missing title

Mark, can we do a mic check?

Can you hear me?

Hello?

Hello.

The December 3rd, 2025 Land Use Committee meeting will come to order.

It is 2.03 p.m.

I'm Eddie Lin, chair of the Land Use Committee.

Will the committee clerk please call the roll?

Vice Chair Strauss?

Here.

Council Member Roars?

Here.

Council Member Rink?

Present.

Council Member Rivera?

Present.

Chair Lin?

Present.

Here there are five members present.

Thank you.

So I'd like to move on to the agenda.

I move to adopt the agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

If there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

So good afternoon, everyone.

Thank you all for being here today.

I'm Eddie Lynn, the new district two council member and land use chair.

Thank you.

And as always, thank you to our city clerks, council central staff and SDCI for helping us prepare for this meeting.

We will move on to public comment.

We will now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comments should relate to items on today's agenda and within the purview of this committee.

Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

We have seven in person and five remote.

Each speaker will have two minutes.

We will start with in-person speakers first.

Clerk, can you please read the public comment instructions?

The public comment period will be moderated in the following manner.

The public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

Speakers will be called in the order in which they're registered.

In-person speakers will be called first, after which we'll move to remote speakers until the public comment period is ended.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of their time.

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not end their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call the next speaker.

The public comment period is now open, and we will begin with the first speaker on the list, and that is John Chaney.

in just one second, John.

My name is John Chaney.

I'm an invisible person.

And I'm an invisible person because I live on my boat.

in Seattle and was never counted as a part of the Comprehensive Plan.

When I look at things that you're addressing related to the Comprehensive Plan and changes related to housing in the city, we are invisible people.

And I hope that the work of the Council this year in directing the Mayor's Office to do work related to understanding the full amount of housing within the city accurately reflects all of us who live on the water.

I'm also, I have been evicted from my moorage with no protections as an affordable housing person, 17 households out of my moorage owned by the Port of Seattle, Salmon Bay Marina.

And this would not have happened if I'd lived on a house on the land.

So I think there are some places where the city is not protecting us as citizens, especially as resident citizens.

All of you here have us within your districts, and I hope that you hear from us.

We are so hopeful that you will eventually begin dealing with the shoreline management program, because we have waited for years, essentially, as you have gone through the floodplain work, and we have been told to wait, to wait, to wait.

and we have many things that we would like to see corrected in the current city shoreline management program.

So I'm hopeful that you get off to a good year.

Congratulations, Chairman Lin, and do lots of good things for us because we're part of the housing of the city.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Susan Fedor.

Good afternoon, welcome Chairman Lin, Susan Fedora, District 1. I'm here to express deep concerns for CB121-093 as it's currently written.

Last Friday I spent time at the, sorry, Osso Slide Memorial, a site where 100 homes and 43 lives were lost in a matter of five minutes.

That slide occurred as a direct result of heavy rainfall and serves as a chilling reminder of the critical role that SEPA plays in our unique region.

Thresholds exist for a reason.

When pushed too far, the environment collapses.

No land use proposal should be approved without serious consideration of the geographical and hydrological realities and risks of living in this region.

Further, on October 22nd, Governor Ferguson signed Executive Order 2510 effective immediately to strengthen Washington State's commitment to working directly and respectfully with sovereign tribal nations and set higher expectations for how state agencies build and maintain those relationships.

The order requires agencies to consult with tribes early in their decision-making processes whenever an action may impact tribal people, lands, and resources.

SDCI's own land acknowledgement states a commitment to strive toward restorative land stewardship rather than unsustainable and extractive use of the land.

No land use proposal should be approved if it does not uphold the federally recognized rights of our tribal communities.

With the bill as written, the potential loss of project-level SEPA includes the inability to condition proposals with necessary mitigation, the elimination of proactive review for previously undocumented cultural resources, and the removal of a mechanism for measuring mitigation effectiveness using the best available science as required by the Growth Management Act.

Thank you for your attention to these critical environmental, community, and public health concerns.

Thank you.

Next up, we have David Glover.

Hello Council, my name is Dave Gloger and I live in District 5 and I'm asking you to vote no on Council Bill 121093. This should have been proposed during the two-year process that we were going over the One Seattle plan.

So now it seems like Mayor Harrell, as he's on the way out the door, he's trying to slip in more gifts to the developer.

We have a new mayor coming in.

We have new council members coming in.

This should be part of Mayor Wilson's.

She should get to chime in on this.

This is part of the new world we're living in.

It shouldn't be something from a mayor that's out the door.

It wasn't that long ago that Seattle was all about the environment.

We had a council pushing things through like the Green New Deal.

We can care about the environment while we increase density and produce affordable housing, but not having environmental reviews doesn't do that.

It just makes it easier for the developers to build things.

And developers are always telling us that they need to change the city code.

First they told us they needed to be able to cut down all the trees, and that would help us get more affordable housing.

And then they said they needed smaller setbacks, and that would help create affordable housing.

but we don't see that.

We see townhouses going up that cost over a million dollars.

None of this increases our housing stock that makes it more affordable to people.

So I'm asking you, we need environmental reviews.

They're there for a purpose.

It's to keep our city green and to make it why people come here and why we all love to hear.

So therefore, I ask you to vote no on this.

Thank you.

Next up we have Sandy Shetler.

Great, saved you some time there.

Okay, yeah, hi, I'm Sandy Shetler with Tree Action Seattle.

I'm commenting on CB1, or sorry, CB121-093.

Seattle needs more housing and more trees.

We need these projects, we just need to be smart about their potential impacts and mitigate them.

Please remove the additional 50 parking places allowed and encouraged by this bill.

Doubling parking from 40 to 90 spaces, increasing the urban heat island effect, stormwater runoff and flooding are environmental impacts that should be acknowledged.

Please restore the housing requirement of 50% of the floor area ratio, which this bill proposes to replace with a single unit.

As currently written, this encourages development of massive retail complexes with just one ADU stuck in the basement.

And please acknowledge cultural resources during construction going beyond land acknowledgements.

This should include culturally modified trees, which remain completely unprotected under Seattle's tree code.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz said it best when he said, all red tape is not the same.

