Mill Creek Beacon - Your Hometown News Source

Representatives for the 44th District are visiting the Mill Creek City Council meeting, on invitation from Mayor Pro Tem Stephanie Vignal.

The intent of the visit is to start a conversation and move toward a long-term planning for the city's legislative agenda.

"I think it's extremely important that we have our legislative agenda and with that the interest-statement for the whole council," Vignal said in a March 2 council meeting.

Rep. John Lovick, D-Mill Creek and Rep. April Berg, D-Mill Creek are scheduled to make a presentation to the council on March 22, the same month the council discussed a need to stay in touch with the state. Vignal is also a council member. She said she issued an invitation for both state leaders, after the early March council meeting where she floated the idea for long-term planning that involves the state. The Mill Creek City Council's regular meeting is 6 p.m. March 23. Berg sits on committees for finance, education and local government; and Lovick is on committees for community and economic development, public safety, rules, and transportation.

Vignal also suggested a legislative agenda be put in writing. The intent is to start a pre-planned dialogue with the state.

In the March 2 meeting, Public Works Director Mike Todd agreed with her point, to keep communications with the state productive.

"If we have conflicting interactions with legislators, sometimes you get nothing," Todd said. "So it's important we speak with one voice."

The visit this week will allow the council to get an "update us on what's going on in Olympia," Vignal said in a phone interview with The Beacon. It will also give them a chance to talk about it's upcoming plans for Mill Creek.

Mayor Brian Holtzclaw added that it was important that council members "make sure we are not representing our own interests or opinions, we're representing what the council's direction is."

Council member John Steckler clarified that a leglislative agenda for the city council should be updated annually: "I just thought that was a nice point of interest to be sure this represents an annual interest statement on behalf of the council."

John Lovick

Meetings are currently remote and Zoom-based due to COVID-19 restrictions continued by an emergency proclamation. The Mill Creek City Council voted to keep restrictions in place through April, due to COVID-19 infection-data and advice from city attorney Grant Dettinger that to do otherwise would come with some legal challenges. Some have suggested that remote access to council meetings continue as an option, once the pandemic resolves.

The Beacon is inviting members of the public to take advantage of the current remoteness of the pandemic, by ordering take-out from a Mill Creek area restaurant the evening of a council meeting, then "attending" online.

The presentation is listed on the March 23 council agenda: https://bit.ly/2OULPjj for a council meeting that will air on Zoom: https://bit.ly/2OVdm4a. The public is invited to attend.