county\u2019s regional park system<\/a>, as well as funding for local city parks and the Woodland Park Zoo.<\/p>\n<\/p>\nIf approved by voters, the proposed levy would replace two voter-approved measures set to expire at the end of 2013.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cAll residents of King County have access to the regional park and trail system,\u201d said Council Chairman Larry Gossett in a county media release. \u201cThis ordinance will give the people the opportunity to decide how much value they get from the system.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThe parks levy proposal that we adopted is intended to ensure joint parks operations and maintenance,\u201d said Council Vice Chairman Julia Patterson. \u201cIt also includes trail investments that may eventually connect communities in South King County to our regional parks system.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The county parks system has evolved from 150 acres in 1938 to more than 26,000 acres today. The regional county parks and trails include Marymoor Park, Cougar Mountain Regional Wildland Park, the Weyerhaeuser King County Aquatic Center and the Sammamish River Trail.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The adopted legislation sends to voters a six-year property tax levy lid lift of 18.77 cents per $1,000 of assessed value \u2013 an estimated $56 per year for the owner of a home valued at $300,000.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
If approved by voters, the proceeds from the levy would go toward funding the maintenance and operation of 200 parks, 175 miles of regional trails, and 26,000 acres of open space. Levy funds would also be used to expand the regional trails system \u2013 including developing the Lake to Sound Trail \u2013 and to expand the Community Partnership and Grant program.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to thank the County Council for giving people the opportunity to support our open space and parks,\u201d County Executive Dow Constantine said. \u201cI also want to thank the King County Parks Levy Task Force members for their thoughtful recommendations on how to keep and maintain our parks with the voters’ support.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The levy proposal is consistent with county\u2019s practice to end the use of general fund monies on regional parks, trails and open spaces and on local facilities in the rural unincorporated areas. King County also continues its regional business plan for parks with support from non-profit, corporate and community partners.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Metropolitan King County Council on Monday approved sending to the voters in August a six-year property tax levy lid lift proposal to raise revenue for the maintenance and operations of the county\u2019s regional park system, as well as funding for local city parks and the Woodland Park Zoo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":212,"featured_media":1731,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-1730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/212"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1730"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=1730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}