Everett site recommended for new UW branch campus

Everett has been recommended as the best location for a new University of Washington branch campus to serve the North Puget Sound region.

A consultant today said the 32-acre site around the city's landmark transit center, Everett Station, would offer future students the amenities of an urban location and was among the least expensive to develop.

News that Everett had been ranked number one among four site finalists was greeted with excitement in Snohomish County's largest city and county seat.

"Everyone has a big grin on their faces, including me," said Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson. "This has always been about students. Now families here can consider educational options close to home."

Although Everett outspent rival cities on lobbying and site proposals, Stephanson said the Everett Station site was picked on its merits.

"I've always contended that if the process was based on fact, Everett would compete very well."

The consultants ranked the Everett Station site first, Marysville second, Everett's Riverside site third and a site near Lake Stevens fourth.

The site-selection team said the Everett Station site off Pacific Avenue, "leverages the region's existing urban infrastructure and current and forecasted employment opportunities ... and is among the least costly solutions" for building a new college.

The UW estimated the cost of a campus to serve 5,059 students by 2025 to be from $645 million to $803 million.

The recommendations were made to Gov. Christine Gregoire and the Legislature, which will make the final decision about where the new college is located and establish a timetable for when it will be built. Interim classes at the new college, dubbed UW North, are supposed to begin in fall 2008.

Leaders in Marysville and Lake Stevens vowed to take the fight to land the new college to the Legislature. Marysville City Administrator Mary Swenson said the consultant's report contains errors about the condition of the Marysville site and the costs to develop it.

She said the city had spent $4 million to ready the 369-acre rural site near Smokey Point for development and plans to spend $6 million more.

"We're frustrated," she said. "We have a story to tell."

Gregoire urged the region's political leaders to rally behind whatever site is ultimately chosen.

"Our top goal must be to consider what is best for the students," Gregoire said.

The UW today released an academic plan for the proposed college which calls for a "transformational branch campus" offering courses in engineering, health, education and business in conjunction with a strong arts and sciences core. The new college would emphasize experiential learning and critical thinking, and would "create a higher education resource that fits well into the constellation of four-year institutions in the state."

The academic plan also calls for an ambitious outreach effort in the North Sound region to encourage more students K-16 to pursue careers in math and science. The effort could then be extended to the entire state, the report says, noting that Washington's college enrollment in science and technology fields is low compared to employer demand.

The UW initially opposed creation of a new college, saying the state wasn't adequately funding its existing institutions of higher education. UW officials cautioned that the plans to create a new branch campus must not come at the expense of the state's current community and four-year colleges.

"The challenge for the legislature is how do they provide funding for this college without cutting funding to other colleges or anything else central to state government," said Randy Hodgins, UW director of government relations and the college's chief lobbyist in Olympia.

The 2007 Legislature authorized $4 million to recommend a location and develop an academic plan for a branch campus that would address the higher education needs of North Snohomish, Island and Skagit counties. Local leaders say the region lags behind the rest of the state in residents with college degrees because of the lack of access.

Over the past three months, more than 1,000 people attended enthusiastic and often partisan town hall meetings in the competing cities. UW officials and representatives from the governor's office also met with dozens of local Chambers of Commerce, business and political leaders.

The Everett Station site was the smallest of the four finalists at just 32 acres. It is shoehorned around railroad tracks, the transit station and a large Everett Steel distribution warehouse. It also will need some environmental cleanup because portions of it have already been identified as contaminated by the state Department of Ecology.

Lynn Thompson: 425-745-7807 or lthompson@seattletimes.com