Thanks to Dr. Alfred Skinner for his May 10 letter to the editor summarizing the history of citizens’ actions to preserve green space, open space and parks on Mercer Island. His suggestion that the Mercer Island Center for the Arts be “located adjacent to community facilities such as the Mercer Island Community and Event Center” is a win-win solution for everyone. Youth Theatre Northwest would get their theater, and public parkland would be preserved.

On Sept. 9, 2015, John Gordon Hill (chairman of the MICA Board) and Lesley Bain (MICA architect) conducted a tour of the proposed MICA building site at Bicentennial Park and the Nature Garden for me, Louise Kincaid (then MICA executive director), Manny Cawaling (YTN Executive Director) and a friend of Lesley’s. When I saw the area — in public parkland, with no parking, at a dangerous elbow intersection and in a swampy wetland — I asked why they did not site the theater beside the community center. Lesley replied that there were two reasons: (1) the building would not be visible behind the community center, and (2) there was not enough parking.

Instead, Lesley said, she favored the Mercerdale Park site because the building would be visible from across the park, and patrons could park on the street or at the Park and Ride and be shuttled to the site.

However, siting the building beside the community center not only preserves our public parkland, but also makes sense since parking is readily available not only in the community center lot but also at the Luther Burbank lots and within walking distance at the Park and Ride.

Meg Lippert

Mercer Island