Seattle City Council 91619

Good afternoon, everybody.

Thank you for being here in City Hall.

I never heard that used.

Hey, it worked.

The September 16, 2019 City Council meeting of the full City Council will come to order.

It's 2 o'clock p.m.

I'm Bruce Harreld, President of the Council.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Herbold.

Here.

Juarez.

Here.

Mosqueda.

Here.

O'Brien.

Here.

Pacheco.

Here.

Sawant.

Here.

Begshaw.

Here.

Gonzalez.

Here.

President Harrell.

Here.

Nine present.

Thank you very much.

And again, thank all of you for being here in City Hall.

At this point, I'll move to adopt the introduction and referral calendar, but I do believe Council Member Sawant has an amendment she'd like to propose.

Yes, thank you President Harrell.

I move to amend the proposed introduction and referral calendar by introducing Council Bill 119656 entitled an ordinance relating to land use and zoning providing that transitional encampments for homeless individuals are allowed on any property owned or controlled by a religious organization without approval of a permit under the Seattle Land Use Code to permit transitional encampments for homeless individuals as an interim use on all publicly owned or private property within the City of Seattle and providing for renewal of temporary use permits for transitional encampments as a Type 1 decision of the Director of the Seattle Department of Construction and Inspections amending various sections.

With your indulgence, I won't mention the numbers of the Seattle Municipal Code and amending Ordinance 124747 and referring it to the Human Services Equitable Development and Renters' Rights Committee.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the infrastructure referral calendar.

Did you want to say anything more about it?

I wanted to clarify a few things.

I'm going to support the amendment, but I did want to say a few things.

Why don't you ask me the questions, and then I was going to say something, but maybe I can incorporate all of that.

Sure.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the introductory referral calendar to consider this legislation.

We've been informed by central staff that of course many of you know there's been a SEPA appeal on this issue and we got some clarifications on the date.

this afternoon, about an hour and a half ago or so, and the actual SEPA appeal will be heard December 17th, 18th, and 19th, which will logically mean, because there will no doubt be briefs filed after that period, that the decision would be made next year, most likely sometime in January, perhaps.

Ali Panucci's following this issue closely, which basically means, according to law, we cannot take final action, which means full council approval until the SEPA appeal is exhausted or over, I should say.

So we are well within our rights to have a committee discussion, to consider the legislation, have a public transparent process on this issue, but we will be prohibited from taking final action until the SEPA appeal is over.

And for those reasons, I certainly support the amendment.

Are there any questions?

And we'll let Council Member Swann have some final words unless there's other questions on this particular amendment.

Council Member Swann, you have the floor.

Thank you, President Harrell, and thank you for sharing with the Council and the public the developments that we just heard from the pre-hearing conference that was held by the hearing examiner about the dates.

And just to add a couple more things to what you said, President Harrell, we would also like to proceed not only with adding this to the introduction and referral calendar, but also hopefully having a legally required public hearing into the bill.

that the proposed date from my office is October 17, but it bends permission from your office.

And just to clarify to members of the public, by law, the council is allowed to add this bill into the calendar and also have a public hearing while the hearing examiner is deliberating the appeal.

And also to put a little bit of a context as to why it will be a good progressive step forward if the current council discusses this a little bit here in the public hearing, is to mention that the appellant, Elizabeth Campbell, is a habitual appellant on progressive policies, and also most recently she had appealed the Fort Lawton affordable housing development, which I think is an important step forward.

So I think it'll be good if we have a discussion on this.

Very good.

Any other comments on the motion, Miss Infrantis?

All those in favor of the amendment to the introduction referral calendar, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

It is amended.

I believe Council Member Juarez is going to have an amendment as well, but because of the timing, unless there's objection, I'm going to suspend the rules.

We didn't have it in early enough.

So I'm going to suspend the rules if there's no objection, and we'll hear from Council Member Juarez on her proposal.

Okay, we're good?

Thank you, Council President.

I move to amend the introduction referral calendar to include Council Bill 119648. This legislation authorizes the Superintendent of Parks to amend the existing 10-year lease with the Seattle Children's Playgarden for an additional third term of five years.

This will allow the bill to move forward.

We had a committee meeting, we have a committee meeting this Wednesday, September 17th, and the legislation is planned for a briefing My apologies for not getting this on the IRC just unfortunately just got by us.

So thank you.

Oh And I should add that we you guys all have copies the pink sheets is the copy of the proposed ordinance It's been moved and seconded to Amend the introduction for calendars stated by councilmember war is any other questions all those in favor say aye aye Opposed the ayes have it Those are the only two amendments that I'm aware of.

And with that, I'll move to adopt the introduction and referral calendar as amended.

Is there a second?

All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

Okay, let's move to our agenda.

And unless there's objections, I will approve today's agenda.

However, having said that, I'm gonna make a motion.

I'll move to Actually, I'll just do it by the great power that I have without a motion.

The agenda will be amended by moving agenda item number 21 after agenda item number 19, and basically that's a finance and neighborhood resolution before the ordinance.

It's dealing with real property, and we think that makes sense, and so that's not really a substantive amendment.

placement but we think that's important to do so we'll I'm moving to put 21 right after 19 and then I'm moving agenda item number 33 which is dealing with the Green New Deal the Oversight Board we have many well not many we have a few amendments I would like to move to have that right after item number four which would be our new item five we want to move that earlier in our agenda as opposed to its current placement number 33 so that's the move I'd like to make unless I hear objections from any of my colleagues So hearing no objection, the agenda is amended as stated.

So having said that, those in favor of approving the agenda, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

The new agenda is adopted.

The minutes of the September 3rd, 2019 City Council meetings have been reviewed.

If there's no objection, the minutes will be signed.

Hearing no objection, the minutes are being signed.

Presentations, we have two great presentations we'd like to make this afternoon, and we're going to start with Council Member Bagshaw, and Council Member Bagshaw, you have the floor.

Very good, thank you so much.

This is a proclamation recognizing Gregoria Rosas, and I'm going to invite you to come up in just a moment, but I'd like to first read this proclamation.

Whereas, Gregorio Rosas, also known as Greg, I understand, has physically and emotionally nourished Seattleites for 41 years, serving all-day breakfast with Filipino specialties at Ludi's Restaurant on the corner of 2nd and Pike Street in downtown Seattle.

Whereas Seattle has been Gregorio Rosas' home since 1978, after he immigrated from the Philippines, having been orphaned at seven years old.

And whereas Gregorio Rosas began his American journey at Ludi's, formerly known as the Turf Restaurant, as a part-time dishwasher in 1979. And whereas he became owner of the restaurant in 1988, after faithfully and diligently serving the former owner.

who passed the business to Mr. Rosas, recognizing his tenacity and hard work.

And whereas he serves both American and Filipino food at Ludi's, introducing customers to Filipino culture, which uses food to create friendships, connect family, and build community.

And whereas he has used his life's blessings to pay it forward to others, including complete strangers.

And whereas he has been recognized by local, national, and international media for his philanthropic endeavors, including in 2010 when he helped a young orphan Filipino man who he did not know and saw perform on TV reunite with his long lost father who lived in the United States.

And whereas he is celebrated for helping countless others by providing them with jobs in his restaurant, financial aid to gain citizenship, financial aid for education, and the adoption of orphans.

And whereas he is fearless, embracing the challenges of entrepreneurship with a positive attitude, leadership, and hard work.

And whereas he is a family man, a great father, kind to his siblings, relatives, and complete strangers, he leads by example through his honesty, generosity, commitment to community, and making the world a better place for those who need help.

And so now, therefore, the Seattle City Council proclaims today as Gregorio F. Rosas Day for his life and contributions to the residents of Seattle on this day, September 16th, 2019. Mr. President, if you're...

Mr. Rosas, will you join me up here at the microphone and let me give this proclamation to you signed by all of us.

Thank you, Councilmember Bagshaw and Mr. Rosas, thank you.

And we have another presentation and we'll turn the floor over to Councilmember Mosqueda.

Thank you Mr. President.

Today we have an opportunity to continue a tradition that has been celebrated in our country since 1968. Today we have members of the Latino Latinx community here with us to celebrate Seattle proclaiming September 16th through October 16th to be Seattle Latinx Heritage Month.

This is a real incredible honor for us to be able to bring this resolution forward, and we have members of the Latinx community here with us.

I want to thank El Centro de la Raza, Hilda Magana, and Miguel Maestas, the Mexican Consulate, Dia Angeles Quiroz, the Political and Economic Affairs person, Association of Latinx Professionals for Americans, Alpha, Carlos Ruiz, and our very own, from Councilmember Gonzalez's staff in the past, Roxana, here to join with us, and also Seattle's Latinx Chamber of Commerce, Marcos Juanles, President and Founder.

We have a resolution in front of us that recognizes the incredible contributions that the Latinx community has provided to Seattle, to our state, and to our nation.

This proclamation recognizes the significant and fast-growing Latinx population here in the city of Seattle, in our region, and across the country.

As someone who identifies as Chicana, as someone who comes from a Mexican-American family, and someone who is proudly bringing those values to city council, it is very exciting for us to be able to bring this forward on a city council that has four members who come from Mexican-American heritage.

The Latinx community has helped shape this city through business contributions, through arts and culture, through festivals, and through contributions from La Comida de Nuestra Familia.

This is an opportunity for us to celebrate in a month where we celebrate independence across the region.

When we think about the festivities in South Park with Fiestas Patrias, the festivities at Seattle Center hosted over the weekend to celebrate our traditional dances, music, and food.

To celebrate with the Mexican Consulate and El Centro who are hosting the annual Mexican Northwest Festival.

We have an active Latinx community here in this city.

We promote civic engagement, we make sure our community feels welcome, and we are represented in politics.

This upcoming census season, we all have an opportunity to talk about our pride of being Latino, Latina, Latinx, and also to make sure that our voice counts and our community counts.

Given the national and local attacks, it is important now more than ever that we correct wrong past racist narratives that often put our community on the back burner and celebrate all that we have done to build this city and continue to build this city through the Latino community.

There's a few whereases I'd like to read in the proclamation today, Mr. President.

Please do.

Thank you.

Whereas the Latinx community represents a significant and fast-growing demographic of the City of Seattle.

Whereas Seattle's civic and political leaders have shown the conviction of protecting all migrant communities in Seattle and beyond, including the Latinx community, from unfair and unjust laws.

and whereas Seattle recognizes the values of great cultural contributions made by many generations and individuals of Latinx heritage residing in Seattle.

Now, therefore, the Mayor of Seattle and the City of Seattle City Council do hereby proclaim September 16th through October 16th, 2019 to be Seattle Latinx Heritage Month, signed by all members of Council and the Mayor.

Thank you.

We could suspend the rules.

Would you like to present this formally?

Okay, and while Council Member Mosqueda makes her way, did any of the council members, would any other council members like to address our audience or the dais on this matter?

If not, we will be honored to hear from any of our guests.

Would any of you like to address the crowd, please?

Thank you very much.

Yes, however you'd like, all the mics are in play today.

Okay.

On behalf of El Centro de la Raza, our Executive Director, Estela Ortega, mil gracias for declaring Seattle Latinx Heritage Month.

It is wonderful that this proclamation coincide with September 16, celebrating our Independence Day, along with other Latin American countries.

We are honored that the city and its people recognize the great contributions of the Latino and Latinx people.

Our culture, our traditions, our language, our work ethics, has contributed to make this city a diverse, rich community.

We like to thank, we are grateful that Seattle civic and political leaders have shown the commitment in protecting our immigrant people in the city and beyond, and including the Latino, Latinx community.

and your commitment for protecting the people from unfair and unjust laws.

Thank you so much.

Mil gracias.

Thank you.

Thank you again.

My name is Marcos Juanles.

I'm the president and the founder of the Seattle Latino Chamber of Commerce, and I thank all council members for this fantastic proclamation.

We at the Chamber think that it is time to get Latinos united.

We are facing an incredible era, an incredible era that gets contrasted between these fantastic opportunities of new businesses and Latinos coming out as incredible professionals as they have.

by the way, since the 1930s in Hollywood where Cantinflas was already being one of the greatest Latinos ever, you know, here in the United States.

But not only that, the idea is that we are contrasted by a terrible political situation where we, part of our people, are being placed in actual concentration camps in the United States while they are being departed and separated from their family.

That is unbearable and impossible to withstand.

It is something that we should be talking about every single day.

because this has to stop.

This is impossible to be tolerating every day, and we cannot be looking the other way.

This has to be faced.

So proclaiming the date and the month of Hispanic heritage has to come along also with this reminder of what is actually happening in the political scene and immigration scene.

This has to stop.

This cannot be.

And I appreciate our major that actually took a trip to Texas to visit this immigration detention centers, as they're being called.

And it is something that we should not tolerate, Latinos should not tolerate, and Americans, as us, because we are Americans too, should not tolerate.

There should not be this type of things going on in our country.

I want to remind us that, as I thank the consul for proclaiming the day, and I want everybody everybody, all races, everybody, American, African American, Asian, all races that are American that live here to get together and to stop this type of things.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, Seattle City Council and citizens of the City of Seattle.

On behalf of the Washington State Commission on Hispanic Affairs, Alpha Seattle, and the Latino Small Business Alliance, and many other organizations supporting the Latinx community, thank you for today's proclamation.

Thank you for recognizing the cultural and economic contributions and importance of the Latinx community in this great city.

We look forward to continuing to work with the City of Seattle to help develop programs for the Latinx communities and for all the other diverse communities in a culturally rich city like Seattle.

Looking forward to working together on the 2020 Census.

Thank you once again.

Hello.

On behalf of the Consulate of Mexico, I just want to thank Mayor Durkan and all of the City Council members for taking these steps and continuing this tradition of recognizing the importance and the contributions that benefit not only the society of Seattle, but the U.S. society in general.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'd like to thank Council Members Bagshaw and Mosqueda for those wonderful proclamations and thank all of you for participating.

We're going to continue with our agenda, which the next section is our public comment.

So at this time we'll take public comment on item that appears on today's agenda, our introduction referral calendar, or our work program.

We have several pages of public comments, and we also have 35 agenda items, some of which require amendments.

So I'm going to take the two-minute allotment down to one minute so we can hear from as many people as possible and try to get through some of these pages.

So get your notes together to take it down to one minute, and Madam Clerk, I'd ask that you put it one minute.

We're going to start with first will be Mark Hennen, and then Kathy Dawson, if you're here.

Kathy, can you please come to my right, your left, and then after Kathy, is Jesus H. Christ.

So we'll start, Mark, Kathy, and Jesus.

Hi, I'm Mark Hannon, author of Status Quo's Death.

Today's environmental groups realize our lives are at stake.

Greedy billionaires, corrupt politicians, and evil corporations kill people with poison so they can make more money.

That's murder.

People getting murdered now live near the equator, but air, water, and heat pollution are coming to kill us all.

Right now, permafrost in Alaska, Canada, and Russia melts ever faster, releasing megatons of greenhouse gases that spread to all the skies and beam heat down at us.

Without preventive measures, heat pollution will metastasize like cancer to wither and kill hundreds of millions each year.

The status quo is death for all life on earth because greedy billionaires paid corrupt politicians to let evil corporations heat and poison our air, our land, our water.

Soon it will be too late for children to live a full life, too late for anyone to enjoy careers and retirements.

We will doom ourselves if we let greedy, corrupt, and evil people continue murdering.

Please help stop them from murdering us all.

Stop them from murdering us all.

Stop them from murdering us all.

Thank you, Mark.

Kathy.

President Harreld, council members, thank you for your service.

I'm Kathy Dawson here on behalf of Earth Ministry, where we transform faith into action for the well-being of communities and the environment.

We stand in support of the ordinance on the Green New Deal.

This important next step for the Green New Deal is in alignment with many of the faith commitments and values of our members and other constituents.

These values include care of creation, because it is good, and is under attack by short-sighted human greed and lust for power.

These values include loving care and responsibility to future generations.

These values include commitments to care for those most impacted, who are often the least able to prevent and recover from climate disasters.

These values include the dignity of all persons, including the need to be included in deliberations and decision-making.