These are standards we have developed as a society to protect public health and the environment that supports us.

He used the example of fire exits, emergency fire exits.

That's not something we would get rid of.

Environmental regulations protect public health, climate resilience, and city infrastructure and should not be rolled back without an analysis of the impacts on community health and climate resilience.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Jessica Dixon.

Hi, council members.

My name is Jessica Dixon and I am in district six.

I'm asking you to please reconsider your vote on council bill 121093. This bill would exempt projects under 65,000 square feet from CEPA review.

CIPA was created to assess and mitigate the specific impacts of building on the environment.

Why would we be afraid of a basic analysis of whether a project has impacts on the environment?

And by the environment, I don't mean some abstract out there concept.

This is the air that we all breathe, the water that flows into the sound that we all share and which either supports us and other life that it has traditionally sustained.

What about the health of communities affected by heat domes during the summer?

Why would we not want to assess and then mitigate the impacts of a particular project on these aspects of our shared environment?

Is it because a few might not reap maximum profit?

Unless we stop requiring these impacts to be assessed and addressed.

I hope that you will consider changes to this bill.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we have Steve Rubstello.

Welcome, Chairman.

Not the first in recent history.

And this reminds me of many years ago, I was lobbying Norm Rice before he was mayor, and after the discussions were over, he pointed out that he had not only not chairman of the Land Use Committee, he had never served on the Land Use Committee and that was part of his political analysis which did lead him eventually to be mayor.

So I issue you great Thanks for coming, but I'm warning you, I also give you my condolences upon this assignment, because it is not an all roses position.

Now, getting more serious here, this committee and the city claims to be pro-housing.

but this committee and the city have uniformly been pro-housing only when it makes money for developers.

and I think it shows in the fact that we are over zoned and the amount of affordable housing is disappearing that is not subsidized.

And that means the total amount of affordable housing is going away.

And I think we need to do business in a more business-like way.

I think we need to have goals that are realistic because everybody in Seattle doesn't make over $135,000 a year.

I'm not worried about those people finding housing.

What about people who make $40,000, $50,000, $60,000 a year?

And with your minimum wage, that is really what is going to happen in a large part of it.

Let's have housing for real people.

Let's have housing for people who have lived here for an extended period.

Don't give all your aid to people who just want to come here.

Let's take care of some of the folks that are actually here.

Next up, we have Orla Kincannon.

Hi there.

As I said, my name's Orla Kincannon, and thank you for this opportunity today.

So I'm asking you to please vote no on CB 121093 and asking you that you do not dismantle SEPA without a real EIS because the addendum doesn't address the problems on the EIS.

We shouldn't already be moving forward Removing SEPA, claiming regulations cover it when you're actively changing other codes like the stormwater codes and CAO.

Please protect our trees and follow the SRKW recovery plan recommendations.

do not increase impervious surfaces without assessment and impact and mitigation.

And the Nature Conservancy studies show trees are not in the way of density and middle housing.

The 90 space parking lots are going to fast track pollutants into our waterways, and our 74 remaining critically endangered orcas cannot take any more human-made obstacles.

Thank you.

That's our last in-person speaker.

We will now be moving over to our remote speakers.

First up, we have Megan Cruz.

Good afternoon.

I'm Megan Cruz from District 7, speaking on CB121-093.

The director's report for this bill says that for the next 20 years, this legislation will, and I quote, exempt most development from SEPA environmental review until citywide long-term growth objectives are met.

That's over the span of two decades.

That should give anyone pause.

Recognizing this extreme statement, the report adds that this is, quote unquote, within the bounds of state law.

But to be clear, state law left environmental thresholds open for each city to determine after review and public vetting, not to use as an excuse to eliminate the process for most development.

As we've seen before, comp plans are static documents.

They do their best, but can't anticipate all factors.

Our review processes allow us to catch conditions that change.

The report seeks to refuse us saying the comp plan EIS has already considered everything needed for the next 20 years of growth.

It doesn't mention that the EIS was completed before the city doubled its growth target.

The report also says city codes and policies are another safeguard for eliminating environmental review.

As proof, they present an attachment that shows design review as a safeguard for key environmental elements.

However, the report and its author failed to note that design review has been suspended citywide and is in flux.

This shaky legislation takes away all checks and balances and effectively clears the way for unexamined rubber stamp decisions.

On top of this, the bill has flown largely under the radar with no large public meeting.

If the council faces a large workload in the waning days of the year and a waning administration, there is no deadline to meet here.

There is time to vet this publicly in January, which is a matter of weeks.

This season, please give city planning, the environment, and the public the respect they deserve and table the potentially devastating legislation until January.

Thank you.

Next up we have Ruth Williams.

Hello, I'm speaking on behalf of Swarton Creek Alliance.

I live in D5 and I want to talk about Council Bill 121-093.

Sorry, I'm out of breath.

I got off on the wrong stop.

Just ran up here.

So it's 121-093, significantly raising and relaxing environmental review thresholds beyond commitments made in the EIS while eliminating the community voice.

This bill erroneously states that the environmental impact statement has been completed for the comprehensive plan.

This is false since the plan was radically changed after the EIS was released.

I won't address the contradictions in the new EIS amendment that concern preservation of cultural resources in indigenous archaeology because I'm here to talk about the environment.

You all know that our city is more susceptible to excessive heat due to being bracketed by two large bodies of water.

You know the value of trees, clean controlled runoff, habitat preservation, and you know where the liquefaction zones are.

And now we have this bill that claims to support climate change resiliency.

How did we get to a place where we can abridge attention to environmental conservation, excessive heat, hot dirty air, and pollution of Puget Sound and claim to be working toward climate resiliency.

You are being asked to agree that the SEPA review is, and I quote, out of step with current public policy priorities.

How did we get to a place where we say out loud and even codify that environmental review is out of step?

Is the converse also true?

That you are sure you can count on SDCI, all on its own, to steward the land we live in and the air we breathe even when the agency relies on construction permits for its income?

Does anyone really believe that measures like this will help relieve the pressures of living in the Anthropocene?

