By Alia Sinclair
As the city slowly moves forward with plans to build a new Civic Campus in SeaTac, efforts have been made to get community opinions on what amenities they would like to see.
A survey was conducted both online and in person to collect feedback from community members across demographics, with results given at Tuesday’s (June 10, 2025) City Council meeting.
The survey included six categories of amenities where community members could choose their most-preferred amenity in each category.
The categories were:
- Community & civic spaces
- Cultural & artistic spaces
- Health & wellness spaces
- Educational & Resource services
- Business & Economic Development
- Food & Culinary services
The in-person results, collected across 8 community events and 5 languages, showed community members’ top-desired amenities are:
- Cafés/Restaurants (20%)
- Educational Spaces (18%)
- Small Business & Entrepreneurial Support (17%)
- Farmer’s Markets & Community Events (15%)
- Cultural Center (15%)
- Healthcare Services (15%)
The online survey showed different results, with Farmer’s Markets and Community Events ranking highest at 20%, followed by Community Support Services (19%), Small Business Support (16%), and an International Market (16%).
While community outreach is an important part of the Civic Campus project, in some ways it’s putting the cart before the horse. The process of acquiring real estate to build the campus is still ongoing, with an even bigger question looming – how will the city pay for it?
The Council heard a presentation on some of the financing options available to the city for land acquisition and the construction of the new Civic Campus from city staff, but as yet, no definitive decisions have been made.
However, the Council is, collectively comfortable with exploring going into debt to complete the project, citing a desire not to deplete cash reserves, particularly in the unstable political climate at the federal level.
Council Member James Lovell pointed out that, on a pragmatic level, the city will be forced to spend money regardless, as the current City Hall is badly in need of renovation to remain usable in the future.
Community and Economic Development Director Evan Maxim confirmed this, stating:
“Councilmember, we will have specific numbers at a later date, [but] we were in the order of $70 to $80 million dollars for renovation of this facility. And I’ll remind council we have ongoing challenges almost on a monthly or bi-yearly basis around operations in this facility.”
Maxim went on to express that construction costs continue to rise and the longer it takes to move construction forward, the more expensive the project will be.
“I don’t take it personally that there’s a suggestion that this is a vanity project,” Councilmember Lovell stated, referring to some Facebook comments that were received during community outreach, “It’s really just there’s no way we can afford to stay in this building.”
Video
Below is full, raw video of the meeting (Civic Campus presentation begins around 13:26):
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