These and other faith values cause us to support the ordinance creating the GND Oversight Board and we urge you to adopt it.

Thank you, Kathy.

Following Jesus will be Lacrisse Green and Gianni Ficru.

And actually, what I'm gonna do is call the next 12 people out, the next 12 to follow Jesus.

God was just joking, see a little inside joke there.

See you guys with me on the next 12. No, we're gonna go with Lacrisse and Johnny Fickrew after Jesus.

Thank you, Council.

My name is Jesus H. Christ, but you can call me Josh.

I have been sent by my father.

I know we've been waiting 2,000 years for this.

I'm going to try and fit it in 60 seconds.

I've been sent by my dad to forewarn you about the encroaching apocalypse.

Obviously, that's the big thing on the news.

And, you know, I've been checking in and out, mostly out for obvious reasons.

But when I do check in, I've noticed my fan club is really about my dad and not so much about my mom, which is Mother Earth right here.

So I have a letter from my dad to you all and you as well.

Dear humans, WTF?

I gave you a perfect planet, the indigenous people were doing amazing, and now Jeff Bezos wants to fly you to Mars?

Bad idea.

How about we pass the Green New Deal, respect the indigenous community, and I might give you another shot at this.

P.S.

Love your neighbor.

Look, dad is harsh.

He's a fiery dude.

I get it.

I forgive you guys unconditionally either way, but Let's pass this Green New Deal.

Let's respect the indigenous voices that are in the building.

And most importantly, if you're truly a fan of mine, I'll see you on Friday at the climate strike.

I have Lucrece, Johnny and Nicole.

Lucrece, Johnny and Nicole, we're all set, go ahead.

My name is Lucrece and that means behold a Christian.

I would like to say to Miss Bagshaw, I'm sorry to see you leave and I was very disappointed when I found out the other day that you Mr. Harrell and Mr. O'Brien are not running again.

We will very much miss you.

We appreciate what you've done.

And for those who, the ladies that are on this, let me tell you something.

This is America, a republic that is one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

And if you have not treated us all, may God reward you as you have done us.

Thank you.

Following Johnny is Nicole Grant.

Hey council members, my name is Johnny Fikaru and I'm an organizer at Got Green.

I'm calling to urge y'all to support the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

We want to make sure that communities who are most impacted from climate change are also the decision makers in building out the policy that would better fit our community.

And I think we also know that the city's climate emissions are still rising.

And so I think having an accountability body would be important to make sure that we are on track because we have some pretty lofty goals.

If we want to be rid of climate pollutants by 2030, then we gotta take it seriously.

And I think having an oversight board would make me feel good at holding the city accountable and making sure that our communities are safe, healthy, and thriving.

Thank you.

Before we begin, let me call out the next three speakers.

Stefan Moritz, Katie Garrow, and Catherine Leggett.

So, Stefan, Katie, and Catherine.

Nicole Grant, MLK Labor, representing unions in King County, and I want to say thank you to the Green New Deal community for being here.

I'm inspired, and the Labor Council is going to be considering the Green New Deal on Wednesday, and we're looking forward to it very much.

I wanted to thank everybody on the council for your leadership on behalf of hotel workers.

And I wanna say, me too, and thank you personally, because I've been sexually assaulted on the job, and I know what that's like.

And I wanna say thank you to all the work that you've done to make sure that hotel workers and their families will have access to healthcare.

And lastly, to say thank you for the protections and the ordinance to save people from on-the-job injuries, because you cannot enjoy your family and your life and your job when you're hurt.

So thank you.

It's a big day for us.

Good afternoon, council members.

The hotel worker laws you're voting on today are a momentous step forward in strengthening our communities and making sure that workers are welcome and protected in our city, which is increasingly unaffordable to service workers.

The protections you are putting in place will help thousands of families better take care of themselves and their loved ones.

You can be proud of the work you have done as this set of laws will make Seattle a better place.

and you have listened and made significant adjustments along the way.

There's sort of a narrative out there that some stakeholders weren't heard as you move forward.

Here are the facts.

This legislation is narrowly crafted to only cover businesses that serve hotel guests.

Many small businesses are excluded from the healthcare requirement of this ordinance and many others have time to adjust to the situation and there's a phase in for them.

Medium-sized businesses, will not be covered until 2025. You've made adjustments to the benefit of the business community, and you deserve credit for that.

We understand that legislative process requires hard work and sometimes compromise.

This is what you see in front of you today, and I urge you to vote yes on all four ordinances.

Thank you.

And also, really excited to see the Green New Deal being discussed here because it is important for our future.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Councilmembers.

My name is Katie Garrow, and I'm the Deputy Director at MLK Labor.

I am also here today to say thank you for your leadership on implementing Initiative 124 into law here in Seattle.

Over the past few months, we've heard a lot from hotel managers about how onerous these laws will be.

And I get that when the rules have been rigged in your favor for years, resetting the standards feels like a loss.

Yes, there are regulations in this legislation that limit the amount of backbreaking work that hotel housekeepers have to do.

But hotels never should have profited off of the exploitation of their staff in the first place.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that housekeepers report higher rates of injury than coal miners.

Workload standards are long overdue in this industry.

City Council, the public is with you.

77% of us are, thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Catherine, and I'm a volunteer with 350 Seattle.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

I strongly believe that the City Council should vote yes on creating a Green New Deal Oversight Committee.

Today I read that this week the Seattle Times will be joining more than 250 newsrooms across the world in publishing stories about climate change.

So it's another reminder of where we are with this issue.

So imagine several years from now, two years, four years out, and we are experiencing the progress that this wealthy, progressive city has made on the Seattle Green New Deal.

Imagine we're on our way to reducing climate pollution.

Imagine we have good green jobs that are thriving.

Imagine we have stood by our words and we have a strong oversight committee compromised of a variety of stakeholders, including those from frontline communities who offer experience and expertise.

Imagine the insights offered and the networks developed and the just policies they've made in collaboration with the city council.

Thank you, Kevin.

Could you wrap up, please?

Oh, you wrapped up.

Thank you very much for your testimony.

So I'm going to call three more speakers.

Yan Ting Deng, Yan Ting, and then we have Nancy Huizar, and then Jill

Mangaleman.

Jill.

I'm just gonna stop there.

Hi, everyone, good morning, good afternoon.

So my name is Yen, I'm a hotel worker.

First, I thank you all, council members, for getting us time to listen to us.

And a lot of hotel workers have job injury, and I really appreciate that you guys can be loading up 4,500 square feet to protecting the workers who have less job injury.

And when we have less jaw injury, we have the good help, and then we have also the better healthcare for my take care of the family.

And thank you, all you guys, for listening to us, to helping us getting this lot processed.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Council.

Thank you for your approval of the Green New Deal resolution last month.

I was born and raised in Beacon Hill, and I know the potential of my community when we come together, as you can see today.

In order to make bold moves on climate change, the City must commit to community-led processes and solutions.

The Green New Deal Oversight Board is an important piece in this process.

We have to break down barriers that include only having experts be involved in this process.

People's lived experiences are also important to consider and are important to have their voices heard.

We must have the voices of frontline and fenceline communities to ensure the success of reducing climate pollution by 2030. I urge you to please vote yes on the ordinance for the oversight board and to keep pieces of the legislation that have the board and the intergovernmental team working together on climate policies.

I also hope that you do not add additional seats that would undermine frontline groups.

The point of this process is to have a seat at the table for all of us.

Thank you.

And also, lastly, stand in solitarity with our folks at the hotel workers.

Thanks.

Following Jill Mangaliman will be Matt Remley.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Jill Mangaliman.

I'm the executive director of GOT Green.

We're a people of color-led environmental justice organization in Seattle.

I'm a lifelong Seattle resident.

I lived here almost all my life, with the exception of two years, and I've seen Seattle thrive, but also struggle.

We have communities of color not only feeling the pinch around the rising costs, but also around climate and environmental injustices.

By passing the Green New Deal Oversight Board, we can ensure that we have a strong commitment to be accountable to these communities, to communities of color, to workers, to people on the front lines.

We oppose the amendment to add additional seats for tech and for philanthropy because we want these voices of the people most impacted to be prioritized.

And speaking of which, of the Green New Deal and this need for a just transition to a just economy, we are in solidarity with the hotel workers.

We stand for an increase of their protections and their rights.

We need to support our workers in our city.

Thank you.

Well, good afternoon.

My name is Matt Remley.

I'm a resident of Beacon Hill, and I thank the Council for the opportunity to share some words today.

I'm here in support of the Green New Deal Oversight Board, and I find it an important piece of legislation following the efforts of the Council here last month passing the Green New Deal resolution.

that this committee oversees the bold policy of the council to see Seattle be fossil fuel free by 2030. And I'm also in support of this committee being led by frontline communities, labor, tribes, and youth.

I'm also expressing support for the resolution to support the climate strike, as well as for the hotel workers legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you, Matt.

So I have a request that I'll look favorably on for the next four speakers to speak as a group.

So let's give them three minutes.

And we'll go with Alec, Caleb, Daniel, and Bobby is what I have as a group.

Don't we get four minutes as four people?

Sure.

Wonderful.

Thank you.

I need it.

My name is Alec Connan, and I'm an organizer with 350 Seattle and the Seattle for a Green New Deal campaign.

We're here today to urge you to vote yes on the Green New Deal Oversight Committee Ordinance.

And we're here as a group today because I'm sure that the council, or at least some of the council may remember, the last time I was here, I tried my very best to read aloud all of the names of the hundreds of organizations that support a Green New Deal for Seattle.

But sadly, I ran out of time.

And I know that the council has no doubt just been sitting on the edge of your seat ever since then wondering, who else supports Seattle for a Green New Deal?

So with some help from my friends, we're hopefully going to get through the full list of organizations that support a Green New Deal for Seattle today.

But we're going to have to still be very quick.

And with that, I actually forget, Caleb, who does support Seattle's Green New Deal?

Well, quite a few organizations.

Got Green, 350 Seattle, El Centro de la Raza, Rainier Valley Core, Tenants Union Washington, Sierra Club Washington, Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, Mazaska Talks, SEIU 775, SEIU 6, UAW Local 4121, UA Local 1981, UFCW 21, AFTWA Retiree Chapter, Seattle Neighborhoods Greenways, Transit Writers Union, Washington Environmental Council and Washington Conservation Voters, Fuse Washington, Delridge Neighborhood Development Association, Rooted in Rights, Washington Healthcare Access Alliance, Nicholsville, Real Change, Other 98, 350.org, Families of Color Seattle, Emerald Cities Collaborative, Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, Fridays for Future Seattle, Sunrise Seattle, Sunrise Movement, Zero Hour, Plant for the Planet Washington, Climate Action Families, Protectors of the Salish Sea, Friends of the Earth, South Seattle Climate Action Network, Seattle 500 Women Scientists, Community Alliance for Global Justice, Food and Water Watch, Climate Solutions, Kultura, Terraform Education, Passive House Institute U.S., Village Volunteers, Vashon Climate Action Group, Nature Stewards, Legal Voice, League of Women Voters Seattle, King County, Surge, Reproductive Justice, Hedgebrook, Zero Waste Washington, West Seattle Helpline, Stand.Earth, and Climate Justice Initiative.

Capital Hill Renter Initiative, The Urbanist, Cascade Bicycle Club, Orca Conservancy, Coalition of Anti-Racist Whites, United to End Racism, Tech for Housing, Rainforest Action Network, Rethink Green, Sustainable Ballard, For the People, Our Climate, Architectural Lobby of Seattle, UW Sage, Stevens Pass Climate Team.

Parents for Future Seattle, Beacon Hill Safe Streets, Sustainable Seattle, Crown Hill Community Garden, West Seattle Meaningful Movies, Columbia City Community Chorus, Share the Cities, Mount Baker Hub, Mothers Out Front USA, Climate Reality Seattle, King County Chapter, Seattle Green Families, SOAR, People for Climate Action Seattle, Coalition Ending Gender-Based Violence, Sustainable West Seattle, Food Systems Coalition, 34th Legislative District Democrats, 36th Legislative District Democrats, Puget Sound Advocates for Retirement Action, Story 2 Designs, Indivisible Seattle, Wallingford Indivisible, and more, which is to say both the more options for accessory residences movement and a lot more names.

But I'm a little tuckered out, so I'm going to pass it on to Bobby.

OK.

So, I think you get the point.

I can't keep reading like that.

I'm not going to and I can't.

It looks like a lot of work.

But as you can see, the Green New Deal Oversight Committee has a lot of support.

In addition to the organizations that were just named, over 30 faith communities, faith leaders and churches, including major faith coalitions, we just heard from one, Earth Ministry.

Also, we have the Faith Action Network, six church congregations, including Keystone UCC, Prospect Church UCC, First United Methodist Church of Seattle, and the University Congregational UCC, and Jewish community groups, Kavanah Cooperative and Kadima, all support the passage of the Green New Deal Oversight Committee.

And so do 12 of the 14 candidates for city council, community leaders like Nikita Oliver, Dennis Hayes, Kristen Harris-Daley, former mayor Mike McGinn, and three professors of atmospheric science from the University of Washington.

and in their small businesses based in Seattle, including the Royal Room, Bike Works, Alky Bikes, Sunpath Electric, Bird Bar Place, Triple Bottom Line Construction, and the Broad Fork Restaurant.

So with that said, Seattle City Council, we urge you to pass the vote, to please vote yes on the Green New Deal Oversight Committee Ordinance and vote yes on the legislation to support the hotel workers.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm going to extend public comment.

We actually exceeded our 20-minute allotment by a few minutes.

We have a lot of folks here, so why don't we hear from some more folks, and I'll keep reading off the names.

Our next three speakers will be Katrina Peterson, Roy Scardina, and then Don Smith.

Katrina, Roy, and Don, and then John Peterson.

Katrina, Roy, Don, and John.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for having me.

My name is Katrina Peterson, and I'm the Climate Justice Program Manager at Puget Sound SAGE.

I'm here to voice my support for the Green New Deal Community Oversight Board, especially as it is composed of a majority of indigenous people, black people, and people of color who are cannibal to frontline communities.

As communities most impacted by climate change, by sea level rise and flooding in the Duwamish River Valley, by heat and cold and wildfire smoke, and the associated health disparities, we know the problems intimately and have the solutions and vision that all of us need to rapidly address the climate crisis.

I'm also here in support of adding more labor seats to the board in order to advocate for the needs of workers.

In contrast, I do not support giving tech and philanthropy seats at the oversight board.

Big business and big money are drivers of the climate crisis, and here in Seattle, they are the very actors who have displaced communities of color from the city.

They already have an outsized influence on policy creation and politics here and don't need another seat.

Let's remember that this is a community oversight board whose role is to give community members, not corporations, power over how policy and investments are made in their communities.

It is the vision of frontline communities that will lead the way forward through these uncertain times.

And these are the voices that we need to uplift into leadership.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Roy, Don, and John.

Hello and thank you very much for the opportunity to speak with all of you today.

I'm going to be speaking I think maybe a little out of order on the program but ancillary businesses to hotel business.

I'm representing a small business here in Seattle.

We employ technical labor.

for hotels and we're partnered with hotels.

We depend on their livelihood and we are currently a small business.

We'd like you to reconsider on how you look at how small businesses get lumped into the entire program.

We currently provide a competitive wage We can currently provide all of the necessary elements that people need to live a fulfilled life in an expensive city like Seattle.

So please remember, don't always lump our Seattle small businesses into the big scheme of everything.

Look to what we actually do for the community and what more we can do.

So thank you very much and I appreciate your time.

I'm sorry, was that Roy?

Okay, thank you.

I just want to make sure I'm in order.

I'm with Roy.

I'm Don Smith with AVMS.

Our employees are not like housekeepers.

They're more like the IT manager.

We pay the 100% benefits.

We give them technical training.

We give them sexual harassment training.

We give them diversity training.

And as an AV supplier, we don't really belong in this group with the hotel, with what you're saying there.

So, thanks.

Thank you.

John, following you will be Michael Clark and then Jessica Horton.

So, following John will be Michael and Jessica.

Hi, I'm John Pearson and I'm speaking on agenda item 28, saving Seattle Times Park.