I hate to use the word absurd, but there it is.

I'm so sorry.

Thank you for hearing me out.

Thank you.

We'll now return to our remote commenters.

Next up we have David Haynes.

Hi, thank you.

David Haynes.

We need a 21st century first world quality redevelopment of homes and buildings.

This should be called the Land Misuse and Abuse Committee because they've exempted the scrutiny of the environment that people will be living in and acting like they're doing them a favor of putting a bus and a train right next to the residential living space, creating modern third-world inner-city housing that's going to have negative impacts on the livable environment of people's day-to-day mental and physical health.

It's like they're constantly going to be listening to the bus and the train and the road, yet they don't have a car, but you're forcing them to live in the loudest, noisiest part of each neighborhood as if you're doing them a favor.

That's acceptable to Seattle sellouts, weaponizing the tree ordinance and corrupt greedy cold-hearted landlords on council self-dealing with conflicts of interest that are weaponizing the rules of law to sell out the working class they expect to pay 30% of all their money for a crappy rental as they sabotage the future developments to ensure nothing is built back better that would compete with their remortgaged home.

they want to dump on other people while council's rental property and housing speculations want to ensure an oppressive supply and demand squeeze lacking in qualitative homes denied by the pride of council self-dealing to get rich undermining the one Seattle comprehensive plan cheating a multitude of younger generations sold out by the likes of landlords on council who water down the integrity of the comprehensive plan by tainting it all with racism and doing the bare minimum and taking away the incentives from real developers while only helping non-profits politically connected who cannot build quality, taking 30% of all your wages and salary.

It's obvious that self-dealing landlords with conflicts of interest at City Hall don't care about the quality of the environment upon which 21st century residents will live in because everything is on the side of the road.

you're being punished because you need to have some sort of affordable housing that they take away the quality of the building and water down the integrity of the design to expedite building modern...

Thank you, David.

Next up, we have Scott Levy.

Scott, please press star sticks.

Okay, we are going to move to our next one, but Scott, we'll come back to you.

Next, we have Alberto Alvarez.

Alberto?

Oh, hello, hi.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rank, Congratulations on winning several elections in our city thus far.

And thank you for your bold leadership and empathy for the working class.

It is our responsibility to welcome new families, owners on fixed income, and young working people.

As our population surpassed 800,000, it was reported that less people have cars.

Eliminating parking mandates and building vertically are the best ways to protect tree canopy and provide homes for people in need.

We have a problem with landlords limiting housing to increase the value of their property.

I fully support easing and expanding zoning for new families across every neighbourhood.

Welcome vibrant new families.

Support our low-income elders.

Invite the young working class.

Councilmember Eddie Lin, congratulations on winning a mandate for affordability.

We all hope to see real action and support for the working class.

Thank you all and have a great day.

Scott, we're going to try you again.

Yeah, thanks.

I was hitting pound six.

My fault.

Thank you.

I'm Scott Levy with Bluefish Oregon.

I introduced myself yesterday at the full council meeting.

The land commission is hearing about the pollution runoff and how that's harming the southern resident orca.

which is certainly the case as they get starved, the amount of pollution that comes out of their fat is more detrimental.

So paying attention to the pollution runoff into the Salish Sea definitely makes a difference.

The largest thing that Seattle City could do is have the city in light of Seattle require that no lower Snake River dams are present in the energy that they buy from the federal government.

except for negotiation now.

Bonneville's really stressing on if they're gonna get a good contract with you guys, the City of Seattle, second largest customer.

So if you request no lower Snake River dams, the court case can easily be resolved.

I hope you consider this.

There'll be maybe a postcard writing campaign on this idea starting now.

Thanks.

Next up we have Suzanne Grant.

Hello.

Hello, this is Suzanne Grant.

I'm talking about CB121-093, which uses a grossly inadequate environmental impact statement and mitigation to rubber stamp the vast majority of construction for the next 20 years.

Are you trying to echo the actions of the Trump administration when it comes to ignoring the environmental crisis we are in?

The city claims the environmental review is already covered by other codes, but this is certainly not true.

Do not pass CB1-2093 without analyzing the impacts of increased impervious surfaces and tree removals on stormwater and aquatic life, including our ORCA.

Do not pass it without adding enforcement of post-construction private-owner stormwater system maintenance to prevent overflow into public storm drains.

Do not pass it without removing the 90 space parking lots and 30,000 square foot retail exemptions to align with the allowances of RCW 43.21C2293.

Do not pass it without providing an analysis of the capacity of SBCI to sufficiently enforce equivalent protections as SEPA.

SBCI struggles to enforce current violations.

Do not pass it without assessing the adequacy of mitigation.

Do not pass it without restoring the 50% floor area racial housing backup from just one unit of housing in the proposed bill.

Please follow the guidance of Representative Jerry Paulette.

Don't dismantle SEPA.

Thank you.

Next up we have Gabriel Kennedy Gibbons.

Hello Council, this is Gabriel Kennedy Gibbons.

I'm a current student at the University of Washington and I'm calling in today and skipping my class because of how concerned I am with Council Bill 121093. I'm currently studying environmental science at the University of Washington, and it's instilled in me and my professors every single day how important it is that when we're building with density and increasing housing, we're also doing that in a way that's protecting the environment.

Those things don't have to go and have a compromise with one in order to have the other.

We can do both.

um the way that this bill is currently written is highly concerning especially given uh its impacts that will last for the next 20 years and if the statement is made that this the environmental protections are already covered in other legislation then keeping this legislation around wouldn't cause any problems would it because it's already there um so It's absolutely reckless and quite frankly very alarming and surprising that you'd even be considering this.

I urge you to vote no and to amend the language to be more responsible because this is gonna affect all of us for the next 20 years.

Thank you.

Chair, that concludes our speakers.

Thank you.

Thank you all for your public comments today.

And I do just wanna clarify that there is not a vote expected today.

So we will hear a briefing here shortly.

So there are no additional registered speakers.

We'll now proceed to our items of business.

We'll now move on to our first items of business.

Will the clerk please read items one and two into the record?

