City Council Meeting Recap

Here are a few highlights from last week's City Council meeting. 

• Mayor Florea re-appointed Oliver Brulotte to the Design Review Board and appointed Kirstie Miethe and Laurie Brenan to the Downtown Steering Committee.
• Conducted three public hearings: on Cottage Housing, the Six-Year TIP, and Code Consistencies. Ordinance 1693 - Cottage Housing and Ordinance 1694 - Code Consistencies were adopted.
• Granted a temporary construction easement for Autumn Strasse to build the entrance road to the Leavenworth Meadows apartments.
• Approved a Professional Services Agreement with Leavenworth Taxi & Shuttle for a river recreation shuttle during the tubing season.
• Approved an interagency agreement with WSDOT to build a salt shed at WSDOT's Leavenworth Maintenance Facility on Highway 2.

The agenda and packet can be found here. The meeting was recorded and uploaded to our YouTube channel.

2024 Wildfire Awareness

Before the Fire: Prepare Your Family

Wildfires are unplanned fires that burn in natural areas like forests or grasslands. Wildfires can spread quickly and devastate not only wildlife and natural areas but also communities. With the Leavenworth area being prone to wildfires, we’d like to highlight a few ways you can prepare for wildfire season:

• Sign up for Chelan County’s Emergency Alert System, Everbridge.
• Know the evacuation levels and what they mean (e.g., 1 – Stay Alert; 2 – Be Prepared; and 3 – Go Now!).
• Plan your wildfire evacuation routes (e.g., school, daycare, work, etc.) and know several ways to leave the area.
• Assemble an emergency preparedness kit or “go-bag”. Here’s a helpful resource when building your kit: ready.gov/kit.
• Protect your important documents in a fireproof safe.

Monthly Mythbuster for Wildfire Awareness Month in May

Last summer, United States Forest Service (USFS) crews responded to over 100 fires in the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest (forest) – over half of those fires were caused by humans. Another busy fire season is anticipated for 2024.

The cooler spring weather has helped keep fire danger low, but conditions will change as the weather becomes hotter and drier this summer. In addition, the low snowpack and summer forecasts prompted the Department of Ecology to declare a drought emergency for most of Washington.

During Wildfire Awareness Month, we’d like to bust a common myth surrounding wildfires in the Leavenworth area.

MYTH >> The City of Leavenworth responds to wildfires. 

Read the full mythbuster here.

2024 Solid Waste Community Interest Survey

The City of Leavenworth and our community partners, Waste Loop and Winton MFG Compost Works, are looking for insights into community composting awareness and hope for additional feedback regarding potential recycling programs.

The survey takes about 5 minutes to complete and will be active until midnight on June 7.

BONUS: You can opt-in at the end of the survey to be entered into a raffle drawing to win one (1) of four (4) $25 gift cards to local Leavenworth-area restaurants who are Community Composting Program participants.

RV Parking Quick Reference Guide for Leavenworth

With Glacier Lot closed for construction this summer, you may be curious about where to park a RV or oversized vehicle in (or near) Leavenworth. We’ve highlighted a few locations below, but you can check out the full RV parking reference guide.

Day-Use Parking

• Willkommen Park and Ride (linktransit.com/), 200 Ward Strasse, Leavenworth, WA 98826
• Willkommen Lot, 1310 US Hwy 2, Leavenworth WA 98826
• Kristall’s Restaurant & Lounge (kristalls.com/), 280 US Hwy 2, Leavenworth WA 98826

City Project Tracker

Construction is underway at the Glacier Parking Lot!

KRCI, the project contractor, continues excavation efforts across the site and have also begun prepping the foundation for the new restroom facility.

Utility excavation work is anticipated to begin the week of June 10 (the start date is tentative and subject to change). Alley access will be impacted. Closures and traffic impacts should be anticipated.

2024 Scrub Seal

During last week's regular meeting, the City Council awarded the 2024 Scrub Seal project to the lowest responsible bidder, One Way Trigger, LLC.

Work is anticipated to begin in June (date is subject to change).

To learn more about the scrub seal pavement treatment process, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m50z5F_vF4c.

Neighborhood News

Upcoming construction work scheduled this week at the roundabout in Leavenworth

Link Transit's contractor is planning to go out on June 4 to perform repair work on the Icicle River Road Roundabout. Limited shoulder closures are anticipated.

The work includes rehabilitation of the damaged pedestrian warning tiles, and installation of a more robust cast iron product to limit further snow removal related damage from occurring.

Yard debris burning for Chelan County Fire District No. 3 is not allowed starting Monday, June 3

Open burning will close on June 3 (e.g., yard waste, clearing burns, etc.).

• Recreational Campfires allowed inside the City Limits: YES
• Recreational Campfires outside of the City Limits: YES
• Yard debris burning outside of the city limits and urban growth boundary is: NO
• Yard debris burning inside of the city limits and urban growth boundary is: NO

Questions? Call Chelan County Fire District No. 3 at (509) 548-7711. You can also find current burn regulations here.

Chelan County Natural Resources begins construction for an irrigation project on Icicle Creek

Construction is underway on a $9 million irrigation project that, when completed next year, will upgrade a more than 100-year-old system while restoring instream flows to Icicle Creek.

The Cascade Orchard Irrigation Company (COIC) Improvement Project kicked off earlier this month at the end of Shore Street near Leavenworth, where the contractor, Strider Construction, is building a new pump station on land owned by COIC.

Keep up on the project and its progress on the project webpage.