The Seattle Times editorial board argues that keeping King County parks open “require innovative ideas,” and they offer a few innovative ideas of their own:
Park purists must become park pragmatists. The best option is to deed parks to local governments that promise to retain them as open space in perpetuity. Cities have a record managing parks. Cities can assume responsibility as part of annexations, or citizens groups can assume ownership in some cases.
Another Triplett idea with great merit is to deed parks to the library system in exchange for a covenant to retain them as parks, while allowing a library branch to sprout on a small portion of the grounds. The synergy of a library and a park in the same location should be obvious; both spaces would be maintained by the library.
A similar plan to have the housing authority take over some parks offers other benefits. Triplett has gone so far as to suggest partnerships with fire districts.
Huh. Well, as long as the Times is encouraging us to be both pragmatic and innovative, I’ve got a creative idea of my own as to how to keep our parks open: why don’t we just pay for them?
I mean, honestly, all the proposals above succeed in doing is shifting the costs of park maintenance from county government to city and other local governments. Whether the county or a city or a (really?) fire district owns the deed, it doesn’t much change the cost of maintaining a park, and taxpayers still ultimately pick up the bill. The only difference being, rather than all of us helping to pay for all of the parks countywide, each community will only have to pay for its own.
Does this Balkanization of our park system fulfill any civic objective larger than budgetary chicanery? Not really. But it does highlight the screwed up way we hamstring the funding of local services.
See, unlike things like courts and jails, parks operations are considered a discretionary activity for county government, and thus have no secure hold on any piece of the general fund. And without the statutory authority to create a countywide parks district, this leaves county parks with no regular levy of their own. The county can ask voters to approve special parks levies every few years, but this is never an easy or politically popular task, and it certainly isn’t a sustainable approach to long term budgeting.
That’s where we get all the so-called “innovative” talk of shoving parks off on library and fire districts; they do have their own regular levies, and as they provide popular, quantifiable services, they generally have an easier time than counties passing lid lifts and special levies. It’s not that it makes any particular sense to have a library or fire district maintaining a park, it’s just that some of them have the resources to pay for them, while due to its inflexible revenue structure, the county does not.
So if the Times’ editors really want to get innovative about funding parks, it’s time they look beyond the parks themselves and start focusing on fixing the arcane and inadequate tax system that is forcing these sort of bizarre contortions. As our region has grown in population and wealth, we have naturally demanded more parks and open space, and it’s past time we give the county the means to pay for it.
Sure it does.
Be honest Goldy.
Do you really believe that low income seniors in Shoreline should be paying to operate and maintain Klahanie Park?
Look at the tax base surrounding that park and consider what role it could possibly play in a regional park system. Is it reasonable to expect that such a park will draw users from throughout the county or that it fulfills a critical need important to all of the county citizens?
It’s a local neighborhood park surrounded by some of the most expensive SFR real estate in King County. Including it in part of a regional, county-wide park system only serves to reduce the tax burden on a small handful of very wealthy home owners. Very much the same can be said of many of the other parks on Triplett’s list. These are parks the county has been struggling with for many years. Many of them simply don’t belong in a regional system. Quite a few of them should have been devolved into local jurisdictions a long time ago.
For the county, what sort of taxing authority do you suggest? Surely not a county income tax… do you want to raise property and/or sales taxes during the recession???
@2,
Absent statewide tax structural reform, there should be more park districts with their own levy authority, the way there is a Vashon Park District and a Bainbridge Island Park District (formed to operate local parks, before the City of Winslow annexed the whole island in 1991.)
Small, truly local parks should be handed off to city governments or new, focused park districts.
And, there should be a King County Park District to operate large regional parks, such as Cougar Mountain.
The tax structure is formed in such a way that building infrastructure is way out of balance with maintaining it, and staffing it, no matter what it is.
Library, parks, Seattle Center, king county parks.
@4 That’s true. Schools and other public buildings around here fall apart within a few years for want of a few bucks’ worth of maintenance.
@1 The tradeoff is that other neighborhoods whose taxes help support Klahanie get their neighborhood parks from the same pool of tax funds, too. Shoreline, for example, has a number of such parks.
Whether low-income seniors should be stuck with paying for these parks has already been answered with property tax exemptions for low-income seniors.
I think Goldy is wrong on this one. Yhe answer is to do away with as many layers of government as possible. Given the urbanization of KC, the rational for parks belonging to the county vs the local municipality has long past.
Why are the zoo, Discovery Park, Seattle Center, SAM .. city while Boeing Field is county?
If we were to reduce the County to courts and jails, I suspect the need for a KC council would poof. Doing away with the Council might present legal issues for the State, but how much elected admin does it requore to run a court system?
There are other things the Cpunty does and these are valuable .. eg the library system, the port and metro, but they have their own taxing districts and governance.
Other local agencies, Harborview for example, probably need some government to belong to but do we really need the whole Co Govt for that?
@7 When a county becomes almost completely urban, as King County has, county and city functions can appear redundant. But this certainly isn’t true elsewhere. Outside Pugetopolis county governments are the main (and often only) providers of municipal services. King County’s demography is unique, and therefore its government structure and municipal needs also are unique. I think the rule “whatever works best” is what should apply.
@7
Legally state law also requires a sheriff, an elections office, and an assessors office. I think the health department may be a statutory requirement as well.
Unincorporated areas would still need someone to provide services like police protection and road maintenance. Sure if you live outside a city you shouldn’t expect the same level of service, but you should get at least some services.
BTW Metro Transit and sewers are very much part of King County Government and under the authority of the King County council. They do have separate funding sources though.
“Whether the county or a city or a (really?) fire district owns the deed, it doesn’t much change the cost of maintaining a park, and taxpayers still ultimately pick up the bill.”
