A newcomer to Bainbridge politics, and a returning veteran to the island’s political scene.
That’s the matchup in the race for the Bainbridge Island City Council’s at-large, District 1 position.
It’s a wide-open race, with the decision of incumbent Councilman Ron Peltier to not seek a second term. But both candidates, Anthony Oddo and Kirsten Hytopoulos jumped into the race before Peltier, battered by ethics complaints over the past year, decided against another run.
Oddo is a relatively new resident on the island, and works as the policy and programs coordinator at Housing Resources Bainbridge. He has been a paralegal for the Department of Justice’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, budget analyst for the Office of Management and Budget, as well as a continuous improvement and project management consultant. Oddo, 34, has a bachelor’s degree (philosophy, politics and economics) from the University of Pennsylvania, and a master’s (public policy) from the Sanford School at Duke University. (His campaign website is at www.AnthonyOddo.org.)
Hytopoulos, 49, is a former Bainbridge councilwoman and mayor, and she served on the council from 2010 to 2013, and is a collaborative attorney and mediator based on Bainbridge. Also, she is a former assistant city attorney for the city of Seattle. Hytopoulos has a bachelor’s degree (political science) and a law degree from theUniversity of Arizona. (Her campaign website is at www.kirstenforcouncil2019.com.)
* Transcripts edited for length and clarity.
Kirsten Hytopoulos
BIR: You stepped away, you didn’t want to run for a consecutive term. So why now?
KH: Well, I might very well have run right away then, because I actually liked serving on council. But I had gotten divorced four months into, or separated and then divorced, four months into my council term. And I had to start a law practice; I was the single mother of three kids, who were still quite young, still even after my term.
So, I took time off.
I mean, there was just no question I was going to focus on my business and my kids. So that took me off council.
And what’s brought me back to council is a combination of the fact that we’re going out for a new city manager. And that’s such a critical, critical opportunity.
As well as continuing to believe that there’s disconnect between city hall and the community, reflected in development in particular.
And just the need to, the desire, to join the council doing the good stuff they are doing. Like addressing climate change and environmental issues and non-motorized transportation. Knock on wood.
BIR: You just mentioned the disconnect. Expand on that a little bit. What exactly is the disconnect between the city…?
KH: Well, what I feel, I think the easiest thing to point to in this election … although I think you have a different opinion about the Winslow Hotel…
BIR: I don’t have an opinion, no.
KH: The Winslow Hotel is a very good example of where we have a code in place. We have a comprehensive plan that our staff should understand what, what we intend to do with the Winslow Master Plan. How the code should be enforced in the Winslow Master Plan; what we’re looking for.
And for the staff to be championing an 87-room hotel with all sorts of other amenities in an area that is zoned for a 15-room inn, is an example to me of an extreme use being promoted by staff, as opposed to, just walked through the process by staff.
And to me, that’s a good example of not getting what the community’s looking for. I think it’s a great example because it’s so extreme.
BIR: Let me push back on that. A 15-room inn would be allowed, but so would a hotel over 15 rooms. A whole bunch of other things could be allowed, due to the zoning. So if it’s allowed under the zoning …
KH: It’s not allowed. It’s conditional use.
BIR: A conditional use is still a permit, though.
KH: Right. But it doesn’t mean anything can be conditioned into validity, right? You can say, I am going to build a 500-room hotel. I mean, there’s a point at which there’s no way that there are conditions that can be applied to a project to make it comply with what a conditional use requires.
So my feeling is that an 87-room hotel with a banquet, you know, with a banquet facility, a spa, a restaurant, an outdoor entertaining area — that level of use is so high.
Again, I’m not saying.
The staff has to walk it through. That’s fine.
But … the applicant has the right to say, hey, I am going to condition it.
You can impose conditions, I will do them if this is going to work.
The difference is — staff championing it.
There’s a difference, coming forward and saying, “This is so great, and this is what we need.” And trying to help facilitate it. Because I think it’s so contrary to what our community has clearly stated.
And we’ll see what the hearing examiner says. Maybe the hearing examiner will say that you can actually condition that use to be consistent… with the adjacent uses, legally. That it can be conditioned into something appropriate.
BIR: Don’t want to dwell on this, but the developers have said, well, this property could be developed much more intensely than a hotel.
KH: I would say, and of course this gets into details that we can’t get into, but I mean, I would say that there’s a big difference between … what we actually want. We have to figure out how to put tons of housing in downtown. And a housing development, a condo building or whatever you want to call it, apartments, aren’t going to have some of the worst impacts that the hotel — which are the periodic, huge impacts, for example — you’re going to have constant people coming, going, typical of the housing use. And that’s different than having hundreds of people show up in one fell swoop off the ferry down Winslow Way.
