Select Budget Committee 7/30/25

During the July 30th, 2025, Select Budget Committee meeting will come to order.

It is 9.30 a.m.

I'm Dan Strauss, Chair of the Committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Kettle has been excused.

Council Member Rivera.

Present.

Council Member Sacca.

Here.

Council Member Salomon.

Here.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Council Member Juarez.

Here.

Council President Nelson.

Council Member Rink.

Present.

And Chair Strauss.

Present.

Six present.

Thank you.

And I didn't see the note before I said Council Member Kettle is excused.

Council Member Nelson and Hollingsworth are also excused for the moment.

They will be here shortly.

We have seven items on the agenda today and 17 amendments on one of those items.

We have the Seattle Shield Initiative, the legislation that would make adjustments to the city's B&O tax.

We have two ordinances relating to the carry forward, the Jumpstart Payroll Expense Tax Exchange as well as the carry forward.

Two ordinances related to the mid-year supplemental budget.

One is the grant acceptance and the other is the supplemental budget.

We have an ordinance relating to World Cup appropriations and finally an ordinance relating to financing the human capital management system project, more commonly known as Workday.

Council Member Hollingsworth is now present.

Before we begin, if there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Colleagues, with this amount of work to do today, I have created a consent package for the BNO tax vote.

We have a number of amendments that are still going to be taken as individual votes.

I welcome everyone to speak as much as they want, understanding that we have seven ordinances, 18 amendments to get through in two and a half hours.

So I guess we have until one, sorry, three and a half hours.

So I just set that out there.

I'm not gonna cut anyone off, but I am gonna potentially ask us to keep moving.

We will have presentations complete before we go back to questions.

That is the chair's report.

We'll now move into the hybrid public comment period.

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

Clerk, how many speakers do we have signed up?

So far we have eight remote and about 13 in person.

remote and 13 in person which is fewer than 30 and so everyone will get two minutes to speak again I think everyone's heard the long agenda that we have today so if you don't need all two minutes please uh we'll just move on to the next speaker and clerk if you want to pass me the in-person each speaker will have two minutes to speak we'll start with the in-person speakers first and then we'll move to the online speakers.

Public comment period is up to 60 minutes as of yesterday's vote.

Speakers will be called in the order in which they are registered.

Speakers will alternate.

We'll do first all in person and then we'll move to just remote.

You will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of your allotted time.

You still have 10 seconds and then we will mute the microphones once that time has expired.

The public comment period is now open.

I'm gonna read everyone's name.

So you know which order you've come in, please feel free to line up in the center column or alternate between microphones.

First up, we have Maurice Walker, followed by Chris Leakman, Andy Gallegos, Anne Beck, Jordan Crawley, Morgan Groban, and you can start coming on up now.

Hallie Willis, Amanda Koba, Lydia Joelle O'Taylor, and Lily Hayward.

So with that, Maurice...

Welcome.

You've got two minutes.

And we'll start the clock when you start talking.

Good morning.

Good morning, council members.

It's a blessing and a privilege to be here today to speak for...

Hang on real quick.

We're going to restart your time.

If everyone just wants to use this tall microphone, it's probably the better way to go.

Good morning, members of the council, people of Seattle.

Hold on, hold on.

Is this microphone on?

Joyce, you got to stand closer?

Yeah.

Okay, yeah.

There we go.

Thank you.

Sorry about that.

Okay, so my name is Maurice Walker.

I am...

in the kitchen as the assistant in the Chief Seattle Club.

I am here today to speak in favor of the Shield Seattle B&O tax reform proposal.

I want to thank Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Renick for championing this legislation and urge the full council to support it.

Chief Seattle Club's meal program is serving low income and homeless indigenous people in Pioneer Square.

A big emphasis on what we do is creating community and safety and healing as part of what we do and the meal program is a big part of that because a lot of our members, we are a vulnerable population in Seattle and the meal program is a big part of that.

We provide two vital meals a day, breakfast and lunch.

To our club members and everybody's welcome to join.

If this proposal fails to pass, our city funding is reduced.

The impact on our community would be severe.

We typically prepare 200 to 208 meals per day, and for most of the indigenous people we serve, it is their only source of food.

A reduction in funding would directly jeopardize our ability to provide these essential meals, leaving most of our vulnerable community members without access to consistent nutritious food.

And I want to ask that.

particularly that the meal programs be not excluded from this proposal because that would have a grave impact on our community members.

While not a majority of our funding, the support we get from the City of Seattle is critical to sustaining our work.

Shield Seattle is a meaningful investment in safety and community well-being that will help everyone.

This is a great This is, okay.

I'm going to thank Mayor Harold and Council Member Renick for it.

Thank you, Maurice.

Up next, we have Chris Leakman followed by Andy Gallegos and then Anne Beck.

Good morning, Chris.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Chris Lee Keenan, and I'm a volunteer and board member of Community Lunch on Capitol Hill, and we're one of about 45 members of the Meals Partnership Coalition.

I'd like to encourage you to support the Shield Seattle Business and Occupation tax reform proposal and to ensure that meal programs are not excluded from this proposal.

I'm glad we're helping people eat, and I'm glad to hear from our guests that they appreciated snacking on this afternoon's box lunch last night at 10 o'clock.

I'm deeply disappointed we live in times in which these meal programs are so critical.

But here we are.

Community Lunch on Capitol Hill distributes between 300 and 400 box lunches every day, Monday to Friday, every week.

We don't miss Thanksgiving.

We don't miss Christmas, Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Ramadan.

We are always open and we are needed.

These are the times we live in.

We also live in times in which taxes are considered a burden, an affront to a business's sense of purpose, particularly an affront to a successful, profitable business's bottom line.

It seems the bigger the business, the bigger the affront.

I think our sense of impropriety is misplaced.

If taxes are rude, impertinent, inconvenient, what do we call hunger and homelessness amidst the success of multimillion-dollar, even billion-dollar corporations?

This proposed tax will raise about $90 million a year.

It's not a cure for poverty.

It's a Band-Aid.

A national job guarantee is a cure, but we don't run in that arena.

This tax is a Band-Aid, but it's a Band-Aid we can administer.

So please, help us aid our neighbors, put this on the ballot, let the voters decide.

Thanks very much.

Thank you, Chris.

Up next is Andy, followed by Ann, and then Jordan.

And the speakers can please get really close to that mic.

I really appreciate it.

Thank you.

You said use the tall microphone, but I'm like, oh, I'm short.

It's still going to work better.

Welcome.

Yeah, it works.

My name is actually Andy Gallegos.

The double L makes a Y sound, but thank you for trying.

And I work for Elizabeth Gregory Home, which is a drop-in day shelter in the university district.

And we are also a member of the Mills Partnership Coalition.

I'm here to speak in favor of the Shield Seattle B&O tax reform proposal and to include funding for meal programs alongside food banks.

At Elizabeth Gregory Home, we serve hot breakfast and lunch Sunday through Friday to unhoused women ages 18 and up.

We are one of the few service providers in the university district.

And with the closure of Mary's Place, which served the same demographic, we have been serving over twice as many women.

since that closure, and we have already had to scale back on portion sizes, second helpings, and pantry giveaway days.

The funding provided by the B&O tax provides us with the ability to purchase necessities for our meal programs, such as bulk ingredients, food grade equipment, and food safe cleaning supplies to prevent the spread of disease.

With all of the federal funding cuts, the support we get from the city is vital to our program.

I would like to wrap up with a thank you to Mayor Harrell and council member Rink for championing this legislation and I urge the full council for support.

Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you, Andy.

Up next is Anne Beck followed by Jordan Crawley and then Morgan.

Good morning.

Good morning.

My name is Anne Beck, and I'm a volunteer and advisory board member for Edible Hope, a feeding program in Ballard.

We serve a meal from 8 to 10, Monday through Friday, regardless of what holidays might fall on that.

And I'm here to have you guys support.

Can you hear me?

You need to get really close.

Get closer?

We'll give you an extra 10 seconds.

I'm here today and speak in favor of the Seattle B&O tax reform.

I urge the council to support this legislation and ensure that community meal programs are not excluded.

I've been involved with Edible Hope for eight years and on the advisory board for six.

We provide a meal from 8 to 10, Monday to Friday.

I'm responsible for the meals on Mondays and Tuesdays.

I log in four to five hours each day to do that.

Our operation runs on a shoestring, so we have become very adept at serving tasty and healthy meals using donated items.

Rely on the Meals Partner Coalition for critical protein purchases, without which our budget would be very taxed.

With just two paid staff members and 30 core volunteers, we turn donated and gleaned food into 3,000 meals a month.

We are on track to provide 40,000 meals in 2025. This is nearly double from what we were doing three years ago.

We are feeding the hungry and homeless people of Seattle in a way which the city, state, and county have failed to do.

