(1) As a condition to imposing a sales and use tax under RCW 82.14.465, a city, town, or county must apply to the department at least seventy-five days before the effective date of any such tax. The application shall be in a form and manner prescribed by the department and shall include but is not limited to information establishing that the applicant is eligible to impose such a tax, the anticipated effective date for imposing the tax, the estimated number of years that the tax will be imposed, and the estimated amount of tax revenue to be received in each fiscal year that the tax will be imposed. For purposes of this section, "fiscal year" means the year beginning July 1st and ending the following June 30th. The department shall make available forms to be used for this purpose. As part of the application, a city, town, or county must provide to the department a copy of the ordinance creating the benefit zone as required in RCW 39.100.040. The department shall rule on completed applications within sixty days of receipt. The department may begin accepting and approving applications August 1, 2006. No new applications shall be considered by the department after the thirtieth day of September of the third year following the year in which the first application was received by the department.

(2) The authority to impose the local option sales and use taxes under RCW 82.14.465 is on a first-come basis. Priority for collecting the taxes authorized under RCW 82.14.465 among approved applicants shall be based on the date that the approved application was received by the department. As a part of the approval of applications under this section, the department shall approve the amount of tax under RCW 82.14.465 that an applicant may impose. The amount of tax approved by the department shall not exceed the lesser of two million dollars or the average amount of tax revenue that the applicant estimates that it will receive in all fiscal years through the imposition of a sales and use tax under RCW 82.14.465. A city, town, or county shall not receive, in any fiscal year, more revenues from taxes imposed under RCW 82.14.465 than the amount approved by the department. The department shall not approve the receipt of more credit against the state sales and use tax than is authorized under subsection (3) of this section.

(3) No more than two million dollars of credit against the state sales and use tax provided for under RCW 82.14.465(2), may be received in any fiscal year by all cities, towns, and counties imposing a tax under RCW 82.14.465.

(4)(a) The credit against the state sales and use tax shall be available to any city, town, or county imposing a tax under RCW 82.14.465 only as long as the city, town, or county has outstanding indebtedness under chapter 39.100 RCW or the tax allocation revenues are used for public improvement costs, but in no case shall the credit be available for more than thirty years after the tax is first imposed by the city, town, or county.

(b) Local governments may pledge any receipts from taxes levied and collected under chapter 39.100 RCW and RCW 82.14.465 to the repayment of its bonds or bond anticipation notes. A local government shall notify the department when all outstanding indebtedness secured in whole or in part from receipts is no longer outstanding or tax allocation revenues are no longer used for public improvement costs, and the credit provided for under RCW 82.14.465 shall be terminated.

(5) The department may adopt any rules under chapter 34.05 RCW it considers necessary for the administration of chapter 39.100 RCW.

Finding—Application—Effective date—2007 c 266: See notes following RCW 39.100.010.

Effective date—2006 c 111: See RCW 39.100.900.