KING COUNTY WASTES MILLIONS OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS IN SUPPORT OF ALCOHOL INDUSTRY

Summary: King County continues to waste millions of dollars of taxpayer money defending special interest legislation for the alcohol industry. Allowing manufacturing facilities and retail bars on protected lands is in violation of county and state laws. This legislation impacts public safety, harms fish and wildlife, degrades watersheds, brings long-term economic hardship to farmers, and increases social inequities.

Timeline: On June 14, the King County Council will hold a public hearing on proposed legislation for the alcohol industry. A Council vote is expected on June 21.

Learn more, via a phone call or birds-eye tour: Prior to June 21, come tour the Sammamish Valley, visit residents, farms, businesses, and wine tasting rooms to learn more about this issue.

Contact: Serena Glover, Friends of Sammamish Valley
serena@friendsofsammamishvalley.org; 425-985-2992

Background

In December 2019, King County Council passed Adult Beverage Ordinance 19030.  The Ordinance opened protected King County Rural Area (RA) and Agriculture (A) zones across the entire county to alcohol manufacturing facilities and retail bars, creating urban sprawl.

For context, in 1990 the Washington State legislature passed a landmark land use law called the Growth Management Act (GMA) to stop costly urban sprawl and conserve our farmland, forests, wetlands, watersheds, green spaces, and habitat for fish and wildlife.

The Rural Area and Agriculture zones, by law, do not have urban infrastructure such as sewer hookup, sidewalks, stoplights and turn lanes, streetlights, and parking lots. Urban businesses allowed in these zones create numerous negative impacts:

  • Businesses without proper infrastructure create toxic runoff and cause flooding. These impacts, together with significantly increased land prices, threaten protected farmland.

  • Specifically, farmers working in the Sammamish Valley provide food to underserved communities in Seattle.  Many of the farmers are diverse, coming from the Hmong, Khmer, Hispanic, and Black communities. Their livelihoods are at risk.

  • Polluted groundwater, reduced instream flows, and habitat loss harms fish and wildlife.

  • Public safety issues result from parked cars and pedestrians walking on the side of narrow, unlit rural roads and highways, and no turn lanes increase traffic backups.

  • Alcohol manufacturing and retail facilities inside the urban area pay more for land, leases, permitting and operations as it includes urban infrastructure and space with less restrictions. Those operating on Rural Area and Agriculture lands pay much less, allowing them to generate unfair profits.

  • Over several decades King County has spent millions of taxpayer dollars on successful rural, fish and farmland protection programs. The legislation flies in the face of taxpayer dollars being spent on these programs.

Futurewise, Friends of Sammamish Valley (FoSV), and farm businesses appealed Ordinance 19030 to the Growth Management Hearings Board. The Board invalidated the Ordinance twice in strongly worded, unanimous decisions; in May 2020 for violation of the State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA) and again in January 2022 for violating SEPA and the Growth Management Act (GMA).

Yet the county appealed the Board decisions to the courts twice and continue to waste taxpayer dollars defending their special interest legislation – both in court and with new proposed legislation scheduled for a vote on June 21 that remains non-compliant with SEPA and GMA. In addition, FoSV and Futurewise must raise private funds from citizens to challenge the county – creating a double cost whammy for consumers.

County officials are required to uphold state and county laws that protect agriculture, the environment, and rural communities.  Citizens should not have to pay to get the county officials to do their jobs!