Council Bill 121-135, an ordinance related to land use and zoning revising requirements for transportation impact analysis, transportation management plans, and construction management plans, and Council Bill 121-093, an ordinance related to land use and zoning revising environmental review thresholds and related provisions addressing transportation related requirements and archaeological and cultural resource preservation requirements.

Will our presenters please join us at the table?

and once ready, will you please introduce yourselves for the record and begin your briefing and presentation.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Council Chair Lin and others.

It's an honor to be here.

Thanks again and congratulations.

We've had one briefing on this before, and so this may be familiar, but because we have a new council members and a new process.

Oops, sorry.

Who are you?

Oh, sorry.

I'm Dave VanSkyke.

I'm the policy director at SDCI, sort of utility player.

You may see me in different roles at different times.

Thank you.

Gordon Clowers, senior planner with SDCI.

Yeah.

So I wanted to give just a super quick overview, which I think will kind of help ground the discussion that Gordon is going to go through.

One of the challenges I think we face here is that SEPA is a topic that sounds great, like it's environmentally protective, it has that in the wording, but there's not a lot of grounding in what is the history of it, what is the purpose of it, and how does it actually work?

So I want to frame for a moment the purpose of SEPA, which is to act as a backstop to when regulations are insufficient to address things like you know, stormwater runoff or reduction of tree canopy or other issues that people are rightfully concerned about.

SEPA was put into place in the Nixon administration around the National Environmental Policy Act.

So it's been around for some time.

And what we've seen over time is a gradual accretion, a steady gradual accretion of more and more sophisticated codes that addressed environmental impacts.

The shoreline code, the ECA code.

our construction codes, our stormwater codes, which are mandated for updates by the federal government.

There's a broad web of sophisticated rules that the city has adopted that are meant to address all these very valid concerns.

The reality of SEPA is borne out by what we see in the history of the last three or four years, while we've been operating under thresholds that are pretty much the same as what we're proposing here.

So we know what the net effect of taking SEPA out of the equation is.

And we also know sort of the broad history of what we see in terms of SEPA appeals and how often those SEPA appeals result in additional conditioning.

Because again, the focus of a lot of folks is to think of SEPA as the way to get conditions.

and unfortunately that's just not the case.

SEPA has a grounded within it what's called the overview policy and I don't want to get too deep in the weeds but it's essentially a rule set that says you can't impose mitigation if there's already something in place as a better, and I do mean better, a regulation that has no discretion is better than a discretionary ask from a planner saying consider doing X or Y.

So the overview policy as we've seen over the last has resulted in less and less conditions being imposed by SEPA because we have more and more of a regulatory web that addresses the very real and specific impacts.

That's something that's not easily understood or apprehended.

I think it's something we could do better at in sort of our and the public conversation around it.

But I would just ground us back in, what was its original goal and how are we doing in that way?

And I think what we've seen is, We're doing really well at implementing regulations that are passed by council.

There are, you know, a web of environmental regs.

The stormwater codes get updated.

You're going to hear about floodplain regulations.

There's a shoreline master program update coming.

All of these provide a much stronger fabric for mitigating and addressing environmental impacts.

And that's really the thrust of why the state has said to the cities and certainly the biggest city in the state, consider revising your thresholds and here are the guardrails for doing it.

And so that's what we're doing is operating within the guardrails advised by the state to do what we have seen over the last three or four years as a very positive impact in expediting permitting and taking away something that wasn't really providing us the service that we imagine it as and letting the regulations that we have do the heavy lifting.

So that's the general overview that I want to kind of frame what Gordon's going to talk about.

So thank you.

Thanks, David, for that overview.

This presentation here will cover a number of topics about this proposal.

The objectives are findings that help support the change, what overview of the proposed changes, what the non-residential sleep thresholds are, and how they relate to things like the comprehensive plans, growth planning estimates, and also touch on transportation and archeological historic topics as well and how we're addressing those.

So, Part of the overarching objectives here are to adopt and implement the state's guidance for streamlining environmental review.

That relates in a large degree to wanting to foster faster housing production and encourage the transit-oriented development patterns that are represented in the comprehensive plan past and the current one proposed.

and we'd also like to do what we can to support small business and medium-sized business in being able to get permitting to pursue their objectives and support the community as well.

Overall, this proposal does quite a bit to streamline the permitting process sort of as David mentioned, rely on the codes we have more to vet what is needed to grant the permit and we find that our codes are providing a lot of effective protection that warrant streamlining our permit process.

we want to document a few of the existing code requirements, proposed code requirements that help provide mitigation for impacts.

So, Definitely the new comprehensive plan, as ones in the past, they are promoting a citywide-based growth centers, transportation centers oriented model.

And given that the state is really pushing that kind of centers-based growth and affordable housing.

We feel it's the right time that we should do take the next step and align the CPRA review requirements with those more consistently statewide or citywide.

And so we found that the regulations of the state do support taking this approach.

We can talk about that more if you'd like and that but there are certain limits for non-residential development to have a break from SEPA review.

So when we talk about SEPA thresholds, we're talking about the level above which, if a project is larger than the threshold, that they still require the SEPA review.

And the state has set certain limits on non-residential development such that larger ones would need SEPA review still.

and as David alluded to, we're finding that our codes really extensively address environmental protection in them such that the SEPA review becomes redundant and not productive.

I'll talk a little bit more about that.

So this is an overview of the main categories of the changes we have.

We would propose to exempt all development from SEPA review that includes housing.

And that would be of any size, but there are certain exceptions for if a project is located in a shoreline area, in many cases if an environmental critical area is present on a property, and if there are historic locations affected by development, there are policies and regs addressing that as well.

as has been mentioned, the proposed exemptions would last until the city-wide growth targets are achieved for residential development as well as employment growth.

One second.

Council Member Juarez, did you have a question?

I'd like to recognize you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just want to do a point of clarification and also because I'm going back to my notes, Mr. Chair, and I just want to clarify something.

with the presenters and also for the public.

My understanding, just so we're clear, is this information that's in front of us is the same information that we received on Friday, October 14th and also October 31st.

