Kent Chamber of Commerce requests reduction in property tax in 2012 city budget by nearly $5 million | Letter

The Kent Chamber of Commerce recognizes there are two issues in regards to the Regional Fire Authority. One is the action of the Regional Fire Authority as it pertains to fees charged to the business community. The other issue is regarding the city of Kent and the additional money that the city of Kent kept from the fire benefit tax, which was funneled into the general fund of the 2011 city of Kent budget.

After extensive input from our members and discussion with the city of Kent and the Regional Fire Authority, the Chamber requests the following actions from both the Regional Fire Authority and the city of Kent.

Regional Fire Authority

• The Chamber wants to support and encourage the Regional Fire Authority to aggressively pursue a drop in the Kent Fire Department Insurance Service Office rating from a 3 to a 2. The ISO is the leading supplier of statistical, actuarial and underwriting information for and about property/casualty insurance industry. The ISO fire insurance rating for a community is the foundation on which most insurers build their coverage programs. The ratings are based on many factors and ratings range from 1 to 10, with 1 being perfect.

• Since the ISO fire ratings are used by property insurance companies to set insurance premium rates, the lower the ISO fire rating, the lower the insurance premium thus affecting the bottom line for Kent’s businesses. Furthermore, lowering the Kent fire department ISO rating will help save lives by increasing the city of Kent’s standards for fire protection. The chamber would like to offer any assistance, if needed, to the RFA for a speedy process regarding a drop in the ISO rating. We request that the RFA provide the chamber with updates on the progress of this process.

• The chamber requests that the regional fire authority continue to allow the credit and appeal procedure to be an open process that can occur if and when a business owner or resident challenges the assessment of their property and/or decides to appeal the findings of the King County Assessor’s office with the RFA.

• The chamber requests that the RFA proactively work to reevaluate and reduce the risk factor for commercial building expanding the credits that businesses can receive in order to mitigate their costs associated with RFA coverage.

The chamber appreciates the Regional Fire Authorities willingness to communicate with the chamber regarding these issues.

City of Kent

The 2012 budget process has started and will be approved in December of 2012. The chamber requests that the city of Kent form the 2012 budget and future budgets without the additional tax revenue generated from the fire benefit charge. There has been discussion regarding the amount of additional funds generated from the fire benefit charge and the obligation to the city of Kent to the Regional Fire Authority in contract services. The chamber believes this number to be $4.94 million per year due to the City Council meeting on Sept. 21, 2010 in which the city of Kent finance director, Bob Nachlinger, and the city of Kent council members agreed upon the additional revenue generated at $4.94 million annually.

The Chamber recognizes that the city of Kent swept this additional $4.94 million into the general fund for 2011 budget and asks that the city of Kent not take this action in the future with additional revenue generated by taxation. We request that the City of Kent reduce all property tax in the city by reducing the cities levee tax rate equal to the agreed upon 4.94 million. This effort by the city of Kent council will hopefully repair and restore trust in the governmental process, which has clearly been eroded by their decision in 2011 to sweep the additional revenue into the general fund instead of refunding it to the taxpayers of Kent.

The city of Kent is already raising and seeking additional taxation sources in order to fund the city of Kent government. The Kent Chamber of Commerce urges the city council members when looking at new taxes to remember that businesses cannot thrive with a higher tax burden and therefore funding for public services will dry up. This is very evident in the drop of sales tax revenue and other revenue sources that the city of Kent has relied on in the past. Continuing to burden the business community and city of Kent residents with increased taxes and ignoring this opportunity to give the reductions to all property tax payers in order to offset the additional costs of the Regional Fire Authority is irresponsible and burdensome to the Kent community as they continue to fight for their livelihood in this tough economy.

Andrea Keikkala

Executive director

Kent Chamber of Commerce