We've been working on this since 2013, over six years.

Compared to the original plan for this park, which was to destroy it, saw down five exceptional trees, this current plan is great.

It represents a compromise on both sides, saving the park for the life of the buildings, but allowing some added height in a building on the next lot.

This solution is supported by the South Lake Union Community Council and their neighbor, Mirabella.

This solution would not have happened except for Councilmember Sally Bagshaw.

She and her office worked tirelessly to develop this compromise, obtain a written MOU, and follow it up with a text amendment that came to you today for a vote.

I speak for the South Lake Union Community Council Board, and the Marabella community, we will miss Council Member Sally Bagshawn next year when she's back at Harvard teaching young people instead of saving the city or at least Council District 7. Thank you for all you've done for us, our community and neighborhood in the city.

Thank you.

Thank you, John.

So I have Michael Clark and Jessica Horton.

Is Michael here?

And Jessica, you have the mic.

You can join us over here.

Hello.

Thank you for having me.

My name is Michael Clark.

I'm the general manager of the Renaissance Hotel and sit on the board of the Seattle Hotel Association.

I've been in our industry for 33 years and started as a dishwasher.

Managers and owners in our industry care about our employees and agree that access to affordable quality health care is important and we wouldn't have it any other way.

It's so disappointing that you have legislation in front of you requiring arbitrary cash expenditures instead of focusing on quality coverage.

I'm certain that that's not what 77% of the voters intended.

We've been talking for months about what appropriate penalty pay is for those who choose to offer cleaning assignments over the maximum square footage.

Yet you're about to vote on a last-minute change to square footage that impacts our entire industry with no advance notice, no stakeholder outreach or input, no opportunities for review or discussion, and no consideration of local recent data which is readily available.

After months of hearing testimony from small businesses and non-hotel employers asking why are they included in this legislation, you've come up with a definition of ancillary hotel businesses that does little to address the concerns that the businesses have raised.

I'm certain that this legislation is not what 77% of the voters intended.

Thank you, Michael.

After Jessica will be Caitlin.

Al Corn and then Scott McClay.

Good afternoon.

My name is Jessica Horton, and I am the Director of People Support for the Pan Pacific Hotel.

I have testified before you on several occasions on behalf of the hospitality industry.

I speak to you today as one of your constituents, and I am disappointed in Seattle City Council, my local elected officials.

It is important to our industry to establish good rapport with public officials.

As such, we asked ourselves what is the best way for us to ensure you have all the information you need to make an informative decision on I-124.

So we've had several personal visits, been prompt and patient.

We were prepared, truthful, understanding, and accommodating to opposition.

We've written you letters, testified publicly.

We've been brief, specific, reasonable, and courteous.

Our industry has spent hours providing input and offering solutions throughout this process, but as you sit here before us all, our elected officials, you have diverged significantly from your constituents' concerns and are not representing us.

Thank you.

Hi there.

My name is Caitlin Alcorn.

I'm a graduate student at the University of Washington and I study labor issues, so I just wanted to come and state my support for the four council bills extending additional labor protections to hotel workers.

Seattle voters already demonstrated that they're very much in favor of such legislation when they approved Initiative 124 some three years ago.

I think all workers deserve as a very kind of minimum to work.

a working environment that's free of harassment and many hotel workers work in private rooms behind closed lockable doors and are in need of these additional protections.

So I just wanted to state my support for hotel workers.

It's not only hotel workers that care about this issue, it's the community at large that does.

So I urge you to please pass this legislation.

Thank you.

Following Scott will be Shannon, Sharon, and then Shaza, Shiza, Darji, Shaza.

My name is Scott McClay.

Thanks for listening to me.

I'm very excited that the city council has passed the Green New Deal last month and is already doing the first implementation that shows an urgency that we need on this issue.

I'm totally in support of the Oversight Committee and urge you to pass it as is, not to add more seats for tech and philanthropy.

As it is, it empowers frontline communities to make changes in the city that will improve their lives and clean up the horrible environmental injustices that have happened to them.

I also support the resolution supporting the strike and Arctic and I'm a proud union member and support the resolutions supporting and improving the lives of our hotel workers.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Council.

My name is Shannon Sharon, and I am the Managing Director of Hotel Sorrento.

I've been in this room a few times and certainly spoken to everyone individually about the concerns of our industry, so I'm happy to be here, but equally disappointed.

When we think about this initiative, we go back to the law, which again, it was found to be illegal, so it was broken apart.

And over the last three, three and a half months, we have stood by and negotiated and given really fair insights and offered opportunities to invite you into our hotels, to meet with our associates, to really understand some of the unintended consequences and ramifications.

I do have a small business, and although we like to champion and cheerlead the fact that small businesses have a little bit of a concession, they really don't.

If we want to compete for that high quality associate, then we are really limited to really almost exact me-too complements of benefits, and so that makes it extremely difficult.

Additionally, when we think about the after 12 weeks of hearing testimony for small businesses and non-hotel employers asking why they are included in this legislation.

You've come up with the definition of ancillary hotel business that is little to address the concerns that non-hotel businesses have raised.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

My name is Shiza, so I'll respond to Shiza, Damji, and my family has owned the Hotel Nexus at Northgate for the last 40 plus years.

I wish to remind the City Council that as an industry, hotel owners, including myself, have actively supported progressive city and state legislation on behalf of our employees, including support of minimum wage increases, support of creation of the nation's best paid family leave program at the state level, and support of statewide panic button requirements.

For the last 12 weeks, we have been sharing our feedback to City Council about this proposed legislation.

It has become abundantly clear, however, that the City Council and staff have been allowing us to provide feedback purely for the optics.

In fact, there seems to be a concerted attempt to attack and burden just one particular industry rather than try to address the underlying cost of family health care for all residents of Seattle by supporting either a state public option or other ways to expand access while reducing costs.

That would be real change.

That would be meaningful change for many, many people instead of just choosing to attack one industry because we are sitting ducks.

Example number one.

Can you start to wrap up, please?

Sure.

The process has been an absolute disgrace.

And when small and immigrant family businesses are able to make the choice, which many are already doing, either to shut down or to no longer invest in Seattle because of arbitrary overreach by the city council, you should not be surprised.

Thank you.

So we're on David Rojas.

Melody Sweat and Dustin Hinkle, 28, 29, and 30. Dustin Hinkle.

David.

Hi, how are you all doing?

Good afternoon, Seattle City Council members.

My name is David Rojas.

I am speaking today as a union worker from Fred Meyer.

I'm a member of USCW 21, the largest USCW local union in the nation and a longtime member of the Alliance for Jobs and Clean Energy.

We are very supportive of Seattle's Green New Deal and signed onto the letter of encouraging the Seattle City Council to adopt this work.

We agree with our partners, leaders from communities of color, people with lower incomes, and others who are disproportionately that workers and those of us on the front lines need to be the center of policy development to address climate change and reduce the pollution.

We are also in favor of making sure that voice of unionized workers need to be part of the oversight committee.

Thank you for your time, appreciate it.

Dear council members, my name is Melody Squirt and I worked at the Western Hotel and the Main Bar for 44 years.

And I know what it's like to serve guests in our industry.

I want to thank you for listening to us and making sure that hotel restaurant workers like me will gain better access to healthcare.

I appreciate that you kept the legislation strong and helped prevent outsourcing of jobs to low wage and no benefit companies.

As I stated, I have worked in the hospital industry for 44 years, and access to good health care is equally important to all workers, no matter for whom they work.

It matters to me and everyone in this industry because of our workloads, our irregular hours are incredibly hard on us physically.

And we use our benefits, we use our medical benefits, we use our prescriptions.

And just for example, I actually had my veins surgically done three times, and my husband's had four strokes.

Now his healthcare, his therapy, his physical therapy, and his medications, I couldn't afford them without my benefits.

Thank you for listening to me.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

I wanted to continue last week's committee conversation about ancillary businesses.

Councilmember Gonzalez, you discussed how your husband is in the restaurant business.

At best, this was a light-hearted attempt to personalize the conversation, and I thank you.

At worst, you are proposing legislation that applies to his direct competitors but does not apply to his business.

You have a clear conflict of interest and I call for you to abstain from voting on any of today's hotel legislation.

Council Member Sawant, you discussed how a central district coffee shop is at a disadvantage to a hotel coffee shop.

I think it could be a fair point, but I think it's the wrong comparison.

The harsh legislation you will apply to hotel restaurants, but not restaurants right across the street at Amazon's headquarters.

Is that really what you intend?

The restaurants closest to Amazon's thousands of employees will have more favorable business conditions than their hotel neighbors.

This is not equitable.

I believe that the legislation should be equitable to everyone, else it's equitable for no one.

Thank you.

Thank you, Dustin.

I'm going to call out three names.

Dustin Lambrow, another Dustin.

Dustin Lambrow, Tsering Bahartso, and then Jess Wallach or Wallace.

Dustin, Tsering, Jess.

Good afternoon Council President Harrell and members of the council.

I'm here today in solidarity on behalf of Teamsters Local 117 and MLK Labor with my brothers and sisters in the hotel industry.

Too often, the work that hotel workers do, particularly housekeepers, is invisible.

But I want to tell you that we see you, and we appreciate the work that you do.

And I appreciate the work that you all are about to do today.

You're doing the right thing.

And this is just the latest example of a string of victories that working people have had before the Seattle City Council.

So we thank you so much for all of your work on behalf of working families in the city.

Hello council members, my name is Sering and I work at the Edgewater.

My co-workers and I voted 93% to strike this weekend because we are fighting to survive in the city.

We're just getting too expensive.

Thank you for listening to us and making sure that hotel workers like me will get better access to health care.

I appreciate that you make sure that hotels can't subcontract jobs to companies that don't offer health care.

The housekeepers at my hotel are so happy about the 4,500 square foot limit for housekeepers.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Just after you is Marco Wanlis.

Thank you.

Hi, council.

My name is Jess Wallach, and I'm an organizer with 350 Seattle, and here as a part of the Seattle for a Green New Deal campaign.

And I'm here today in support of the Green New Deal Oversight Board that's before you.

This is an opportunity for Seattle to continue leading on climate and the Green New Deal.

And when we passed the Green New Deal resolution about a month ago, we had the eyes of the nation on us as an example of what cities can do ahead of federal inaction on climate, a model for how local leadership can transform not only the climate conversation, but the kinds of climate solutions that we're seeing.

The Green New Deal Oversight Board is a critical piece of that because it creates a mechanism for community accountability, for deep community engagement, and most importantly, centering the experiences and priorities of communities most impacted by the climate crisis and communities most impacted by the transition away from dirty fuels.

This is an opportunity for Seattle City Council to support communities that are most impacted by the climate crisis, driving the kinds of solutions that will support everybody moving towards a healthier climate justice future for all.

So I urge you to vote yes on the Green New Deal Ordinance Board.

And I see that I'm at time.

That went fast.

I also just want to highlight there's two other things that Seattle City Council can lead on today.

Please wrap up, though.

OK.

OK.

Go ahead.

Make your point.

We have an opportunity to stand with student strikers around the world who are coming out on Friday calling for climate justice.

And we also have an opportunity to support hotel workers who are fighting for their well-being, basic economic security, and health and safety.

Thank you.

Colleagues, we've gotten through three pages of public comment.

I'd like to move to the agenda.

I did remind, I think we've got a good variety of opinions there on these different matters.

So unless there's objection, I'm going to move to the payment of the bill section.

So please read the title.

Council Bill 119646, appropriating money to pay starting claims for the week of September 2nd, 2019 through September 6th, 2019 and ordering the payment thereof.

Move to pass Council Bill 119646. Second.

It's been moved and seconded.

The bill passed.

Any comments?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bagshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed in the Sherrill Senate.

Please read agenda item number one, the short title, and I think we'll take these individually, Council Member Mosqueda, so let's just go That'll work with you, I assume.

Take them individually.

Council President, I wonder if we could read all four into the record so we can all speak to them and then maybe take individual votes.

I do have one amendment on health care that I'd love to consider individually when we get to the voting process, but if it pleases the President, maybe then we can speak to all four.

Let's do it.

So read all four in the short titles, then we'll vote on them separately.

I've reported the Housing, Health, Energy, and Workers' Rights Committee.

Agenda item one, Council Bill 119554, relating to employment in Seattle requiring certain employers to limit room cleaning workloads for certain employees.

Committee recommends the bill pass.

Agenda item two, Council Bill 119556, relating to employment in Seattle, adding a new chapter 14.29 to the Seattle Civil Code.

The committee recommends that the bill pass.

Agenda item three, Council Bill 119557, relating to employment in Seattle requiring certain employees to take certain actions to prevent, protect, and respond to violent or harassing Conduct by guests.

Committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

And agenda item four, Council Bill 119555, relating to employment in Seattle requiring certain employers to make required health care expenditures to or on behalf of certain employees for the purpose of improving access to medical care.

Committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Esqueda.

Thank you, Mr. President.

It's been a long road to get here.

It's been about nine months of engagement with community partners that we've heard from today.

And over the last nine months, we've had nine committee meetings directly talking about specific legislation.

While it feels like a long road for us in the midst of these policy debates, in the midst of media soundbites, In the midst of policy amendments that we've brought forward to our committee, it can be easy to forget what this legislation is all about.

And this legislation is mostly about the women, and I say women intentionally, who you've heard from today and over the last nine months, actually over the last few years.

Women who've experienced harassment, injury, and fear in the workplace.

Women who are mostly people of color, mostly immigrant workers.

We've drafted legislation and put it in front of you to think about what it means to walk in the shoes of a hotel worker, somebody who's been waiting on tables in hotels and serving guests of those hotels.

And for decades, many of these workers have been waiting for this legislation to pass.

While it's been a long road for us, it's been a much longer road for those individuals who've been asking for these type of protections over the years.

This worker, she's probably been harassed, potentially in a hotel, behind a closed door, in a room, or in public, like we heard about at the last committee meeting, where an individual came forward and said that as a server in a restaurant connected to a hotel, she had to get out of an unwanted hug and run away, and then was reprimanded by her employer for getting out of that hug.

She's probably felt trapped and didn't know what to do, and she maybe felt uncomfortable about reporting it.

As we know, 50% of housekeepers have experienced harassment and haven't reported it because of fear or discomfort not knowing what the outcome would be.

She probably got injured on the job, as we know that hotel workers have higher rates of back injury than construction workers and coal miners.

Let that sink in.

Than construction workers and coal miners.

We're talking about basic protections that we want to make sure every worker has in every industry.

You heard today about the individual who mentioned four surgeries.

Think about that individual now being able to potentially access health care.

When we were first talking about this legislation last December and January, I heard testimony of worker after worker who had experienced miscarriage after miscarriage because of the high rates or high number of square footage that they had to clean.

She may not have wanted to ask for protections because she was fearful of retaliation and maybe was fearful because of what she had heard about coworkers speaking up.

But then, guess what happened?

77% of voters voted to have her back.

She felt protected by this very city.

She felt protected by the voters who stood up and said that, yes, they want people to have access to health care, panic buttons in case they go into a hotel room, like we've talked about, the ability to know how much square footage they will be asked to clean every day.

And today, we are moving forward.

with some of those basic protections that many of us voted for and that many of us have actually had the chance to learn from since the implementation of 124. So thank you to all of the workers and the industry who've come forward and worked with us over the last nine months.

I know that nobody needs an overview, and I'm trying not to get into the policy weeds, but I can't help it.

I just want to remind folks that these four components are incredibly important.

Protection from harassment and intimidation.

Access to health care and the ability to purchase that health care.

Job retention and protection against unsaved workloads.

Our offices, Councilmember Gonzalez and I, as co-sponsors of this legislation, have been working diligently with the Office of Labor Standards, Central Staff, the Executive Office, the Attorney's Office, all of you on council, and the stakeholders, the multiple stakeholders that we've heard from today, who have helped us craft the legislation in front of you.

And over these nine committee meetings and I would say hundreds of calls and emails that we have received, we have tried to pull forward the common ground that we see between what stakeholders want and the very protections that we know voters wanted.

The process in and of itself was very inclusive.