Correct me if I'm wrong, Mr. Clerk.

in which we went through this PowerPoint and also when we also at those two times we had public hearings and we also went through the 15 page director's report.

So I know it's a refresher.

I just want to make sure that this is all the same information that we're getting again today, which we should.

I just want to make sure I'm clear on that.

So it's the director's report, the PowerPoint, the two public hearings, the summary and fiscal note that you did, I understand, Mr. Gower, I was gonna call you Gordon.

So this is all the same information, correct?

The PowerPoint is the same information I believe we've only presented at one time to the committee and since some of the folks here were not present at that meeting we thought we'd go over it again and the intent is not to go over every single bit of information here but to like you say sort of summarize or capture the overall picture I'm not questioning your judgment about

doing it again.

I just want to make sure my notes are clear.

So because you heard some of the public comment about whether or not this has been in the committee, and it was certainly in the committee under our former chair, I just wanted to make sure I had the right information that nothing had changed in the PowerPoint.

And when did we do the review of the SDI 15 page director's report?

Was that also on October 31st or was that on October 14th?

I don't believe we have covered the director's report in detail at a discussion here.

Okay, not in detail, but have we addressed it?

Or is it in the PowerPoint?

Overall, the content of the PowerPoint is similar to the content of the director's report.

but I'd be happy to take up any detail of the director's report that you'd like as we proceed.

Again, I apologize, Mr. Chair.

I'm just trying to clarify the order in which the information has been provided under the Land Use Committee, under the former chair and leadership in the information and the two public hearings in the fiscal notes and summary notes and your PowerPoints and the information involved.

I think it's always important that the public that calls in and certainly shows up for public comment knows that we've been studying this for quite a while and we've been tracking the state law for quite a while.

And I know Mr. Chair is aware of this as well.

So I'm just trying to put things in context, mainly for myself, because I have notes here from October 14th, as I shared, and October 31st.

The director's report, the two summary and fiscal notes that I understood you authored and of course the PowerPoint.

And so with that, thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for indulging me.

Thank you, Council Member Juarez.

And I do just want to have one kind of clarifying question.

Was there any additional environmental analysis that was done for the comp plan that is related or was required for this legislation?

There was an addendum that was published for the comprehensive plan and it addressed the amendments that were made by the council's committees and then the net or marginal differences and impacts related to that.

And that happened to cover the historic resource, archeological resource topic in a bit more detail in particular.

Okay, thank you.

And was that public?

And do you know the timing of that at all?

I think that was out in just the past week.

Okay, okay, thank you.

And again, you can look it up on OPCD's website and find it that way.

So Mr. Chair, Mr. Chair, I apologize.

May I ask a quick follow-up question?

Of course.

Yep.

So just quickly, was the director's report and recommendation for the SEPA threshold update, the 15 page with recommendations, is that posted online under SDCI or OPCD or was it posted for the public?

The proposed information for this proposal and both bills are present on the SCCI website and can largely be found on Legistar as well, although that would have to be double-checked as to the overall completeness of that.

Okay, so the only reason why I say this is, like, help me help you.

So a lot of the questions that we've been hearing, and I know the Chair knows this as well, and the former Chair, from public comment and the folks that show up and call in, a lot of these issues were addressed in this 15-page SDCI director's report.

So I just wanna make sure that it's posted for the public to see it and can answer particularly the questions about the analysis and the approach to archeological and cultural resources.

All of that is in the report with the recommendations.

I just wanna make sure that it's online for people can see that.

So that's why I'm asking.

Sure, it's on our SDCI website.

There's a changes to code link under codes in our public website, changes to code, and then current projects under review.

This will show up under the SEPA topic.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you Councilmember Juarez I do believe it's really important to make sure it's clear where this information is obtainable so that everybody that's interested can find it so thank you for clarifying that.

Sure thing.

So just to be brief here, we are proposing a few items to update in our codes that relate to transportation as well as to update our provisions addressing archaeological resource, historic resources that could be found in future project development.

That latter, the topic, especially follows guidance from the state of Washington that asks us to check our rules and update them accordingly to be as current as possible.

So that's what we've done in the proposal.

So I mentioned a little bit about the non-residential SEPA thresholds.

We propose to have up to a 65,000 square foot non-residential SEPA threshold for most commercial or non-residential uses.

such as industrial or other non-retail uses, and then a 30,000 square foot limit for retail uses.

And then there are these other changes proposed to parking space limits and grading, and those reflect raises that the state had accommodated.

Certainly we could talk about whether the City of Seattle should make those changes.

So, yes, we'll just be following, we're recommending following the comprehensive plans approach and have a citywide SEPA thresholds and a particular exemption for residential development and have those run until the higher thresholds run until citywide growth targets are met.

Yeah, so I alluded to the updates to archeological resource protection.

We would be keeping all of the good pre-development assessment requirements we have, and possibility of archeologist site visit, looking at soil conditions.

if a grading permit is required, if inadvertent discovery of resources occurs, that there are certain state laws that apply, including stop work and assess the resource, we would continue to include those.

We're proposing to add those kinds of protections to one additional area, which is called a meander line buffer, which reflects the distance close to previous shoreline areas such as the meanders in the Duwamish River.

And this is an illustration of that.

The purple areas were the historic flow pattern of the Duwamish River which was straightened at a certain point more than 100 years ago.

So we have a few complementary transportation requirements and this would retain a transportation impact study requirement even if a CEPA review was not required of a project.

We are reorienting this to reflect an assumption that a larger project could happen without this kind of a study, but if a non-residential project is above 40,000 square feet, we recommend that a transportation impact study still be done to consider if there are impacts in the area.

This would not be required in the regional centers like downtown, given their role as major growth centers.

we would update the transportation management plan requirements we have in the code today applying to the same zones they do today and also clarify a construction management plan requirement by this is a element in city practices that is often requiring developers to go work with SDOT to manage the flow of their construction traffic and delivery of construction materials and so on.

We're just setting a threshold for that in our code to cover the bases, kind of close the loop on that requirement.

And TMP TMP requirements would be restated to be more clear.

They're approximately required at the same level as they are today in the Seattle mixed zones, downtown and Northgate zones.

