Letters to the Editor

To the Editor:

The recent editorial by the Seattle Press in the April 19 - May 2, 2000 issue is remarkable. (This is very good). It has been hard to understand a lot of what has been written regarding the law and the live-aboard situation. Your article gets the "feeling" for what is happening. It touches on the spirit of the law, which is harder to track, and in a way that helps clarify this "muddy" situation. I know personally that there are many live-aboards whose contributions to our city and our lake are of great benefit to this community. It would be a terrible loss to remove these people from their neighborhood that now thrives, only to find crime and neglect increasing, while a neighborhood dies.

Thank you.

Sharon Doub via e-mail

Live-aboards Contribute Fair Share of Taxes

To the Editor:

In reply to the letter to the editor from Patricia Stambor

Re: Live-aboards in penthouses escape property taxes.

Stambor's claims of live-aboard boaters dodging property taxes is probably the real reason the state is trying to take action on submerged DNR public lands that boats are moored over. Why all the shrouding? Why not just propose levying an appropriate tax that allows this affordable lifestyle to continue. It's hard enough finding affordable housing in this area, with the average price of a home around$275,000. Could all this posturing and political rhetoric be the catalyst needed to impose boating property taxes?

However this would seem somewhat fair if there truly is an inequity. But then equally fair would be to suspend the annual "User Fee" that Stambor overlooked. All registered boats have to pay their "Tabs" to the State of Washington, by July 1 each year. (Annual fees for boats as with motor homes can be in the thousands of dollars.) I-695 has tried to change this but I think boats are still on the hook for this fee. Paying both property and user fee taxes would be unfair. In regard to property taxes, perhaps examining the waterfront tax assessments for marina operators would add a sobering aspect to Stambor's view. Not to mention State B&O taxes and OSHA, WISHA, and environmental compliance fees.

Live-aboards contribute to the bottom line in other ways. They pay sales taxes to the State of Washington every time the boat changes ownership. Boaters pay the 40c per gallon road taxes when they purchase boat fuel although no roads are used. This excess tax money, totaling millions of dollars annually, used to fund the State marine parks system for all to enjoy. Now I understand that it goes into that bottomless pit known as the "General Fund" to be allocated for who knows what.

The public trust doctrine and water dependent uses certainly should include watercraft as being water dependent, lived aboard or not, and their marinas. Following the letter of the law in this case seems fairly clear. Boats and floating homes require water. Lake Washington and Lake Union are not tidelands; they are inland waterways. Most live-aboard boaters see themselves as stewards of the waterways.

Live-aboards do not live covertly in the shadow of property tax-paying homeowners on land. Most of them own boats too, and we're all sick and tired of the State of Washington having their hands in our wallets, or imposing pointless legislation, every time we turn around.

Eric Jackson Home and Boat owner

Stambor is Right About Property-tax Dodgers

To the Editor:

Patricia Stambor's letter to the editor (The Seattle Press , May 3-16, 2000) regarding boat "live-aboards," was well researched and well documented. It may be fun to live on a boat on commonly owned public property but it is also a way to dodge paying a fair share of the cost of government by avoiding property tax.

Robert Kildall via e-mail

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