December 8, 2016

Honorable Edward Murray

Mayor, City of Seattle
Seattle City Hall
600 Fourth Avenue
Seattle, WA 98104
Honorable Dow Constantine
King County Executive
401 Fifth Avenue, Suite 800
Seattle, WA 98104
RE: Seattle Arena
Mayor Murray and Executive Constantine:
Following our October 25th letter regarding the Seattle Arena, we wanted to take the opportunity
to further detail the elements of our new proposal. This was developed after carefully considering
the concerns expressed by City Council members.
The basic elements of the new proposal are as follows:
We would restore $200 million in debt capacity to the City and County by terminating
the MOU. Furthermore, the sales tax revenue generated by the Arena which would
have been devoted to debt service for the Arena bonds would now accrue to the city
and county general funds.
The revised petition will include new elements to help address freight mobility
concerns. We also support the councils proposal to devote the payment we would
make for the vacated street to the Lander Overpass project to help close the projects
remaining funding gap.
The Event Scheduling Agreements with the Mariners, Seahawks and Sounders and
their respective venues will remain in place.
The Transportation Management Plan conditions of the vacation would be preserved.
Additionally, we commit to robust use of social media, ride share, interactive
messaging and similar measures to drive a new generation of TMP solutions.
We reiterate our commitment to equality and fairness for those who would build and
work in the new Arena as well as meaningful engagement of Minority and Womens
Business Enterprises on the project.
As a part of this new Agreement we seek a waiver of the citys admissions tax. This reflects similar
treatment for CenturyLink Field and Safeco Field, which are exempt from the tax; those revenues
are instead dedicated to payment for those facilities. We would also like to explore an adjustment
to the Citys Business and Occupation Tax for national broadcast media.
We also want to emphasize that the proposed vacation is only for the development of the Arena
and for no other purpose. The street would not be vacated until and unless an NBA or NHL

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franchise has been secured. Furthermore, the termination of the MOU and sole reliance on private
financing removes the NBA first element of the MOU and allows us to engage more directly
with the NHL.
We believe this proposal makes a good-faith effort to address the concerns expressed by council
members and represents the best opportunity to bring a state-of-the-art new professional sports
venue to Seattle. In addition to being privately financed with no direct costs to the City or County,
the region would benefit from the Arenas net positive economic impact of between $230 and
$286 million a year.
Approving the conditional street vacation in no way hampers or interferes with the Key Arena
RFP process, but rather puts the city in the best possible position to take advantage of franchise
opportunities that could become available.
We will soon re-file the updated street vacation petition to include all Arena design elements
and public benefits previously presented to the council as well as the new elements described
in this letter.
We look forward to working with you and the City Council.
Regards;

Chris Hansen

Wally Walker

Erik Nordstrom

Pete Nordstrom

cc: Seattle City Council members

Russell Wilson