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The IssaquahPress • An nual • Ba home ckyard ch • Wi projec eckup nte
riz • Ho ts Spec ial pub me bu ing licat in The ying Issaq ion of Issaq tips uah uah Pres s, Sam Press Inc. mam ish Revi Media ew & Group pub SnoV alley lished Star
Issaquah’s only locally owned newspaper
Council adopts Costco agreement Move paves way for headquarters expansion By Christina Corrales-Toy newcastle@isspress.com The nation’s second largest retailer is free to expand its headquarters, and it will continue to happen here in Issaquah. The Issaquah City Council unanimously approved a 30year development agreement with Costco Oct. 13, giving the company flexibility to add an additional 1.5 million square feet to its international headquarters housed in Pickering Place. “It’s really a very, very big deal for Issaquah and for Costco,” Issaquah City Councilman Joshua Schaer said at the Oct. 13 meeting. “It ensures that, for years to come, when people around the country and around the world speak of Costco it will be in connection with the words ‘An Issaquah, Washington-based corporation.’” The Fortune 500 company has called Issaquah home since 1994. Its current office space covering 700,000 square feet on 47 acres in Pickering Place is set to double under the agreement. The development agreement was very important to Costco’s future here in Issaquah, Rich Olin, the company’s senior vice president and general counsel, said before the council Oct. 6. It allows the retailer to expand and offers the infrastructure improvements necessary to achieve that goal, he added. “We are committed to staying in Issaquah and growing,” Olin said. One of the agreement’s major details is a public-private partnership that will bring much needed street improvements to
North Issaquah, city Economic Development Director Keith Niven said at an Oct. 6 City Council meeting. The city will pick up a little more than half of the expected $50 million expense to cover three road projects — the widening of East Lake Sammamish Parkway in front of Home Depot and Fred Meyer, a new road connecting Pickering Place to East Lake Sammamish Parkway and improvements to 12th Avenue Northwest near the Issaquah Holiday Inn. “Really, these North Issaquah road projects have been on the city’s traffic improvement list for a long time, and this is an opportunity for us to actually bring them to construction,” Niven said. Longtime business owner Randy Bass continued to voice his concerns about the agreement at an Oct. 6 public hearing. The road improvements will force Bass to redevelop some of his storage facility on East Lake Sammamish Parkway, since part of the new road will go through his property, he said. During the public hearing, Bass and his attorney Sam Rodabough asked the city to provide some sort of mitigation for the negative impacts to his property. “To be clear, my client does not oppose the proposed expansion of the Costco campus, or the anticipated improvements to the city’s infrastructure that are necessary to accommodate such expansion,” Rodabough said. “However, my client does object to the wholesale failure of the city and Costco to mitigate the impacts of these projects to the Bass property.” It ultimately wasn’t addressed in the final adoption of the development agreement, but Issaquah City Councilwoman Nina Milligan See COSTCO, Page 2
www.issaquahpress.com
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
EARLY HALLOWEEN HAPPENINGS
Photos by Greg Farrar
Above, Jay Radmer (left), of Issaquah, with dozens of other zombies lying on the City Hall steps, prepares to perform a flash mob dance to Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ after shuffling south on Front Street from the Hailstone Feed Store for the fifth annual downtown Zombie Walk on Oct. 18. Below left, zombie Sean Tucker, 5, of Issaquah, lurches along Front Street.
SLIDESHOW See more photos from the Highlands Halloween festival and the Downtown Zombie Walk at www.issaquahpress.com. By Greg Farrar
Above, triplets Charlie, Owen and Alex Mount, 5, Issaquah Highlands residents, pick toys out of a basket after playing the giant spider ring toss game Oct. 18 at the Halloween in the Highlands family festival at Grand Ridge Plaza. At left, Noel Flores (left), 8, Maripaz Alfaro, 11, Ava Hanify, 9, and sister Sophie, 5, race to scoop out the insides of pumpkins as fast as they can under during a Halloween in the Highlands timed contest.
Give input on city’s proposed 2015 budget Residents can offer their input about the city’s proposed 2015 budget at two upcoming public hearings. The Issaquah City Council will hold a public hearing to consider revenue sources, including a possible increase to property tax revenues, at its Nov. 3 regular meeting beginning at 7 p.m. The council will hold its final public hearing at 7 p.m. Nov.
17, during the regular meeting in which the city is expected to formally adopt the 2015 budget. Both meetings will be held in the Council Chambers, 135 E. Sunset Way. View the preliminary budget online at http://goo.gl/Qh7h6P, or at the city’s finance department and city clerk’s office, at 130 E. Sunset Way, or the Issaquah Library, 10 W. Sunset Way.
Police find burglar near Fall City Almost six hours after the King County Sheriff’s Office asked the public to help them track down a prowler near an unincorporated area of SamShayne Kennedy mamish on Oct. 17, police reported that the suspect was arrested near Fall City. Police specifically mentioned the Duthie Hill Park area and the 30000 block of Southeast
Issaquah-Fall City Road as areas he had roamed. There was probable cause to arrest Shayne C. Kennedy for possession of stolen property, according to a news release from the sheriff’s office. The release described Kennedy and asked for people to call if they had seen him. A neighbor called 911 after seeing the man that fit the description. Deputies and a K-9 unit responded and found Kennedy in the woods. He was taken into custody at 5:40 p.m.
Business community raises concerns about new B&O tax By Christina Corrales-Toy newcastle@isspress.com As the city of Issaquah considers raising its business and occupation tax for the first time since 2004, local business owners gathered to offer their concerns about the proposal at an Oct. 15 roundtable at Tibbetts Creek Manor. The Issaquah Chamber of Commerce-hosted event showed business leaders have plenty of questions about the tax increase, including where the extra revenue will be spent. “I don’t want to pay for fluff,” said Norma Stephens, Curves of
Issaquah owner. The proposal would increase B&O taxes for manufacturing, wholesale and retail companies from 0.0008 to 0.0015 effective April 1, 2015, and then to 0.002 effective Jan. 1, 2017. B&O taxes for printing/publishing, retail services and services/other would go from 0.001 to 0.0012 effective April 1, 2015. Under the proposal, more than 30 percent of those who do business in Issaquah (with gross incomes of $100,000 or less) would be exempt, which creates tangible efficiencies, Issaquah Mayor Fred Butler said. The current exemption is set at
$20,000. “Meanwhile, larger companies would pay a higher rate for the first time since the tax was created in 2004,” Butler said Oct. 6 as he presented the budget to the Issaquah City Council. The proposed increase will account for the volatility of one of the city’s major revenue sources — sales and use taxes — which is heavily dependent on consumer spending, Butler added Oct. 6. Business owners split into table groups at the Oct. 15 See TAX, Page 2
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