Let's Buy Seattle's Broadmoor & Sandpoint Golf Courses

Let's Buy Seattle's Broadmoor & Sandpoint Golf Courses

Started
May 27, 2020
Signatures: 219Next Goal: 500
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Why this petition matters

Started by End Golf Subsidies! Let's buy the golf course!

The two exclusive and private country clubs in Seattle -- Broadmoor and Sandpoint -- together are being subsidized by Seattle and King County taxpayers to the tune of at least $1.2 million per year.

How? Because the King County Assessor has undervalued the courses by at least 1200%. While a single family parcel in Broadmoor is valued at $150 per square foot of land, the golf course off the backyard is valued at 76 cents per square foot.

The King County Assessor claims this is the golf course's "true and fair value". Meanwhile, the land of Seattle's municipal courses are valued at $12.50, $15, and $62.50 per square foot. Talaris, a large parcel of undeveloped land near Sandpoint sold for $20.14 per square foot. While the Sandpoint course is valued at $1.03 per square foot, just a few blocks away Magnuson Park is $90. Discovery Park is $43.79. Even the Arboretum next door to Broadmoor Country Club is valued at $4 per square foot!

This means the private clubs pay just $78,505 in taxes rather than what they should: at minimum $1,332,544 if valued uniformly with the publicly owned Jefferson or West Seattle golf courses.

So, Seattle City Council and King County Council: let's use our eminent domain powers to buy Broadmoor and Sandpoint Country Clubs at the King County Assessor's "true and fair value"! Our housing, homelessness, and climate crises provide the public good justification. We need more land on which to build urban housing, and the under-used and massively subsidized private golf courses fit the bill.

The golf course land is valued at $8.5 million. Adding in the club houses (which are future community centers!), the total is $20.5 million. Seattle's Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) raised $15 million in 2019.

Let's invest 2020's MHA funds to secure permanently affordable housing in Seattle, and end this massive tax giveaway to the rich.

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Signatures: 219Next Goal: 500
Support now
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