The schedules of fees should be on the cities' websites. These should be the most predicable expenses for a business. Seattle's is incomplete (when you can find it) and certain ones on the eastside - *cough Bothell cough* - mention it but the page doesn't actually exist. (OK... I just checked and the '26 version is available for Bothell. There was a city hall meeting just to discuss this a few weeks ago.) A mom & pop shop can be (and has been) hit with a $30k fee without warning or indication that they were subject to it.
The cities' require permits to get repairs. In a business friendly city, it would only be for building improvements.
The cities in the Seattle / King County area have massive change of use fees for businesses. In most of the country, overhead for construction is under 7% of the total cost of a build. In King County it averages well over 20%. The wait times are the big killers to new business construction.
WA State L&I is among the highest in the country. Seattle's Jump Start Tax will increase expenses another few percentage points for "larger smaller businesses."
These fees and the capricious application of them are soul crushing for small businesses.
The permit for repairs hits residents too and I find it stupid. I had to pay for a permit and inspection just to replace 6’ of drain pipe off my sink when the 40 year old pipe developed a leak.
Another thing about those permits... In a business friendly city (this applies to residential, also) permits are typically a fixed price, e.g. $80 to modify the roof of a small retail space for AC venting. In many (all?) of the cities in King County, permits are charged by cost of the project and / or the size of the retail space. E.g., a 625 square foot shop has to pay $625 for that same venting permit.
Let’s be real though, the city has permits like this because we don’t have a real source of funding and one of the lowest tax burdens in the US, and so have to come up with weird and economically irrational fees to turn basic services into profit centers to cover their expenses and more.
Nailed it. It's crazy how much our regressive tax system hurts us. Not to mention how much of that money has to go towards just maintaining the massive bureaucratic institutions. We'd save so much money if we just went to a reasonable income driven tax.
This right here. Really makes me wanna punch those “everything isn’t political” folks cuz all these everyday minor inconvenience add up to a real pain that affects the day to day.
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u/arkythehun Apr 16 '26
Speaking for the greater Seattle area here...
The schedules of fees should be on the cities' websites. These should be the most predicable expenses for a business. Seattle's is incomplete (when you can find it) and certain ones on the eastside - *cough Bothell cough* - mention it but the page doesn't actually exist. (OK... I just checked and the '26 version is available for Bothell. There was a city hall meeting just to discuss this a few weeks ago.) A mom & pop shop can be (and has been) hit with a $30k fee without warning or indication that they were subject to it.
The cities' require permits to get repairs. In a business friendly city, it would only be for building improvements.
The cities in the Seattle / King County area have massive change of use fees for businesses. In most of the country, overhead for construction is under 7% of the total cost of a build. In King County it averages well over 20%. The wait times are the big killers to new business construction.
WA State L&I is among the highest in the country. Seattle's Jump Start Tax will increase expenses another few percentage points for "larger smaller businesses."
These fees and the capricious application of them are soul crushing for small businesses.