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2005 City of Tacoma Legislative Priorities adopted by the City Council November 30, 2004 Infrastructure: The City’s ability to provide for maintenance of streets and bridges and to fund improvements to local arterials and residential streets has been seriously eroded by inflation, ballot initiatives, and inaction by the Legislature. The City’s unfunded infrastructure needs are believed to total more than $700 million. The Legislature is to be commended for its work to fund important regional transportation projects and in adopting increases in the state gas tax and other taxes to pay for major state transportation infrastructure. Unfortunately, the Legislature has not provided new funding for local government for this purpose in 14 years. It makes little sense for the State to significantly improve the capacity of important state highways while City arterials that feed those highways remain clogged and in a declining state of repair. ● The City supports legislation authorizing new gas taxes dedicated to local government needs as well as a menu of local transportation funding options. The City also supports necessary changes to the existing regional transportation funding mechanism. The Legislature has assisted local government in building important tourism infrastructure such as sports facilities and convention centers. Because the State does not allow tax increment financing, a tool used in 45 other states, it has been the practice to provide direct or indirect revenue from the State General Fund. The City has long supported adoption of tax increment financing and has introduced several bills on the subject. The City also introduced the legislation that resulted in substantial State assistance to the new convention center. ● The City supports legislation authorizing tax increment financing for important infrastructure needs and/or other mechanisms which will assist the City with Cheney Stadium improvements and other economic development needs. The City has invested millions of dollars and many years of effort to restore the Thea Foss Waterway. The State has provided some funds for portions of this effort through various grants and loans. More significant assistance is needed. The Puget Sound Freight Building is an historic structure on the waterway. It was once part of the famous “mile long warehouse.” The building and the piers it rests on are in danger of failure. Most of the historic waterfront’s structures have been lost and the Puget Sound Freight Building may also be lost soon. The Foss Waterway Development Authority has plans to redevelop this building with private funds but these plans cannot move forward unless the initial cost of saving the building is met through other sources. The City has no resources available to address this need. ● The City seeks a $2 million appropriation to allow immediate preservation of the Puget Sound Freight Building so that the structure can be rehabilitated and reused. The LeMay Collection of automobiles and auto memorabilia (which is the world’s largest private collection) is to be housed in a major museum to be constructed on 11 acres of City property adjacent to the Tacoma Dome. The City’s contribution to the project is valued at nearly $11 million. This facility is expected to be one of Washington’s premier tourist attractions. The museum is seeking a significant state contribution to this project to help secure the needed private funds that will be raised. ● The City supports a state contribution to the construction of America’s Car Museum on the City’s property adjacent to the Tacoma Dome. Fiscal policy: The Legislature has provided local government with new general revenue opportunities. Unfortunately, this authority was unnecessarily burdened with restrictions and limitations which make the tools less helpful. Older tax sources are also limited by restrictions on their use, some of which make little sense, complicate budget preparation, and frustrate citizens. ● The City supports changes to local tax authority that remove non-supplanting, earmarking, and other limitations on the uses of such revenue. The states are moving to bring their sales taxes into alignment at the request of national retail and Internet businesses. This action will result in sales tax collections on Internet sales and ultimately on mail order sales, leveling the playing field between large on-line and mail order businesses and local brick and mortar retailers. Washington needs to adjust its sales tax distribution to a destination based model as part of this effort. The result of this policy change is substantial new revenue to the state and local governments. It will also cause some short term revenue disruptions in some communities, including Tacoma. This disruption can be mitigated from the new revenue. ● The City supports adoption of destination sourcing for sales tax provided reasonable mitigation is made available as part of the adoption. |
