The city will be forced to make make millions of dollars in unplanned cuts if several tax-repeal measures pass on the November ballot. In a worst case scenario for the next two years, the city will face—in addition to the $67 million shortfall already on the table for next year—“$11.7 million in deficit, depending on the voters’ choices,” council staffer John McCoy writes in a brief he presented at a Seattle City Council budget hearing this morning.

The looming threat puts the council’s budget decisions in limbo—waiting for the election results—and makes city leaders particularly nervous that vital funding for human services could vanish. “It does look gruesome,” says Jean Godden, chair of the city council’s budget committee. “We still have our budget up in the air because of these initiatives.”

The most severe impact would result from the passage of both liquor initiatives, I-1100 and I-1105, which would cause a two-year deficit of $8.8 million. A repeal on candy and soda taxes from I-1107 would create another $2.9 deficit, the city estimates.

Exacerbating pressure on the city, both the state and county have withdrawn funding for human service over the past few years—particularly medications for the indigent—leaving Seattle facing “the sort end game in which the city is... the last resort,” Godden says.

Nicole Macri, director of administrative services for Downtown Emergency Service Center (DESC), left a meeting today with Godden alarmed by the figures. If the measures pass in the just the wrong way, she says, “Services will just not be available to people who need them—not just services that are good to have, but basic survival services.” Health care, mental health care, and food could all be on the chopping block.

The city directs $5 million to DESC's programs each year—helping paying for shelter beds and 380,000 meals annually. DESC receives $5 million from the city each year; of that, $1.83 comes from the city’s the general fund. And DESC is not alone, Macri says: “I have not talked to a homelessness or low income service provider who would not be impacted.”

However, if voters feel generous by passing a 0.2 percent sales tax, Prop 1, the city would receive a windfall of $20.8 million over the two years, the report says (.pdf).

Godden says wait and see. “We are trying our very best to minimize the impacts as much as possible, but we will all feel it," she says, "and I mean all.”

Last week, the city's landmark preservation board voted 8-to-0 to designate the steam plant attached to Yesler Terrace, the city's—some say the nation's—oldest public housing project, as a historic landmark. But at the same time, the board also voted unanimously to reject Yesler Terrace's community center as historic.

The Seattle Housing Authority, which owns and manages Yesler Terrace (and nominated itself for historic designation to avoid problems down the road with redevelopment) was pleased with the news. "It’s definitely not a show stopper; we can accommodate the steam plant," says Anne Fiske-Zuniga, the SHA project manager for the redevelopment. Next week, the she expects to receive an environmental draft study examining the impacts of four alternatives to the aging complex—alternatives that would jump the number of units on the 28-acre site from 561 to as many as 5,000—reshaping the southern slope of First Hill to look more like downtown. Since the plans are still being discussed, the historic designation can be folded into the process. "There’s nothing locked down about the redevelopment plan," Fiske-Zuniga says. "Knowing we have a landmarked building is something we work with instead of around."

But Yesler Terrace residents and low-income housing activists were disappointed by the vote, if not surprised. "We were simply waiting for that decision to come down before we take it further, to a federal level," says John Fox, Executive Director of the Seattle Displacement Coalition. "Now we're exploring that option."

The full, weird back story on the vote is here, but in brief: The SHA wants to bulldoze Yesler Terrace and build a new, dense, mixed-income and retail complex. A group of Yesler Terrace residents and affordable housing activists—led by Fox—are protesting the project, saying it will drive out affordable housing in the area. And as any developer in Seattle knows, one way to stop a project is to nominate it for historic landmark status. Historic designation severely restricts what can be done to a property (thus lowering its overall value), which is why you see this and this happening. If Yesler Terrace were deemed a historic landmark, it couldn't be redeveloped. So the SHA beat activists to the punch by nominating itself for historic designation early on in the development process, before such an upset would cost them valuable time and money (also worth noting: a building can only be nominated once every five years).

And now activists are considering nominating all of Yesler Terrace for historic designation on the national historic register, which would trump the local designation (and would side-step the city's pesky five-year waiting rule for renomination). Rebuilding Yesler Terrace is expected to be a 15-year process and we're just at the beginning of it. Clearly, residents and activists are gearing up to fight redevelopment every step of the way.