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AN ORDINANCE authorizing the King County executive to execute an amended and restated commercial ground lease agreement with one of the original lease signatories for the child care, comfort station, and retail space elements of the existing mixed-use affordable housing project on county-owned land located at the Northgate Park and Pool lot, in council district one.

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STATEMENT OF FACTS:

1.  Consistent with K.C.C. 4.56.070.C.1., in 2018 King County issued a request for qualifications and concepts, number 1207-18-VLN ("the RFQ/C"), through which King County sought proposals for the development of its Northgate Park and Pool lot.  Among other things, the RFQ/C required proposals to include a minimum of two hundred units of subsidized affordable housing for a minimum of fifty years to serve households earning up to sixty percent of Area Median Income ("AMI"), with a mix of unit sizes and configurations, and with a minimum of ten percent of the units to be "system connected," serving very-low to extremely-low income households below fifty percent of AMI.

2.  The RFQ/C resulted in three proposals and King County selected a developer team and commenced negotiations with the selected team.

3.  After extensive negotiations the Metro transit department determined that the county should award a ground lease of a portion of the county-owned land located at the Northgate Park and Pool lot to Bridge Housing Corporation and the entity now known as Community Roots Housing (collectively, "Bridge/CRH") for an affordable housing project to include two hundred thirty-two units of affordable housing for seventy-five years with at least twenty-four units designated for system-connected households with incomes of fifty percent or less of AMI, as well as a child care facility, a comfort station for transit operators, and a retail space.

4.  The Metro transit department successfully negotiated a ground lease with an entity managed by Bridge/CRH ("Northgate Affordable Housing LLLP") for a portion of the county-owned land located at the Northgate Park and Pool lot and the metropolitan King County council approved Ordinance 19363 authorizing the executive to execute the ground lease.

5.  At the time the ground lease closed in December 2023, Bridge/CRH had not secured all necessary funding to complete the interior buildout of the child care facility.

6.  To satisfy lenders, Bridge/CRH provided a guarantee to cover the remaining funding gap and identified funding to substantially complete the comfort station and finish the shell and core for the child care facility and retail space, in anticipation that the ground lease would be restructured to separate these commercial elements from the affordable housing element of the overall project.

7.  To allow construction financing to proceed and to allow project construction to begin on time as planned, Bridge/CRH and the Metro transit department agreed to work together in good faith to amend and restate the existing lease into two separate leases.

8.  The Metro transit department subsequently negotiated with Bridge/CRH to amend the existing ground lease and restate the lease terms in:

  a. an amended and restated ground lease with Northgate Affordable Housing, LLLP for just the affordable housing elements of the existing Bridge/CRH project; and

  b. an amended and restated ground lease for just the commercial space, consisting of the child care facility, comfort station, and retail space elements, with Northgate Retail LLC, for which CRH acts as its manager.

9.  The parties have negotiated that the amended and restated commercial ground lease will not be effective until the shell and core for the child care facility and retail space has been finished, the comfort station, including tenant improvements, has been substantially completed, and both have been accepted by the Metro transit department.

                     BE IT ORDAINED BY THE COUNCIL OF KING COUNTY:

                     SECTION 1.  The executive is authorized to execute an amended and restated ground lease for commercial space, which includes the child care facility, comfort station, and retail space elements of the existing Bridge/CRH transit-oriented development project on county-owned land located at the Northgate Park and Pool lot, with Northgate Retail LLC, substantially in the form of Attachment A to this ordinance, and to take all actions necessary to implement the terms of the commercial ground lease.

                     SECTION 2.  If any provision of this ordinance or its application to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the remainder of the ordinance or the application of the provision to other persons or circumstances is not affected.