We're seeing new faces, a changing demographic, and the increasing numbers each day.

With rent increases, a lack of affordable housing, food costs going up, and human services stretched to the max, to not provide funding or limit access is to turn your backs on a vulnerable population.

I do not know how many of you have had any experience or direct exposure to the people that serve other than passing on the street.

So I invite each of you to come to Edible Hope, join us for a cup of coffee, perhaps a meal, and meet our neighbors in need and discover what we do and why it matters and why your funding assistance is essential.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Anne.

Up next is Jordan, followed by Morgan, and then Hallie.

Good morning, council.

My name is Jordan Crawley, and as a lifelong West Seattleite, chair of the 34th District Democrats, and a dedicated advocate for small business, I stand proudly in support of the proposed changes to the B&O tax.

We're at the edge of yet another fiscal cliff.

Between our failures to enact better tax policy and the Trump regime's defunding efforts, this council is in a tough position.

With some impactful changes, Seattle can ease the burden on virtually every small and medium-sized business while supporting essential city services with new revenue.

For too long, small businesses have bought the narrative sold to them by huge corporations and conservative policymakers that shielding the wealthy from sharing equitably in community investments is the only path toward prosperity.

Budgets have been balanced on the backs of the working class.

Wealth has evaporated out of our communities and none of it has ever trickled down and it never will.

Economies grow when small businesses thrive, when communities are supported, and through sustained, reliable public investment.

The status quo is failing us, but we have the chance and must have the courage to change course.

These changes won't solve all of our problems, but it is a good and necessary first step.

This isn't just about who pays what, it's about answering a fundamental question.

Who do we serve and how do we serve them well?

There are specific investments under attack, which the underlying bill seeks to maintain.

Unfortunately, there are those on council who just months ago cried that Seattle has a spending problem and they're trying to take advantage of this progressive proposal to fund pet projects.

The one job we have right now is to get this proposal on the ballot.

So let's get that done.

Thank you, Jordan.

Up next is Morgan followed by Hallie and then Amanda.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Morgan Groban, and I'm the kitchen coordinator at Teen Feed, a member of the Meals Partnership Coalition.

I'm here today to speak in favor of the Shield Seattle B&O tax reform proposal.

I urge the council to support this legislation and to ensure that community meal programs are included in this proposal.

TeenFeed works with the community to offer support to meet basic needs, build strong relationships, and ally with homeless youth as they meet their future off the streets.

We serve dinner to our youth aged 13 to 25, seven days a week.

That's every single night.

We're part of the Positive Pathways Coalition in the U District, along with Roots, that I'm sure many of you are familiar with.

One of our biggest strengths is our consistency.

Dinner every single night, same time, same place, just like most of us had in our homes growing up.

Funding from the city of Seattle is crucial for maintaining that consistency.

That's what we draw from when the whole volunteer team calls in with the flu four hours before dinner is supposed to start and we need to buy something last minute.

This is what we use to make sure that there's some backup pasta and canned beans for the nights that there's surprise 90 guests instead of our usual 75. So they get some protein and calories for what might be their only meal.

This is what we use to keep stocked gluten-free options for our guests with celiac disease.

Imagine having a flare-up without regular access to a bathroom.

Shield Seattle is a meaningful investment in public safety and community well-being and will help everyone in this great city weather the difficult years we have ahead of us.

I wanna thank Mayor Harrell and Council Member Rink for championing this legislation and urge you to support it.

Thank you, Morgan.

Up next is Hallie, and I am now very nervous that I mispronounced Andy's name that I'm mispronouncing yours.

You did it right.

It's Hallie, yeah.

At least one for two today.

Thank you, yeah.

Good morning, everybody.

My name is Hallie Willis.

I'm the policy manager for the Seattle King County Coalition on Homelessness and a member of the Seattle Human Services Coalition, and I live in District 5. I'm really glad today to support the progressive B&O revenue proposal proposed by Councilmember Rink and Mayor Harrell, and I urge the council to send this to the voters without delay.

We need to prepare ourselves for an influx of people relying on homelessness shelter and homelessness services when they lose their emergency housing vouchers, and an influx of people relying on food banks and meal programs when they lose their SNAP benefits.

You've already heard about how this has already begun.

I'm so glad that we have this $90 million progressive proposal on the table today, and I urge you to send it to the voters.

But frankly, I'm really scared of what will happen if this revenue proposal is reduced or further peanut buttered across many different worthy causes.

And I'm mostly really worried about what will happen to this community if we don't fix our own $240 million deficit, much less prepare ourselves for federal cuts.

This is a good and necessary step towards ensuring that nobody loses their housing, shelter, food, or other necessities because of local or federal cuts, but it's not nearly enough.

Please send this to the voters, maximize all local revenue tools, and we will be with you to push the state legislature for better options in the coming year.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Up next is Amanda, followed by Lydia, and then Lily.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Hello, my name's Amanda Koba.

I'm from the PNA in North Seattle.

I'm here representing our hot meal program.

I'm here today to speak in favor of the Shield Seattle B&O tax reform proposal.

I urge the council to support this legislation and to ensure that community meal programs are not excluded from this proposal.

Meal programs are the front line of the humanitarian crisis that's playing out across Seattle right now.

For many folks living outside, our free community meals are the only form of social connection and relationship.

This connection is vital for mental, emotional, and physical health.

Thank you for your time.

I appreciate it.

Thank you, Amanda.

Up next is Lydia, followed by Lily, and then we'll move to online public commenters.

Just before we get started here, thank you for everyone online being here and present.

I'll read the order so that you can be ready.

We'll go Brandy, Darcy, Gabriel, Marsha, Alberto, Marta, Rocket, and then Jonas.

But before we get there, we have Lydia and then Lily.

Sorry.

Yeah.

And then if you've got more signed up, we'll take it.

Good morning.

I'm Lydia Taylor, and I'm here with Mockingbird Society to voice my support for the Shield Seattle Initiative introduced by Mayor Harrell and Council Member Rink.

Sorry.

I'm a client with Youth Care and have been for three years.

And over those years, I have seen many programs close.

They are the South Seattle Overnight Shelter, the University District Youth Center, Casa de Los Amigos for Undocumented Youth, the Catalyst Transitional Living Program, and Home of Hope.

Additionally, the transitional living program for queer youth I used to live in is closing down and relocating.

These programs closures coincide with the decision to reduce education and employment support to prioritize basic needs like food, housing, and shelter.

Recently, YouthCare has had 30 staff layoffs and the resignation of the company's CEO, DeGayle Cooper.

In spite of this, demand for the human services provided by YouthCare have not reduced, with young adults coming from Washington and other states alike to access safety and support, many becoming my close personal friends.

Some of my friends are sheltered and others sleep outside, like the 1,800 young adults who sleep outside every night in King County.

I want the funding from this initiative to support human services.

I support the revenue from this initiative being raised from businesses making over $5.8 million per year, as that would include megacorps with locations around the country or the world that siphon money from the local community to send elsewhere and gives breathing room to locally owned Seattle businesses who spend money locally, putting it back into the local economy.

However, this initiative generates $90 million and our budget deficit is 240 million, not to mention the impacts of loss of federal funding.

So it's crucial to view this as only the first step in generating progressive revenue that closes the deficit, makes up for the loss of federal funding, and produces excess income to provide food, shelter, and medicine to the struggling through the Trump regime and beyond.

I believe that the Shield Seattle Initiative should be put on the ballot for Seattle to decide.

Thank you, Mayor Harrell and Council Member Rink for introducing the Shield Seattle Initiative.

Thank you.

And you were Lydia or no?

Yes.

Yes.

Great.

So then we'll have Lily up next.

And I see others have signed up in person.

Irene, Jason, Ryan, Manny, and Amarintha.

Good morning Chair Strauss and committee members.

My name is Lily Hayward speaking on behalf of the 2,500 members of the Seattle Metro Chamber of Commerce with concerns regarding CB 121028. Supporting small businesses is a priority for Seattle voters and one that over 80% agree elected officials should focus on to improve their quality of life according to our latest index polling.

The Chamber agrees, and we support the elements of this bill that provide small business relief.

We have advocated for similar policies in the past, and we believe that it is essential to keep businesses open, spur development, and fill our empty storefronts across the city.

However, raising the B&O tax on other businesses is the wrong choice right now, and there is no doubt that the cumulative impact of this proposal and the tax package passed by the legislature this session, which is the largest in our state's history, will result in higher prices for Seattle consumers.

Voters understand that these decisions have consequences that impact their quality of living, according to our statewide polling.

Should council put forward and voters approve this proposal, the public, including the payers of this new tax, deserve accountability and transparency, which is why we support Council President Nelson's Amendment 6, to ensure that investments are meeting their intended outcomes.

