Seattle cancels fast-track of potential annexation vote; Burien, meantime, may move ahead
When Kenny Pittman from Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn‘s office spoke to the North Highline Unincorporated Area Council recently (WCN coverage here), he reiterated that the city’s plans for moving ahead with a possible northern North Highline annexation vote would be contingent on a forthcoming financial analysis. That analysis came out today, as city budget boss Beth Goldberg presented a briefing. Bottom line: Too costly for Seattle to consider an annexation vote before 2011 – and even then, it’s not likely to be on the ballot before November 2011, if at all. Meantime, the Burien City Council will talk again Monday night about pursuing annexation of the area – here’s the agenda. The resolution they’re considering would state Burien’s intention to “advance” (that) annexation “as soon as reasonably possible” after completing the North Highline South annexation that takes effect next month.
Tags: Seattle annexation, white center
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March 19th, 2010 at 11:12 pm
Too costly? Is this because of the huge deficit in Seattle’s budget due to the overall cuts? I think if Seattle says it’s too costly than I would vote no to annex to Seattle. All the services, more firefighters, and more officers on our streets would surely not happen from annexing to Seattle. All the talk on these blogs about recieving more more more, looks more like a definite NO NO NO.
March 20th, 2010 at 5:52 am
Let me get this straight. First Seattle does not want to annex North Highline because it would not be financially feasable. Then Seattle decides it wants some more land to develop and Norh Highline has land. Then the state puts puts up some tax dollars and then Seattle is really interested so they can take the money and run. And finally the financial report comes out and it is not such a good deal and now Seattle puts on the brakes. Wow, I am glad they are only annexing North Highline because they care about the citizens. Wake up people. Seattle only wants land and money and could give a rip about the citizens of North Highline.
March 20th, 2010 at 12:48 pm
i’d still rather be seattle than burien. uggh. but at least we’ll get one more year as unincorporated now.
March 20th, 2010 at 1:09 pm
LOL. Nobody annexes anything because they “care about the citizens.”
As a citizen of Seattle, I want my leaders only to annex when it’s not going to cost me more tax dollars, period – if they’re not at least self-sufficient in taxes paid vs. services needed, it’s a burden we shouldn’t take on.
March 20th, 2010 at 7:14 pm
The fact is, very few areas are self-supporting, and most “areas” end up subsidizing other areas.
If this was a healthy economy and Seattle’s budget was flush with money, I think you’d see a continued push for annexation. With Seattle’s budget woes, it seemed inevitable that the area wouldn’t be annexed anytime soon.
The question I have, is what happens after the tax credit legislation expires? Also, how will the GMA affect this area, IF an annexation by either city never pans out. Would you then see the county government get more aggresive with interpreting the State’s GMA, and then assign remaining unincorporated area to adjacent cities?
The story goes on…
March 20th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
It does. And the other twist, if you read the supporting documents with Monday night’s Burien Council agenda, is that there’s an advisory group that does NOT want to see Burien move too fast – reading between the lines, it sounds as if the group thinks the city might be biting off more than it can chew, if it proceeds anyway. Will be interesting to see how that all plays out next week.
March 20th, 2010 at 11:22 pm
You must be referring to the BEDP (Business and Economic Development Partnership). They have expressed their concern with annexation since this whole thing started. They were pretty-much ok with the last annexation, however they have (rightly so) concerns with taking another large chunk.
March 21st, 2010 at 5:52 am
Yah god forbid highline actually becoming whole again!
March 22nd, 2010 at 3:42 pm
m, Seattle’s current idea is to give us a vote in November of 2011 for a 2013 annexation – why would anyone vote in favor of that scenario?
March 23rd, 2010 at 12:14 am
Annex to Seattle? Have any of you been downtown lately? It is a cesspool. Seattle city council seats are all voted “at large” which means they have no districts. Everyone in the city votes for every council member. This means only the higher density vocal areas get any love from the council. So where do you think White Center would fall in this pecking order? Probably way down at the bottom. Keep Highline whole and annex the rest to Burien. Seattle is way too downtown and Capitol Hill centric!