And if the cities own the parks, the richer cities will have better parks. But I suppose the Times editors see that as a positive.
@8
Population wise King County might be “almost completely urban” but in terms of land area huge swaths of the county are very rural. In addition outside the UGB the currently unincorporated areas of the county are expected to mostly remain so. People do live there, more than the entire populations of some smaller counties in the state.
Furthermore the unincorporated rural areas still need those services the county provides.
@10
I am skeptical. Whenever one adds admin layers one must add costs.
For example, each of the council memebrs must have a staff.
If the main need for the Co govt is to admin the courts, I do not really see why we need a country executive and council.
Roger ..
“whatever works” ,, as in whatever kept GM in business so long??
Things change and what worked in 1909 may not be such a good isea in 2009.
I do suspect there is a real need for municipal government in more rural counties, but it is hard to see why we need one for KC other than state law.
Electing an appraiser or a sheriff is ridiculous as is electing an election commissioner.
I assume the judiciary has its own administration. so the role of the KC government is to set judges’ salaries?
If we REALLY need a KC govt, lets at least rationalize it by rationalizing the costs of regional resources … Somehow I suspect Hunts Point does not pay its fare share of the costs of Seattle Center, Myrtle Edwards,or the zoo,
Maybe if the damn stadia were regional they would not have been built in and killed Pioneer square? Hell maybe if the Sonics were the King’s Sonics, they would still be playing here?
@12
You do realize that large portions of King County are quite rural?
You do realize people live there and need both local government and services?
Running criminal justice is a bit more than administering the courts, there are parole officers, the jail, the prosecutor’s office, the sheriff’s department.
@6
for starters you’ll have to show us either a King County neighborhood park in Shoreline, or a county revenue sharing fund that provides parks revenues to the City of Shoreline.
The point is that “optional” local services and amenities really should not be the responsibility of a regional government like King County. And do you honestly intend to defend Klahanie Park as part of a regional system? Seriously?
I’m not remotely suggesting doing away with a county park system. And I recognize that there will always be some room for debate about what kinds of amenities and services such a system should provide. I consider myself very fortunate to live in a city like Seattle which treasures its parks and is willing to pay the taxes to support them. And right along with the overwhelming majority of Seattle property owners, I’m very happy to pay general fund taxes as well as special levy taxes to King County in order to support a healthy regional park system.
But just as I would never dream of expecting property owners in Renton or Burien to fund the maintenance and upkeep of the dozens of neighborhood city parks facilities within walking distance of my home, neither would I expect to pay for neighborhood parks in one of the wealthiest communities in East King County. I’m not claiming that every single one of the parks on Kurt Triplett’s list should be removed from the regional system. But honestly. Klahanie?
Goldy–
Here’s an idea–
Put up your Tip Jar and see how much you can VOLUNTARILY RAISE for Parks.
It will give you a clear statement on how much folks really value Parks.
My guess–
Less than $50…meaning people don’t give a sh*t..they just ONCE AGAIN want something they prioritize for as close to nothing as possible.
@15 Tip Jar? You mean like when Seattle voters passed the $149 million 2008 Parks and Green Spaces Levy with 59% approval? Was that voluntarily enough for you?
How about the part of REET (or is that REET II) that can be used for infrastructure investment for parks (and similar stuff) be made available to staff and maintain those same facilities.
How about annexation include tranfering facilities, and the tax resources to the local community, where possible?
That King County library in Shoreline is really nice, when it is open.
@ 13. Chris Stefan spews:
@12 Chris
You do realize that large portions of King County are quite rural?
You do realize people live there and need both local government and services?
actually? No. What proportion of KC lives in unincorporated areas, what are the numbers?
If they are small, as I suspect, what is the admin cost/person compared with folks living in Issaquah?
and what part of this requires a county executive, county council, etc to administer?
Moreover don;t we already elect the judgesm prosecutor, and sheriff? Do THEY need a council?
I am very open minded on this and certainly could be wrong, but so far none has told me why we need an elected bureaucracy at this level. I also feel much of the management of tyhe facilties you describe really needs to be done by professionals ..electing sheriffs and judges makes no sense to me.
The only clear need we seem to have for a County govt. is to set our tax rate.
16. Steve spews:
No, that was committing EVERYONE to pay for something. I’m talking about lefty’s actually putting their own money where their mouths are…something obviously foreign to you.
sj–
Peeling the onion quite nicely on this one sir.
I do believe the law requires each County to have an elected Board…but don’t have time to look it up now. It’s their job to take as much money from us as they can and to make regulations via Ordinances to control our lives and make us as beholding to them as possible.
Dimwit, 59% of Seattle’s voters said “yes”, they’d pay for parks. The “no” votes must have come from selfish faux-Christian wingnuts. In other words, asswipes like you.
@0 Mr C
err ahh how did Mr C vote on the election commissioner?
Currently there are nearly 400,000 people living in unincorporated King County. That is more people than live in all but 4 counties in Washington. Even once you subtract all of the areas the county is trying to pawn off on the cities you still have roughly 140,000 people which is more than all but 10 counties.
If Chelan or Lewis county need a county government, I’m pretty sure King county does too. For that matter consider King County has a larger budget currently than many entire US states.
@23 Chris …
400,000???
That is an awful lot. I would be very interesting to see how the tax burden is distributed.
So, if these folks do NOT need schools, and other things are paid for by the Distrcts, what services do they need from the country that the rest of us do not get?
road maintenance?
local police
??
Do they have their own parks? community facilities?
I understand your point but now find it harder to understand why any county mony goes to museums ets in incorporated areas?
What portion of the budget goes explicityly to the 400,000?