We tried to make sure to have weekly meetings to hear both feedback and amendment ideas and of course not everybody is satisfied with every aspect of the legislation.

That's what happens.

There are some incredibly important protections, though, that we have been able to maintain in the initiative.

And as you've heard from folks who testified as workers, this is a really important step forward in carrying out the will of the voters and making sure that the legislation in front of us truly does improve safety, protect folks from harassment and intimidation, improve access to health care and the ability to purchase it.

and make sure that this industry moves forward with what we know some good employers already include in their policies, but makes it a public policy of this city to make sure that every worker has those same protections.

We've included some really important language and I want to thank all the council members for engaging with us, especially the folks who are on our committee.

Council Member Bagshaw has been working with our office as we thought about how do we include the feedback that we heard on ancillary business.

And what's really important to know is that the definition of ancillary business has been very much scoped to make sure that there's a specific and direct connection to the hotel purpose.

That's something that we heard was really important, as well as making sure that food and beverage establishment had a direct entrance for guests into that business.

This is a direct element of the feedback that we've received from community stakeholders.

And there's also some phase and provisions.

It's really important to note that the workload safety protections, the retention and healthcare bills, they only cover businesses with 50 or more employees.

And if there is a business that has between 50 and 250 employees, they have five years to work to get into compliance to make it workable or renegotiate leases.

This is directly based on feedback from especially some of the smallest businesses that we've worked with to make sure that the legislation is implementable that there's time to make these administrative changes to get into compliance.

On the safety legislation You may recall that we had initial protections included to look at excluding guests who were accused of harassment and intimidation.

And I think that this is something that all of the voters really wanted to make sure that no worker is put in the position where they are again intimidated, harassed, or assaulted in their workplace.

And that includes whether or not you're working in the restaurant that's connected to the hotel or if you're in that closed door with the hotel guests.

And what you have in front of you today really represents an amended version of the concept that we had brought forward because of the feedback that we got from the ACLU, King County Sexual Assault Resource Center, King County Prosecutor's Office, Refugee Immigrant Alliance, the REWA folks, folks from One America, and more.

We have had very important conversations about how we include some of the feedback from Legal Voice and the Sexual Violence Law Center.

And we look forward to making sure that there are protections that aren't just words on a piece of paper or aren't just a panic button that looks like the Staples button, but that when you push a panic button, you truly have somebody that's called so that they can come and free you from that situation and that people know where to go when that panic button is hit.

This is really important, as we've learned from past legislation, that we need to make sure that this is workable, that it's meaningful, and that it results in behavior and norms changes.

So thank you to the folks who have worked with us on that.

Council Member Pacheco, you brought forward an amendment that helped to make sure that when workers do access the time that we've proposed that they can have off to access an advocate to pursue the situation that they've claimed has happened to them, They'll be able to use that time within a two-week period.

We know sometimes it takes people a while to process what's happened to them, and that was an important amendment.

We also made sure that the violent or harassing conduct is something that will never get a pass and that we have opportunities to lift up what we know some good employers have implemented and apply these good policies across the board.

So some have talked about what they already have in place.

We appreciate that, but public policy is significant.

Public policy means that every worker gets protected and public policy is what we're carrying out today.

On the injury legislation, this legislative process, we've learned a lot about what housekeepers need in order to be safe.

The 2010 American Journal of Industrial Medicine study found that occupational injury disparities in the U.S. hotel industry found that employees have higher rates of occupational industry and sustain more severe injuries than most other service workers.

And there's a disproportionate aspect, right?

Especially when you think about this applying to more women and women of color, we have an equity call to action here.

They're sounding the alarm bell for us to act on these injury rates, and that's exactly what we've done here.

In 2016, the Puget Sound SAGE survey found that we had three times the percentage of back pain and injury than the general population.

This is calling on us, again, to make sure that we act so that these workers, again, mostly women, people of color, and immigrants, don't experience higher rates of trouble sleeping, chronic pain, and interruption with daily activities.

And again, I'll mention miscarriages because that often doesn't get reported as a public health aspect.

We are very excited about what we've been able to put in front of us today and in many respects we see the legislation in front of you as a carefully crafted term of art because many of you have wanted different things and we have tried to come together to include those, but what's most important is that we don't forget the stories that we've heard today.

The workers who have come forward time and time again to talk about why it is so important to have safety protections in terms of workloads, safety protections in terms of protection from harassment and intimidation, the ability to access or purchase healthcare, and to make sure that all of us have retention and the ability to stay at our jobs.

We have one of the most thriving industries in the hotel hospitality industry, and your work on a daily basis makes the work of this city function.

So for us on city council, it is about moving forward and ensuring that there's stability and security for these workers and helping, and in doing that, that will help us be one of the more attractive places to come to because people will continue to point at Seattle for being the place that lifts up workers and I applaud all of you for making this legislation today possible.

Mr. President, I'll have a few more thank yous, but I know the co-sponsor and other committee members probably have a lot to contribute to this.

And so before I get into the thank yous for all of the incredible work that went into making this legislation possible, I'd love to hold that until right before we vote.

OK.

Sounds good.

We can speak on all four pieces of the legislation.

It's all been read into record.

Sorry, we're just working.

Yeah, go ahead.

You can say it loudly.

Council Member Gonzalez, would you like to have some comments?

Sure.

I think that Council Member Mosqueda did a good job of outlining the various components from a policy perspective in terms of how these four bills have evolved since they were first introduced for council consideration.

So I want to thank Council Member Mosqueda for that heavy dose of the wonk sauce.

Appreciate it.

I do think it's important to, in this forum and venue, really highlight the key policy points that have changed and that have evolved in large part in response to much of the public testimony that we've heard and a lot of the ongoing engagement that occurred.

over the last several months.

And so, you know, I just think it's really important for us today to really acknowledge that what we are about to vote on now is a follow-up on a historic moment that occurred in 2016 when the voters first initially passed Initiative 124. with 77% of the vote.

And today, City Council, it is my belief, through the passage of these four bills, is going to fulfill the intent of the voter to ultimately provide protections to this part of our workforce that, unfortunately, is subjected to much more to issues in the labor workforce that are quite problematic.

And so I'm really honored to be able to be a co-sponsor of this legislation.

I'm really honored to be able to continue to struggle with a lot of these issues in a way that I think is responsive to the people who need the help most, which are the workers in our city who really do need these protections to continue to be able to thrive and to succeed in our city.

Last week at committee I spoke a little bit about what my motivation is and what my motivation has been in terms of wanting to pursue this suite of labor standards and I just wanted to reiterate that a little bit today by saying that for me I think even when we were first considering initiative 124 I came out very strongly in support of the initiative when we were first considering a resolution to support it on the ballot and I continue to support the concepts and the principles that are included in all four of these bills and it' s very simple for me.

As Council Member Mosqueda mentioned, the large majority of people who work in this industry are women.

Many of them are women of color in particular, and many of them are immigrants and refugees.

And so for me as a woman, as a woman of color and the daughter of immigrant parents, it is incredibly important for me to come here every day to City Hall and live those values out in the way that I shape and think about policy and make policy.

I don't believe that's a conflict of interest.

I believe that that's why the voters of Seattle elected me as the first Latinx person to be elected to Seattle City Council in 2015 by mandate, by the way.

So I think that for me, it isn't a conflict of interest.

It is incredibly important for me to bring my perspective as a working class person, as somebody who relied on social services growing up, as somebody who comes from a union household and is someone who is a person of color and a woman of color and the daughter of Mexican immigrants to make sure that every day I'm here, I am living those values through this policy-making process, and that means centering my policy work and my priorities on helping those who need the most help.

And for me, those are workers.

And many of you in this audience are in that category as people who are gonna directly benefit from this policy.

So I wanna thank you and do this for you today, but also do it for all of the women who are not in this room today, and for all of the women across the state who I know work day in and day out to serve their families and to do it with dignity and respect.

My father, who's no longer with me, used to oftentimes say, you know, we're migrant farm workers.

We're poor and humble people.

but there is dignity in all work, and there is respect in all work.

And just because you change somebody's bedsheets, it doesn't mean that you deserve to not be seen.

So today we see you, we respect you, we respect your work, and we acknowledge that every day, you, in a small and big way, serve the people who visit our city, and serve the people who live here.

And I thank you for that service.

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you, President Harrell.

I am happily voting yes on the next four pieces of legislation as a rank-and-file union member, a member of the Teachers Union, and an elected representative of Seattle's working people as a socialist and as a woman.

The protections in this legislation started with union members organizing to write initiative 124 and organizing to win 77% support in the election.

And when the court struck down 124 on a technicality, not on the political basis, workers organized to bring the legislation to City Hall and I am so happy to join Councilmembers Mosqueda and Gonzalez in supporting this legislation and I thank both your offices for the work and also your staff.

Unfortunately, though not surprisingly, and this needs to be noted, Mayor Durkin and some others attempted to reduce the scope of the worker protection by playing esoteric games with the definition of ancillary business and trying to discuss, you know, who deserves health care and protections from sexual harassment.

As we have said very clearly, All workers deserve these protections and I'm really glad we were able to stop efforts to water down the bills and that the most damaging amendments are not being included in this legislation.

I also would add that for the hotel and restaurant industry, who are upset about the cost of providing health care, I would first echo my sister Katie Garrow's point that when the system is rigged in your favor, when occasionally workers win some benefits, you may think that it is tipping the scales in the wrong direction, but it's not.

This is a small measure of justice that workers are going to win, and if you don't like providing health care to your workers, then join us in the movement for single payer Medicare for all universal health care, but no business has the right to exploit workers.

Ultimately, what the labor movement is able to win depends, as it always does, on the unity of our workers movement, on the activism of union members themselves, and that is why the passage of these bills will be a testament to the tenacity of the members of Unite Here Local 8, who not only fought for this initiative, but who are now fighting for their rights every day.

Just this past Saturday, I joined Unite Here members like Tsering, who spoke today, at the Edgewater Hotel, who are in a difficult contract fight with the hotel owner.

They have shared moving stories of overwork and abuse by their managers, but they are determined to fight back.

And as Tsering said, and I'm delighted to share the news that the Edgewater workers have voted by an overwhelming 93% to authorize a strike.

And we all need to stand with these brave workers.

And last but not least, since our Teamsters brothers and sisters are also in the house, I wanted to applaud Teamsters and other unions in California for their tremendous victory last week with the legislative bill AB5.

This is a landmark legislation which will expand employment rights for tens of thousands of workers, Uber and Lyft drivers, Ford truck drivers, and many, many other gig economy workers who are currently misclassified by their employers as independent contractors.

This is not only a vital step against exploitation of the workers in California, this is setting the trend for gig economy workers throughout the nation and throughout the world.

And it's a strong message to exploiting corporations like Uber and Lyft that workers will continue to organize.

And I'll end by saying that Seattle and Washington State need our own AB5, not half measures.

by the political establishment, and I'm fully committed to be working with all unions in our community and our community allies to bring something like AB5 to Seattle and Washington.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Chico.

First, I just want to begin by thanking Council Member Mosqueda and Council Member Gonzales for introducing these four ordinances.

Not everyone received what they wanted in interpreting I-124, and through it all, Council Member Mosqueda chaired a very open and inclusive process, and for that, I thank her.

Through this process and in my conversations, I kept voter intent atop of mind.

And for me, it was my mother, Maria de Lourdes Watkins.

My mother, for nearly two decades, cleaned hotels.

And as a kid, I sometimes go to my mom's job after school or after a morning at the doctor's office to help her.

I'd often vacuum the hallways and fold the towels and sheets.

My mother, over the years, has shared stories of guests who made her feel uncomfortable and unsafe.

It was with my mother in mind when I voted for Aids 124 and who I kept in my mind through this process.

Councilmember Gonzalez said during committee that she didn't have a crystal ball during the discussion regarding health care and the well-being of hotel workers.

Neither do I.

I just have my mother in mind.

She's now had had multiple surgeries on her shoulders and her hands.

I know how hard your job is, and I know how important your well-being is.

This council did its best to interpret voter intent as I did with keeping my mother in mind.

I may no longer be going to visit my mother at work, but today at work, I get to keep my mother in mind and urge this council to affirm the will of the voters and support the four pieces of legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you so I want to continue with the thank yous and first I want to say thank you to the hotel owners and managers who have been here coming week after week and I have a reached out to you.

I have spent time with many of you, and I want to acknowledge Anna Boone.

Thank you for your continuing responses and working to help us reach resolution.

And I do want to acknowledge and recognize that not everybody in this room is happy.

That said, I think we've made some real progress on this, that the legislation is a far cry from when I first read it a number of months ago.

And to the hotel workers, I want to acknowledge and say thank you to you for all of the beds that you've changed, all of the towels you've brought in, all of the toilets and showers that you clean on a regular basis.

That is no job that anybody would decide or decry as being easy.

I think it's one of the most difficult jobs, as we've heard, that people have a higher rate of injury.

And I think in no small part, if you're trying to change a king-sized bed by yourself and you weigh 100 pounds, there's nothing easy about that.

So please know that I appreciate all the work that you have done.

And also for the small businesses that have said, No, this is a family-owned business.

We can't afford this.

For businesses that have fewer than 50 employees, this legislation isn't going to impact you.

And if you have a business that has less than 250 employees, you've got a five-year phase in.

That strikes me as a very reasonable approach.

I also want to say thank you to Stefan.

A number of years ago, I don't know whether it was five, seven years ago, I offered to come and work a shift at one of the hotels with the people that are cleaning the rooms just because I was willing to do it and to see how hard it actually was.

So I want to say thank you for the times that you spent with me talking about that and for all of the people that you have represented.

Also, we had a woman today earlier that said, why don't you do something about health care legislation going to the state?

Believe me, if that's something you want to go with me, hand in hand to go down to our legislature and to get a better health care coverage that is paid for by the state, with the state, whether it's universal health care, no matter what it's going to take, I believe we're going to have to start in the state of Washington.

I'd be more than glad to go with you and support that.

I think that's what's needed.

Lastly, I do want to say about the ancillary business.

This has been something with which I have struggled, and we started off having every business that had anything to do or anywhere close to the hotel, and we're now at a point where I think that we have heard from so many people that it's limited to businesses that routinely contract with a hotel for services in conjunction with the hotel's purpose.

It does not cover routine maintenance.

It also covers an office or a company or a business that leases or subleases space at the site of the hotel for services in conjunction with the hotel's purpose, and that is a definition that excludes routine maintenance.

And also, lastly, if it is a restaurant that provides food or beverages to hotels and to the public, there must be a public entrance into the hotel.

That has scoped the definition in such a way that I feel that we have reached a compromise that I can live with.

Finally, big thank you, Councilmember Mosqueda, you've been leading this charge, nine meetings, and for those of you who have come to all nine meetings, you know that Councilmember Mosqueda listens to people.

We have routinely have three hours, three and a half hour meetings, because it's important to her that we have heard from everyone here.

Councilmember Gonzalez, thank you for your leadership.

Also, Dan Eater, I don't know if you're out here somewhere, but Dan and Karina Bull, thank you for the million drafts that you have done for all of the evening and weekend work that you have done to help this.

And I also want to acknowledge our law department, particularly Carolyn Bowes, who once again has spent many of her weekends redrafting.

So that's thanks.

I'm going to be supporting you in this, and I appreciate your leadership.

Thank you, Council Member Begshaw.

Any other comments before Council Member Skid does her thanks?

I'll just say before you give your thanks, can one of the sponsors describe the, there was a sort of a last minute change from 5,000 square foot to 4,500 square foot that I left the committee table and that was passed at the table, but I've gotten a lot of calls as early as today on that issue and perhaps one of you could explain the wisdom behind that change and sort of the impetus behind that, what justified that because I thought the 5,000 square foot standard was when I-124.

I'm happy to address that.

Please, Council Member Gonzalez.

Council President, thank you.

So in committee, we, both Council Member Muscat and I introduced an amendment that would lower, further lower the threshold as it relates to when penalty pay would be triggered.

So that's what the question is for those colleagues who didn't have the benefit of attending committee.

