Boiseans opposed this 200-apartment building. The City Council approved it anyway. Why?
Despite dedicated opposition from neighbors, Boise real estate developer Hawkins Cos. won a victory after the Boise City Council denied the neighbors’ appeal over a proposed five-story, nearly 200-unit apartment building.
The mostly vacant parcel is at at 1095 S. Federal Way at the top of Protest Road hill, near Terry Day Park and between Vista Avenue and Boise State University. The building would squeeze into a lot on the western side of the intersection between Federal Way, where Protest Road turns into Kootenai Street on the Boise Bench.
A handful of neighbors along Pico Street, a short road that forms the western border of the site, argued at a public hearing Tuesday that the building was too tall and too dense, would negatively impact them, would add traffic hazards, and didn’t fit into the neighborhood.
Karen Moore, who lives across the street and represented her neighbors during the appeal, said they were against the height when the building was first proposed as a smaller and shorter, roughly 100-unit development in 2022. There are only a few single-family homes along Pico Street, each with about 900 square feet, she said.
The somewhat triangular site was home to a few small businesses. Broller Insurance Agency and an outdoor decorations shop filled the southern side for a while, but both buildings are vacant. Control Engineers is headquartered in a building on the northern side of the lot, according to its website. All the buildings would be demolished to make way for the Hawkins development.
“(It’s) in no way consistent with the character of the immediate or extended residential areas,” Moore said. “There are no multifamily apartments or townhomes or condominium developments in the immediate or extended Depot Bench area greater than three stories in height.”
Moore said the neighbors gathered 340 signature from nearby residents who were in favor of limiting the height of the building.
She said that during design-review hearings, Design Review Commissioner Patrick Boel had agreed that the proximity and scale of the project was jarring but voted to approve it anyway because it was allowed by the site’s zoning.
“Our proposal was three stories,” she said. “I would put forth today that I think even four stories on the Federal Way side and three stories on the Pico side would be better than what’s currently proposed.”
According to Laura Robinson, another neighbor, there is nothing in the area like the 64-foot-tall building Hawkins proposed.
“While I understand that under the new zoning rules this neighborhood is zoned for a building up to 70 feet in height, putting a five-story complex that runs the entire length of the block across the street from small single-family homes is ludicrous,” Robinson said by email.
Hawkins points to the Blue Cross building down the road, but “that is not comparable,” Robinson said. “That building is an office building set in the middle of a parking lot and surrounded by other office buildings.”
Jim Pickett, who represented the Depot Bench Neighborhood Association, said it was strange that the new zoning code — which went into effect Dec. 1, 2023 — rezoned the six houses and the proposed site despite being surrounded by residential zoning.
“How was that decision made, and why was that decision made?” Pickett said. “Seems very odd that this parcel got zoned this way.”
Pickett argued that the city zoned the parcels incorrectly in the rewrite, and that the mistake should have been corrected.
Commissioner Meredith Stead said there was extensive public outreach during the creation of the new zoning code and that the time to address the site’s zoning had passed.
“Ultimately, we are held responsible to the development code, and that has to drive our decisions,” she said.
In an appeal, City Council members can reject a prior approval only if there was an error in the entitlement process, such as if the Design Review Commission or the Planning and Zoning Commission made a mistake, according to a recent Idaho Supreme Court ruling.
The Hawkins building went through the Boise Design Review Commission, and council members said they could find no error in that body’s approval.
Council members said they appreciated the neighbors’ involvement but the arguments focused on rezoning the property — not on anything the Design Review Commission did.
“You were testifying on a rezone … but that wasn’t what we were hearing here,” said Council Member Jimmy Hallyburton. “You’re making rezone arguments in a design review hearing, which we can’t consider.”
Hallyburton said that when a proposed building fits the zoning code, someone can build there without telling neighbors or going through a public-hearing process.
“They can just do it,” he said. “It’s all able to be done with staff.”
The development plan calls for residential amenities and space on the ground floor for businesses.
