Key land swap up for vote tonight

By RALPH BARTHOLDT

Staff Writer

COEUR d’ALENE — The Coeur d’Alene City Council will decide tonight whether to go ahead with a land swap that would bolster a potential 870-unit development along the Spokane River in exchange for acquiring a 3.8-acre parcel inside the former Atlas mill site and more public waterfront.

Developer Lanzce Douglass discussed the land trade at a council meeting last month. The city entered into a memorandum of agreement with Douglass, which could be finalized after a public hearing tonight.

Douglass, the owner of River’s Edge Apartments LLC, proposed trading his 3.8-acre triangle of land along Seltice Way to the city — the former Stimson office site of the Atlas mill property — for about 3.7 acres of city-owned railroad right of way that bifurcates a chunk of Douglass’s riverfront property between Mill River and the Atlas site.

The property exchange would also add 1,500 feet of public waterfront to the approximately three quarters of a mile of adjacent city waterfront at the former mill site.

City attorney Mike Gridley told council members the land exchange would meet a city objective of adding more public access to the Spokane River, something Coeur d’Alene residents have indicated should be one of the city’s top priorities.

“One of the goals is achieving more waterfront access, more view for the public, more public area,” Gridley said. “This would allow for more public waterfront.”

By opening up 2.7 acres of waterfront at River’s Edge to a walking and bicycle path as well as river access, and not building there, Douglass would still be allowed to use the acreage to calculate allowable density.

That means he could build between 17 units per acre on the parcel, or up to 34 units per acre if he is granted a zone change by the city, amounting to 435 units to 870 units in 6-story apartment buildings up to 75 feet high.

If the city agrees to the land exchange, and Douglass in the future is approved for a zone change, it could take several years to complete the project.

“When you are talking this many units, you don’t do them all at once,’ Douglass said. “You do them as the market warrants.”

Douglass’s many projects include award-winning developments in Spokane and Cheney.

The public has a chance at today’s 6 p.m. council meeting in the Community Room, in the basement of the Coeur d’Alene Library, to hear more about the project and to weigh in.