So there is a provision within this suite of legislation that would require employers who request or require housekeepers to clean more than a certain amount of square footage to pay a certain level of penalty pay or as Council Member Mosqueda referred to it as injury protection pay, to workers who work for those hours above and beyond what it takes the worker to work that square footage.

So the original amendment had the level set at 5,000 square feet, so for every hour that it took a worker to clean more than 5,000 square feet, they would receive three times the amount of pay hourly pay for that extra work done above that limit.

We had a discussion in committee about lowering that by 500 square feet to 4,500 square feet while still leaving the penalty pay rate at the same rate of three times the hourly rate that it would take a worker to work the additional square footage.

And the motivation behind that, and I talked about this at committee, was a couple of different things, and it was based on some math that I didn't bring with me today.

But essentially, there has been some work done in California.

As we have been discussing in committee, there are two jurisdictions in California that already have these laws in place that were passed also by voter initiative.

And in both of those instances, the square footage in the legislation that those cities considered is at 4,000 square feet, in large part because it takes, there is a number out there that is cited in public sources that says that on average, a housekeeper cleans approximately 14 rooms 14 rooms a day and the average times the average square footage of a room sort of yields to about 4,650 in terms of a square footage to clean 14 rooms a day, which would then, which then led us, us being Council Member Mosqueda and I to believe that if we were truly serious about creating disincentives, to assign excessive workloads and to really address the issue of what is an excessive workload, we felt more comfortable supporting a 4,500 workload, which seemed to be a greater disincentive to assign excessive workloads to housekeepers based on that math.

Thanks for that explanation, Council Member Gonzalez.

I'll make a comment that I think what's behind the legislation and it's going to pass is the great work that organized labor and workers are standing together and saying, in our struggle, we need to be heard and changes need to be made.

And for those reasons, this kind of legislation comes into being.

And that's a good thing.

I'm not into the demonizing of hoteliers or employers in my efforts to reach good legislation, because I believe they also care about employer safety as well.

Some more than others, of course.

I think the history would prove that.

But I also believe that a definition of an ancillary business, I voted for I-124.

I don't even remember the term ancillary business quite candidly.

I'm not sure how much of it I read.

But I was certainly compelled to support employee safety and employee health and the conditions that, the healthy conditions that are needed.

In this process, you know, as Councilmember Baxter said, there were some compromises, some concessions made.

I'm sure everyone doesn't get everything that they want, but at the end of the day, I hope it works for the employees and for our business community.

So for that, I'll support it.

And Councilmember Mosqueda, will you sort of close this out and then we'll vote?

We'll vote on the first three and then we'll pause on item four and take an amendment.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Thank you all again for your robust engagement on this issue.

I know some folks who didn't speak today were also a part of the committee meeting, so thank you to every single council colleague.

I have appreciated working with especially our stakeholders who you've heard from today and from really every council meeting that we had, we made sure that we had public testimony included at every committee meeting and there has been robust discussion with folks outside of that.

I do want to first acknowledge, again, the workers who came forward and shared their stories.

It is not easy to tell those stories time after time, and we know what the Council President said.

Not every individual in the industry experiences those stories, but those stories illuminate why we need public policy change to truly make sure that every worker has the same safety protections.

And like your shirt says, that one job should be enough.

So thank you for continuing to show up and make sure that folks can hear that message loud and clear.

Again, I want to thank the folks from the industry that I'll get to at the very end, but you too have brought out tremendous expertise and feedback that I have tried to incorporate in many iterations, as you saw, and really appreciate your continued engagement with us.

But I'll get to that in a second to say thank you to everybody who's been part of the stakeholder process I do want to start first with councilmember Gonzalez as the co-sponsor of this legislation Thank you for your ongoing work with us as we've come forward and brought these four amendments forward and we could not have done it without our teams so a huge amount of appreciation to say Jill Parikh who is is not out here, but her fingerprints are all over this legislation.

Many hours late at night working on this legislation, and we could not do it without her research and her feedback and her thoughtful engagement with all of you who've testified and called into our office.

Also, we couldn't do this without Breonna Thomas.

Thank you.

Oh, there they are, Sejal and Breonna.

Just in time.

Thank you for all of your work.

Sajal and Brianna from our offices, a huge amount of appreciation for your work.

We talk about how we get to be up here bringing together these public policy pieces, but the paper in front of us would not be possible without your ongoing engagement.

So thank you very much.

to Sejal and Brianna.

And making those ideas come to fruition.

Thank you, Dan Eder and Karina Bull.

Dan's back there and Karina, I hope she can hear us.

Oh, she's over there.

Thank you from central staff for working with us on these various iterations.

As folks saw in the last few committee meetings, we really tried to be responsive to some amendment ideas and you all were very flexible in working with us.

So our central staff team get a huge amount of appreciation and applause for their work on this.

Let's give it up for them.

And every single office has engaged with us on this legislation.

Allison from Councilmember Bagshaw, Susie from Councilmember O'Brien, Brindil from Councilmember Juarez, Alyssa from Councilmember Pacheco, Ted from Councilmember Sawant's office, Alex from Councilmember Herbal's office, Vin from the Council President's office, and our communications team, Dana, Stephanie, and Joseph have been working tremendously hard to help get us the information and then push out information about this legislation.

So a huge amount of appreciation for your teams as well.

We have really been able to move the ball forward on getting some legal analysis from our city attorney's office.

I believe Council Member Bagsdell mentioned Erica Franklin, but they have been engaged with us as we've run through various iterations and also tried to get feedback on stakeholder ideas as well.

So thank you to the City Attorney's Office.

Janai from the Office of Labor Standards has been incredibly engaged with us along with the executive, so we appreciate all of their work.

And also to the Office of Civil Rights, we have Kedmon Cahill and Tamara Zuri from the Office of Civil Rights.

In terms of stakeholder engagement, we don't do anything without folks who actually are on the ground experiencing this, as you've heard.

our appreciation for the industry and workers.

This is also true when it comes to the advocates for preventing folks from experiencing sexual harassment and assault, and also to making sure that folks' constitutional rights are respected.

So thanks to the folks at the ACLU, Allison Holcomb and Eric Gonzalez.

Thanks to Rich Stolz and Eli Goss from One America.

Manaz Etsu from the Refugee Women's Alliance who really brought forward the voices and perspective of immigrant and refugee workers and all of their input on especially the protection from assault and harassment.

Rebecca Johnson, Andrea Piper Wentland, Mary Ellen Stone, Ben Santos from the King County Sexual Assault Resource Center and the King County Prosecutor's Office.

There's so many folks that we have received feedback from, but again, I want to end by thanking Stefan and Anna.

Stefan from the Unite Here workers perspective, thank you for meeting with us and for bringing in voices of workers constantly to true test the language that we saw.

We really appreciate being able to work with you and Abby Lawler from Unite Here as well for her work prior to her departure.

So thank you to Unite Here and for all of your members for raising up your voices and bringing those ideas forward.

To Anna Boone, John Lane, Leah and Teddy from the Seattle Restaurant Alliance and Seattle Hospitality Association, the managers who've been coming in to give us feedback and suggestions right up until the very end, which is where we will get to the amendment on health care here soon.

We know that there's some points of disagreement and policy deviations from what folks wanted, but I do really appreciate you engaging with us.

And I think that with that, Council President, I have just a huge amount of appreciation for the flexibility from the central staff, from the clerk's office, and Federica Cuevas also was generous to chair our committee or to host our committees for four hours sometimes.

as we had flexible agendas.

So thanks to all of you for engaging and for making this a piece of public policy we can be proud of.

I really appreciate all of you and look forward to having the final vote.

Please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bagshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed and shared with Senate.

We have Council Bill number two that's already been read into the record.

Please call the roll on the passage of agenda item number two, Council Bill 119556. Herbold?

Aye.

Juarez?

Aye.

Mosqueda?

Aye.

O'Brien?

Aye.

Pacheco?

Aye.

Swan?

Aye.

Begshaw?

Aye.

Gonzalez?

Aye.

President Harrell?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Bill pass with Chair of Senate.

Please call the roll on passage of agenda item number three, Council Bill 119557.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Bill passes and the Chair will sign it.

Agenda item number four, we do have an amendment.

Council Member Mosqueda.

Mr. President, I'd like to move amendment one to provide clarification on the bill to improve access to medical care.

Second.

to move and second, would you like to elaborate on the amendment?

Sure, thank you, council colleagues.

As you see in front of you, we have a bill to amend Council Bill 119555 to make sure that we're offering clarification to employers and to employees.

The language that you see in front of you makes sure that there is a requirement that the employer obtains a signed waiver for the employees and that the waiver is offered in the employee's primary language prior to offering the waiver.

The employer must provide the employee with written disclosure of the rights being waived and make sure that that information is being prescribed by the director from Office of Labor Standards so there will be a chance to engage with OLS as we talk about what that form looks like.

And importantly, we have added a section here to make sure that there's clarification that if an employee receives the waiver and written disclosure described in the law under subsection 060D2, and the employee refuses to sign the waiver, then the employer has been deemed to have satisfied the required health care expenditure rate for that employee.

I thought this was a helpful suggestion and we really appreciate working with law to make sure that this clarification could get in here.

I would encourage our council colleagues to support.

Any other comments on the amendment only?

I can't recall was it seconded?

It was?

Okay, so we're going to vote just on the amendment.

All those in favor of the amendment as articulated by Council Member Mosqueda, please vote aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

So we have an amended agenda item number four.

Are there any other comments?

Council Member Mosqueda, are we ready to vote?

I think we're ready.

Okay, any other comments from any of my colleagues?

Please call the roll on the passage of the amended bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bigshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Okay, the bill passes and the chair will sign it.

Okay, we amended our Agenda to address formerly former agenda item number 33, so let's take it down.

From the report of the sustainability and transportation agenda item 33, Council Bill 119604 relating to the Green New Deal for Seattle establishing a Green New Deal Oversight Board.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

Council Member O'Brien.

Thank you very much and thank you for moving this up in the agenda.

We have a number of amendments to work through and appreciate having a little more time in case we need some flexibility to get the language exactly right.

So really briefly, the legislation would establish a Green New Deal Oversight Board.

We heard in public comment from a lot of folks who feel strongly that this board is designed, it should be designed, and I agree, to be a place to represent folks most impacted by climate change to date and make sure that their voices are centered and uplifted as we design policies consistent with the Green New Deal resolution that we passed last month.

This has been an amazing body of work and there's a lot of work going forward.

First to hopefully seat that board by the end of this year and then of course all the work that will follow out of that that needs to happen across the whole city but the members of this board will be making really important decisions and recommendations to us on how to proceed to address the Green New Deal.

which is how do we simultaneously solve the climate crisis and the economic crisis that has impacted frontline communities, communities of color, low-income communities, immigrant refugee communities, for too long, for generations in our city.

And recognizing that if we simply address the climate crisis without addressing the economic crisis, we will inevitably be back right here where we are in the same spot.

This is an opportunity also, as we reshift our economy to be a fossil fuel economy, to make sure it shifts in a way that is much more equitable and gives more opportunity to people throughout our community.

We have a number of amendments, and so, Council President, my proposal would be to work through them in order.

Amendment number one is mine, amendment number two is Council Member Herbold, and amendment three is Council Member Pacheco.

That's right.

Let's do it.

Right.

And I believe that as we get into it, we may need to suspend the rules because some of these, at least some language was provided afternoon.

But the First Amendment was provided in a timely manner.

So I'd go ahead and move Amendment 1. which would make some adjustments to how this board would play out.

I'll touch on the main aspects.

One is remove language that requires the mayor to notify the board of changes to city policies related to the Green New Deal.

Two, it would remove references to climate action plans and instead focus efforts of the board on the proposed interdepartmental team and implementing climate actions.

Three, it would specify what should be included in the board's work plan.

Four, it would reduce the frequency of reporting requirements and meetings between the interdepartmental team and board from four times a year to two times a year.

And finally, it would correct the number of typographical errors.

Is there a second on that?

Second.

Thank you.

Okay, we have in front of us amendment number one.

I'm sorry, Council Member Brant, can you point out the four, you're moving it from four times a year to two times a year, a reduction of meetings, is that?

Correct.

What's the thought behind that?

What we heard from the department was quarterly meetings of the interdepartmental team would be significantly time consuming to the department.

There was also a question as to, you know, if this board is meeting once a month, How much new information they would have how much the capacity they have?

What I've told the folks from the community been working on this who would like to see They'd like to have access to a lot of information that there are other ways that we can get that for instance Instead of the whole interdepartmental team that they're really interested in transportation policy Would work hard to make sure we get the transportation experts to report to them any questions on amendment number one from the dais I

Okay, let's vote on amendment number one.

All those in favor of amendment number one, say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

So I'm going to suspend the rules to take amendment number two, which is from Council Member Herbold, unless there's some objection.

So the rules are suspended and we'll look at Council Member Herbold's proposal.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

I'd like to move amendment number two.

Thank you.

This amendment does three separate things.

The first is to, in addition to authorizing the Green New Deal Oversight Board to provide recommendations on what the priority budget actions are, it also clarifies that we want this entity to prioritize the policy actions that are contained in the Green New Deal resolution.

The second item in this amendment adds two more labor representatives to a total of four.

There are about 19 different Building and Construction Trades Council unions and several of them, at least four if not more, actually work on projects that would be impacted by the implementation of the recommendations found in the Green New Deal legislation.

I also think it's really important to have labor at the table as part of the necessary collaboration to get us to where we need to be on the front end, and so that we can strengthen that blue-green collaboration that we need to get us to the finish line.

Then thirdly, the amendment requests that the Office of Sustainability and the Environment analyzes the impacts of the potential actions that are identified in the Green New Deal resolution and how much each of those actions will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the sources identified in the 2016 Seattle Community Greenhouse Gas Inventory.

From that analysis, estimate measurable progress that each action would provide towards making Seattle free of climate pollutants by 2030. The goal of the amendment is to make sure that you have the information.

as members of the Oversight Board to ensure that the decisions about which items to emphasize and prioritize are grounded in data and that we as policymakers have a clear sense of where the potential actions fit in the overall goal.

This version that's before us now is a little bit updated from the versions shared earlier this morning with additions suggested by the Office of Sustainability and the Environment to note that the request is to the extent possible with the budget and staff resources that they have available, and it is specifically for actions that require council approval, which is definitely in line with my intent.

Very good.

Thanks for clarifying that.

And so can I just ask, is that Amendment 2, Version 3?

That is Amendment 2, Version 3.

And I'll second that if it hasn't been seconded yet.

It's been seconded twice.

Excellent.

Okay.

So we have Amendment 2, which has been moved and seconded.

Any further comments just on Amendment 2?

Council Member O'Brien.

Council Member Herbold, I really appreciate bringing this forward.

I think the points you made about the impacts of the Green New Deal will be significant across workers and the ability to have four representatives of labor, which represents a diverse group of workers, is a great addition and I appreciate that thoughtfulness.

I also appreciate the other changes you made to it too.

Thanks for your work on that.

Okay, any other comments?

Okay, we're going to take the amendment only.

So all those in favor of amendment number two as stated by Councilmember Herbold, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

Okay, I believe amendment number three will be proposed by Councilmember Pacheco, but I believe I don't have to suspend the rule, so I believe I don't, well, I'm going to suspend them anyway, just in case.

So I'll tell you our confidential whisper here is that some of the contents on amendment number three are somewhat contained in amendment number two, but I will defer to Council Member Pacheco as to whether I need to suspend the rules and he still would like to propose an amendment number three.

I don't think we do because I actually accepted Council Member Herbold's first amendment that she provided this morning, which was the priority city actions.

So we've already accepted it, so I don't think we need to suspend the rules because this is the same amendment that I spoke of this morning.

Okay.

And the concept of philanthropy and high-tech, is that

It I did also actually you know what I do need to suspend the rules because I did make an amendment Take a friendly amendment from councilmember Mosqueda regarding Councilmember Mosqueda's office of a bona fide collective bargaining agreement for the business So okay, so do we I'm sorry.

I really I would say yes So do we have a document that describes this concept do I have a document if not I may have to Consider it out of order go ahead To do that so I So let me, let's just be open and transparent on this discussion.

