Just got back from City Hall, where council member Tim Burgess—who, along with Richard Conlin, is pushing to repeal the so-called "head tax," $25-per-employee tax charged to employers whose workers commute by car alone—told me more about his plans to replace the tax with other funding sources.
The most interesting aspect of Burgess’ plan, which is still very much in the preliminary stages, is that it would create a dedicated fund to pay for projects in the city’s bike and pedestrian master plans, neither of which is fully funded. The pedestrian master plan alone could end up costing as much as $800 million. "When SDOT presents its funding plan every year, we ask them, ‘Are you going to give us a specific list of projects?’ and SDOT waffles on that," Burgess said. Creating a dedicated funding source for bike and ped projects would give the council some control over which projects get funded, Burgess says.
One possible glitch in Burgess’s plan: Of the four potential new tax sources Burgess has identified, several have already been identified as possible funding sources for other projects. For example, the city has talked about paying for its share of the replacement of the Alaskan Way Viaduct by doubling the parking tax to a total of 20 percent. The transportation benefits district, a fee of up to $20 on car licensing, has been discussed as a funding source for both the vidauct and to pay for any transit shortfalls King County Metro can’t afford to make up. If those two options were taken out of play, that would reduce the total potential funding to just over $4 million—not even enough to replace the money that will be lost when the head tax is repealed.