So those would continue.

Then another point was that the state asked us to coordinate with WSDOT about project review and referrals in the city.

We've had a couple of meetings with them to talk about how we might do that.

We would close a loop with WSDOT to specify sort of exactly how they would want that notice.

That doesn't require any code change, but just an administrative check.

and that is the brief overview and happy to entertain more questions.

Wonderful.

Do any of my fellow committee members have any questions?

I do, Chair.

Okay.

Okay, please, Council Member Rivera.

Thank you, Chair.

And thank you for being here.

And I will say, I was not here at that last time this was briefed, but since then, SDCI did give me a briefing and an update.

So I wanna publicly thank SDCI for that and also to assure the public that I did get a briefing, even though I missed that one committee meeting.

I do feel high level.

And when you briefed me, we talked about this.

This can get wonky really fast.

So can you just, I'm going to, if you would indulge me, and maybe for the public watching who maybe is also thinking this is a bit wonky.

These changes are being made to align with the state.

However, the city, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm remembering this from our briefing, the city's environmental review is stronger than the state.

So in many ways, just to reassure the public that this isn't less review necessarily.

So can you talk a little bit about that?

And I think you'll do a better job explaining than I am.

Thank you.

No, thank you.

And thank you for the opportunity for the briefing.

It was a really productive conversation and we took away some good points for that.

A couple things actually, because you touched on all the right spots.

This is in alignment with the state guidelines.

The state guidelines are obviously, and the keen insight into the obvious, for the entire state.

SEPA is applied statewide.

These changes are really meant to address a realignment at the state level around urban centers, right?

Because as a state, we plan on things where there's growth in urban places and there's less growth in rural under the auspices of GMA.

All of these changes are meant to align with the notion of infill development.

And so what we found with infill development in urban areas is that we have, for instance, far more sophisticated regulations, and lots of them, as compared to, let's say, the regulations that apply in Whatcom County.

So when you might need SEPA in a rural area in Whatcom County is very different than what you need for infill development.

So I think you framed that exactly right.

We do have a robust set of rules.

I know everyone hates that word.

We have a lot of rules.

And the takeaway point as a former reviewer, the rules are not negotiable.

SEPA is discretionary.

It involves conditions.

We place conditions on projects.

It's kind of two steps, right?

You first see if, are there impacts so significant that we need to do conditions?

And then do we need to do an EIS to evaluate what those ought to be or not?

that's a discretionary process subject to appeal, meaning those conditions can be thrown out.

Our underlying rules around critical areas, cultural resources, shorelines, those are not negotiable.

Those rules are hard and fast.

And if you want to challenge them, there's a very narrow window to challenge them.

So I think that may be a bit wonky.

Thank you, I think that's the right word.

But it kind of gets at the heart of that matter.

I don't know if that answered both your questions or just the first one.

It did.

I just, I want to acknowledge that these things are wonky, but that the public has some real serious concerns that I, um, uh, you know, I agree with, I mean, you know, we don't take these things lightly and I want to make sure and, and reassure the public that as the city is moving forward with these housing and other projects that we are taking our environmental review very critically, seriously.

I don't know another word than serious at this juncture to use for this, but we do take it seriously.

And I don't want the folks to walk away feeling or who are watching or who are tracking this to feel that somehow we're loosening something that's going to have this serious negative impact such as the commenter who came and talked about the landslide.

And of course, that's an environmental critical area.

And we have stricter rules for that as per your presentation here when you talked about those are not exempt from this SEPA update, if you will.

This legislation is updating SEPA.

That is not exempted.

Those areas are not exempted.

So I just really, in lay people's terms, want to assure the public that that's not what this legislation is doing.

That is to say loosening that review for things like those critically, environmentally critical areas.

And that the city does in fact have rules that we are not relaxing by way of this update to align with the state.

You nailed it.

That's exactly right.

I think that's the best way to look at it.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Rivera.

I appreciate that.

And this is, in my opinion, super wonky stuff and can be confusing.

And so I do think it's important for us to have a common understanding to the extent possible.

And I did have a couple of just sort of general questions in that regard.

when we talk about SEPA review, we're really, if you could clarify, we're talking about new development, we're talking about changes that we're planning to approve, there's some sort of city action that we're taking, but I just wanna clarify, I think SEPA was adopted in, you said the Nixon era, like 1971, so for example, prior to 1971, there was no SEPA review, would that be correct?

That's correct.

And so lots of land use decisions, urban planning decisions that were made before then never underwent sort of SEPA review, environmental review under SEPA at least.

That's correct.

and those uses would be continued to allow.

So if we have roads and highways that are causing environmental impacts, if there's no action to take, we're not sort of re-reviewing those unless there's some sort of new action that we need to take.

So I just want to kind of clarify that that SEPA is focused on new development, new action, but it's not really taking a look at all the prior decisions, even if those decisions might be causing environmental impacts.

Would that be correct?

Yeah, I think that's fair to say, and it's always one of the wonkier parts of SEPA, is that it doesn't give us the authority to walk past decisions back, and as we know, living in a city that's highly urbanized, most of the really impactful decisions have been have been made and so that's why the focus of the state on infill development.

I think you characterize it very fairly.

Yeah and I just want to make that clear because I do think a lot of us care deeply about the environment and you know this tool is really focused on new development but in many ways prior decisions in existing urban infrastructure in many ways may be just as impactful or not more in terms of environmental impacts, but SEPA does not require us or even perhaps allow us to go back and revisit those decisions.

Yeah, that's exactly right.

I think, you know, an example where SEPA is clearly still used and usable is on those big projects, which this would do nothing to change.

You know, things like a WSDOT project, we can think of many of those.

Sound Transit is obviously doing, you know, EISs when they do a transportation infrastructure update.

The Port of Seattle will have to do an EIS if they expand in a substantial way.

This doesn't change any of that.

This is really focused on infill development that's in an area where most of the major decisions have already been made.

So I think you characterize it very fairly.

And one other thing, I just want to clarify.

I mean in general, new development, new construction is subject to much stricter requirements, environmental energy code requirements than say 10, 15, 20, 50 years ago.

