Above: Dani Madrone, 35, of Olympia, announced her candidacy
for Olympia City Council, Position 3 on Saturday. Little Hollywood interviewed
Madrone on issues of homelessness, affordable housing,
sea level rise, and neighborhoods.
By
Janine Gates
Little
Hollywood
Dani Madrone, 35, of Olympia, announced her candidacy
for Olympia City Council, Position 3 on Saturday.
The position is an open seat because Councilmember Nathaniel Jones, who currently occupies that position, is running for the seat currently held by Mayor Cheryl Selby. Selby is running for reelection.
The position is an open seat because Councilmember Nathaniel Jones, who currently occupies that position, is running for the seat currently held by Mayor Cheryl Selby. Selby is running for reelection.
Madrone, a resident of Olympia since 2004, studied
science, sustainability, and public policy at The Evergreen State College. She received
her master’s in public administration in 2016 and works for the Northwest
Indian Fisheries Commission.
Madrone met with Little Hollywood in downtown Olympia Saturday
to discuss her candidacy and the issues of homelessness, affordable housing, sea level rise, and neighborhoods.
She says Olympia faces big decisions on the environment,
including climate change, and the health of Puget Sound. She wants to
incorporate environmental priorities into all areas of city government with
decisions based on science.
Above: The city-sanctioned homeless mitigation site located on the corner of Olympia Avenue and Franklin Street Saturday morning in downtown Olympia.
Beginning our walking interview at the city-sanctioned
homeless mitigation site located on the corner of Olympia Avenue and Franklin
Street, Madrone acknowledged that homelessness in Olympia is in crisis mode.
She says she recognizes that social service providers
are overwhelmed, potential shoppers are afraid to go downtown, and local
businesses are losing customers.
“I love downtown. I feel safe, but I don’t want to
tell other people what feels safe for them. There’s a lot of tension downtown
and at this point, it takes a lot of courage for businesses to step up and say,
‘This isn’t working for me.’ The conversations just aren’t very good right now.
“I’m hoping to be a bridge builder and to listen to
people and say, ‘OK, what does it look like when we’re succeeding?’ and develop
a crisis management plan around that. This is a big issue and it’s going to be
tense for a while.
“We need a clear problem statement. We need to know if
the mitigation site is working, for example. It’s a big community conversation
that needs to happen between folks who are homeless, businesses in the area,
service providers, and city staff to come up with a shared vision of success.
Otherwise, we don’t know if we’re heading there.”
Asked about the mitigation site, Madrone said that it
is a good first step but needs to lead to something more permanent. She says she thinks of it as Olympia setting the table, but wonders how the city is going to make sure all are fed and healthy in the long run.
“What comes after this? This is obviously not a
sustainable solution. We don’t want people living outside on pallets in tents.
It’s not the end-game. That’s the piece I’m not seeing yet and that’s the
part I’d like to help bring around – a long term crisis management plan,” she
said.
Asked about funding, Madrone said the Home Fund is an
important piece of the funding puzzle.
“I’d say by the time the Home Fund was already
approved by the voters, it was not enough. We have a growing problem, a
problem that is becoming increasingly visible. The city does need more help
from the county, state, and federal government.
“We have to ask ourselves, are we putting our resources where they need to go?
Do we know at what point we can declare that something is not working so we can
free up those resources and put them toward the things that we know are working?”
Housing
Options
Madrone has lived in a variety of rental situations in
Olympia and has had to leave housing because the rent was suddenly raised so high she couldn’t afford it. She’s also lived in places where the landlord really
cared about her situation.
Madrone says her rent was not raised for four years because
her landlord knew she was struggling. She is now a homeowner in the northwest
neighborhood where she lives with her young daughter.
Madrone was active in the recent “Missing Middle”
housing conversation and sees a need for more diverse housing options throughout
the city. She says she will explore renter protections and the barriers created
by short-term vacation rentals and long term vacancies.
“The Missing Middle conversation is a big, complicated issue. Calculations
from the city say that 1,000 more housing units across the city could be built
over the next 20 years due to the recent passage of the ordinance.
“It’s a very small piece of what’s needed. In terms of
what’s next, we really need a lot more multi-family housing in the density
nodes: downtown, over by Capital Mall, the Eastside, and the high-density
corridors. We have to figure out why those aren’t being built.”
Above: Dani Madrone walks along Percival Landing near the children’s playground where soft-armoring of the shoreline with native plants help control flooding.
Sea
Level Rise
Another issue facing Olympia is the threat of sea
level rise. Discussing the city’s draft sea level rise plans, Madrone says that
floodable landscapes are mentioned but not incorporated into the plan.
“I really think the city should be looking at places
downtown that will allow flood water to come in and become the receptacle for
flood water until everything subsides.
“There are opportunities to take underutilized parking
lots and turn them into a park-like area so when it floods, you can direct the
water into those areas to contain it.
There’s a lot of planning to protect
downtown from flooding but not enough planning for where that water is going to
go if we can’t handle it.
“I would like to see us have a range of flood barrier options to choose from for downtown….We don’t have any options that suggest
that we only protect part of downtown. What would it look like if we were to retreat
from downtown? Let’s put it out there on the table.”
Little Hollywood asked Madrone if she was suggesting
that retreat still be considered as an option and if she was in agreement with the city’s sea level rise plans.
The city is committed to saving
downtown and all its assets, such as the regional LOTT water/wastewater facility.
“Not 100 percent,” responded Madrone. “I think their
direction is fine if we only get two to three feet of sea level rise, but if we
end up on the higher end of the projections, I think we’re underestimating the
issue….
“I don’t think a complete retreat from downtown at
this point is realistic, but we might start talking about what it looks like to
put new housing over in that direction (Madrone points southwest across Capitol
Lake).
“The less we have to protect in the areas most likely
to flood the better. What does the community conversation look like in terms of
what parts of our downtown is most important to protect? What is the phased
approach?
Finally, Little Hollywood asked Madrone if there were
any issues she needed to learn more about.
“I could stand to learn more about almost every issue.
I would hope everyone would say that. I would love to hear more from
businesses throughout Olympia about their experiences and what their needs are,”
she said.
Madrone said she would also like to hear from neighborhoods and their
issues.
“I’m going to learn a lot in the next year. One of the
biggest challenges I see is how much people talk past each other. I want to be
someone who can help with seeing our shared interests and help bring people
together a bit more. It’s part of the national politics right now for
everything to be so divided and I just feel like we can do better locally,”
said Madrone.
Madrone has already received endorsements from some elected
officials and community members.
The filing deadline for council races is in May.
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