Nearly a year ago, I raised the alarm about increased spending by the City of Sammamish. At that time, I identified at least $100 million in spending and that the City could be on a path to tax increases.

Here’s what I identified in May 2014:

• Community Center: $35 million and probably more.
• Developing the former YMCA property next to Pine Lake School, at a cost of $15 million proposed in the park plan.
• Sahalee Road improvements at an unidentified cost, but probably in the low millions at the least.
• Millions of dollars in the park plan for the Sammamish Landing, the Pigott property and more.
• Klahanie Annexation: $32 million for road improvements and who knows what else on top of this, almost certainly amounting to tens of millions of dollars more.
• Widening Issaquah-Pine Lake Road at a cost of $16.5m.
• Rebuilding “Snake Hill Road” (it’s really 212th Ave. SE, down the windy, snake-like drive to East Lake Sammamish Parkway): Millions of dollars.
• Desires to take over the Northeast Sammamish and Sammamish Plateau Water and Sewer Districts: tens of millions of dollars, at a minimum.
• Town Center improvements.
• And this is on top of the normal operations of the city, including millions of dollars for road maintenance, parks, services and overhead.

Let’s update these: Continue reading →