This afternoon the City Council approved the Families, Education, Preschool and Promise Levy, sending it to the Mayor for her signature and ultimately to the November ballot.
The FEPP is a combined renewal of two existing levies: the Families and Education Levy and the Seattle Preschool Program Levy. The new levy increases the total amount of revenues raised to $637.8 million over seven years, with nearly all of the new amount going toward expanding the Seattle Preschool Program from its current 1000 students up to 2500. According to city calculations, it will cost the owner of a median-priced Seattle home about $240 per year, or $20 per month.
The measure – which includes a property tax ordinance and a companion spending plan resolution – saw no substantive amendments today, passing essentially unchanged from its form at last week’s committee meeting. That includes no changes from the draft spending plan that co-chairs Lorena Gonzalez and Rob Johnson put together earlier this month.
This afternoon, Mayor Durkan put out a press release celebrating the Council’s passage of the levy.