SEATTLE: PLEASE FUND OUR AGING PARK FACILITIES!
This petition is being sponsored by the Lake City Neighborhood Alliance (LCNA), an organization of 26 community organizations with the mission to protect and enhance the quality of life in the greater Lake City area.
Click Here to Sign! (Google Docs)
Lake City and Green Lake have aging community centers, recommended in the 2016 Community Center Strategic Plan for total replacement. Yet despite having the new Seattle Parks District, their budget spending plan has grossly insufficient funds to replace aging Park facilities. There are many aging Park facilities throughout Seattle. Each of the existing 27 community centers will at some time need extensive renovation or replacement. As a result of the total lack of recognition and action by the Board of Commissioners of the Seattle Park District (all City Council Members) to consider LCNA’s request for a new, full-service, Parks-operated community center, LCNA is sponsoring this petition to FUND OUR AGING PARK FACILITIES. This effort is being done concurrently with the Green Lake Community Center group who is also sponsoring a petition to have the Seattle Park District fund aging community centers and pools and to abandon use of privatization. People should feel free to sign both petitions.
PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION TO URGE OUR BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS OF THE SEATTLE PARK DISTRICT TO DO THE RIGHT THING.
An in-depth analysis of the Problem and Potential Solutions (click to view (PDF))
Background: Seattle voters approved the Seattle Park District with the understanding that the initial 6-
year property tax assessment would not be higher than 33 cents per $1,000 of assessed value, and that this assessment rate would generate approximately $47.9 million dollars a year for the first 6 years of the Parks District’s operation.
Problem: With Seattle’s unprecedented growth and housing density, the need for Park facilities is great. Replacement and major renovation of aging park facilities are not funded within the existing Seattle Parks District budget. Now two community centers that have been identified by the Parks Department as needing to be replaced will not be replaced, and the budget for the renovation for six other community centers has been substantially reduced. The Board of Commissioners of the Seattle Park District has stated that the wording in the inter-local agreement, which includes the initial 6-year spending plan, prevents any changes to the budget until the next 6- year cycle starting in 2021.This self imposed limitation on funding has resulted in the Park District Commissioners not being able to meet their fiduciary obligation to improve community centers, pools and other park facilities.
Opportunity: As a result of all the new construction, the taxable base of the City has increased by $22.3 billion dollars from 2016 to 2017. The current assessment rate is 27.5 cents per $1,000 of assessed value—well below the promised high level.
Solution: If the current 27.5 cent rate was maintained for the next 3 years, an additional $26 million could be generated by 2020, allowing growth to pay part of this cost. These additional funds should be used to replace and renovate aging Park facilities without resorting to privatization of existing publicly owned Parks’ community centers and pools.
The Friends of Funding Our Aging Park Facilities thank you for your support!