[EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is a Letter to the Editor, written by a verified resident(s). It does not necessarily reflect the opinions of The B-Town Blog, nor its staff:]

Our city council tonight has a chance to unite an entire city with one Vote, truly giving all the citizens in Burien what we want.

Does the city council have the vision, integrity, and business experience?

Over the course of a few months, we have seen our city planners and our community development director argue and present a private project at a special hearing, but not argue or ask questions on the behalf of its citizens. Businesses have been told by city council member Cydney Moore to get out of town for asking questions. City officials are not talking to council, council is not getting information from planning. We are being lied to by the private company coming into town about their capabilities. The community has been kept in the dark on many of the details of this project, by all parties, including the council, city hall and DESC. How can we as a community trust our council and city to make such large decisions that impact all of us with any confidence?

DESC is coming to town to build supportive housing in our downtown core, this is not what we are fighting against. What we are fighting is if they qualify for the Affordable Housing Demonstration Project.

DESC has applied through our city for the Affordable Housing Demonstration Project, this will allow them to build bigger, have fewer restrictions, provide only 3 parking stalls for over 100 people, provide less green space, no balconies, and most importantly, pay no taxes, ever!

It all comes down to if they qualify for the Affordable Housing Demonstration Project, and many believe they do not, and we have heard no argument from the city on why they would. There is an easy way for our city to unite everyone tonight including businesses and citizens for or against DESC. Rarely one gets a chance to please all parties, but our council has that opportunity. It would show us our city council thinks about Burien first, not their next political move out of our community by joining King County.

Vote no to DESC falling under the Affordable Housing Demonstration Project for the reasons below:

- DESC is still coming to town as they stated. Making people for DESC happy.
- We will get a better building that is more suitable for the location, more parking, more green space, balconies, proper set-back, more assurances. This makes the people against it happy, or as happy as possible.
- We get tax revenue, millions of dollars over the course of a few years and it keeps giving. We are told by council that we cannot afford more police, more services, the list is long. We will have more money to provide for these things and that will help our current homeless. If smart, we can possibly earmark tax dollars from DESC for a true affordable housing project/emergency housing project. This makes all of us happy.
- It will unite us and restore a bit of confidence back into the community. This too makes all of us happy.

I ask the city what does Burien get if you vote yes? No one is answering this question. This DESC project will not even house Burien’s homeless and Vets as stated by DESC.

City Council, show us you have a good business sense for our city, that your goal to please King County does not come ahead of representing and pleasing Burien. We need to be united; we need this revenue drastically; we are not a wealthy city.

I would also ask the council to start talking about hospitals, most of the homeless need hospitals, doctors, full time counselors. Our government has privatized healthcare, pushing away their number one duty, taking care of the citizens. They have created business models that get incredibly wealthy on human misery, it is shameful.

– Danny House
Resident and business owner for 33 years

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