The responses to criticisms from the community have been somewhat disingenuous. That if someone is opposed to an 87-room hotel, they think there is going to be a park there or there’s going to be like 10 houses there.
That doesn’t follow.
So, it’s that particular use that I think, most of the people I’ve talked to in the community, feel is excessive. That does not mean that they think there shouldn’t be intensive housing there. Maybe mixed use, perhaps, on the bottom.
That meets what we are trying to do in Winslow. And that serves the local community.
BIR: Has the whole specter of development on the island been overblown?
KH: For me, there’s two things. There’s the nature of the development, right? Are we building McMansions, you know, lot line to lot line? And there’s the long-term impact of the numbers coming; it’s not just today.
So, I think we all have concerns about what could we do differently in the code, and I think the council has been trying to address that, not to wind up with the kind of development that we don’t think is in line with the community.
It’s not just, when I express concern about growth, it’s not just the growth that comes this year or next year, it’s how we’re planning for the growth that comes, you know, the next four decades. And that we do it right.
I don’t think that’s overblown.
One of the big issues is, do we have a council and a city staff, and a city manager, who are working to accept the minimal amount of growth that we have to accept to, regionally? Versus seeking to increase density beyond what we need to do.
That’s where, I think, the rubber is going to hit the road in the next year.
BIR: You said, “I believe the city’s role is to mitigate growth, not enable it, and to make development pay for its impacts.” What are you exactly saying, by “enable”?
KH: In other words, for example, to upzone beyond our next growth horizon, and our projected population.
From my understanding, we will, in this next round, with Vision 2050, we will likely wind up with more growth projection than we have capacity for.
So we will probably have to upzone. It’s kind of inevitable in this round, I think.
If we were to have to upzone [for] 3,000 [people], that’s one thing. But to say, we want to upzone 8,000, because we want to do inclusionary zoning and we want to get 800 units … of affordable housing, that would be a difference.
That would be promoting growth.
BIR: What do you think about relaxing building heights, and going up to get more density?
KH: I think that is one area that makes sense. I think it’s all in the numbers, probably, right? Are we talking five stories? I don’t know.
But if anything, in Winslow, especially districts within Winslow, but that makes a lot of sense.
And I think it’s weighing the overall impact on the immediate area, the surrounding area. But, yes, I think that makes sense to look at.
BIR: Speaking of downtown, what would you like to see happen to the old police building?
KH: I would definitely prefer that to be either a public use or affordable housing or something that, basically anything other than more market-rate housing, quite frankly. To have people come in and be greeted right there at the entrance to our community by luxury apartments, I think would be a real shame.
I’ve always thought that it made sense as a transit area.
I’d say some sort of public use, or ideally, affordable housing would be great.
BIR: So, not surplusing and selling to a private developer.
KH: That is something that I’ve always been concerned would happen, and we wind end up with something like what I’m talking about.
I’m not 100 percent committed. But my preference would be, that it would be something that would benefit the community, either because it was a public use or affordable housing. It meets some sort of community need on some level, rather that further gentrifying the island. And further emphasizing us as a future Mercer Island.
But I recognize the need for us to actually generate revenue, too.
Anthony Oddo
BIR: You said you’d have an emphasis on respectful, collaborative decision-making. Expand on that; define what that means to you.
AO: I have been struck by these candidate forums, and in general, in talking to people, often we find that there isn’t a huge amount of policy difference between the candidates across the dais.
It does often feel like, almost like, a case interview, where it’s your method of thinking and the way that you approach a problem, as opposed to the actual, specific decision that you arrive at. By bringing skills that I’ve developed as a manager who’s led consulting projects, as someone who has served on boards, and actually had to work with other members of what is essentially a team — which would then be the city council — and come to a decision, but doing that through the building of consensus.
That kind of requires being able to certainly understand the people that you are aligned with, and what’s in their mind, but more importantly, what’s in the mind of someone and with people that you disagree with.
Because, first, if you understand where they’re coming from, it makes it a lot harder to just go to the instant, kind of a negative, or just be against them. And instead focus on what is — and listening really is the skill that’s most crucial here — what are your concerns and how can we work together.
I’m not saying that is at all necessarily lacking in the everyday business of the city council today, but it really strikes me as sort of the essential skill to have. And when we’re talking about things … there are going to be this whole spectrum of policy, some that really divide the council and really divide the community, but the vast majority, it’s really just kind of trying to all form a consensus about what’s best for the community.
BIR: Related question. You said, “As your council member, I will work to ensure everyone who calls Bainbridge home has the opportunity to thrive and is respected by the council.” We’re getting back to that word, respect. It leads to the impression that, in some regard, there has been some lack of respect.
AO: The seven people up there need to be the models for civility and respect in the community.
Absolutely, in the past, councilmembers have failed to do that. And it’s cliche, but yes, you should hold yourself to a higher standard. Because you are in public office. And if not the people in public office, then who can be the good models for good behavior?
