According to an article that appeared on Crosscut.com this week, John Christison, head of the Washington State Convention and Trade Center, is not in total agreement for using a portion of City of Seattle’s hotel-motel tax money to help fund a $300 million remodel of KeyA
rena.

[More:]

Here’s the excerpt:

John Christison, director of the Convention Center, says he’s not ready to sign on for this proposal, and (Seattle Deputy Mayor Tim) Ceis concedes that there’s more work to be done on working out such a deal. Part of any such deal is the question of whether the Convention Center is going to build a new facility, likely at the Metro station just north of the Paramount. Studies are under way for this proposal, and in about a month the Center might be able to say if it’s going ahead with a plan and if there’s enough money left over from its hotel taxes to be generous on KeyArena. Further, Christison notes that the 10 percent of the hotel tax being talked about by the City “is a lot more than we discussed" and would produce well more than the $75 million needed for KeyArena. He also says that the Convention Center “would look at the proposal positively” if it doesn't need all of the tax.

The tax rate in Seattle is 7 percent, but only about 6 percent is needed to pay off the remaining bonds. So the city is asking the Legislature to reduce the Convention Center tax to 6 percent and restore the remaining authority for the city to extend 1 percent of that tax as part of its overall finance package to remodel KeyArena. But as Christisons’ comments suggest, the city still is negotiating with the hotel industry and state convention center officials on the proposal.

A joint task force created by the Legislature, co-chaired by Rep. Ross Hunter, D-Medina, and Sen. Tracey Eide, D-Federal Way. The seven-member group is charged with evaluating options for using King County taxes, some of which are being used to pay off debt on Safeco Field, Qwest Field and the demolished Kingdome.

Here’s a link to the joint task force informational web site.

And if you have some time on your hands you can watch the first joint task force meeting in July here. It’s a little over an hour long, but goes through all of the King County tax funding sources paying for the Kingdome, Qwest Field and Safeco Field. The meeting also provides a good background of the motel-hotel tax for King County and the City of Seattle.