Q. What is the mission of OLY 2012?
A. OLY 2012 believes that downtown Olympia is a unique and special place that has managed, despite the odds, to hold on to its distinctiveness and character throughout the myriad of approaches to urban planning that American cities have faced over the last half century. However, while downtown Olympia has succeeded in avoiding the pitfalls of these movements,
OLY 2012 believes Olympia has also sacrificed benefiting from some of the more positive elements associated with these movements as well. In being rightfully cautious about the negative effects growth can cause, downtown Olympia has inadvertently developed an environment that makes it difficult for local businesses to sustain themselves and for private developers to justify investing dollars.
OLY 2012 believes that downtown Olympia needs, more than anything else, higher housing density – both affordable and market rate. Other amenities that support housing density, such as parks, traffic & parking plans, public utilities, and retail businesses must also be developed to support housing. Furthermore, downtown’s other purposes, including commercial and industrial use, must be carefully weighed and balanced with residential development. Finally, if real progress is to be made it is imperative that thoughtful architectural design and environmentally sustainable building standards are used in downtown’s redevlopment process so that the unique character, historic detail, and environmental leadership that Olympia has fought so hard to protect over the last several decades is not sacrificed.
Achieving these things is not only a key to making downtown a place that is more vibrant and appealing to all members of the community, but a necessity for our region to accommodate the population growth that it will face over the next several decades.
It is OLY 2012’s mission to help ensure that real progress between now and 2012 is made toward achieving these needs.
Q. What will OLY 2012 actually do to pursue its mission?
A. The OLY 2012 steering committee will choose to address key issues facing downtown as they enter the community’s consciousness. We will also bring new ideas to the City to promot our mission and goals. We plan to address each issue through rigorous and balanced research. Ultimately, we will draft and publish a position paper for each issue we take on detailing our research, conclusions and recommendations. Our research will draw from a wide-ranging number of sources including professional experts, city and regional government and management, local community leaders, and the supporters of the OLY 2012 network.
The conclusions reached in our position papers, whatever they may be, may only appeal to part of the community, but our hope is that by supporting our conclusions with well-informed, well-reasoned, and well-rounded ideas, we will help drive constructive conversation within the community – even from those who oppose our views.
Q. Do the conclusions reached by the OLY 2012 steering committee reflect the opinions of everyone who chooses to get involved with OLY 2012?
A. No. The conclusions reached in OLY 2012’s position papers reflect the opinions of the OLY 2012 steering committee itself. As such, OLY 2012 fully acknowledges that it cannot reflect the opinions of each and every per who chooses to get involved with OLY 2012 on every issue that comes to the table – but therein lies its beauty: OLY 2012 provides every individual with the power (and hopefully some sound reasoning) to reach their own conclusions and take their own action. Our hope is that those who choose to get involved can disagree with some of the individual conclusions we reach as a steering committee, while at the same time lending their support for the overarching mission of our organization: to make downtown a better place.
Q. Are the members of the OLY 2012 steering committee residents of downtown?
A. No. But, all six members of the steering committee are Thurston County residents, most of us live very near downtown, some of us work downtown, and all of us use downtown frequently. It should go without saying that we all harbor a deep passion for downtown, care immensely for its future, and want to see it reach its full potential.
We recognize that downtown Olympia is not exclusively the property of Olympia citizens and that all who visit downtown should have a voice in its future. We do not require that supporters of our organization – nor future steering committee members – be official citizens of the City of Olympia. But, sharing a love of downtown is a pre-requisite.
For more information on our steering committee, please see the Who We Are section of our website:.
Q. Is OLY 2012 steered by, financially supported by or otherwise influenced by anyone in the real estate or real estate development sectors of the economy?
A. No. The founders of OLY 2012 decided early-on its formation that its steering committee must exclude anyone who stands to directly profit from future downtown development. Along those same lines, no one that is currently elected to, employed by, or otherwise involved in the governing or managing bodies of our city or region can become a member of our steering committee.
Q. Is OLY 2012 associated in anyway with the Tri-Way project aimed at developing the downtown Isthmus?
A. No. The genesis of our organization began months before that project was ever publically proposed. OLY 2012 does not have (and has never had) any ties with that organization or its project whatsoever.
Q. Can anyone get involved with OLY 2012, even if they work in city government/city management or in the real estate profession?
A. Yes. Getting involved with OLY 2012 simply means that you want to stay informed on issues related to downtown, be part of the conversation, and learn what you can do to take action. Everyone in our community has a stake in downtown and all thoughts, opinions and needs should be heard. OLY 2012 strives to help facilitate the conversation by being inclusive of all parts of the community.
To get involved now, please click here.
Q. After more than a year working as an organization, how has your aproach changed?
When OLY2012 first formed in the fall of 2007, never could we have imagined how exciting and eventful our first year in operation would play out. Though our group took on several important issues, including The Capitol City District, The Hands On Children’s Museum, and House Bill 1016 (a bill which would have placed the Mayor of Olympia on the capitol campus design advisory committee), it was, of course, the The Isthmus Rezone that took by far the majority of our time.
On one hand, this highly public and polarizing issue allowed us to demonstrate our approach and establish credibility as a new voice in the community. On the other hand, the controversial nature of the rezone issue polarized citizens and, thus, undermined our initial objective of “building a broad-based and well-informed network of community support to realize the potential for a beautiful and unique downtown between now and 2012.”
As we move into a new year, we continue to embrace our mission of building a broad, grassroots coalition of people who want to move downtown in a positive direction. But we recognize that achieving that objective will take patience, persistence, and be accomplished only over time. We have confidence that as less polarizing issues and ideas come up, the value of our organization will appeal to an increasingly broad segment of our community. We will continue to recruit support for our organization and its mission as we move ahead on those issues.
In the meantime, our steering committee will continue to pursue issues the way we did in our inaugural year: by working closely with citizens, groups and officials throughout the community; by writing position papers and opinions on specific issues; and by taking direct action as a steering committee at hearings and other public forums.
