Councilmember Larry Phillips praises renegotiated arena proposal

September 11, 2012

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Metropolitan King County Councilmember Larry Phillips released this statement on today’s announcement that an agreement has been reached between investor Christopher Hansen and the city of Seattle on the proposed SoDo arena:

“We appear to have a slam dunk of a deal for the Sonics to return to Seattle.

“From the beginning of the arena discourse, I raised concerns about the financial risk to taxpayers and the very real challenges to freight mobility that threatened living wage jobs. I thank City Council members Sally Clark, Tim Burgess, and Mike O’Brien, and investor Chris Hansen for negotiating a much better deal that significantly addresses these critical public concerns. This agreement paves the way to bring the Sonics home where they belong.

“It took persistence and thorough vetting of the issues by the City Council to get to this point. We should all deeply appreciate their due diligence. I look forward to reviewing the agreement when it reaches the County Council and hopefully voting yes for Sonics basketball returning to our city.”