Title
AN ORDINANCE related to the loan agreement between King County and Pacific Science Center Foundation; and adding a new section to K.C.C. chapter 4A.200.
Body
STATEMENT OF FACTS:
1. RCW 82.32.558 allows for a local sales and use tax deferral for construction of a new arena located at the Seattle Center in the city of Seattle. Under the statute, once the new arena, Climate Pledge Arena, is operationally complete, the deferred local sales and use taxes begin to become due to the state of Washington and must be paid to the state over the course of eight years.
2. Under RCW 82.32.559, fifty percent of those deferred local sales and use taxes ("deferred tax payments") have been designated for use by Pacific Science Center Foundation ("Pacific Science Center") for capital improvements specified in the statute.
3. County Ordinance 17402, enacted in 2012, indicated its willingness to support development and construction of new cultural or civic institutions with countywide benefit.
4. Pacific Science Center has sought the county's assistance in accelerating the payments it will ultimately receive from the state of Washington.
5. Pacific Science Center serves the King County population through educational program focused on its mission of curiosity, discovery, experimentation and critical thinking.
6. Some of Pacific Science Center's programming includes:
a. high-quality science education experiences at the physical campus in Seattle, the Mercer Slough Environmental Education Center in Bellevue and as the largest provider, through outreach programming, of informal science learning in the state, annually reaching more than seventy-four thousand King County students through field trips to its facilities, visits to classrooms and community centers, summer camps at seven locations throughout King County, winter and spring break camps and youth development programs, as well as providing those services to an additional ninety-six thousand students across the st...

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