The past couple of days have brought a couple of good announcements for the Snoqualmie Valley: another new business opened in Snoqualmie and unincorporated areas of East King County will see more sheriff deputies added.
King County Department of Permitting and Environmental Review Office Opens in Snoqualmie
King County Executive Dow Constantine received applause today when he issued the first single-family home building permit from inside the new Snoqualmie office of the newly renamed King County Department of Permitting and Environmental Review.
The agency opened for business today in its new location after moving over the weekend from its long-time Renton offices. The move is expected to save hundreds of thousands of dollars per year, and is the latest in a series of customer-service-focused changes made in the past two years by the department.
The county says annexations and incorporations have dramatically reduced the size and number of urban areas in unincorporated King County, leaving most of the agency’s customers in rural east King County.
“It is by far more convenient than dealing with all the traffic at Renton,” said Jeff Peterson, with Developer CamWest, who picked up a permit today. “I think it will be good for everyone up and down the Valley. It was great to see all the familiar faces today.”
The new offices in the Snoqualmie Ridge Business Park ( 35030 SE Douglas Street, Suite 210) are designed to serve customers more easily and create new efficiencies and transparency for staff. Office hours for the King County Department of Permitting and Environmental Review are 7:30AM to 4PM, Monday through Friday.
For more information visit www.kingcounty.gov/permits.
King County Sheriff Hiring New Deputies for Valley Area
On October 12th, King County Sheriff Steve Strachan announced that he would hire 14 more deputies in the coming months to increase public safety for King County residents.
The deputies will be added using current resources from his existing budget – money saved by reducing department overtime. At the time of the announcement, King County Sheriff’s Office Public Information Officer, Cindi West, anticipated that because of the large geographical area covered by the sheriff’s office in east King County, it would likely be an area where new deputies were assigned.
Last Friday, October 19th, Strachan confirmed that eastside location for some of the new officers. He said he anticipates that as many as three of the new sheriff deputy hires to be assigned to the King County Sheriff’s Office northeast area, which includes the unincorporated areas that surround Woodinville, Sammamish and North Bend.
“The northeast area is geographically spread out, which has traditionally made response times longer,” explained Strachan. “Adding more deputies to the area will better serve our residents in terms of service and visibility, along with improving our response, and will add a safety factor for our deputies when critical backup is needed.”
Comments
I have spent at least an hour trying to establish a contact with someone in the Sheriff’s Dept. who covers the rural area of Carnation, WA. Why can’t correct information be provided online?