So if we are to consider any additions to the board as already amended, it's been suggested that we would then do that within Council Member Herbold's amendment.

But we have to do that on the fly, as they say.

So, and, Uh, Councilman Pacheco, you know, I've been doing this for a while, you know, everything's, nothing's really etched in stone.

If you really want to push it, we could have some conversations, see if there's an appetite.

If not, uh, I think we've amended it consistent with Councilman Herbold's proposal.

So I'll defer to you on this issue.

Sure.

Uh, I would like to have a discussion on my proposed amendment.

You have the floor, sir.

So first, let me just acknowledge that I'm glad as a city we're having a conversation about what we can do to make a more sustainable future.

The Great New Deal isn't just on a local level what we're doing as a result of federal inaction for multiple decades.

So I just want to first acknowledge that because that's where the intent of my amendment comes from.

The amendment that I am proposing is to align the workforce development representative to be connected to the Career Connect Washington initiative, which is an initiative that was passed this past legislative session so that as the state goes, which was an initiative launched by Governor Jay Inslee, the city aligns with the priorities and as well leverages the expertise of the state so that we can maximize our investments with regards to workforce training.

Additionally, wanted to outline who the four representatives within labor are.

are going to be, as we've seen over the last couple of weeks, the four industries that are going to be most impacted by decisions that this council makes, as well as the city continues to move forward with, with regards to construction, energy, transportation, and building trades.

I wanted to make sure that we were explicit with regards to their involvement in the conversation.

And then lastly, I wanted to outline the three additional seats that I had mentioned this morning.

One representative for a philanthropic organization that funds programs and services in the Seattle area.

We are very fortunate to have the sixth largest community-based foundation, the world's largest philanthropic organization in our region, a number of organizations, the Bullitt Foundation, the Satterberg Foundation, who focus on a lot of environmental causes.

And so acknowledging that as a city, while we often want to pilot programs, We unfortunately sometimes don't have all the resources to be able to pilot and fund pilots that can most impact and benefit communities in need.

And so I wanted to provide an opportunity for them to be represented as well.

And representative of a technology-based company here in Seattle, I have, this was not to, contrary to what I think some people want to identify it as Amazon, but, I have been a big, strong proponent of scooters, of the e-bike programs, companies that have operated here in Seattle because it's allowed me to get out of a car and wanted to ensure that as we consider those conversations and all of these new technologies, continue to be developed, that we embrace the innovation and acknowledge the trade-offs that are a result of it.

In my district, the students at the University of Washington have a laboratory called Co-Motion, which tries to leverage the innovations that students are trying to take and take it to market, but understanding how that continued innovation keeps driving the conversation forward.

And then lastly, a representative of green business operating in Seattle, I was very fortunate to have a conversation between offices with Councilman Mosqueda's office, and it's the language that I mentioned this morning, and I'll just reiterate it for the public, which is a business that preserves or enhances environmental health as well as the economic and social well-being of people in communities, prioritizing communities most negatively impacted by climate change, provides living wages and career pathways to its employees, and whose employees are covered by a bona fide collective bargaining agreement.

So ensuring that the company that we, the green business that we include in this conversation is doing well, doing just by its workers as well as helping us embrace the new technologies and again, the new industries that are going to be created as a result of a green economy.

So just to clarify the concept, is it philanthropic,

and philanthropic, tech, a green business, I had an additional seat for labor, and a better defined workforce development position.

Now, just thinking out loud before we do a pro and con, I'll just sort of tell you from the chair's perspective, trying to manage the legislative process a little bit is, It's a little difficult to do it because I don't think I have the concepts in writing or embedded in the legislation.

And it's a dangerous precedent to try to wordsmith anything at this point in time and even to have a quote unquote committee discussion.

So I'm not comfortable with legislating the amendment.

However, Council Member O'Brien just passed me something.

What is this?

Well, I think we do have it in writing.

So we do have it in writing.

So okay, correct it there.

Oh, so we do have it in writing.

So does everyone?

I have it in writing.

Okay, so I think the only confusion is we all have it in writing, but it includes the stuff that we just voted on in my amendment.

Oh.

Oh, okay.

So it's so somewhat mooted because of the

Not all of it.

It includes two of the three elements.

It includes two of the three elements.

So it includes the green business and the tech.

And the philanthropic.

No, no.

Right?

Council Member O'Brien.

If I can.

Some light on the issue.

So I believe Council Member Pacheco has proposed, and we have before us, adding one labor position and then a philanthropic position, and then the tech positions, for a total of four.

But we already added two labor positions under Councilmember Herbold, so I believe that one position that Councilmember Pacheco spoke to would be moot, and it's just the three additional positions that you're asking for, is that accurate?

Correct.

Okay.

And so...

But the other parts of Councilmember Pacheco's amendments are still in play.

Well, everything's in, we haven't had a second yet, but yeah.

Okay, so I apologize, I'm not doing a good job here.

So the, Council Member Pacheco, will you describe to me the board seats that are not in play that you're trying to put in play even though we passed Council Member Herbold's amendment?

And I may ask the clerk or Council Member O'Brien to do that.

Sure, so the three additional seats would be for philanthropy, for a Seattle-based tech company, as well as for a green business.

Okay, so those three are not embedded in Council Member Herbold's Amendment correct.

It's correct.

They're not in the underlying legislation at the moment.

That's been amended already Okay, so in order to see if there's any appetite for that and I'm keenly aware We did hear some public testimony some community testimony expressing concerns and objection to some of this.

I'm not ignoring that and I will ask any Councilmembers if they'd like to express an opinion on Councilmember Pacheco's proposal of the three positions, philanthropic, high-tech, and a green business.

I saw some hands.

Councilmember Algo Mascada and then Councilmember Sawant.

Thank you very much, Mr. President, and I want to thank Councilmember Pacheco for checking in with our office.

I wasn't actually planning to speak to this, but just because our office was mentioned twice, I do want to offer a little bit of clarification.

I appreciate the author's intent to try to bring this forward, but I am supportive of Councilmember Herbold's amendment.

I think in our conversation between offices, the discussion was, if we were going to include this, there should be some clarification around what green businesses we're talking about, including making sure that, as we do in every situation, we want to lift up high-road employers who respect the collective bargaining process and engage with communities, especially communities on the front line here.

So I appreciate the engagement in our office.

I just wanted to provide that clarification though.

If we were going to have this, we wanted to make sure that there was the collective bargaining respect included there.

At this point, since Council Member Herbold has her amendment, I am supportive of that one and so just wanted to offer that clarification for Council colleagues.

Unfortunately, I'm not supportive of this, but do appreciate the inclusion of additional labor voices that both Council Member Pacheco and Council Member Herbold had in common, and we'll be supporting the bill with that amendment that's already been included.

Thank you, Council Member Skiddek.

Council Member Schiwant.

Thank you, President Harrell.

Again, just because this amendment contained two components, and one of those was about labor, and we have already unanimously voted on Council Member Herbold's amendment of adding two additional labor representatives, and I think that was an important amendment, because it is essential for the labor movement to play a leading role in the movement for a Green New Deal and for a sustainable future, because without workers, we will not be able to win that.

But the rest of this amendment, let's be clear, focuses on adding big business representatives, including representatives from corporations like Amazon.

Big corporations do not need more power in society.

They already run the economy.

And actually, and this is the most important point here, this is about the Green New Deal.

The corporations that would end up having a seat at the table if this amendment passed, they not only already run the economy, they are actually responsible for the structures of our society that generate the overwhelming majority of climate change in different forms, whether it's carbon emissions, fracking, or you name it.

And so, to me, that's akin to the White House appointing coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler to head the Environmental Protection Agency.

We cannot have the fox guarding the hen house.

And I think the same points apply to philanthropy.

Philanthropy is just a thinly veiled disguise for big corporations to weigh in on social issues.

And therefore, for all those reasons, I will be voting no on the amendment to put representatives of big business and neoliberalism onto the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Thank you, Council Member Shawant.

Council Member Pacheco.

Well, I appreciate Council Member Sawant's passion.

I want to clarify, tech business is not an oil business and green business is not a natural gas company.

So I want to clarify and make sure that my position or the organizations that I have identified are not being presented the way that you are describing.

Secondly, with regards to philanthropy, I outlined a number of organizations that I think do good work.

And for example, as I referenced, the Bullitt Center was funded by the Bullitt Foundation.

And it's the Bullitt Foundation, the Bullitt Center I should say, that has led to a lot of innovation with regards to new products coming operationally online with regards to either local land use code changes or weatherization of commercial development.

And so I want to be clear about the organizations that you're referencing.

None of them have anything to do with the natural gas or oil companies that you have referenced.

Thank you, Councilmember Pacheco.

I'll chime in.

Would you like to go before me?

I will defer to you, Council President, whatever order you would care to call.

I'll stick with my usual precedent.

I'm trying to go toward the last.

Council Member Gonzales, you have the floor.

Thank you.

So in considering or just having the discussion, because I don't think that this amendment has actually received a second.

And I don't think it's been moved either.

So I think we're just having a discussion here on this.

I am sort of setting aside which bodies are actually going to fill these seats.

I begin to get a little concerned when we get oversight commissions that get to this proposed size of 22 people.

It was already large at 17. We then expanded it in a moment's notice to 19, and now the proposal is to go to 22 individuals.

Of the positions that are being proposed by Council Member Pacheco, position 20 would be appointed by the city council, that's the philanthropic position.

Position 21 would be appointed by the oversight board itself, that's the representative of the technology company.

And then the last proposed position is position 22, which would be the green business operating in Seattle, would be appointed by the council.

So I'm just a little concerned about the size of the oversight committee as expanded to 22. I also do share concerns that at least two of the three new positions being proposed by Council Member Pacheco, I'm having a hard time seeing the nexus between the philanthropic organization and the technology-based company to the underlying work that is being proposed to be accomplished in the Green New Deal.

Although I think that Council Member Pacheco has orally described his intent behind the tech company addition, I noticed that there is not any language in this particular ordinance that clarifies that it needs to be a technology company that is working on and is committed to climate adaptation and resilience, prioritizing frontline communities who stand to lose the most if we don't get serious about climate change.

You know, I think, you know, I might be able to be persuaded to go for the green business model, but unfortunately this is all presented as a package and I'm not able to support this amendment as a structured for those reasons.

Thank you, Council Member Gonzalez.

Council Member Schwantz, you want to make another point?

Just to clarify that the majority of ordinary people understand at this point, I mean, if we were here 20, 30 years ago, the question might be different, but at this point, I think the majority of us are very clear that the idea of while there may be businesses, especially smaller businesses that are genuinely in good faith participating in the community effort towards the Green New Deal, and I know that there are many small businesses who support it strongly, That is not the same as promoting the idea of green business, because by now, most of us are very clear the idea of green business or green corporations is just a thinly veiled sort of way for corporations to co-opt the discussion and the actual efforts around the Green New Deal.

And I would also just say, Council Member Pacheco, maybe you didn't intend this, but I don't think it is a good thing to tell a woman that you appreciate her passion.

Thank you.

I think it's patronizing.

So, Council Member Bryan, may I make another point on the amendment itself?

I was actually prepared to support it and I'll tell you why.

And I hear the community saying that I think first and foremost we should have communities that are either traditionally underrepresented or those most disparately impacted at the table for this very, what should be a powerful oversight board.

I get that.

What I do like about your proposal is bringing, I don't assume that those sitting on this board are coming without positive intent.

I assume that whether it's intellectual capital, resources, personal commitments, that they would come to the Green Deal Oversight Board for the right reasons.

not to water down its power, but to assist those on the board.

And I like having resources and intellectual capital at the table to come up with great ideas on what's out there.

I don't, and while I supported the labor positions, when we get down to the nitty gritty, there could be opposition from labor on some of the efforts we're doing, and that's a good thing.

You're going to get that rich, diverse discussion to come up with a good idea and product.

So I liked where you were heading with this.

I don't even know what high tech company or green business or philanthropic organization we have in mind, but that doesn't offend me when I look at what we're trying to achieve in the bigger picture.

And I also believe that even I believe that people sort of meet their own needs.

And by that, I mean that the great representatives we will have on the Green Deal Oversight Board will be able to advocate for themselves strongly and passionately, and no one's going to steamroll them over.

And these additional members would help, again, with the research and the resources they could make for a richer product down the road.

So I was prepared to support it.

It probably might be the only one, I don't know, but that's where I was gonna stand.

And Council Member O'Brien, you are in queue, so you have the floor, sir.

I was just gonna say that I will not support the amendment, but for the reasons that other colleagues who are not supporting it have articulated.

Okay.

Would anyone else like to opine?

It's just an amendment.

It's not the base legislation.

Any other comments?

We're good?

Everybody good?

Everyone know where they're going to vote?

Yes, you can, Council Member Gonzalez.

Parliamentarian question here.

It hasn't been moved and seconded, so I was going to go through that.

Oh, okay.

I thought you were going to call for a vote.

I started getting nervous.

No, I'm not going to call for a vote yet.

So I'm going to just make sure everyone express their opinion first.

Okay, so Council Member Pacheco, you've gotten some feedback from many of your colleagues.

You haven't made a formal amendment.

Would you like to withdraw an amendment?

I'm sorry?

We don't have a formal amendment, though.

That is the point, that we don't have a formal amendment.

So I'm going to see if he would like to make one or if he'd just like to end discussion.

I could read the writing on the wall.

OK, so I don't hear a formal amendment.

So we don't have a vote.

But we do have two past amendments.

And so with that, are there any more discussion on the two past amendments or the base legislation that has been amended twice?

Any more closing parts?

Why don't someone make some closing remarks and put us in a good mood?

I will just say, eternally grateful for the work that the community members have done on this.

As you can see, this is not easy work.

And this is the easiest of the hard work there is left to do.

And I look forward with working with you all.

Let's say, let's start tomorrow and maybe we can get some action on legislation about home heating oil and talk about natural gas hookups.

There's a lot of work to do, but I'm really excited to get this board up and running ASAP.

Okay, thank you, Casper O'Brien.

That's a good mood.

Okay, so please call the roll on the passage of the amended bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bangshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Yes, please.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The bill passes.

The bill passes, and the bill as amended is not quite ready to sign, so I'll make an announcement once the bill as amended is presented for signature, but it's warm and almost baked, and we'll have it ready by the end of this meeting.

So let's move to the next agenda item.

Please read it into the record.

The report of the City Council Agenda Item 5, Resolution 31907, Support of Youth-Led September 20th, 2019 Global Climate Strike, urging Seattle Public Schools to support its students' rights to assemble and participate in the global climate strike, and affirming the city employees may request unpaid leave for a day of conscious on September 20th, 2019.

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you, President Harrell.

On Friday, September 20th, Hundreds of Seattle public school students will walk out of classes to take part in the global climate strike.

The strike action is part of global movements demanding immediate action from political officials in response to the impending climate catastrophe.

It is now expected to be one of the largest protests ever with 3,500 strikes in 117 countries and more than 700 in the US alone.

After decades of inaction by corporate politicians throughout the world, and a recent report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change giving humanity just 12 years before surpassing a critical threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming, young people are correct to be outraged, and they have no choice but to take action.

This resolution in front of us supports this global call for student walkouts as part of September 20th global climate strike.

We as a city council and the legislative body of the city owe our young organizers our deepest respect and support.

The resolution also asks Seattle Public Schools not to punish students who participate in the walkouts.

In fact, New York City School Board is giving students an excused absence.

Finally, the resolution reaffirms that City of Seattle employees who wish to participate have the right to do so under state law by taking something called a day of conscience and ask City of Seattle departments to inform people of those rights.

I wanted to thank the Seattle for a Green New Deal coalition for all the work that the activists on the ground have done to promote the idea of a new Green New Deal and also emphasize, most importantly, emphasize the urgency of action.

It's also important to note that workers throughout the world will be supporting the youth climate strike.

As many of you might have heard, nearly 1,000 Amazon employees have declared that they will be joining the strike action.

And they are specifically demanding that their employer, Amazon Corporation, stop donating to climate change denier politicians and lobbyists.

stop working with oil and gas extraction companies.

