Yesterday, I received a document from the King County Assessor's Office regarding Area Y/White Center/North Highline.

This makes annexation by Burien of Area Y at this time as even a worse plan than originally thought.

While it was only a preliminary draft, but it shows Area Y as decreasing in taxable land value by $126,295,650 for the year 2012.

This is significantly lower than Berk or the City of Burien projected the value of the land to be in the report and the application. Of course, this means less monies coming into Burien should they annex the area.

The Assessor's office anticipates that the Fire District will receive $189,443 dollars less next year to operate in Area Y. Area Y land values dropped by 17 percent and remember that Berk projected in its report that land values would continue to rise by 2 percent annually in the area-- that is a difference of 19 percent from the report to the reality of the situation.

I am still waiting to hear the approximate amount less of total dollars this will bring in to operate the area in 2012.

You will recall the Assessor's office notified Burien that the city will receive approx. $467,000+ less monies to operate the city in 2012 due to the declining land values in Burien-- the core area of the city dropped by 8+ percent and the newly annexed area dropped by 12 to 17 percent.

Again, Berk assumed that values in the city would increase by 2 percent in Burien.

Clearly, the city will receive a significantly lower amount of revenues than anticipated. The assumptions about revenues in the Berk report draft are no longer valid and will not be valid for a number of years-- if ever.

This is a point that will be made about the Draft Berk Report and the assumptions for revenues that the report is based upon to the Boundary Review Board.

Also, I received a letter that clearly states that the Highline School District would receive more monies for the north end schools, if Area Y were to annex to Seattle.

John Poitras
Burien