As you make this decision today, I just want to point to that just a month ago, you all received a presentation from the city itself that laid out that regional employment has declined, Seattle office vacancy is one of the highest in the U.S., consumer spending has weakened, and there are fewer international visitors expected this year.

Now is not the time to make employing people in Seattle more difficult.

We encourage you to give small businesses this needed relief now, but use fund balance and underspend to do so rather than raising costs for others.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Lily.

Up next, we have Irene Hong, Jason Austin, Ryan Bain, Manny Colling, Amarantha Torres.

Good morning, members of the council.

My name is Irene Hong and I'm the Kitchen Loop with YWC Angel Line Center.

I'm here today to speak in favor of the SHIELD-Seattle BNO tax reform proposal.

I want to thank you, Mayor Harrell and council member for championing this legislation and urge the full council to support.

Our center provides safety and support to women experiencing homelessness.

More than 100 women each day access Angela's drop-in services, which includes three meals a day, seven days a week.

We not only address immediate nutritional needs, but also foster a supportive community that contributes to public safety.

As we are the sole women's day center in Seattle, catering to a growing number of women in need.

This funding is not just a request.

It is a necessity to prevent human hunger from tightening its grip of our community.

While not a majority of our funding, the support we get from the city of Seattle is critical to sustaining our work.

Show Seattle is a meaningful investment in public safety and community well-being.

Again, I want to thank Mayor Harrell and councilmembering for championing this legislation and urge the full council to support.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Irene.

Up next is Jason followed by Ryan and then Manny.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Good morning members of the council.

My name is Jason Austin, district two resident and the program director with the Meals Partnership Coalition.

I'm here today to speak in favor of the Shield Seattle B&O tax reform proposal.

I urge the council to support this legislation and ensure that community meal programs are not excluded from this proposal.

The members of the Meals Partnership Coalition are the frontline of defense against hunger in Seattle.

Our 45 member organizations collectively produce over 4 million nutritionally dense, culturally uplifting meals every year, 11,000 meals every single day of the year.

Our members include programs such as the South Park Senior Center, Aurora Commons, El Centro de la Raza, and Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church.

Every single neighborhood in Seattle contains at least one meal program, supporting everyone in this great city.

The work of our members is under attack.

Tens of thousands of Seattleites are expected to lose their SNAP benefits as a result of the federal budget.

Community meal programs provide life-saving nutrition to people who otherwise struggle to feed themselves.

Homebound seniors, those with medically sensitive diets, and people who lack access to a kitchen rely on our members to stay fed.

If we do not take steps now to defend our hunger relief infrastructure, our member organizations will be overwhelmed and unable to respond to the dramatic increase in need.

SHIELD Seattle is a meaningful investment in public safety and community well-being that will help everyone weather the difficult years we have ahead of us.

I urge the council to support this legislation to ensure that community meal programs can continue to serve nutritionally dense, culturally uplifting meals to everyone who calls Seattle home.

Thank you for your time this morning.

Thank you very much.

Jason, up next is Ryan followed by Manny and then Amarantha.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Mr. Chair, members of the committee.

Ryan Bain speaking on behalf of the Downtown Seattle Association, testifying in support of Amendment No. 6 to the B&O tax proposal.

DSA remains concerned that increasing the B&O rate 50% above the statutory maximum will have a negative impact on downtown's competitiveness at a time when office vacancy rates remain stubbornly high.

However, Amendment No. 6 adds a layer of accountability and transparency that the measure needs.

We believe that this will boost voter and taxpayer confidence, and hopefully these reports will provide a benefit to council as you consider future budgets.

It is our hope that these reports demonstrate that the continued investments in the programmatic areas enumerated in the ordinance providing measurable community impact, at least enough to partially offset the negative impact of the tax increase.

We urge your support for amendment number six.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Up next is Manny, followed by Amarintha, and then we'll move to online public commenters.

Good morning, honorable chair and members of the committee.

My name is Manny Kowalian.

I am the executive director for Inspire Washington.

We are your Seattle and King County and the state's cultural advocacy organization.

I speak today with a representative voice for the hundreds of cultural nonprofits and the thousands of creatives that make Seattle vibrant every day.

I want to thank Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Rink for the Shield Seattle proposal.

This legislation is a right step forward to support Seattleites, especially our most fragile communities, and to ensure the continuation of essential services now when the cost of programming skyrockets and funding shrinks from state and federal sources.

Specifically, I am here today to support Council Member Hollingsworth's amendment to add arts and culture in the list of authorized essential services.

Often, arts and cultural programming are quickly categorized as simple entertainment, but I tell you as a third generation Seattleite and cultural leader with over 30 years in the field that that is not true.

My dad was a Boeing machinist.

We really struggled to get by here in Seattle, but it was the work of cultural organizations that connected us to our communities, kept us busy, especially during those critical hours after school, and made sure that we felt fully embraced by the city.

As a cultural professional, telling you a personal story, summer is a nostalgic time for me.

I have done some of my best work in partnership with the City of Seattle during the summer.

Back when I was a very young man, I worked on the Summer Youth Employment Program.

The City of Seattle challenged me by giving me some of the most challenging young people that needed mental health support and also diversions from some of the other activities they were engaged in.

it was essential for them.

Also, I ran the Langston Hughes summer team musical program.

Everyone will agree that that program is essential to them.

Thank you for this proposal.

Please add this to the list so that we can...

Thank you.

Thank you, Manny.

Up next is Amarintha, and then we'll move on to online public commenters.

Hi there, good morning everyone.

My name is Amaranthia Torres.

I live in District 2, and I'm the co-executive director of the Coalition Ending Gender-Based Violence.

We support over 35 community-based organizations, all working towards an end to gender-based violence.

I'm speaking today in support of the Seattle Shield Initiative because we believe in ensuring that gender-based violence survivors of all identities can access safety planning resources when they courageously disclose abuse, and we believe this proposal will help us do that.

The proposed amendments show just how many important areas of our city that may experience less resources as a result of federal policies.

And we also see this proposal as just a first step among many, many more that we need towards fair and progressive revenue so we can actually support the people in our communities that are most vulnerable, that depend on the basics, safety, food, housing, shelter, and so that we can support all the other areas of our city that we know are at risk of cuts.

As you consider these amendments, please keep those most on the margins front of mind and continue to work on all options for progressive revenue, both locally and at the state level, so that we can fund the investments that we know we all deserve, that we know make Seattle a place where we all wanna live and have arts and have culture and have good transit and support survivors and all the things that I know we all care about.

And we know this revenue is one step and not actually that much money at the end of the day.

So we urge your support to really consider these amendments and really just thank you for, thank you for considering this proposal.

Thank you for the proposal, Council Member Rank and the mayor's office.

And thanks for the time to speak today.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

We're gonna move on to online public commenters.

We have Brandy McNeil followed by Darcy followed by Gabriel Newman, Marcia, Alberto Alvarez, Marta Kidani, Rocket Garcia, Jonas Rios and David Haynes.

Brandy, I see you're already off mute.

We'll start the timer when you start talking.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Brandy McNeil and I serve as deputy director at Purpose Dignity Action or PDA.

I am here today to express PDA's support for the Shield Seattle proposal.

At PDA, our mission is to advance a public health-based approach to address public safety concerns.

These concerns are now being exacerbated by a new danger, recent federal cuts in health and human services that will, by their very nature, make both health and safety less accessible to everyone in our community.

These reductions will affect every single person that lives or works in Seattle.

In light of this, we want to acknowledge Council Member Rink and Mayor Harrell for taking decisive, if challenging, steps through the proposed restructuring of the B&O tax.

This is an essential first step, and we are eager to see the Council give the public an opportunity to weigh in on this proposal.

I also want to recognize the vital role that small businesses play in PDA's work.

They are key partners in our shared goal of improving public safety, and we are grateful for the thoughtful approach you've taken to ensure their needs are considered.

As this proposal moves towards implementation, it will be crucial to allocate these resources to human services that are grounded in evidence, thoughtfully designed, and positioned for collective impact.

Ultimately, this is about mending our social safety net, which has been stretched thin.

This council has already shown its commitment to protecting that safety net, and PDA looks forward to partnering with you in this important work.

Thank you.

Thank you, Brandy.

Up next is Darcy, followed by Gabriel and then Marcia.

Darcy?

I see you are here and off mute.

When you start talking, we'll start the clock.

Good morning.

My name is Darcy Buendia and I am the co-executive director of Hunger Intervention Program, a meal program serving primarily District 5. I'm also a resident, renter and voter in District 3. PIP is a proud member of the Meals Partnership Coalition and the Seattle Human Services Coalition.

I'm here to speak in favor of the Seattle Shield B&O tax reform proposal.

My thanks to Mayor Harrell and Council Member Rink for championing this legislation.