And as a corporation, they're calling on Amazon to achieve zero carbon emission by 2030. And last but not least, as many of us have acknowledged, but we should keep reiterating, the Green New Deal is nothing but a massive public works program.

It's a public sector jobs program, because in order to achieve what it will take to make Seattle 100% renewable by 2030, we will need to massively expand public transit, do clean energy retrofitting of all our buildings and businesses, and that will generate you know, if we actually do it, it will generate thousands of public sector unionized construction and other trades jobs.

And I really appreciate all my labor sisters and brothers today who expressed their solidarity with the Green New Deal and especially commend the workers in the fossil fuel sector who are joining us on Friday and calling for a just transition, including retraining programs, prioritizing fossil fuel workers so that They are not on the line.

Their jobs and families are not on the line.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Schwat.

This is the resolution.

Any other comments or questions on the resolution?

Council Member Bryant.

Just quickly, I'm really looking forward to Friday.

All right.

Okay, we're going to vote on it.

Those in favor of adopting the resolution, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

The resolution is adopted and the Chair will sign it.

See you Friday.

Agenda Item 6, Council Bill 119623 relating to city employment authorizing execution of a collective bargaining agreement between the City of Seattle and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Number 77.

Thank you.

Thank you.

This is the first of 13 items I'll be talking to today.

None as exciting as the first five.

But this one is a council bill that will authorize the execution of a collective bargaining agreement between the City of Seattle And the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, local number 77. And then a companion piece, which we will get to in item number seven, which will deal with information technology professional discretionary pay.

So the fiscal impacts on this will have estimated aggregate costs of wages for local 77 contract and for similarly classified non-representative employees, which will have approximately a $9 million increase between 2018 and 2022 to 74.7 million.

That's 65.2 to 74.7.

And this did not go through a committee.

It was directed to the full council, which is typical of this kind of legislation that authorizes the execution of collective bargaining agreements directly to full council and we recommend that the full council pass this legislation.

Very good.

Any questions or comments?

I'll move to pass Council Bill 119623. Is there a second?

Second.

Please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbal.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed and the chair will sign it.

Let's go to agenda item number seven.

Agenda item seven, Council Bill 119624 relating to city employment, adjusting the pay zone structures for the city's information technology profession discretionary pay program and ratifying confirm research and prior acts.

Thank you.

So this companion legislation to the one we just passed and is related would adjust the pay zone structures for the city's information technology professional non-representative employees that hold the same job titles as the local 77 employees.

Financial impact is unknown because the executive would submit future legislation.

for department budget appropriation to cover any wage increases.

Recommend same situation, it did not go through a committee, but we recommend passage of this bill.

Very good.

Any questions or comments?

I'll move to pass Council Bill 119624. Second.

It's been moved and seconded.

Please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The bill passes and the Chair will sign it.

Please read the report of the Civil Rights, Utilities, Economic Development, and Arts Committee.

The report of the Civil Rights, Utilities, Economic Development and Arts Committee, Agenda Items 8 and 9 of reappointments of Dorothy Hallman and Rosita I. Ramirez, members, Museum Development Authority, Governing Council, for term to July 31st, 2022. The committee recommends the appointments be confirmed.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

So Dorothy Mann is appointed to the Museum Development Authority Governing Council.

Dorothy is a founding member of the Washington Women's Foundation, as well as a member of the Seattle Art Museum Development Authority Council.

And then Rosita Romero is appointed by the mayor.

Rosita is on the board of Artist Trust and was a Washington State Arts Commissioner, as well as owner and director of an art gallery in Seattle for 15 years.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Any questions on these appointments?

Those in favor of confirming the appointments, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries and appointments are confirmed.

I'd also like to announce that Council Bill 11906 as amended, the Green New Deal Board has been presented to me and is ready for me to sign.

I will now sign Council Bill 11906 as amended.

That's been signed.

Lost my audience though.

Okay, please read agenda items number 10 through 13.

Agenda items 10 through 13, appointments 1393 through 1396. Three appointments, Zadara Farivar, Rekia Jones, Kayman Pease, Jamilah Williams as members of Seattle Women's Commission for term to July 1st, 2021.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

Daria Farivar is a council reappointment.

Daria has background in advocacy for people with disabilities and multicultural families.

Rokia Jones is also a reappointment of the city council.

Rokia has a diverse background in behavioral health, youth education, and is a graduate of the Puget Sound SAGE Community Leadership Institute.

Kay Min Peace is also a reappointment by the Seattle City Council.

Kay currently works to connect engaging social entrepreneurs to investment resources.

And Jamila Williams is also a reappointment by the Seattle City Council.

Jamila has background of advocating for reproductive rights and gender justice, currently works in communications with Planned Parenthood Votes Northwest, and serves as a woman of color advisory serves on a women of color advisory group for the YWCA for Seattle, King County, Snohomish counties.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Any questions or comments on these appointments?

Okay, those in favor of confirming the appointments, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

Appointments are confirmed.

Please read items 14 and 15.

Agenda items 14 and 15, reappointments of Tyrone Grandison and Aaron G. Orovio as members of the Seattle Human Rights Commission for term to July 22nd, 2021. The committee recommends the appointments be confirmed.

Thank you.

Tyrone Grandison is a reappointment of the Seattle City Council.

Tyrone works with the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation on the technology team from a diverse background in using IT systems to connect people with public efforts.

Aaron Aravio is a reappointment of the Seattle City Council.

Aaron works at Neotero, an organization committed to supporting indigenous communities in their efforts to reclaim their rights to their lands, and also volunteers with the Social Justice Fund to increase grassroots funding efforts in the Pacific Northwest.

Very good.

Any questions or comments on these appointments?

All those in favor of confirming the appointments, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

Appointments are confirmed.

Please read reports of the Finance and Neighborhoods Committee.

and Neighborhoods Committee, agenda item 16, Council Bill 119626 relating to city employment commonly referred to the second quarter 2019 employment ordinance.

Committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you.

Thank you.

This emergency, or it's not an emergency, it's the second quarter 2019 employment ordinance.

The next one's the emergency.

It designates a number of positions exempt from civil service system.

11 positions will be exempted.

the nature of the work to be performed by the positions consistent with the exemption criteria that's set forth in municipal code.

We also reached out to the labor unions to make sure that all applicable and interested unions had been involved in the conversations.

And it returns one position to the civil service system and adjusts the salary ranges for the work training employee tier two pay title.

That's it and we recommend passage.

Thank you Councilmember Baxter.

Any questions or comments?

Now please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Baigshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The bill passes.

Excuse me and the chair will sign it.

Please read agenda item number 17 in the short title.

Agenda item 17, Council Bill 119642 relating to city emergency purchases of goods and services.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you.

And at the last meeting, Barb Graf came, our excellent emergency manager, and I want to first of all say thank you to her.

She's going to be with us for another four months, has done stellar work, and it's her recommendation that this ordinance align emergency management code with the purchasing and contracting code.

in the event of emergencies.

And the example that she used at the table was last February when we had snow that nobody expected that late in February, and we ran out of salt.

And she was able to obtain that, but based upon low bid using the regular process that requires competitive solicitations.

We will still do that whenever possible, but if there is something that is an emergency need such as that, this legislation would allow her office to move forward, get what we need, and have us in line with federal FEMA requirements.

So that's what this bill does, and we recommend passage.

Very good.

Any questions or comments?

Please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold, Juarez, Mosqueda, O'Brien, Aye.

Pacheco, Aye.

Swant, Aye.

Bagshaw, Aye.

Gonzalez, Aye.

President Harrell, Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed and the Chair will sign it.

Please read the next agenda item.

Agenda item 18, Council Bill 119629, relating to appropriations for the Human Services Department amending Ordinance 125724, which adopted the 2019 budget.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

That's where I'm back y'all.

Thank you.

So last year you will recall during our budget we placed a proviso on the piece of our sweetened beverage tax public awareness campaign with a concern that we have the department come back and tell us more about what they were doing, what they would spend that money on, and what results they were expecting.

So we're allowing our human services department to move forward with a $1.7 million appropriation and the proviso will be lifted and the report submitted in August will outline specifically as we had asked for the activities to be funded, the qualifications expected of a communication firm.

further collaboration with our cab and a project timeline for the media awareness campaign.

So we recognize that what we had asked for has been accomplished and we move to pass this council bill lifting the proviso.

Any questions or comments?

Please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Juarez.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bigshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed and the chair will sign it.

Please read the next agenda item, the short title.

Agenda item 19, Council Bill 119641 relating to property at Sandpoint.

Committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you.

This legislation will authorize our Office of Housing to enter into a 30-year lease and renewable for an additional 30 years if needed with our low-income Housing Institute for Property at Sandpoint at Magnuson Park.

And Lehigh will develop 20 to 25 studio or one bedroom cottages for people who are formerly homeless.

And I mentioned this morning how pleased I am with this.

And I want to give thanks again to our former Speaker of the House, Frank Chopp, working with Council Member Mosqueda.

A really great idea to move forward.

These cottages will be a step up from the tiny homes that we have authorized around the city.

They have toilets.

They have running water.

They have small kitchenette in each they will cost roughly a hundred and fifty thousand dollars So they're substantially more more than our tiny homes But I believe that we really want to have a continuum available Housing and this is a good first step and we recommend that we pass this ordinance to allow these cottages to be built.

I

Thank you, Councilmember Baxhaw.

Any questions or comments?

Councilmember Mosqueda.

Thank you very much, Mr. President.

I want to thank Councilmember Baxhaw for including this item in her committee and for the generous time and table discussion that was had on the piece of legislation.

We're talking about $3 million that the state provided for innovative housing models.

that can help us reduce the cost of building affordable housing and we know that we can reduce the cost of building when we do it on public lands.

The Sandpoint Community Cottage Project is a result of us being smart with public land, engaging the community out there who's very supportive of this, partnering with Lehigh to make sure that these community cottages are really built and that our community colleges also have a role in helping to be a component of this project.

I wanted to call out specifically that the project is going to bring in worker and worker rights by including apprenticeship opportunities with the trades to help fabricate and construct the housing units.

and providing learning opportunities so that folks can get a good living wage job and access to a union.

This is exactly the model that we hope will continue to be replicated as we create more affordable housing across the city.

So thanks to Council Member Bagshaw, to the Speaker of the House, well former Speaker Frank Chopp, and to the House members who've continued to give us more tools in our toolkit to try to build more affordable housing, especially on publicly owned lands.

And as we build the housing, it's not just homes and units.

We're talking about a common building, community garden, outdoor recreational space, and a walking path.

So it's truly a community asset.

So thank you.

Well done, and just a final note on that.

This is coming fully funded from the state and the state's innovative methods to address homelessness in King County grants.

So Seattle City taxpayers are not paying for this, but we're going to have a great pilot project.

And I'm very excited to move forward with this and urge passage.

Very good.

Any other questions or comments?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold?

Juarez?

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed in the Sherrill Senate.

I know I switched the agenda item order, so go ahead and read the next agenda item as amended.

Agenda item 21, resolution 31905, amending the physical development management plan for Sand Point.

The committee recommends the resolution be adopted.

Mayor Baxhaw.

Thank you.

This is actually separate from what we were just voting on, but still deals with Sand Point, and it's a cleanup ordinance.

I want to say thank you to Tracy Ratzliff from Council Central staff.

for making the changes consistent with the 2012 Sandpoint Overlay District permitting development of housing that meets certain criteria to exceed the 200 dwelling unit maximum that will allow us to move forward with the Lehigh project.

So staff discovered that this physical development management plan had not been amended since 2012. It's now consistent with the changes that are included, and it will allow us to correct the legislation and to move forward with the building of the cottages.

Very good.

Any questions or comments?

This is a resolution.

Okay.

Those in favor of adopting the resolution, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

The resolution is adopted and the chair was silent.

Please read the next agenda item.

Agenda Item 20, Council Bill 119643 relating to real property located at Mercer Street and 2nd Avenue North.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Council Member Baxhaw.

I think this one if it's Mercer Street and it's Council Member O'Brien's.

I'm sorry, K-Site?

Okay, my mistake.

Thank you.

K-Site.

Nice try, Council Member Begshaw.

Just trying to pass it back to you.

K-Site is one of my favorites.

It is right next door to the north side of the Seattle Center.

And it is a wonderful opportunity for us to be partnering with Plymouth Housing for a 99-year lease.

It is, again, city-owned property.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda, for pointing this out yet again.

I want to say thank you to Plymouth Housing, to our Office of Housing, to the Arts Commission, and to the various stakeholders at the Uptown Alliance who have done terrific work for us.

to make this happen.

It's also going to be a great art and culture overlay, just providing 91 units of housing for low-income households and formerly homeless households, but to have an art place and emphasis on the ground floor.

So, many thanks, and we urge passage.

Very good.

Any other questions or comments?

I just have one.

Council Member Esqueda.

Okay, I'm really excited about this.

I'll keep it very short, but Council Member Bagshaw knows that I spoke in her committee about how this is a great opportunity for us to highlight what we know works and that's when you pay workers a good living wage when you ensure that they have access to things like prevailing wage and and the union.

It helps to improve the quality of life and livability of our city and to improve access to good living wage jobs for workers across the board.

So I'm really excited about this project moving forward.

The initial conversation that we had last year on this piece of legislation was directly involved or directly included folks from the Seattle Building and Construction Trades and community workforce, folks who have wanted to see us pilot efforts to include strong labor protections in building affordable housing and the case site has continued to be the area where we look forward to working with partners like Plymouth Office of Housing and Building Trades for this joint effort to show that strong public benefits equal a greater social good and greater equity for not just those who are going to be able to live in those buildings, but also for those who are building the buildings.

So very excited about this case site effort and we'll continue to look towards it to be a model for other areas.

With no further comments, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Jaco.

Aye.

Swan.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Seven in favor, none opposed.

Bill passes and the chair will sign it.

Please read agenda item number 22.

Agenda item 22, resolution 31902, declaring the city council and the mayor's intent to consider strategies to protect trees and increase Seattle's tree canopy cover.

The committee recommends the resolution be adopted as amended.

Thank you very much, and I'm very excited to bring this resolution forward.

I want to thank all from the Urban Forestry Commission who have been part of this, and also Council Member O'Brien and others for keeping this part of our Green New Deal.

The best part about this tree resolution is that we have been working on it for almost 10 years.

And this resolution will set out a work plan.

Some of us who care deeply about it will not be here to vote it through next year.

But the ordinance that will come out of this will be developed by the mayor's office in conjunction with our Office of Sustainability and the Environment.

And I am excited about completing these last steps.

And we have urged the Urban Forestry Commission to work with the Office of Sustainability and the Environment and do Public outreach, in a way, and Councilmember Gonzalez has been super about focusing on ways that we can have culturally relevant outreach to communities, emphasizing some of the communities of color.

and lower income that may not have gotten the trees in the past that they deserve and should have.

So I'm really encouraging not only the amendment that Council Member Gonzalez will be bringing forward here in a second, but also that we do more of the cafe style outreach.

So it's not just two minutes of public testimony, but we're actually going out into the community and asking for people's opinions on this, but for our department and neighborhoods to be involved as well to help reach people that may not have been reached in the past to include those voices and to move forward.

So again, I want to thank all of the community members and the volunteers who helped us put this together and to acknowledge Ali Panucci.

And Yolanda, who have worked with this resolution with me and also have indicated that when we say we want to do what the Portland model has done, it took Portland three years to get there.

So I hope that we can build on the many years that we've been working on this in the past, learn from Portland, and move forward with this at the end of this year and getting started into next.

So the resolution is an important and concrete step, and I urge its adoption.

Thank you very much.

Council Member O'Brien, I just said thank you to you.

Thank you very much for describing the base legislation.

I believe Council Member Gonzalez has an amendment.

I do.

Thank you, Council President.

As Chair Bagshaw mentioned, I do have a small amendment to reflect the need to do community engagement with a prioritization for those communities that are low income and who also live in low canopy neighborhoods.

The resolution is quite that simple.

