Seattle Transit Benefit District Renewal

To: Seattle City Council, Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan

Dear City Council & Mayor,

Beacon Hill Safe Streets is a neighborhood group that is dedicated to ensuring the safety of those traveling through our city by supporting projects and plans that promote a safe, equal, accessible transportation system. Transit is an integral part to how people in Beacon Hill and other Seattle residents get around, particularly in Southeast Seattle. We are greatly concerned that we will lose a significant amount of service hours if something is not done quickly to fix the Seattle Transit Benefit District (STBD). 

We fully support the increase in tax from 0.1% to 0.2% with the caveat that a progressive revenue source would be preferred and indeed may be required to ensure the long-term support of the STBD. We are concerned, like many, about the regressive nature of increasing the sales tax particularly during a recession, but we are more greatly concerned about the people who will be directly impacted by the loss of their transportation options. The impact of this tax should not be ignored; however, we think it should be fairly compared to what we’re gaining & losing as well.

Preserving service hours is critical for many families and worth this tax. A family who makes $50K a year will see an impact of approximately $13 of the course of the year. If one person in their family takes a single Lyft or Uber ride because of lost bus service, it will exceed their tax burden for an increased sales tax. In addition, if a family owns a car (or multiple cars) they will already be saving $40 to $60 per vehicle, savings far exceeding the increased sales tax. If a family owns no car, then we expect from our discussions that people who are transit dependent or transit reliant understand this calculus and would prefer to pay the tax then lose services they rely on. Many of us have been in this category before or currently are, and strongly support the modest tax increase in support of the continued services. 

Many of us know the struggles of what bad bus service looks like. We know the strife people go through trying to make these services work, and right now the least we can do is protect it the best we can to ensure that people have safe, reasonable ways to access the City of Seattle. We fully support using these tax dollars to focus on the most impacted and the most reliant on Metro Services, including those in the surrounding suburbs, We encourage the City to be proactive and work with regional partners and the state to look for progressive sources of revenue. We continue to support equity programs that remove the barriers to accessing services like hostile fare enforcement reform, fare reform or elimination, and fare support programs (like ORCA for All and ORCA Lift). 

Thank you for your time and we hope for your continued support to transit in Seattle.

Robert Getch, on behalf of Beacon Hill Safe Streets Membership