I urge full council support and to ensure that meal programs are not excluded from this funding.

Hunger Intervention Program provides meals to low-income seniors, school children, and adults recovering from homelessness.

If I zoom in on our community senior meal program, it paints a picture of the current need in our community.

Our Lake City and Northgate locations serve over 600 meals every week.

Every time we see cuts in the federal social safety net, we see more folks come to our meal program.

We're the backup when the federal government fails people.

No one is standing behind us waiting to fulfill people's basic needs.

Without us, people go without food.

Because of unprecedented attendance, the amount of funding that usually lasts our senior community meal program a year will likely only last us one more month.

We will keep serving, but we need support from the city to temper the disastrous cuts that have been made at the federal level.

While not a majority of our funding, the support we get from the city of Seattle is critical to sustaining our work and the work of all of our meal program partners.

I hope I've made my case for the council's full support and the proposal for the inclusion of meal programs as a beneficiary of this proposal.

Thank you.

Thank you, Darcy.

Up next is Gabriel Newman followed by Marsha Wright Soka.

Soka.

Gabriel, I see you're here.

Star six to unmute.

Gabriel, I see you're here.

Star six, not pound six.

There you are.

You're off mute.

Take it away.

When you start talking, we'll start the clock.

Gabriel, we see you're here and off mute.

Is your phone on mute?

I am so sorry.

I think I should be good now.

There you are.

Welcome.

Hi.

Thank you.

Good morning.

My name is Gabriel Newman, and I'm the Policy Counsel and Government Relations Manager of GSBA, Washington's LGBTQ and Allied Chamber of Commerce.

I'm testifying today in support of the B&O tax proposal introduced by Councilmember Rink.

On behalf of our members, thank you for introducing policy that will provide immediate benefits to 95% of Seattle's businesses.

It passed this year.

The B&O tax proposal will provide tax relief as soon as 2026. This is a prime example of the quick material support the business community has been advocating for.

We look forward to seeing the impact this relief will have on our city's retail and community landscapes.

That said, we are concerned that the tax will burden middle-earning businesses.

5.7 million sounds like a lot, but with increased costs of labor, insurance, tariffs, and statewide tax increases, these local businesses often rely on margins as low as 1 to 1.5%.

So this tax does raise concerns for those middle-level businesses.

However, this policy is a fantastic first step, but we have to keep the ball rolling.

I encourage Seattle City Council to reimplement a small business advisory committee similar to what was set up in 2018 to ensure our local businesses have a seat at the table in policy discussions.

Thank you again for this work.

GSBA supports the proposal, especially highlighting Amendment 6 with the special emphasis it brings on transparency and collaboration.

Thank you.

Thank you, Gabriel.

Up next is Marcia, followed by Alberto Alvarez and Marta Kidane.

Marcia, I see you're here.

Starsick, you're off mute.

Take it away.

Welcome.

Good morning.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Marcia Reitzweka, a member of the Seattle Human Services Coalition and executive director of Family Works, which focuses on hunger alleviation and family support.

We provide critical support like food, diapers and parent child programs to more than 6,000 families in Districts 4, 5, and 6. I'm here to speak in support of Seattle Shield, and I thank Councilmember Rank and Mayor Harrell for their leadership in putting it forward.

Food security for our neighbors, housing and shelter, and safety from violence are at risk in the city budget as a result of the harmful federal actions that have been taken and the city's projected shortfall, including the work of Family Works and many other community organizations you've heard from today.

Seattle Shield is one step and an important step toward closing this gap and protecting these services.

The crisis is here.

Thousands of our neighbors will lose SNAP benefits and will continue to grapple with affording food, shelter, and other essential benefits if we don't act.

But as you all consider amendments today, please ensure that the revenue raised meets the scale of the solutions our city needs, and especially raises enough to meet the essential human services that are at risk.

These services were tested through the pandemic years, further challenged by the affordability crisis, and are now on the chopping block from the recently passed federal budget reconciliation bill.

And we urge council to use every tool at their disposal to protect them, including additional progressive revenue proposals.

You all know the stakes.

Thank you.

Thank you, Marsha.

Up next is Alberto Alvarez followed by Marta Kidane and then Rocket Garcia.

Alberto, I see you are here.

Star six to unmute.

I see you're off mute.

Welcome.

Good morning, Alberto.

Yeah.

Hi, thank you.

Sorry about that.

Oh, sorry.

Okay.

So thank you.

Thank you, council member Rank for consistently calling for action to defend over 450,000 Seattle renters.

We have greedy mouthpieces, fear mongering about homeless people and scapegoating workers.

Corporations take our subsidies to pay rich shareholders while overworking and underpaying Seattle workers.

This shield program for tax relief for locally owned small businesses is a great first step towards weathering the coming storm.

I especially want to point out the support and funding for OLS, which combined with your SHIELDS program will allow businesses to better manage their money while maintaining the high standards of worker safety that Seattle residents value.

Your SHIELD legislation is foundational to correcting course and lighting the way forward during a dark time for our city.

Thank you again, Council Member Rank and everyone else as well.

Have a great day.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Up next is Marta Kidane followed by Rocket Garcia, then Jonas Rios.

David Haynes, you are not present.

Now is the time to call in.

I see Matt got promoted and now Marta is here.

Marta, star six to unmute and we will reset the clock.

Marta, you're off mute.

Welcome.

Good morning.

Thank you.

My name is Martha Kidana, and I'm the Community Engagement Manager at Low Income Housing Institute.

I'm here today in support of Mayor Harrell and Council Member Ranks' proposed business and occupation tax to sustain housing, homelessness, and human services.

We also request that the Council continue to pursue long-term progressive tax revenue.

Homelessness in Seattle is at a crisis level with thousands of people living unsheltered.

A crisis of this magnitude must be met with equal measure.

The priority must be to keep current emergency shelter, homelessness prevention programs, housing programs, food programs, and other human services from funding clips.

For example, Lehigh and other agencies have been told that formerly homeless individuals that we moved into permanent housing during the pandemic may be forced to leave and return to homelessness.

This will directly affect those who hold the 500 emergency housing vouchers from HUD that were made available to Seattle Housing Authority to house frail, disabled, and vulnerable individuals who are living on the streets.

These vouchers were supposed to last 10 years, but will now only last one more year.

How will residents be able to afford rent when 12 months are up?

We have been told that neither the Seattle Housing Authority nor the Seattle Office of Housing will keep these people housed.

The B&O tax should be used to support these vulnerable households by extending rent assistance as emergency housing vouchers were one of the first housing programs to be cut by Trump and HUD.

It would be counterproductive to vote to support the B&O tax, to back to federal housing cuts, while at the same time allowing people to return to living on the street.

Funding strategies must be progressive and long-lasting.

ZIHI asks that the council approve the B&O tax with no sunset and oppose amendments 8, 14, and 17 to focus on protecting shelter, housing, and human services as housing includes our basic needs.

lastly we ask that the committee please send this measure to voters thank you to the council for your time and consideration thank you marta up next is rocket garcia followed by jonas rios and then david haynes followed by matt landers rocket i see you're already off mute welcome good morning and thank you to councilmember rink and mayor harrell for introducing this progressive tax reform

My name is Rocket Garcia, and I'm a visual artist, student, and disabled King County resident.

I'm calling today in support of sending CB 121028 to voters.

Also, it is critical that the funds raised by this tax are used specifically on housing and human services.

As a child, I experienced abuse that led to me developing disabling health problems.

Because of this, I'm unable to work full time, although I still like to give back to the community through volunteering.

and providing public comments at hearings like this.

At this time of my life, I am reliant on human services such as SNAP and ABD.

Having access to them has allowed me to focus on healing from my past abuse and setting myself up for the future by having access to nutritious food, doctor's appointments, and stable housing.

President Trump has generally expressed that disabled Americans should just die, and the federal cuts reflect that sentiment.

Without affordable housing and human services, I would not be able to afford to live Seattle needs to make good on its promise to invest in affordable housing for its residents as a safe part for the coming years.

The Council also needs to pass additional long-term progressive revenue this year and in the coming years because this reform alone will not be enough to combat Seattle's $240 million budget deficit or the massive federal cuts coming our way.

It is so important that right now the people of Seattle know their basic services will not be cut into oblivion.

Further cuts to emergency shelters, homelessness prevention, and other human services will be catastrophic for the people of Seattle.

I know firsthand because of my own experiences with homelessness and disability.

Please send this progressive tax reform to voters and please send it exclusively on housing and human services.

There are so many young people who can't fall back on their parents and are trying to get their start in the world.

People who aren't physically able to make ends meet on their own.

We still have value and are part of the rich and unique community of Seattle.

Please don't forget us and thank you so much to the council.

Thank you, Rocket.

