Reporter ISSAQUAH | SAMMAMISH
Friday, July 13, 2012
www.issaquahreporter.com
City mourns Former Issaquah councilmember Maureen McCarry dies
Tim Lee, CEO of Lakeside Industries, stands in front of an asphalt mixer at the base of a gravel pit, which he envisions someday to be a hillside neighborhood and business district.
BY CELESTE GRACEY CGRACEY@ISSAQUAHREPORTER.COM
CELESTE GRACEY, Issaquah & Sammamish Reporter
Meet the Neighbors
Seen but never heard, Lakeside Industry’s gravel mine to become a neighborhood BY CELESTE GRACEY CGRACEY@ISSAQUAHREPORTER.COM
I
n the mining business, the best neighbors are the ones you never knew you had. For about 60 years, Lakeside Industries has been that quiet neighbor to Issaquah. They hide their work, a constant crushing and sorting of rock, behind layers of trees and sweep the streets after their trucks.
As its hillside mine, which butts up against the Highlands, grows smaller with each bite of a backhoe, the construction and mining company has grown ever more concerned about how it will leave its spent land. The state requires the company to take steps to prevent landslides, such as planting vegetation. However, CEO Tim Lee is hoping to leave something better than the obtrusive facade behind the nearby Fred Meyer. Once the site of another company’s gravel mine, a wooden barrier, which holds up a barren hill, threatens collapse unless the city acts
“We are making decisions today for the future.” – Tim Lee, Lakeside CEO in the next decade. Instead Lee envisions a hillside community with homes, parks and businesses. He’s ready to be a new kind of neighbor. The kind that leaves a legacy.
The agreement Lakeside set an ambitious goal to draft a 30year development agreement by the end of the year. Such a plan would give future landowners pre-approval to build and the city more control over the development. The company, however, is already behind
schedule. Lakeside and its gravel pit were so unfamiliar to the Urban Village Development Commission that consultants made little headway during their initial proposal. The UVDC needed to better understand the new concept of planning a development agreement for land that will continue to change until the mine is dry, said Keith Niven, who is working on the agreement for the city. Once the million-dollar development agreement is signed, the Lees would likely build a SEE LAKESIDE, 11
Longtime community leader Maureen McCarry died from Lou Gehrig’s disease July 4, just 18 months after stepping down from Issaquah City Council. She was 62. McCarry was known for her work conserving land and preventing the controversial southeast bypass projMaureen ect. Her last McCarry vote on City Council was to conserve Park Point, a complicated deal she spearheaded. A few months later, she won the city’s prestigious Ruth Kees award for her work with the environment. She used the city’s growth as a way to conserve forests. One became her namesake – McCarry Woods. When Mayor Ava Frisinger announced the honor, McCarry wrote her a letter that talked about the importance of listening to people. “She was really in-tuned to the citizens of our community,” Frisinger said. Even after she lost her voice, SEE MCCARRY, 6
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