Many West Hill residents were hoping to get a chance to vote early next year on annexing to Renton. While some West Hill residents have expressed interest in staying in unincorporated King County and others have expressed a wish that Seattle would annex them, there are a large number that have been expressing desire to annex to Renton. (The West Hill is in Renton’s potential annexation area, so it would take pro-active actions from multiple jurisdictions to bring about an annexation of West Hill to any other city. )

Renton Council has previously expressed tentative support of holding an annexation election (with a 5 to 2 council split), with the intent that IF residents of West Hill expressed a majority interest in annexing, Renton would make a final review of whether we could make the annexation work financially. The financial determination would be heavily dependent on an annexation funding sales tax “rebate” from Washington State, which was set up a few years ago specifically to enable cities to close the budget gap when annexing unincorporated urban areas.

But last week, Governor Gregoire revealed that she may propose eliminating this annexation funding. If she did, the budget gap for a West Hill annexation would grow from about ten million dollars over ten years (depending on the assumptions used) to about thirty million dollars over ten years– a gap I predict is too wide for a majority of Renton Councilmembers to accept.

In other words, if Governor Gregoire persuades the legislature to cut this funding, Renton could not afford to annex West Hill.

Here is an article with more information on this topic, as it relates to the city of Burien.