Up next is Jonas, followed by David Haynes and then Matt Landers.

Welcome.

Jonas, I see you're stuck.

There you are.

You're off mute.

Take it away.

Welcome.

Good morning, everyone.

First off, I'd like to thank Councilmember Rink and Mayor Harrell for the work they've done to introduce this tax reform.

My name is Jonas Rios.

I'm a 23-year-old youth advocate and former foster youth.

I'm calling in today in support of this tax reform proposal.

The funding deficits that are occurring currently on statewide and federal levels are impacting all communities, especially ones that are most vulnerable.

Redirecting this funding to human services is essential.

I turned 18 and aged out of foster care the same week COVID lockdowns began in March of 2020. It is not easy to be thrown into adulthood so harshly with little to no support during a global pandemic.

every year since then i've made tremendous progress but i would not be alive right now if it weren't for things like food stamps transitional housing and medicaid i'll never forget the fear i felt being denied ebt when i was actively being forced to get meals every day to preserve my food our communities now are being deprived of basic needs to the point where their lives are threatened we must come up with creative solutions and fight for change as much as possible i see this tax reform proposal as one of those possible solutions please don't forget about us thank you for your time

Thank you, Jonas.

Up next is David Haynes, followed by Matt Landers.

Matt Landers is the final public commenter for today.

Welcome, David.

I see you're here.

Star six to unmute.

And just please remember to speak to the items on today's agenda, which is generally the budget.

Hi, we need a...

Welcome.

Hi, David Haynes.

Thank you.

We need a real scrutiny of the budget to purge the previous spending priorities that exacerbated the public safety crisis.

and created an unconstitutional police reform where the government would run interference for repeat offenders that are connected to the underworld and not make them break their habits or let them hide behind their drug addiction while the budget is constantly reissuing the same money to the unqualified politically connected nonprofits that some claim an expert at running interference for criminals were part of the Black Lives Matter George Floyd protest that shook down the city hall and bullied and intimidated council into capitulating and defunding the police.

And out of the defund police, they created all these spending priorities that this council promised to revisit but couldn't because the central staff was coached to pull the world over the eyes of the new council who now seems to still want to go along to get along and not scrutinize all those bad policies because they're still connected to the political donors and the owners of the contracts who would rather protest or support an election based on the scrutiny of the oversight of the money.

And yet, We got people on council playing the race card, trying to distract from the fact that progressive policies have imploded Seattle, made it impossible for the economy to thrive, making it untenable for people to even want to go out and enjoy themselves because you can't even get on the sidewalk still.

Yet everybody wants to blame Trump.

Trump's been in office six months.

He's promised to solve the homeless crisis and the public safety crisis.

but because council has an agenda that has to do with political connected re-election apparatus that don't have the best interest of community, we need a doge scrutiny of the budget.

We need a more transparent, more trustworthy central staff instead of this BS.

Thank you, David.

Up next is Matt Landers, and that'll be the final public commenter for the day.

Thank you, council members.

My name is Matthew Landers.

I'm calling on behalf of Fred Hutch Cancer Center, and I'm asking for your support for Amendment 8, which would create a tax credit to avoid significant negative consequences for comprehensive cancer centers such as Fred Hutch and our patients and our research.

Federal changes right now threaten almost every aspect of our work from multiple angles.

And this onslaught is really existential.

And we hope that our partners in the city, as they're considering a Seattle Shield law, can support the groundbreaking and life-saving work that we dedicate ourselves to at Pradesh.

Thank you.

Thank you, Matt.

Seeing as we have reached the end of our present and virtual public commenters taking the last call, did anyone else sign up?

No, we're good.

Seeing as we have no additional speakers present, we will move on to the next agenda item.

The first agenda item on today's agenda is the briefing discussion and possible vote on Council Bill 121028, which is an ordinance.

And now I'm gonna ask the clerk to read the short title into the record.

Agenda item one, council vote 121028, an ordinance related to the business and occupation tax for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you.

We are joined today by Director Ben Noble, Director Dan Eater, and Tom Mikesell.

We may be joined by Deputy Mayor Greg Wong later.

Before we get into the presentation, I would like to move the bill before us.

I move that the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 121028. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It has been moved and seconded that the committee recommend passage of the bill.

I'm gonna give us a little bit of overlay of how this process is going to work.

We will speak about a consent agenda in just a minute for the items that are not included in the consent agenda.

We will have central staff brief the item.

We will then have the sponsor speak to the item.

Council Member Rink as sponsor of the underlying bill will then have an opportunity to speak.

We'll have discussion back to Council Member Rink as sponsor of the underlying bill, back to the sponsor of the amendment, and then we will vote.

So just once again, we'll have central staff speak to the amendment, have the sponsor of the amendment, Council Member Rink, general discussion, back to Council Member Rink, back to the sponsor, and then vote.

As a reminder of where we've been in this process, we had a meeting where we briefed this underlying bill.

We then had a second meeting where we had discussion, three and a half hours, broad discussion on this package.

At today's meeting, we will be voting on the amendments.

So we have a lot of work to do today.

I know I'm talking right now, but then I'm gonna ask everyone to move quickly.

We will then have a final vote on the August 4th, Monday City Council meeting.

So as I will pass it, I will now pass it to Council Member Rank for remarks to the underlying bill.

We will then move into amendments.

I will ask colleagues for you to hold your remarks on the underlying bill until after we get through amendments.

I wanna just remind the body that this bill does not solve the budget problem before us.

Last year, we had a $250 million budget whole proximate We utilized cost-saving measures and efficiencies last year with an understanding that slow growth would begin this year rather than, and it did begin until January, which is when the economy took a sharp change While last year we, and I was a big proponent of multi-year budget reform, we have set ourselves up to continue the budget reform work this year.

However, we do not have $250 million worth of cuts that can be made and still be able to serve Seattleites with the basic needs that they desire, that they deserve so that we can have a healthy city.

So that is the overall budget context.

That is the bill context.

I'll now pass it over to council member Rink and then we'll discuss the consent calendar and then we will go into individual amendments.

Before we do go into individual amendments, I'll turn it over to Tom, Ben and Dan Eater for brief discussion as well.

Council member Rink, the floor is yours and then we'll turn it over to the committee table.

Thank you, Chair Strauss.

Colleagues, I want to thank you all for your thoughtful amendments on this legislation to reduce taxes for 90% of Seattle's businesses and secure $90 million in net revenue to prevent cuts to critical city programs.

Before we begin discussion and votes on those, I want to reground us in on what we are doing here today and why.

Our work today is to craft a proposal to present to voters of our great city.

With this proposal, we will be asking our neighbors to provide us with as strong a tool as possible to protect the services they rely on.

We will be asking them to empower us to shield the city programs they will need to weather the coming budget storms brought about by both the federal administration and past council decisions.

And this legislation began with three simple goals in mind.

First, to shield critical city investments from cuts in a very challenging budget environment.

Second, to shield small businesses from the impacts of rising costs to ensure they can continue to fuel our region's vitality.

And third, to shield our community from massive cuts in federal funding that are coming our way, that will increase demand on city services from the most vulnerable of our constituents.

We were working in close collaboration with the mayor's office and the city budget office in developing this, and we've identified a way to raise $90 million in additional revenue while simultaneously reducing that tax burden for 90% of Seattle's businesses.

And that $90 million in additional revenue is not going towards new programs.

We are talking about being able to stabilize our services in our region.

The dollars raised and dedicated to preventing cuts to these programs are those programs that many of our neighbors depend on.

We're talking about supporting housing stability and preventing homelessness, protecting the rights of vulnerable workers and support for small businesses, and serving people experiencing food insecurity or gender-based violence.

And I'll be blunt, asking the voters to shield this $90 million now means $90 million less in cuts each of us on this dais are going to have to make in budget this fall.

And many of the amendments before us today would add categories or examples that council members would like us to protect from the cuts we're going to have to implement this fall.

Of those, two additional categories are already covered by the Every Child Ready levy and the Transportation levy.

And to my mind, Seattle's voters have generously been addressing those areas, and we should not be asking them for more here.

A few amendments before us are aimed at providing exceptions, credits, or carve-outs for a particular class of businesses or services.

If those amendments pass, we would be looking at roughly $10 million less to stave off these cuts to food access, emergency shelter, homelessness prevention.

In light of the projected $250 million budget shortfall in an $8.5 billion budget, $90 million is a relatively small pot to divvy across a lot of very important programs and services for our community.

If we're going to consider amendments to add more potential demands on these funds, then I ask my colleagues not to shrink the available funds by granting special carve-outs to any one business or interest group in this legislation before we send it to voters.

When we get to these amendments, I will be asking the sponsors to consider tabling these until Monday's full council meeting.

At that point, we will have additional full analysis prepared to understand how we can recalibrate the rates to ensure we can still collect $90 million to fund the outline areas of this legislation.

