People out of work, a blue economy, the bottom’s about out of the tub.
But in the midst of “The Great Recession,” says Auburn Mayor Pete Lewis, the city is poised at the block for that much-talked-about recovery, muscles straining, ready to bust out.
“Today I see our Auburn as a place of hope and renewal,” said Lewis in his annual State of the City address Tuesday to the Auburn Area Chamber of Commerce’s Partnership luncheon at Emerald Downs.
To explain why he is so “bully” about Auburn’s future, Lewis summoned a long list of accomplishments that the City, businesses, churches, schools and the many existing partnerships have brought about by working together in the last year alone. The list includes:
• Bringing up to 100 the number of City scholarships that allow children to enter the Auburn Valley Y.
• Providing discounted bus fares for people in need, in conjunction with Metro.
• Sheltering a total of 1,459 people during the mid-January storm.
• Forming a gang-prevention task force through the Y in partnership with the nine industrial valley cities.
• Establishing the first ever Auburn International Festival to celebrate the city’s diversity.
• Signing a new Friendship Exchange Agreement with Pyeongchang, South Korea, a memorandum of understanding between Auburn and its sister-city, Tamba, Japan, and a letter of intent establishing a friendship-exchange relationship with Guanchan, China.
• Getting commitments from five business to come to Auburn, with the promise of 550 additional jobs, according to the Office of Economic Development.
• Benefitting the Auburn economy by creating a construction sales tax rebate program, on-going business assistance, 12 new education and training programs, and the Auburn Center for Emergent Business.
• Opening a new, 9,850-square-foot gymnasium on the Les Gove Community Campus in conjunction with the King County Boys and Girl’s Club.
• Auburn International Farmer’s Market’s 12th-place ranking in the nation and second favorite in the state of Washington.
• Opening the historic Mary Olson Farm on Green River Road, after 15 years of restoration and preservation efforts.
• Opening the city’s first off-leash dog area at Roegner Park
• Seeing Auburn selected by USA Weekend Magazine as one of the five best places to play nationwide, and featured for its 32,000-square-foot Discovery Playground at Les Gove Park.
• Completing negotiations with Robertson Properties Group for the redevelopment of the 60-plus-acre Valley Drive-In theater site
To make good things keep on happening, Lewis said, people must continue to pull together. Pull together to provide for the repair and reconstruction of major streets and arterials and for critical infrastructure so Auburn is ready to welcome more commerce and development in when things perk up.
“Look at what we’re prepared for. This really is the time for Auburn. We have prepared ourselves in every single way, and as this recovery starts to come on, we are ready to go. Everything is falling into place, and it’s all starting to happen, right now. Every week that goes by now, something extraordinary seems to be popping up that we didn’t know about before,” Lewis said.