Would that be correct?

You really nailed it.

Yes, the pace of change in our codes rolling forward into increasingly rigorous and aspirational in some cases.

We now have, I'll give you an example, we now have electric vehicle parking requirements that are showing up in the Lanches code, the electrical code, and soon the building code.

That's an example where we focused on an issue, which is an emerging one, and put in regulations in multiple places to do that.

I've been in this business a fair bit of time and I've not yet seen a regulation roll backwards in terms of protection, but it does require constant stewardship of largely this body to make sure we get it right.

So I think you're...

opening up the issue for the layperson in a very reasonable way.

I think I agree with all of that.

And I think just part of my question is that, you know, we have existing buildings that may be approved under older codes that may not be as green as new development.

And those older buildings are allowed to continue under those less environmentally, you know, robust requirements.

But new development, we are, you know, potentially, I mean, under our code, we are requiring them to comply with our more strict new code.

And so that's, and under the SEPA exemption, our code exceeds oftentimes what we could require under SEPA.

And so that's why it's not necessary.

Exactly.

That's exactly right.

That's exactly right.

In fact, we have, we are unique among many jurisdictions in that we have an existing building code to say, okay, when is enough upgrade of this building that we need to impose some of these newer requirements, maybe not the full suite, but some of those.

So that's an area where the city as a whole has really gotten ahead of that particular issue.

So yes, I think you're framing it exactly right.

Thank you.

Council Member Rivera.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for your additional questions because some of that also goes to what I was trying to clarify for the public as well.

I will say another piece I think is we had a conversation when you briefed me about the fact that we were trying to streamline doesn't mean we're doing less on the environmental review piece because in many ways we already do a more stringent environmental review than SEPA requires and then the SEPA is like additive in a way that's not helpful even though it sounds like it might be helpful and all it actually does is add time.

It doesn't really add more stringent rules.

Yeah, that's exactly right.

I mean, it's sort of a two-fold issue.

One is that if we just look back historically, what has resulted from super reviews, what sort of conditions, which we've tracked.

I think there's material we could provide to you on what we've looked at in terms of conditions.

And the additional legislation that you saw Gordon present really addresses, hey, these are the only places we ever end up with conditions, and so let's just make that part of the code.

but in essence, SEPA has been this extra process that has not really added the value that I think we want out of it.

That's probably the biggest element.

The second piece of that that we talked about in your office and I think is useful to understand for the public is, you know, we're in a time of looking at all of this increased density in our neighborhood residential zones, what we've thought of as single family for a long time.

That's changed.

The state has said, you will change that and we have acted accordingly.

The reality is the thresholds for what projects would have gone through SEPA in those areas.

I think that's where the public's mind goes as well.

Wouldn't this have SEPA?

The reality is at our old lower thresholds, those would not have gone through SEPA.

Those individual projects wouldn't have been subject to it.

So I can empathize with the public who feels like, oh, I'm losing a tool that I'm suddenly going to need.

The reality is, no, that tool wasn't really applied there.

That tool was really always more targeted at these bigger infill projects, and that's where we're following state guidance to say, okay, in the densest city in the state, let's right-size those.

That's an easy misperception.

Right, because SEPA would not have applied to those projects anyway is the point.

So you're not taking anything away because you never had it to begin with.

I do want to say that that doesn't mean we don't all collectively care about environmental impacts, we do.

And certainly I very much care about it and very much care about our canopy across the city and making sure that we are protecting that as we're building more housing across the city because it's needed.

particularly with the impacts of climate change and I do share something that you said about you know that this is all for new development, old development, we don't go back in time and make changes.

We don't require it although in many instances we incentivize such as for instance in homes like coal being, you know, the energy, the furnaces being upgraded for instance and providing incentives to help folks, property, you know, people that own homes be able to do that because it is more energy efficient and it is better for the environment.

So while we don't require it, the city does try to find opportunities to really incentivize conversions.

That's what I'm...

Go ahead, Gordon.

Yeah, just to add on a little bit to that, there's an energy code benchmarking program, the exact title or not, but it is requiring multifamily and some other larger buildings to hit a higher mark of energy code performance.

going forward into the future.

So that is building in some energy code improvement to existing building stock as well.

So that's a very beneficial thing.

Reducing greenhouse gas by 25% was the goal there.

The thing that's maybe instructive to note is it would be easy to say, oh, we're getting rid of an environmental protective tool, but the reality is, and maybe we can all do a better job of highlighting this, is the environmental protections council thinks about all the time.

SDCI thinks about all the time.

The mayor's office thinks about all the time.

It's just that they're nested in different places, and so it's not as obvious like the energy program that that Gordon described, or you're thinking of the upgrade requirements or what we've done on natural gas or what we've done in all these other climate resilience measures.

They seem small, but they're actually more effective because they're targeted.

And I think that's the overarching story that I want to tell about SEPA is we're just being more targeted and specific and honestly less flexible.

It's just clearer and easier to understand.

And there's a time and place to figure out how that is.

And that's what this body, I think, especially this year has spent a lot of time doing.

So I, you know, I think you can pat yourselves on the back for that extensive work at look at thinking about these issues, but thinking about them to use the right tool rather than a kind of a blunt tool that wasn't as effective across the board.

Thank you.

Council member Juarez.

Thank you.

Just another follow-up.

and again, I don't wanna get too wonky.

I can't outdo Council Member Rivera there.

When I went back through the director's report and we had this discussion back in October 14th and you heard people at public comment on the two public hearings and then today, I just really wanna make sure people understand this in regards to inadvertent discoveries, the cultural piece, archaeological and cultural resources that the city this particular recommendation does require tribal notification and after that which is even better is state and federal law kicks in for tribal consultation so the tribes are not being left out of their rightful place for enforcement and consultation with funerary objects, archaeological.

And this goes back from the 80s and 90s.

And I was actually one of the lawyers in the 90s that made sure that the state law complied with the federal law that we are now doing today, which this city has done and will continue to do.

And for me, I was quite happy to see in the director's report that, of course, there's the consultation, and it's more than a backstop when you have the state and federal law kick in and then of course requiring tribal consultation and the state archaeological officer when you heard someone talk about the culturally modified trees and some of those issues that had come up.