There's a strong coalition of support behind this, from over 70 partners, from small business owners and business chambers, human services providers, labor advocates, unions, and now even earning the support of GSBA, as we heard during public comment.

Thank you, GSBA.

Today's work is to build the strongest shield we can around small businesses and the city programs we need.

And I believe that when we give Seattle voters the choice they deserve, they will choose to shield our city and protect what matters most.

And with that, I will close there.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Rink.

I'm going to turn it over to Director Dan Eater, if you'd like to say anything, and then we'll pass it over to Director Ben Noble, Tom Mikesell, and then we'll get into the consent calendar.

So this is underlying bill, please.

Thank you, Chair Strauss, members of the Select Committee.

I'm happy to be here primarily in a question-answering mode.

So I will turn it over to central staff.

I don't have any further comments, but thank you for your consideration of this important bill.

Thank you.

And I understand Deputy Mayor Wong is not able to join us today.

So my apologies for misstating that.

Over to you, Director Noble, and then we'll pass it to Tom.

I have nothing to add.

Just given the time, better to move on.

Great.

Thank you.

Tom?

Good morning.

Just for the record, Tom Mixa with your central staff.

And I defer to the chair on next steps.

Thank you.

Council President, I see you've got a hand.

Yes, I had a question about what was just mentioned about deferring votes on some of the amendments.

I just wanted clarification of that.

Is that in fact what is happening?

Let's get into the consent calendar and then we'll take up amendments one by one.

If that's okay.

So we are voting today.

We are voting on amendments as soon as we can say the next words.

So if we can move on.

I thought that I heard Council Member Rink say that we should do that on Monday.

So I must have misunderstood.

We will get to that in just a moment.

So at this time, I'm going to move us into the consent agenda.

The agenda for this committee meeting was drafted without a consent agenda because I, as the chair, colleagues, I don't think it was intentional, but nobody released confidentiality on their amendments to the chair.

So I only became aware of the amendments once the agenda was posted.

I am proposing that we consolidate these amendments.

Sponsors can still speak to their amendments.

This process simply reduces the number of times we have to say aye.

So if we have five amendments that everyone's gonna say aye on, it simply removes the amount of times we say aye.

So I'm proposing that we consolidate the amendments by voting on the following amendments in one vote, And so colleagues, I know that we sent them an email out, but that would be amendment one, two, 13, 15, and 16. We will have central staff brief us on all of these amendments.

Sponsors can speak to these amendments, and then we will just take one vote.

I know Council Member Rivera, we had offered to add amendments 10 and 11. Again, you can still speak to the amendments right now.

It's just reducing the number of times we say aye.

And so the consent calendar, and so I'm offering again, if you wanna include 10 and 11, the consent calendar consists of amendments where there are no further amendments proposed or we have not been identified, that it looks like everyone's gonna vote yes, I guess, is basically the thing.

Central staff will provide us an overview, just one second, then I'll get to questions.

We'll provide us an overview of each amendment in the voting group, and then we'll vote on them as a package.

The request does not require a second.

So anyone can remove any item from this consent package.

The removal does not require a second.

And then we'll move on to the rest of the agenda items in the order in which they're called on.

I see council member Juarez, you have a question.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just want to make sure I clarify.

I'm responding to the email that you sent us yesterday, which listed now the consent for amendments number one, number two, 13, 15, and 16. And now we are going to also add amendments 10 and 11.

If Council Member Rivera would like to.

And I'm seeing that she's saying no.

So we will just take up.

And Council Member Rivera, again, you do not want your amendments included in the consent agenda.

Just run through it.

I'm fine running through it without adding that.

Okay, again, it just reduces the number of times we say aye.

Okay, thank you.

So with that, I'm going to propose that we put on the consent calendar amendments one, two, 13, 15, and 16. Are there any items that colleagues would like to have removed?

Technical.

That's why they're okay.

Technical.

Yeah.

Central staff, I'm going to ask you to brief each of these amendments, and then we will ask for removal.

If you want to add yours in, we can just add them in if you want.

I just have a question.

Yes.

Vice Chair Rivera.

Thank you, Chair.

Just to clarify, all the council members that sponsored these amendments have agreed to add their things to the consent calendar, and now we're just going to hear and vote.

In a typical world, colleagues would have reduced, relieved confidentiality and we would have had a lot more time to have these discussions with confidentiality with the chair.

What's gonna happen right now is central staff's gonna brief each of these amendments.

If anyone wants to remove an amendment, we can do that and then we'll vote on them as a package.

That didn't really answer my question.

So everyone's okay with theirs being in a consent.

I just want to make sure my colleagues that I know where they are with this.

Yeah, so that's the process of everyone being able to remove any item.

I see.

And there's no requirement for a second to remove an item.

I see.

Thank you.

Great.

So with that, I'm going to turn it over to central staff to brief items 1, 12, 13, 15, and 16. 1, 2, 13, 15, and 16.

Thank you, Chair.

To read that back to you, 1, 2, 13, 15, 16.

Affirmative.

Okay, starting with Amendment 1, this is an amendment sponsored by Councilmember Rink, which makes a technical correction to the standard deduction language of the bill.

It's simply technical, intended to facilitate taxpayer compliance.

Okay, Amendment 3 is sponsored by Councilmember Kettle.

This amendment, so...

Oh, I'm sorry, apologies.

Amendment 2, sponsored also by Council Member Cattle, would add a WHEREAS clause to the bill related to the Seattle Housing Investment Plan.

It generally adds that WHEREAS clause related to the projected budget deficit and specifies that the Seattle Housing Investment Plan was requested in the Statement of Legislative Intent OH-001-SA.

And now Amendment 13 is sponsored by Council Member Hollingsworth, and this adds public health as an eligible use of the portion of funds that are intended to backfill general fund programs.

Amendment 15, sponsored by Council Member Hollingsworth, would limit the sum net revenue generated from the tax restructure to support only existing programs in the budget.

And then Amendment 16, sponsored by Council President Nelson, would add substance abuse disorder treatment as an eligible use of funds in the amount of up to $30 million of net revenue that's provided to backfill federal changes or federal budget cuts.

And it also adds to that section that those uses can also be triggered due to changes in federal policy.

Thank you.

And now colleagues, would anyone like to remove any of these items?

You can still speak to them in just a second.

It just reduces the number of times we say aye.

Council President, I see you've got your hand.

That was for a question for later.

Okay, great.

Are there any items that council members would like removed from the consent agenda?

Hearing no items are going to be removed.

I move to adopt the consent agenda, which includes amendments 1, 2, 13, 15, and 16 presented on the agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to adopt amendments 1, 2, 13, 15, and 16. We will now open the floor for discussion.

So, colleagues, this is the time that you state...

How you, any comments on your amendments, colleagues?

So again, this is items one, two, 13, 15, and 16. So if no one wants to speak to their amendments, Council President, I see your hand.

Thank you, I will speak to amendment 16, just a second here.

My notes are in different order than I had, So I'm glad to think that there is consent that this should pass, but I do still want to explain my reasoning because I am deeply concerned about the Medicaid cuts in the big, beautiful bill.

Well, all the cuts are terrible.

But anyway, we've seen what happens when Medicaid work requirements go into effect and they tend to drive down participation in the program.

And I'm especially worried about how this affects our homelessness and substance use disorder response.

So that's why I put this amendment forward.

It would simply allow for the allocation of funds to backfill federal dollars providing substance use disorder treatment and services.

And I also want to mention that this amendment expands the scope of federal cuts to also include federal, just a second.

to also include federal policy changes, because technically the Medicaid requirement is a policy change, as are many of the requirements related to receiving federal funding for homelessness and substance use disorder responses.

So that's my point that I really want to make sure that people understand, is it's not just simply funding is being cut, it's a policy change that will very well likely result in a program being underfunded.

So thank you very much for supporting my amendment and including it in the consent package.

Thank you, Council President.

Colleagues, any other comments on amendments 1, 2, 13, 15, or 16?

I'm seeing no further comments, so I'm gonna ask the clerk to call the roll on amendments one, two, on the consent package that includes one, two, 13, 15, and 16.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Yes.

And Chair Strauss.

Aye.

Thank you, with one excuse.

We will now move on to the individual amendments in the order in which they are presented on the agenda, understanding that we just passed the consent calendar.

Again, we will...

For each amendment, I'll call on the sponsor to move it.

We will then move on to central staff for an overview, turn it back to the sponsor, Council Member Rink, discussion, Council Member Rink, sponsor and vote.

Remember colleagues, we still have a number of amendments to get through.

I was trying to do math.

We had seven originally.

We've got a bunch of amendments, so we gotta go.

With that, I'm just gonna say generally for myself, looking at these amendments, is that this bill is intended to protect us from the federal cuts that are occurring.

