Street Committee considers marquee

As the dust clears after last week’s Port Orchard City Council meeting, the Street Committee is busy preparing to work on the pragmatics of the phased removal of the city’s marquee.

“We’re waiting for one of our members to come back from Mexico,” said Councilmember and Street Committee Chair Rita DiIenno of plans for the first committee meeting. “This is a rather important issue.”

According to DiIenno, although none of the committee members, DiIenno and Councilmembers Rick Wyatt and Ron Rider, were in dissent over the removal of the marquee, she said she doesn’t think the process will necessarily go more smoothly.

“I don’t think it’s an issue of going smoothly,” DiIenno said. “(It’s just that) none of them happen to be on the street committee. The council itself has its dissenters and proponents and everyone will get their last shake at it.”

DiIenno describes the committee’s upcoming job of finding a way to implement the phased removal of the marquee as a “pragmatic exercise.”

She said the committee does plan to contact all the business and building owners to continue discussion, though she said she considers the subject a “city issue,” not just one that affects owners.

DiIenno said she was surprised by the amount of discussion, considering the city’s Seattle consultant EDAW was hired to make professional recommendations and the Port Orchard Revitalization Committee (P.O.R.T.) was compromised mostly of building and business owners. EDAW specializes in economic analysis and architectural impact, DiIenno said.

“The grant was intended, in fact, to bring the group together,” DiIenno said. “When we brought the group together, we allowed any building or business owner who wanted to participate.”

DiIenno said there were 11 building owners and 11 business owners that signed up to participate in the P.O.R.T. group. The rest of the group was comprised of community individuals.

“It’s hard for some members of the council who weren’t present for those long hours to appreciate the work that went into it,” DiIenno said.

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