August 28, 2003

On the Dole

You and I are subsidizing the builder and the folks who are going to live on this new hillside scar. According to the Seattle Times:

About one-fifth of the funding for the nearly $178million interchange and road, and much of the drive, came from Port Blakely Communities, the company building a 3,250-home "urban village" called the Issaquah Highlands on the south end of the Plateau.
The rest came from taxpayers to the tune of about $43,815 per home (assuming 80%).

There is a lot of glowing talk in the article about future tax benefits to the state and local communities and improvements in traffic flow. But there were other solutions to the traffic problem that did not involve lining a corporate pocket book with tax payer's money (cf, bush and the Texas Rangers). Look at these projected tax revenues on a net instead of gross basis they won't glow quite so brightly and, of course, they do little or nothing to compensate the out of area taxpayers who contributed significant federal dollars to the project.

Let's send Port Blakely an additional bill.

Posted by Steve on August 28, 2003
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