Appearance Statement July 21, 2020 Mercer Island City Council Meeting
(1:12:04 to 1:15:56 on the City Council video)
Meg Lippert
Mercer Island
My comments this evening focus on repurposing the Mercer Island Recycling Center.
A community forum called “The Future of the Mercer Island Recycling Center: Renew, Reuse, Re-purpose,” was held at Mercer Island Library in September, 2017, 2 ½ years ago.
At that meeting, citizens viewed a video about the origin, construction and operation of the Recycling Center. Then they listened to presentations by four former Mercer Island High School students, who had been members ofthe “Committee to Save the Earth,” the High School club that, almost 50 years ago, founded, built, and operated the Recycling Center.
Together with the Consulting Architect of the Recycling Center, Jim Adkins, and Seattle Architect Ellen Judson, citizens at the forum then considered various options for re-purposing the recycling center, including those options that were previously submitted to the City Council on July 12, 2010, in a Bainbridge Graduate Institute report, plus additional ideas suggested by attendees at the forum.
The citizens at the forum concluded that three options best met our community’s needs and were best aligned with the High School students’ original vision of community engagement and recycling. These, in order of importance, were:
“(1) an intake center for the Thrift Shop, freeing up Thrift Shop space for more sales area;
(2) a native plants and gardening center, perhaps in connection with a nursery for native plants in the Native Garden; and
(3) a sustainability education center, perhaps with a tool library and/or a bike-skateboard repair center.”
IF the City Council AND the public, after proper notification and consideration and participation, agree that the best use for the Recycling Center is to be as an intake center for the Thrift Shop,
THEN I hope that the City Council and the architect and/or structural engineer they hire to bring it up to code for occupancy will respect its design and historical importance to the City, as the first Recycling Center in Washington state to be initiated, funded, built, and run by high school students, a distinction that was honored by an award from the Governor of Washington, as well as other awards.
Ideally the integrity of the original design would be preserved by maintaining its unique design and construction, in order to honor the important history of the building, as well as to honor the vision of the students who founded it.
For example, the wide porches have served well in the past to shade Recycling Center workers during the summer, and to shelter them during rainy fall, winter and spring days, and would serve the Thrift Shop workers equally well.
Also, the skylight at the apex of the pyramid shaped roof has its own story, told to me by Mr. Adkins, the architect. Rehabilitating that skylight would be an important step in honoring the artistic vision and integrity of the building’s design. It would also serve as the physical evidence for the story of why the skylight is pyramid shaped, and not conical, as was drafted in the original plans!
I was given copies of the original architectural drawings by Mr. Adkins before he passed away, and he told me they were for my safekeeping. So I am happy to have those and to share them, if requested.
Thank you.