Seattle head tax
The controversial head tax ordinance was passed by the Seattle City Council in May 2018 and was signed into law by Mayor Jenny Durkan, to be in effect for five years before consideration for renewal.
A citizen referendum was planned by business groups and gathered enough signatures to qualify for an upcoming election, but the city council repealed the head tax less than a month later.
[1] The city council adopted the head tax as part of the "Bridging the Gap" transportation levy, which was approved by voters in the November 2006 election.
[1] Nickels, along with councilmembers Burgess and Richard Conlin, proposed to repeal the head tax in June 2009, amid the economic recession.
[16] In 2017, Mayor Murray proposed a $275 million property tax levy to fund permanent housing units and mental health treatment over a five-year period.
[20] The head tax proposal was revived once again in late 2017 by councilmembers Mike O'Brien and Kirsten Harris-Talley, using $100 per employee to generate $24 million in annual revenue for homeless re-housing programs.
[24][25] The proposal was once again criticized by a consortium of business leaders as a tax on jobs or one targeted at Amazon, also accusing the city government of ineffectively using taxpayer revenue allocated for homelessness services.
[26] The full proposal was released in April 2018, outlining a tax on large employers with annual revenues of over $20 million, of which roughly 500 businesses would be affected.
[33] Durkan's proposal was rejected by a split vote of the city council's finance committee the following day, instead favoring the original $75 million version of the head tax.
[39][40] Business groups who remained opposed to the head tax responded days later with the formation of a campaign to overturn the city council decision through a citizens' initiative.
[41] The campaign, named "No Tax on Jobs", received $325,000 in committed donations from local economic development groups and businesses, including Amazon, Starbucks, Kroger (owners of Fred Meyer and QFC), Albertsons (owners of Safeway), and Vulcan, Inc.[42] The campaign was given until June 14 to collect 17,600 valid signatures to bring the initiative to the November 2018 ballot, and reportedly surpassed the threshold by June 11 using on-street petitioning by 2,000 volunteers.
[50][51] Other large metropolitan areas in the Western United States, such as Phoenix, began recruiting Seattle-area businesses for potential moves, citing lower taxes and cost of living.
[53][54] Mountain View and San Francisco both proposed to introduce a head tax to fund homelessness services on a ballot measure; Mountain View would charge $8 to $149 per employee to fund $6 million in transportation and affordable housing programs, while San Francisco's would raise up to $300 million annually for homeless services.
