Title
AN ORDINANCE establishing a commercial property assessed clean energy and resiliency financing program; amending Ordinance 4461, Section 2, as amended, and K.C.C. 20.22.040 and Ordinance 4461, Section 2, as amended, and K.C.C. 20.22.040 and adding a new chapter to K.C.C Title 18.
Body
PREAMBLE:
In 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued new warnings on the impact of climate change and documented that global emissions need to be on the steep decline within the next decade to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
According to the most recent data prepared by ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability, an international technical consulting organization, commercial and industrial buildings make up thirty eight percent of greenhouse gas emissions in King County.
Greenhouse gas emissions are linked to climate change, which poses a threat to King County residents, the county's natural environment and the county's economic security.
Frontline communities are those communities that often experience the earliest and most acute impacts of climate change, face historic and current inequities and have limited resources and capacity to adapt to climate change. This includes Black, Indigenous and People of Color communities, immigrants and refugees, people with low incomes, communities experiencing disproportionate pollution exposure, women and gender non-conforming, LGTBQIA+ people, people who live or work outside, people with existing health issues, people with limited English skills, people experiencing pregnancy and other climate-vulnerable groups. Climate change is a threat multiplier to other social issues such as affordable housing and food security.
In 2020 the executive transmitted to the council the 2020 Strategic Climate Action Plan, which recommended bold action on greenhouse gas emission reductions across the county and in county government operations. The plan includes recommended actions that support countywide goals of fifty per...

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