It is to respond to the change to international and national economy based on the changes that have occurred, and this bill in particular is to focus on the human needs for folks to self-actualize, if not that, to at least thrive, and if nothing less, at least survive through these next few years.

With that, I am going to be bringing amendments on behalf of Council Member Kettle today because he is not present.

So I move to amend Council Bill 121028 as presented on Amendment 3 on behalf of Council Member Kettle.

Second.

Thank you.

It has been moved and seconded to put this amendment forward.

I'm going to now turn it over to Central Staff for a review of this amendment.

Thank you, Chair.

Amendment three would remove, so I'm gonna back up a bit.

The underlying council bill includes a January 1st, 2030 sunset date, and it provides for one optional four-year councilmanic extension to that sunset date.

After that time, all of the ordinance provisions would expire.

This Amendment 3 would remove that sunset date and the potential extension provisions and replace it with instead a tiered rate that would be imposed on in January 1st of 2033, a lower rate.

That lower rate would would still fund the tax restructure requirements to pay for the $2 million standard deduction and the $2 million small business threshold for the tax.

However, it would not raise the $90 million of net revenue.

And that would be the structure going forward beginning January 1st of 2033. We did a quick calculation.

The existing tax structure, if you will recall, had a point of about $5.7 million where Compared to the current tax structure, businesses would either be paying no or lower tax below $5.7 million, or they'd be paying higher tax above $5.7 million.

With this tiered structure, when the tier went into effect in 2033, that cutoff point would be $10 million.

Thank you.

Just another version of that explanation.

The base bill would have the voters potentially authorize two things.

The threshold raised to $2 million and the higher rates that both offset that threshold and raise additional revenue.

That would run for four years, and then council will have to decide whether or not it would continue for an additional four years.

So there's potentially eight years, at which point if things would revert to how they are now, which is to say that the first $2 million of revenues would be, again, subject to taxation, and rates would return to essentially their current rate.

That's the base bill.

What Council Member Kettle is proposing is a total of eight years potential there, if you will.

Council Member Kettle is proposing a version where the voters would be choosing a seven-year path that would, again, exempt the first $2 million from taxation, raise rates both to offset that and to raise an additional $90 million.

At the end of those seven years, we would revert, but not to the current state.

We would revert to a world where the first $2 million is still exempt, and rates are somewhat higher than they are now in order to offset that.

But it would be a revenue neutral reset, if you will, seven years from now, revenue neutral relative to today.

So again, the $2 million exemption costs the city in current dollars about $60 million.

So if we're going to have a revenue neutral option seven years hence, you need to tweak the other rates up some.

That tweak turns out to be about 25%.

And it's in that sense, seven years hence, we would end up with a system that potentially is revenue neutral but is more progressive in that the first $2 million is exempt and rates are somewhat higher.

Again, that somewhat is approximately 25% and is Tom was just describing that the breakeven point then turns out to be closer to $10 million rather than roughly 5 to 6 or 5.5 to 6 now.

So hopefully that's another version that kind of captures what's going on.

Thank you.

Director Eder, anything to share?

No, nothing to add.

That's a good explanation.

Thank you.

Thank you, and for all of Councilmember Kettle's amendments, I'll be bringing them forward today because he is excused.

This amendment aims to give predictability to the small businesses by making sure that that small business tax relief that's contained within this legislation remains permanent.

It also sets us up to really have and give us more of a check for budget reform, that we have seven years to make these reforms and that That's kind of the end of that, right?

And if at that time we need to go back to voters, that will be what we'll need to do.

We'll need to go back to voters.

So this is a compromise amendment that seeks to balance our need to protect funding threatened by federal government while giving more predictability to small businesses in Seattle even after that seven year period.

I will now call on Council Member Rink.

We'll then have discussion back to Council Member Rink.

I will speak on behalf of the sponsor, and then we'll go to a vote.

Council Member Rink.

Do we have a point of order?

I'm sorry, Mr. President.

Can I ask Dr. Noble a question?

Is this the time to do that now, or do we wait?

We'll have Council Member Rink, and then we'll have discussion.

Okay.

Oh, that's what you meant.

Okay.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Rink.

Thank you, Chair.

I'll be brief.

I know we're short on time.

I understand Council Member Kettle's intention here.

I deeply appreciate all the work that he did to fine tune this amendment and ensure that it honors both the intentions of this legislation while also seeking to address the concerns around predictability.

Open up for discussion.

Thank you.

Council Member Juarez and then Council President.

Thank you.

I think the former Council President and the Council President, we were getting confused down here, but we got it now.

So thank you for that.

I just have one question for Dr. Noble.

So when we went through this bill and you explained to me Council Member Kettle's amendment, I just had one question.

So the small business deduction remains?

That's the gist here.

Correct.

If the voters approved this, the $2 million deduction would become permanent.

Perfect.

Okay.

That's it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

Nelson.

Can you tell me or can somebody tell me what was the rationale for seven years?

And then that's my first question and then I have a couple others.

I mean, I can't speak necessarily on behalf of Council Member Kettle on that, but what I can say is that this was a compromise and it's intended to provide small businesses the predictability and to force budget reform to occur.

So both of those two things, as well as when we look at the impacts that we're experiencing from these federal government changes, this is going to last more than four years.

And so how do we ensure that we are able to take that bow wake or if things don't change, it'll still take a year or two to get back onto stable footing even after what we all hope is a new president in a few years.

Council President.

Yeah, I was just thinking that seven years just seems like an odd number of years.

I mean, a strange number of years.

And I was just wondering why seven, not four or five or whatever.

Anyway, he's not here to really answer that unless you know that.

OK.

And then what were the assumptions of number of businesses and B&O amounts it's my understanding that there has been a decrease in business licensing in the past couple of years and so I am, I mean registered in Seattle, so I'm just wondering what were some of the assumptions on the number of businesses and the basic, the size of their revenue and therefore their B&O payments of the larger businesses?

Did you just go straight up inflation increase or how did you do that?

Council President, if I could clarify.

So are you talking about the underlying bill?

I'm talking about how one the change in the rate from current to future to down a little bit.

Right.

Right.

So those those numbers come from the Office of Economic and Revenue Forecasts.

And so they use 2024. B&O collections data, confidential, but they have all of the collections from all the different taxpayers in the city.

And they first did a scenario that accounts for the impacts of the standard deduction, which was about $30 million, the higher small business threshold, about $30 million, and then reassessed what tax rates would be necessary based on that 2024 data.

included an assumption about a state tax law change that occurred, which is actually referenced in their analysis, the memo they attached to their analysis, to account for that kind of state-level impact on the base.

And then with that information, calculated what the new rates would need to be to generate additional net $90 million of revenue.

So to then simulate what happens in seven years with Councilmember Kettle's amendment, they then took the $90 million out to see what that rate would be, and that is the rate that would be assessed in 20, beginning in 2033.

Maybe to answer your question, it's difficult to interpret.

I don't believe that there was a broader dynamic analysis as to whether or not lowering the rates for small businesses and increasing rates somewhat for larger businesses would have an overall effect on the number of businesses or the number of jobs in the city that is suspectively unknowable, if you will.

The long-run projections for the Economic Forecast Office are reflective of general patterns in the regional economy.

So there is growth projected, real growth in the economy projected, so growth beyond the rate of inflation projected for the next four, and then again, the projections go for six years, but over that period.

So there is potential for the tax to potentially encourage smaller businesses, potentially discourage larger ones, but those dynamic impacts are beyond our capabilities of modeling, I believe.

Thank you.

I see Director Eder, and then we'll finish discussion.

We've discussed this in past meetings, but there are going to be approximately 5,000 businesses who will remain subject to the B&O tax after the exemptions and the deductions.

About 2,900 of those 5,000 businesses approximately will have less, have a lower tax bill after this bill passes for the seven years.

And then the remaining about 20, 300 will experience an increase in their overall tax bill.

So that's the base that we're talking about.

Whether there'll be more or fewer of them, I thought that might be important to understand.

Okay.

I understand that.

We're talking in seven years, and so here's where my mind is.

I support this, the impulse behind this, and I will vote for it, but I am trying to understand how was that specific rate determined on what assumptions and what happens if it doesn't cover the existing, well, we'll just find the money elsewhere, I suppose.

But a rate that goes into effect in seven years is based on current conditions.

And so I just want to make sure it's tight.

I mean, you're just going on assumptions.

Mr. President, I'd just say that the executive, like central staff, is relying on OERF for their forecasts, and we think they are the best available information.

Ms. Thanks.

Mr. Thank you.

Is there any other discussion on this item?

Any other discussion on this item?

Council Member Rink, last word from the underlying sponsor.

No final words.

