By DEBERA CARLTON HARRELL
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

When a group of local purple-haired, ring-nosed teens recently were told by Redmond police that graffiti on local bridges was illegal, both the police, youth advocates and the teens brainstormed a solution.

The teens, more interested in graphics than civil disobedience, met with the mayor and City Council members, who agreed to find and develop a wall youths could legally "tag." The art wall now exists downtown near Northeast 83rd Street and 161st Avenue Northeast, reflecting a civic investment not only in public art but also in its kids, say Mayor Ives and others.

Ives was re-elected in 1991 as a slow-growth advocate bullish on building "a sense of community." A public official who questions the philosophy that business is automatically great for a community, Ives says she considers it her mandate to keep neighborhoods strong and business growth balanced.

She holds a monthly "coffee with the mayor," an informal no-host breakfast forum for citizens to air concerns. Instead of designing and imposing a new park on one neighborhood, the city invited residents to design it themselves.

Redmond citizens have worked with both the city and King County to obtain more equestrian trails, preserve open space and push for development amenities. When the Town Center opens in late summer, it will feature shops, restaurants, offices, theaters and pedestrian walkways, including a trail along the Sammamish River linked to the current regional river trail.

Riverwalk, a proposal designed to make the Sammamish River more accessible, aesthetic and natural, is a city-backed work in progress.

"Redmond is an urban island surrounded by what everyone wants to keep as rural," Ives says. "One of my guiding principles is that business development is supposed to be a tool, not an end product. If it threatens the quality of life, it's time to say timeout."

To help pay for growth's trade-offs, including more police and fire protection, the city imposed its first business tax this year.

The city also added staff to process commercial building permits for Microsoft's major expansion, the new mall, AT&T Wireless' world headquarters, and the 6,000-seat Overlake Christian Church, which moved from Kirkland.

Most development is light manufacturing companies, bringing electronics, avionics, space technology, software, biotechnology and other research and development firms to the Overlake area and a technology corridor along Willows Road.

Planners say 80 percent of the city's commercial development projected for the year 2012 is already "built out" -- a dynamic pace that has left city officials and residents both stunned and concerned.