So that’s what I mean by that.
A way to further that respect of the citizens is to listen in a way that indicates you hear a concern. So, there isn’t always the chance to go and give a back-and-forth at city hall, because public comment is always one way. But there have to be other forums and opportunities for the council to be able to respond in some ways. And I think that happens, certainly, if you’ve got emails, or ward meetings, or you interact with someone personally.
But I would also like to see the council do a better job of sort of explaining the why of a decision. And we don’t ever know, as a private citizen and not someone who has been elected, I don’t know and we’re not privy to the number of emails that they all get or the phone calls they get, but I think what I would try to do if elected is really practice the skill of listening by explaining how I arrived at a decision.
People often, they kind of agree or don’t agree with a decision made, but what they definitely don’t understand is how or why the decision was made.
And so, explaining the thought process — and maybe that does require, then, the council spending a little bit more time working through something, so that it is more transparent in the decision-making process.
Delving deeper into how, collectively, we’ve arrived at this decision.
BIR: You’ve said, “I will focus on creative solutions to preserve and expand affordable housing, improve non-motorized transit.” What sort of creative solutions are you referencing there?
AO: The affordable housing task force report calls for “innovative solutions,” is their term.
Affordable housing projects; we don’t have a lot of them. Because they are expensive and costly to build. And they have a number of hurdles that you have to get through.
So what I’m proposing here is sort of a uniquely Bainbridge solution. So when a private group … wants to do some sort of housing project, but there would be no taxpayer funding required, no city funding — but they would require a zoning change. That’s more of a policy decision.
So really fostering and allowing — and being accepting of — innovative solutions for a problem that the city itself has identified that maybe the city isn’t always able to fully address it, because we don’t have the financial resources. But there’s a policy change that needs to be made. And so, rather than saying, we won’t make that policy change because it sets a dangerous precedent or we’re worried about a slippery slope, let’s explore that as a community. And say, these are the constraints with which we are going to operate, and change this policy, so we can potentially see something innovative come through.
I am always struck, each day, by kind of the social, intellectual, financial capital that exists on Bainbridge Island. So things like Suzuki has unanswered questions in the feasibility study about where certain amounts of funding will come from. But what could be a creative solution is exploring what other avenues within the community are there to fill gaps in the future on projects that have similar funding constraints.
BIR: You mentioned Suzuki. Would you be able to vote on affordable housing issues, or is that a conflict given your position at HRB? Suzuki in particular, or elsewhere?
AO: On Suzuki, no, I feel that I would not be able to vote on that project because of the conflict with HRB. And that will come up on a number of other issues throughout the year, particularly when they have to do with community services funding or other granting of specific funds to HRB. I would absolutely recuse myself.
I would hope, regardless, I would be able to offer a perspective on general affordable housing policies, particularly things that aren’t specific to Housing Resources Bainbridge. Because there are quite a few — even recommendations with the new affordable housing task force. For example, with respect to ADUs [accessory dwelling units], one of the things they proposed was off-the-shelf pre-approved plans and designs that just might make it a little less costly for homeowners. I would certainly hope to add my voice to that sort of discussion, because it doesn’t impact HRB.
BIR: What’s been the biggest eye-opener for you? You’ve seen some of the sausage made.
AO: [Laughs.] Most of my work has been with not necessarily the politicians themselves, the policy-makers, but more the administrative implementors. And when Congress or the state legislature, they pass a law, it goes to the agency to write these very specific rules. I’m always struck by, in general, how appreciative the vast majority of people of the work and the role that government plays. It can feel like something very contentious, at a policy level, that can feel divisive, and yet, when the rules are actually written — if they’re done well — most people seem pretty open to that.
BIR: Bring that to the Bainbridge level, if you can. You said generally appreciative. How do you think most residents view city hall, or their city government? Or maybe not “most,” but …
AO: It’s hard to speak for most. I don’t know, I haven’t talked to most.
BIR: Are you door-belling?
AO: I am canvassing and door-belling.
BIR: Did you hear from anyone who said, “The Bainbridge council, that’s a snake pit. Why would you ever want to be involved in Bainbridge politics?” Did you get that from anyone?
AO: Yes. Yes.
BIR: And your response was?
AO: I got that response when I would share with people I was thinking about doing it.
That, in some ways, was motivating to continue pursuing the position. And it was because I was disappointed and didn’t want to live in a community where that’s the perception of its city council. That was the most disappointing, and motivating, factor — was that people would actually say to me how you described it.
There’s a real consensus. Our natural environment was great; this is a very welcoming community. And there’s this disconnect between city hall and everything else. So it’s incumbent on us to fix that disconnect at city hall. Because what we have outside city hall is so great, already.
