Now that a bill that would have exempted the University of Washington from the city’s 12.5 percent commercial parking tax has failed to make it past a legislative deadline, the university and city are discussing options to save the UW some of the money it spends on the tax. The UW argues that it shouldn’t have to pay the tax because it uses parking revenues to pay for its popular UPass bus-subsidy program; with higher taxes, the university says, people won’t use the UW’s parking lots—slashing funding for UPass, which has become substantially more expensive over the past few years.
City Council transportation committee chair Tom Rasmussen says the city and UW are discussing several options, including a city-funded grant program that would that would allow the school, as well as other big institutions like Children’s Hospital, to compete for city funding to offset the tax, and a potential exemption from the 2.5 percent parking tax the council tacked on to the existing 10 percent tax last year.
Neither the Associated Students of the UW nor Josh Kavanagh, head of the school’s transportation department, would divulge details about their discussions with the city. “The UW and the city both realie we have a shared interest in making sure the UPass program continues,” Kavanagh said Friday.
Meanwhile, although the tax-exemption legislation failed to make it past the legislative cutoff date, it could reemerge as an amendment to unrelated legislation later in the session.