I was concerned that that particular language that I just referenced was included in the recitals, but was not included in the action items part of the resolution, so I worked with Council Central staff to make sure that that language was threaded throughout the resolution to ensure that communities again that are low income and live in low canopy neighborhoods are prioritized as part of the community engagement by the executive and also to ensure that the community engagement plan was going to be done in a culturally and linguistically appropriate manner, so I want to thank Allie Panucci and Anne Yolanda Ho for their work and quick turnaround on drafting this eminent Tory language and I want to thank chair Bagshaw for her support both in committee and now at full Council of this amendment to resolution 31902 and so would move for the adoption of amendment 1 to resolution 31902 as described.

It's been moved and seconded.

Excuse me.

Amendment number one has been moved and seconded by, proposed by Council Member Gazzella.

Is there any questions on the amendment?

All those in favor of the amendment, please vote aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

Any other comments on the base resolution, the legislation?

Are we good to go?

We're good to go.

Okay.

Those in favor of adopting the resolution as amended, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

The resolution is adopted as amended and the chair will sign it.

Please read items 23 through 26.

Agenda items 23 through 26 appointments 1405 through 1408 appointments of Nefatali Marie Gonzalez, Danani Hassan, Parisa Harvey, Kevin Jackson, who as members Seattle Youth Commission for a term to August 31st, 2021. The committee recommends the appointments be confirmed.

Thank you.

So these four, three of them came in front of our committee last week and I just want to acknowledge them and their achievements because all four of them are stunning.

Neftali Marie Gonzalez goes by Nicole and she is currently attending Cleveland High School.

She's a member of the Seattle Youth Climate Action Network.

She's passionate about environmental justice.

I have no doubt she'll be leading the charge on Friday.

She wants to raise awareness and education around the injustice that is happening around the Duwamish River and the Port of Seattle region.

Danani Hassan is the Seattle Youth Commission appointment for the District 2 position.

Danani is a 10th grader attending Franklin High School.

As part of the UW Upward Bound program, he is passionate about neighborhood safety, ensuring youth voices are included in the decisions made by the city, and creating access for all who are pursuing college prep courses regardless of cost.

Parisa Harvey is a Seattle Youth Commission for District 7. She is a 10th grader at University Prep.

She is excited about environmental justice issues, gun violence, and women's and girls' health issues, specifically the pink tax.

And lastly is Kevin Hu, who is the second Seattle Youth Commission at-large position appointment.

And I want to say thank you and acknowledge Lena Thibault in my office, who did some of the interviews.

And she said that Kevin was striking.

He's a senior at West Seattle High School.

He's student body president, a One World Now peer leader.

He's working to develop relationships with international students.

He's passionate about youth engagement with all policies impacting our city.

He's a volunteer at his local church.

He is encouraging peers to speak up and get involved.

He is involved in a project up in Everett.

And last year, apparently, he didn't have enough to do, so he joined the tennis and track team.

So I want to acknowledge and say thank you to all of the youth commissioners to be and just acknowledge how important they are to our city and we recommend their appointments.

Any questions or comments?

Okay, those in favor of confirming the appointments, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

Appointments are confirmed.

Please read the report of the Gender Equity, Safe Communities, New Americans, and Education Committee.

The report of Gender Equity, Safe Communities, New Americans, and Education Committee, Agenda Item 27, Appointment 1399, the appointment of Susan Yu-Yi Lee as member of Families, Education, Preschool, and Promise Levy Oversight Committee for a term to December 31st, 2022. The committee recommends the appointment be confirmed.

Council Member Gonzales.

Thank you, Council President.

This item is to confirm the appointment of Susan Yu-Yi Lee to the Families Education Preschool and Promise Levy Oversight Committee as read by the clerk.

Susan currently serves as the Director of Early Childhood Education and Operations at Refugee Women's Alliance.

She led the restructuring of REWA's early learning program to become a high-quality, dual-language Seattle preschool program.

And REWA, of course, is one of the few centers that does everything early learning, including participation in ECAP, CCAP, Step Ahead, and other early learning programs, both funded by the city and the state.

Susan has also led capital efforts and secured multiple streams of funding to build more classrooms so more families can access early learning right here in the city of Seattle.

I'm really excited to welcome Susan to the Levee Oversight Committee, which I have the privilege of also serving on as a representative of the City Council.

She's a proven leader and advocate with lived experiences that help her connect to the immigrant refugee families in our community.

She's multilingual, an immigrant woman of color, and really eager to continue to serve her community and the families in the city of Seattle in this role.

As a result, the committee recommends that the full council approve the appointment of Ms. Lee.

Very good.

Any questions or comments?

If not, those in favor of confirming the appointment, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries and the appointment is confirmed.

Please read the report of the Planning, Land Use, and Zoning Committee.

Please read the short title.

The report of the Planning, Land Use, and Zoning Committee, agenda item 28, Council Bill 119597, relating to Land Use and Zoning Committee, recommends the bill pass.

Council Member Pacheco.

So this legislation would amend our regulatory incentives for open space in the South Lake Union neighborhood in order to facilitate the preservation of the Seattle Tennis Park.

The changes were negotiated after a long period of community engagement and the South Lake Union community members testified in support of the legislation in committee and I believe earlier today.

I'd like to thank Councilmember Bagshaw who put in a lot of time and effort into this issue before my time on the council.

Very good.

Any other questions or comments?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed in the Sherwood Senate.

Please read the report of the Sustainability and Transportation Committee.

The report of the Sustainability and Transportation Committee, agenda item 29, Council Bill 119608, relating to the city-owned property located at 702 Roy Street.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

member O'brien.

Thank you so this is the piece of legislation that I'm going to propose we hold I'll speak to it just briefly this was a bill that passed out a committee that would have converted some of the Mercer block I did maybe a couple square feet back to public right away.

I believe it was a bit of a cleanup that they found later.

My understanding is the department or the executive and the real estate company prefer instead of doing this, doing a permanent easement.

And so that'll be a different way that they will deal with it.

So I'm gonna go ahead and move.

I'm sorry, let me get my thing here.

I'm going to move that we indefinitely hold Council Bill 119608. Second.

It's been moved and seconded that we hold the bill indefinitely as the rules require.

Any other questions or comments?

Those in favor of the motion, please vote aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

That item is held.

Let's please read agenda item number 30 into the record, the short title.

Agenda item 30, Council Bill 119609, laying to certain city-owned properties located in the South Lake Union neighborhood and declaring them as surplus to the city's needs.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

Council Member O'Brien.

Thank you.

Everyone, this is the bill that would authorize the sale of what's been referred to as the Mercer Mega Block.

I want to reiterate just what I said this morning.

First of all, a lot of work's been done, including some community input, both the front end and the back end, to get a deal that appears to be, certainly when you measure it in terms of dollar value the city's receiving per square foot, it's a significant parcel of land with a lot of value, and we're getting a lot of that.

back to the city.

With this bill, I want to speak briefly what this ordinance does and what it doesn't do.

This ordinance authorizes the executive to execute transaction documents with the proposed purchaser of this, that's Alexandria Real Estate, and it gives the clarity of what the price will be and the other terms of that.

the transaction will be.

I want to speak to a couple pieces of that.

It includes a commitment to affordable housing.

They will build on one of the sites 175 units of affordable housing.

It includes a commitment of $5 million towards homeless services.

It includes environmental remediation responsibility for all environmental remediation of the parcel.

It also includes, of course, the sale price, which comes into the city in a variety of forms of dollars, and we will get allocated a future date.

One last thing I want to mention is it requires that they develop and lease a site at the ground floor of the building.

to as a community center for Seattle Parks and Recreation to operate.

Thanks to some questions by some of my colleagues here, specifically Council Member Bengtstein, Council Member Esqueda, we continued to get clear that putting a daycare facility in a community center is a is an outright allowed use.

There's still work to do from the Parks Department in their work to design the build out of that and make sure it's compatible and do the feasibility work.

But I appreciate my colleagues being very clear on the priority and importance of that.

That has been agreed to and was incorporated in this legislation at committee level.

It's agreed to by the real estate developer as this is a kind of bilateral agreement.

What this does not do is talk about where we're gonna spend the dollars that we will receive.

I know when the mayor made an announcement about this, she has a series of buckets that the $138 million would go to.

I imagine everyone up here has their own buckets, but that is the work of the budget, and I'm looking at Council Member Bageshot.

I imagine that a week from now we will hear some specifics on the mayor's proposals, and we will go into two months of negotiating that and lots of other items.

But this transaction is between the city and the seller, and it's about the price and the other terms of that sale, not what we will do with the future proceeds of that.

Thank you, Council Member O'Brien.

Council Member Mosqueda.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Thanks to Council Member O'Brien for his due diligence to work with our office as we engaged on this concept that you heard him describe with including child care in the Mercer-Mager block project.

It's really important that we get this language included at this juncture because we know that this is a critical time to direct the Department of Parks and Recreation to work with the developer to actually include a permanent use on-site ideally as we talked about this morning with an outside play area for folks in the community to also be able to access during off-hour times.

The fact we' re directing the department of parks to include space in the construction and building within the recreation center means we will in all likelihood see at least three licensed child And the goals are outlined in the legislation to provide access to child care for kiddos 0 to 3. But this is not a study and this is not a test.

This is really a policy solution to a pressing crisis that we see throughout the city of Seattle.

We know that the average family spends about 20% of their budget on child care.

In many cases some child care facilities can be charged as much as $3,000 per month on average we see many individual families having to spend more on child care than they spend on rent and mortgage and when we see wait lists continue to pile up and pile up and families are spending 50, 100, in my case I've spent $150 on just to be on the wait list and then often folks don't get calls back.

So we have a crisis in terms of access.

Anything that we can do, especially on public land or formerly public land to make sure that there's a public policy tied to that transaction is going to help address the access issues and ideally the affordability issues.

I see this as a continuation of the legislation we sponsored last year.

to implement House Bill 2382 which made it more possible for us to put requirements conditionalities on public use on public land.

When we are going to sell it we need to make sure that we have affordable housing included and things like child care and health care.

So it's really exciting to see this language worked in there with the developer.

I want to thank them and the work of Council Member O'Brien, Office of Housing, and Parks and Rec as we've worked to make sure that this language was included from the get-go.

It's so much more affordable to do it on the front end than to have to retrofit a building and build out walls or knock down walls to create doorways or facilities for little kiddos.

So really excited to see this move forward.

And again, this is the real deal, not just a test.

And looking forward to working with them as we get this up and running.

Very good.

Any other questions or comments?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Jaco.

Aye.

Swatt.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

The bill passes and is shared with Senate.

Please read the next agenda item.

Council Bill 119561, vacating the alley in Block 1, with its addition on the petition of 2026 Madison Corner, LLC and LMC 2026 Madison Holdings, LLC.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Council Member O'Brien.

Seeing that we're three plus hours into the meeting, I'm gonna try to move as swiftly as I can.

Council President, let me know if you want more detail.

This is a parcel on the north side of East Madison Street.

The council granted conceptual approval to this years ago.

In fact, it was pre the recession.

The project is now complete, has met the requirements of their street vacation.

You can see on the attachment, it's between 20th and 21st Avenue.

And this is the action that actually grants the street vacation.

I can assure you that the departments have reviewed it and everything they've done is consistent with the original intent.

They've met the terms of the original street vacation.

Very good.

Any other questions or comments?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Herbold.

Aye.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pacheco.

Aye.

Swatt.

Aye.

Begshaw.

Aye.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

The bill passed and the chair will sign it.

Please read the next agenda item, the short title.

Agenda item 32, Council Bill 119610, Vacating Portion of the Armory Way as Condemned by Ordinance 67125. The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you.

This is a sliver of land that is just west of the Pike Place Market.

It appears to be almost under the, I believe, I haven't been down there in a few days, maybe Council Member Bakershaw, the former Alaska Way Viaduct that was standing there.

It was discovered partway through the process that it was actually still in right-of-way and was not Pike Place Market land, so this is a street vacation to transfer that land to the market.

They've done the installations of other public benefits that were required as part of this conceptual plan.

Any other comments or questions?

If not, please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Juarez.

Aye.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

O'Brien.

Aye.

Pachinko.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Bagshaw.

Aye.

Gonzales.

Aye.

President Harrell.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Bill passed, Chair will sign it.

Please read the next agenda item.

Agenda item 34, resolution 31903, relating to the procurement and the Arctic National Wildlife Refugee, affirming the city's sales commitment to avoid procuring goods and services from corporations that purchase leases or develop oil fields in the Arctic Refuge coastal plain.

The committee recommends the resolution be adopted.

This is where they're glad we moved 33 to the beginning, see?

We are.

But clearly, there are folks that care immensely about the Arctic, and they're still here in our audience.

Thank you all.

The reality is, if you're an individual fighting to save the Arctic, you have to be in it for the long haul, whether that's a three-plus-hour city council meeting or decades of protection work.

And unfortunately, despite broad public support across our country, across the political spectrum, to protect the North Alaska slope, it continues to be under threat by this administration and the folks that held Congress a year and a half ago when they passed the new budget bill.

And so there, I can assure you colleagues that people around the country and around the world are employing every strategy they can to ensure that the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge will be protected permanently and off limits, not allowed for oil exploration.

Not just for the sake of this beautiful piece of land and the animals that live up there, but for the people.

The Gwich'in who live on the North Slope and for probably millennia have depended on subsistence hunting and a livelihood that they still live today.

But that livelihood will be in jeopardy if these potential transactions go forward.

What this resolution does, in addition to stating our opposition to it, specifically says that the city shall avoid purchasing goods or services from corporations that purchase leases or develop oil fields in the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge should the United States Department of the Interior hold a sale of oil and gas leases in the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge.

The attempt here is to make it clear to anyone attempting to do business up there.

We will be certainly trying to figure out how to prevent those leases from going forward, but we want to make sure that nobody shows up to buy the land because it is understood that the social license to drill in the Arctic has now been removed by the American people.

And I will say that it appears that all major oil companies have started to express a lack of interest in doing business up there.

Of course, there are always minor oil companies, the names of which probably none of us have heard of, who may also be interested in doing it.

But we want to make sure that they know that if they proceed with that, their product is not welcome in our community.

Seattle is taking this action.

The hope would be that other jurisdictions up and down the West Coast will join in to send a really clear message to potential people potentially interested in this that it's a really bad idea.

Very good well stated.

Thank you Council Member O'Brien.

Any other questions or comments from our colleagues?

Thank you for sticking around.

Okay this is a resolution so those in favor of adopting the resolution please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries the resolution is adopted and chair will sign it.

You're troopers.

Please read agenda item number 35.

Agenda item 35, resolution 31899, granting conceptual approval to construct, maintain, operate a below grade private thermal energy exchange system.

The committee recommends the resolution be adopted.

Mr. O'Brien.

This relates to the property where the Seattle Times building has been near where the Seattle Times Park is.

The developer up there owns two large parcels of land on either side of John and Bourne Street, and I believe one is a commercial space, so office building, and the other is a residential space.

They would like to connect the two to share heat back and forth across the two buildings.

This would be the way we typically do this work, to allow this construction to move forward and there be a lease from the city.

We could revoke that in the future if necessary like we have elsewhere.

But actually from an energy efficiency and cost perspective, I think it's a really great idea to allow this to move forward and applaud the folks building those buildings to think of this creative way to share energy across sites.

Thank you.

Any questions or comments?

Those in favor of adopting the resolution, please vote aye.

Aye.

Those opposed vote no.

The motion carries.

The resolution is adopted and the chair will sign it.

Okay, is there any further business coming for the council?

Yes, there is.

Council Member Gonzalez.

I am going to be asked to be excused on Monday, September 30th and Monday, October 7th.

Second.

Moved and seconded.

Get me out of here.

Councilmember Gonzales be excused September 30th and October 7th.

Any questions or comments?

All those in favor of the motion, please vote aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

She is properly excused.

Any other further business coming before the council?

Councilmember Chico.

I move to be excused November 4th.

It's been moved and seconded that Councilmember Pacheco be excused on November 4th.

Any questions or comments?

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

The ayes have it.

Any other business?

Okay if not everyone have a great rest of the day and thank you for being here and thank you for all your hard work.

Thank you for sticking around three hours and 17 minutes.