewarded with $Millions in benefits?! What is wrong with this picture? Therewill not be enough parking spaces for the existing residents, if this project goes through. Willour elderly neighbors with mobility issues have to park blocks from their homes when all theparking near their homes is taken? Will young families have to double park to unload kids andstrollers and bikes, then park blocks from their homes when street parking is at capacity?Where will hundreds of The Elm attendees park when 200+ more cars occupy the adjacentmidtown residential street parking they take for granted? (That was also beyond short-sightedas to the parking decision!!)
Now, let’s look at the super small efficiencies/rooms, 350sf with a murphy bed and hotplate.This is not what we mean as a city when we talk about affordable housing for residents, is it?As I understand it, these micro units are intended as short-term, transient workforce housing,not long-term affordable housing, and will not even have the meager amenities of an extendedstay motel kitchen. This is junk housing masquerading as affordable community value. It is noteven respectable accommodations for the intended tenants. If you read between the lines, itsounds like HBP wants to build cheap facilities to cram workers into for short-terms/convert tocheap Air B&Bs, without any consideration for the long-term diminishing quality of thestructure due to cheaper building materials, which will negatively impact the property valuesof the surrounding homes and erode the character of this family-oriented neighborhood.
Most importantly, let’s look at the safety issues, especially considering the children in theneighborhood surrounding the Gutherie site. How much more unsafe will it be for ourprecious children to get to and from school with this exponential increase in foot and vehicletraffic from potentially 200+ new residents/vehicles 3 blocks away from the school? Whatprevents 6 or 8 people from crashing in these rooms? Who will be vetting the criminalbackgrounds of all these short-term tenants with no ties to this community, who move throughthis elementary school neighborhood? Even a cursory review of increased crime stats in otherboom towns where workers move through and do not invest in the community is revealing! The
stats are facts, there will be bad actors! Please do not jeopardize the safety and security oflocal residents to appease a developer’s greed. Who will be liable for the increased crime andany harm to local, long-term residents? Bad things will happen and beyond the pain of it, theCity and HBP will potentially be sued for foreseeable harm and, as a taxpayers, whoforewarned about the dangers of this project, we do not want to subsidize those avoidablelegal costs.
Action to Consider, please:
Please reclaim your authority to oversee City planning and development. We want thesedecisions made by elected officials beholden to the voters, not employees who autonomouslycater to outside developers without consideration of the impact on the quality and characterof historic neighborhoods and the residents who live here.
In the UDC, please require every large-scale development downtown/midtown to buildparking! It’s that easy. Developers will still make a profit! If that is a deal breaker, anotherdeveloper will come along, rest assured.
Please consider a much smaller scale, affordable, multi-family, long-term housing projectwith parking and respectable amenities at this site instead. Temporary workers in short-termhousing do not belong 3 blocks from an elementary school.
Please revive the Community Advisory Board with 1) the authority to conduct CommunityImpact Reviews for large-scale projects in residential neighborhoods, and 2) a real seat andvoice at the table as these proposed projects are reviewed prior to approval.
We voted for you, please Take Care with our historic family neighborhood, they are preciousand dwindling.
Respectfully,Teri Inscoe - SCAN