So I just want to assure the public again who are watching and can go online and find these resources and hear it again that this isn't just hanging out there that nobody is paying attention to these other archeological resources and cultural resources that they are bringing in tribal governments, their lawyers, their anthropologists, their archeologists and examining these and working with the appropriate authorities and tribal governments to make sure that they're protected.

So I'm just hoping that we can add more information there that the federal and state law does kick in and does provide more protections.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member.

Any other questions?

Chair, just to say, and thank you Council Member Juarez for the additional, I very much appreciate that and agree that we need to make sure we have more information for the public, which is what I'm hearing you say.

I want to acknowledge, I want to thank the public for their comments, not just the folks that came here today, but the folks we've been hearing from online, the emails we've received and letters, et cetera.

people very much care about this and it's important for them to bring this up and then hold us accountable for giving them the information that they need because in the absence of that people are very afraid they don't always trust and with sometimes with good good reason unfortunately so it is good that these things are brought up it's really great that we address them in chambers for the public it's really great that and I appreciate SDCI taking back the feedback about what to include and how to include it on your website and sort of more plain language because as we've all said it gets wonky and saying it gets wonky doesn't mean that I don't think that the members of the public don't understand.

I'm not trying to offend anyone.

There are members of the public that certainly know more than I do.

and get into the weeds about these issues.

But I do know that other folks may not.

And for those that may not, we want to make sure we're making the information accessible.

Because sometimes I feel like it's a different language.

So I want to thank the public for all their comments.

I really thank and welcome the engagement and the feedback.

If we can improve upon something, that is our responsibility.

as legislators.

So that is important to me, and I know it's important to my colleagues.

And I want to thank you all for your willingness to engage with us.

And where we've provided feedback, you're incorporating it for the benefit of the public.

So all those things are true and coexist.

And I do want to acknowledge and thank the public for their engagement, because I very much care about that.

Thank you, Chair.

Absolutely, thank you council member.

Not seeing any other further comments or questions, I'd like to move on to our next item of business as reflected on our agenda.

Will the clerk please read item three into the record.

Item three, briefing on FEMA floodplains extension legislation.

Will our presenter please join us and please introduce yourself for the record and just because I forgot to say it, thank you to our past presenters for that very thorough engagement.

Thank you, Chair Lynn and members of the committee.

I promise I'm not going to use the word wonky more than that instance in this presentation today.

My name is Christina Postalwaite.

I am SCCI's Legislative and Government Relations Manager.

I'm not typically up here, so I leave that mostly to my colleagues, but this is kind of an atypical briefing slash presentation.

This is just more of an update on what's going on with the FEMA floodplain regulations update.

I know there's a lot of familiarity and history among council members and staff about these.

Just for a refresher, in 2020 FEMA updated their flood insurance maps and they've required cities to update their regulations related to those areas that are included in the maps.

2020 is quite a long time ago and we have been working very closely with the port and with other stakeholders to incorporate feedback while we go through and figure out what the final regulations are going to be.

And I'm here today in advance of the next Land Use Committee meeting, which is the 17th, to share a little context behind that.

That meeting will have a public hearing on the 10th extension of the interim regulations, and this is something that unfortunately we have to come back to ask you for, but it's for a really good reason.

So as I said, we conducted additional outreach with stakeholders.

We incorporated that into our ongoing communications with the port, and we do have a final agreement reached with the port and stakeholders for the permanent floodplain regulations.

As I said, the legislation is complete.

We are uploading it shortly.

I just saw an email about five minutes ago saying that we are ready to initiate Legistar with that.

We already have provided notice on the permanent regulations to the Department of Commerce.

which as you know, this is required to be done 60 days prior to final action being able to take place.

So this additional extension allows us to not only take time to provide meaningful briefings to council members about the permanent floodplain regulations, You've all heard about the extension.

This is the real deal, and we're excited to have this agreement in place, and we want to make sure everyone feels comfortable with the final regulations.

And again, it also requires us to be in compliance with commerce's noticing policy.

I think we've said this a few times and I appreciate the support that you all have provided as we've continued to extend these interim regs and as we get finally to the place where with permanent regulations If we do not get this extension and the current extension, it expires on February 4th of 2026. Just a reminder, any property in floodplain areas, Central Waterfront, Duwamish, there's a couple examples, people will not be able to obtain federally backed mortgage or flood insurance.

And there's the possibility if the program does lapse that the City of Seattle could be removed from the National Flood Insurance Program.

So this is, you know, one last effort to get this going.

As I said, we actually have legislation that we are transmitting.

We're getting close to transmitting.

We're really excited to bring the final package to all of you.

We're really thankful for all the support that you've provided as we have come to you repeatedly to ask for extensions, but we're ready to go.

We just need this one last extension to, again, make sure that you and your colleagues and the public are aware of what the final regulations look like.

and to make sure we have all of the noticing in place for the Department of Commerce and for the public too.

We want to make sure there's robust public engagement on this process too.

Do you have any questions for me?

Okay, all right.

I'll take that.

Oh, do you have one, Sherilyn?

No, I do not.

I understand the 10th is the magic charm.

So thankful to have this be the final one.

So thank you.

If there's no questions, then thank you for that update.

And we'll have the public hearing is on the 17th at the Land Use Committee meeting in December.

and then we anticipate noticing a public hearing in January or actually probably more like February as we all get rolling into the new year.

And then we're ready to hopefully get in the position where you all feel comfortable with it and achieve final approval before this extension ends.

So again, thank you for your support.

It's been a journey, but we're really excited to get to the final regulations and to walk you and the public through those.

Thank you.

So I believe we've reached the end of today's meeting agenda.

Our next meeting is Wednesday, December 17th, 2025 at 2 p.m.

Any further business to come before the committee before we adjourn, colleagues?

No, thank you.

Well done.

Thank you, council member.

Thank you again to all the members of the public for joining us today for this very fun and wonky discussion and hearing no further business to come before the committee.

We are adjourned at 322 p.m.

Thank you.