Drafter
Clerk 04/21/2005
Title
A MOTION endorsing the use of the Greenprint for King County for the purposes of identifying the highest priority open space lands to purchase and to ensure that King County is spending public money efficiently on the most important lands for conservation and open space.
Body
WHEREAS, because the Puget Sound region is facing pressing resource conservation issues, such as species becoming listed under the federal Endangered Species Act, population increases and the state Growth Management Act requirements to reduce sprawl and global warming induced climate change, King County needs a comprehensive land conservation strategy, and
WHEREAS, King County is mandated by the State Growth Management Act and the King County Comprehensive Plan to protect regionally significant environmental and cultural resources, environmental quality, resource lands, and provide for the public safety from flooding of its residents, and
WHEREAS, since 1970, King County has spent over three hundred fifty-three million dollars to conserve important recreation, open space and natural lands using a variety of funding sources, including conservation futures tax revenues, farmland preservation program bond revenues, real estate excise tax revenues, surface water management fee revenues and state and federal grant revenues, and
WHEREAS, King County department and natural resources and parks currently manages over twenty-five thousand acres of important open space lands, including trails, ecological lands, farmland, forests and flood hazard reduction lands, and monitors approximately one hundred six thousand acres in conservation easements, and
WHEREAS, the King County department of natural resources and parks is responsible for providing land conservation financing, acquisition and land management services in the region, and
WHEREAS, King County serves as the coordinator for the conservation futures tax revenues, overseeing the process for identif...

Click here for full text