Carl Vander Hoek plans to return to the Bellevue City Council next week with strong endorsements to include underground parking in Downtown Park.

“And I’m going to help you guys pay for it,” he told the council Monday.

Project manager for his family’s company, the Vander Hoek Corporation, which owns substantial real estate holdings in Old Bellevue, Vander Hoek said he is gathering support for a proposal to address parking problems that park upgrades will inevitably create.

The city hopes to begin completing the circle of Downtown Park, which will include a new water feature and constructing an Inspiration Playground for youth and adults of all abilities through a partnership with the Rotary Club of Bellevue. Vander Hoek said the problem is that parking availability won’t increase at the park, despite its growing use for community and private events.

“We’re trying to make a different plan work in a short amount of time,” Vander Hoek told the Reporter.

City Planning Director Chris Salamone said underground parking at Downtown Park had been explored during planning in 1997, but did not go any further. He added the city was only considering parking needs for the park at the time, not outlying areas. The master plan for the park did not anticipate construction of the Inspiration Playground, he said.

The OBMA has been working with the city to address the lack of parking in Old Bellevue, Salamone said, and the City Council should receive a request for a comprehensive parking study in October, as part of a number of recommendations provided by a Downtown Livability citizens advisory committee.

“Downtown has changed so dramatically since we did the last comprehensive parking study, I don’t think we had a reasonable basis to predict this use,” Salamone said.

Vander Hoek said redevelopment of Downtown Park provides the last opportunity to place underground parking there, which would prevent parking from spilling into Old Bellevue and surrounding neighborhoods.

He said he is gathering support for underground parking at Downtown Park from the Bellevue Downtown Association, Bellevue Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary Club of Bellevue. He also met with members of the OBMA parking committee Thursday.

Vander Hoek’s grandfather, Paul Vander Hoek, nicknamed “The Mayor of Main Street” for his political activism on issues affecting his family’s Bellevue properties, founded both the chamber and BDA – when it was the Bellevue Downtown Development Board. He had also originally opposed Downtown Park, changing his mind when he saw it.

Carl Vander Hoek told the council Monday it must be a surprise his father and company president, Stu Vander Hoek, wasn’t before them Monday night.”That’s how bad it’s got,” he said. “It actually spans generations now.”

The Vander Hoek Corporation also recently sold controlling interest in its Main Street Gateway mixed-used project to the apartment developer, the Wolff Co. The project includes 370 residential units, 19,000 general square feet of retail space, 5,000 square feet of restaurant space and 625 parking spaces. It is replacing several businesses in Old Bellevue, at the corner of Main Street and Bellevue Way. The Gateway is just one of four major redevelopment projects occurring on Main Street.