Yelm City Council unanimously approves ordinance amendment, project manager retires

Yelm city councilors unanimously approved Ordinance No. 1135 during a council meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 14, which amended Section 1 of Ordinance No. 465 — correcting an error that has been in city code for over 30 years.

Patrick Hughes, project manager, spoke before the council and provided background information on both ordinances. He said, in May 1993, Ordinance No. 465 was approved by council and annexed an area into the City of Yelm.

The area annexed included “all abutting public rights-of-way and the intersections of 103rd Avenue and Grove Road and of Creek Street and State Route 507.” Due to portions of those annexed right-of-ways and intersections being outside of Section 29, in Sections 20 and 30, a correction was needed to be made to the legal description in Section 1 of Ordinance No. 465.

“This one should be pretty straightforward,” Hughes said. “I’m asking for a motion to adopt a new ordinance, No. 1135. This amends an old ordinance. What the old ordinance was, was when we annexed an area into the city back in 1993, we discovered there was an error in the legal description in that ordinance. Actually, WSDOT caught it because it’s going to be part of the new Yelm Loop. They asked that we’d amend, actually correct, that old ordinance to make it legally correct.”

In the packet provided to Yelm city councilors, Hughes gave a copy of the old ordinance and claimed the changes are to add the words as to which section it’s located in.

“I’ve also included a map finding the boundary of that — the area we annexed, basically, between 103rd Avenue and 507, and from Creek Street to just East of Walmart,” Hughes said. “1993, that’s hard to believe it’s been that long. That’s all I’m asking for tonight, is to amend that ordinance.”

After councilors unanimously approved the Ordinance No. 1135, Hughes shared some personal news with those attending the Yelm City Council meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 14.

“On a personal note, this will be my final City of Yelm council meeting,” Hughes said. “I’m retiring at the end of this year, and I wanted to let you know how much I’ve appreciated working with you. For a couple of you, it’s been quite a long time. You’ll probably still see my face around here from time to time, so I’m not going away completely. But finally, after 44 years of being a civil engineer, I’ve decided to hang up the spurs.”

Cody Colt, Yelm public works director, spoke glowingly of Hughes and thanked him for his contributions to the city and for his guidance throughout the years.

“A lot of you have been on council for a while. Pat has been the workhorse of our department,” Colt said. “The projects, the splash pad, the things you see going on — would not have happened without Pat. When I came on and knew nothing, Pat was the person who guided me. Anything that’s been built in the last seven years has been because Pat is here.”