As I'm bringing this on behalf of Council Member Kettle, I think that this is good because it creates predictability as well as forces what I believe is needed budget reform.

With that, will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 3 to Council Bill 121028.

Council Member DeVetta.

Aye.

Council Member Sacca.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Abstain.

And Chair Strauss.

Yes.

Aye.

Seven in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, the motion carries and Amendment 3 is adopted.

Moving on to Amendment 4 on behalf of Council Member Kettle, I move to amend Council Bill 121028 as presented on Amendment 4. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to amend Council Bill 121028 as presented on Amendment 4. Central Staff, over to Tom and Ben, Dan.

I know Dan, Director Eater, you're not part of Central Staff, but over to the committee table.

Thank you, Chair.

So Amendment 4 would add findings to the bill related to the budget deficit and the use of Jumpstart Payroll Expense Tax Fund.

Specifically, the fundings would be related to the budget deficits identified for 26-27 in future years and would provide further information on the current use of Jumpstart Payroll Expense Tax funds in the budget.

Thank you.

This is, again, good information to receive.

There's no reason to not have more information.

And so I will now pass it on behalf of Council Member Kettle.

This is good information to have.

I'll pass it over to Council Member Rink.

Oh, sorry, Director Noble, did you have something?

I just wanted to explain it.

I think, in part, this is-this Amendment 4 is rationale for the amendment that follows Amendment 5. So it's a-it documents the concerns about the sustainability of the city, and then the next amendment is actually requesting some additional information from the executive on an ongoing basis.

Great.

Thank you, Chair.

Colleagues, I like to think of Councilmember Kettle's Amendment 4 as functionally something in between a recital and a standalone resolution highlighting the extreme circumstances we find ourselves in for the next few budgets we'll have to craft.

So whether or not you vote for this to include in the legislation, I strongly encourage a read-through in taking it to heart.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Colleagues, discussion on Amendment 4. Discussion on Amendment 4?

I'm seeing none.

Council Member Reek, any further words?

On behalf of Council Member Kettle, I think this is a good thing to put into the bill and good budget reform.

With that, will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 4 to Council Bill 121028. Council Member DeVetta?

Aye.

Council Member Saka?

Aye.

Council Member Solomon?

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth?

Yes.

Council Member Juarez?

Aye.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Rink?

Abstain.

And Chair Strauss?

Yes.

Seven in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and Amendment 4 is adopted to Council Bill 121028. On behalf of Council Member Kettle, I move to amend Council Bill 1210, Amendment 5 to Council Bill 121028. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to move amendment five.

This was one that I discussed with council member Kettle of creating a standalone bill because this brings us in line with the state process of having a four year budget outlook.

that then required by state law, we're required to have a biennial budget that is balanced and an annual budget that is balanced.

So whether this comes to us through this bill or is a standalone bill, I think it's a good idea.

And I'm excited to bring it forward.

Council member Rink is sponsored the underlying bill.

Do you have any comments?

Not too many.

I think I have some amount of concerns about whether or not this is standalone legislation or including in here, but largely understand Council Member Kettle's desire to include a comprehensive look at all of our funds and expenditures.

Yep.

And if we might, we may...

Because I was not able to reach Council Member Kettle this morning to finalize a discussion about a standalone bill, we will move this amendment forward today.

And should we get on the phone with Council Member Kettle and want to move forward with the standalone bill, we'll have to come back and make changes on Monday.

With that, Council President Nelson, I see your hand for discussion.

Yes, Council Member Kettle asked me to present this amendment and so we did have a back and forth this morning and also with his office and I understand that there was some question with law but that it is fine going forward as is.

So I will simply say that on behalf of this bill, I mean this amendment, we can't hide from our budget challenges and utilize band-aids to kick the can to our next budget that's never a good practice so these problems are you know we need to these problems tend to be systemic year after year and we must and must be tackled head-on and to do that we first have to recognize and acknowledge the true nature of the problem and commit to having those tough conversations This Bino tax increase is just one way we can help to prevent cuts, but we don't pretend that 90 million is enough, especially when the currently estimated shortfall for next year is 240 million.

So we'll learn more on Monday morning when the August forecast comes out about our outlook for next year, but the structural problems are guaranteed to persist into the foreseeable future, so we as council need to see the full picture of how we will get through this, not just in the next 18 months, but in the next three to five years.

That's all I will say was, you know, the...

Thank you.

Did I forget to call on central staff on this one?

I did.

You can just raise your hand at me.

We've got a lot of amendments.

Tom, I think it's been discussed, but give us the central staff take on this.

Sorry about that.

Thank you, Chair.

I'll just explain the technical details.

So given that there is a identified budget deficit of $233 million based on the April forecast in 2027, this amendment requires the executive to submit with the 2027 budget.

So not the one being developed this fall, but next fall.

a balanced financial plan for both the Jumpstart Payroll Expense Tax Fund and the general fund that shows through 2030, a balanced, or through 2029, I should say, a balanced projection in both of those funds.

So basically revenues greater than or equal to expenditures in those funds.

And then it would also require that the financial plans include the year 2030 which would be the first year after, you know, the original structure of the taxes expiration, to show what the impact is on those funds after that expiration.

And then if there is identified deficit in that year, they would call for a collaborative process between the mayor and council to work on resolving that in the intervening years.

Thank you.

Director Noble.

If I might, I think, again.

Another explanation, if you will.

Currently, when the budget comes, if it's the biennial budget, the mayor submits a budget that is balanced for those two years.

The mayor also submits financial plans that extend for an additional four years, or three or four years, depending.

for each of the other funds.

Currently, those years beyond the current biennium can be shown to be in deficit.

So, in fact, when we quote you, oh, there's a $250 million deficit.

And what I mean by that is the upper part of the chart shows revenues, the lower part of the part shows expenditures, and then they net.

And currently, the financial plans net in an accounting sense, red, and literally they're shown in red, because they are in deficit.

And that highlights the fact that there is a future deficit.

What this would do is force a more difficult conversation, candidly, so the revenues will be what they are.

The expenditures now would have to be adjusted so that there is a zero at the end, so that the fund is balanced.

So rather than abstractly talking about a deficit, it would show reductions in the current environment where we're facing a deficit, it would show reductions in spending categories.

Not at the department level.

These financial plans exist at sort of categorical levels, but that's the implication here.

I think it's Council Member Kettle's perspective that although we are potentially putting more money on the table if the voters were to approve it, as you have all, at least several have mentioned, it doesn't address the underlying budget issues.

And the desire is that that difficult conversation be had in more detail and rather in less abstraction.

That's either a good idea or a bad idea.

That is your choice.

But that's what it would materially do.

Given that it's a fundamental change in the way we kind of do this longer-term financial planning, it is not imposed until after the current budget, because it gives the executive some time to adjust to this potentially new world, if you will.

But it's a different way of doing that long-range planning and coming to terms with, at least for now, the current imbalance between planned expenditures where planned expenditures mean the current spending patterns essentially inflated and projected revenues.

Thank you.

Director Eder, any other thoughts?

Yeah.

The budget book is three, four inches thick, if you're looking at a paper version of it.

It has a tremendous amount of detail at the department and program level, at the budget summary level and budget control level, and that's how you all give us authority to spend money.

This amendment we don't object to, but I just want to note for the record that it is necessarily, as central staff was describing, at a much higher level.

and it would begin a conversation about how spending in the future beyond the authorized appropriations could change.

It will be an inherently high-level conversation that will be informed by changes that happen in the intervening months and years as we find out more, as we do every so often during each year in terms of what revenues are coming in at and are projected to come in in the future, changes in spending and programs, decisions that will have to be made about whether to make any changes to fees and taxes, and other forms of revenues that the city could be including in the future.

We will not be able to get into that level of detail and have a robust conversation about what the actual budgets will look like in future years.

That said, no objection to having a further conversation about the tools that are available, the uncertainties that exist about future year planning.

Thank you.

Further discussion?

I want to echo what Director Eder said.

This is a similar practice at the state level where these are projections on paper.

They are not requirements at the end of the day because even in our biennial budgeting practice, we can make changes in the second year.

Similarly, the third and fourth year are projections on paper.

They're not binding.

Council President, I see another hand.

Is that new?

Yes.

Sorry, I guess I got out of order with this amendment.

I'm going to go Council President, then I'm going to offer the floor to Council Member Rink.

I've already shared my last words and we'll go to a vote.

Well, now I'm not speaking as, now I'm not representing Council Member Kettle's amendment, I'm just speaking for myself, that I support this because I believe that as much long-range planning as we can possibly do, the better.

And I recognize that it might be high level, but every two years is a pretty short timeline when you think about small businesses are planning for many years in advance.

We just have to be more disciplined, and this gives us a better opportunity to think about, okay, so we're balanced, instead of just thinking we're balanced for two years, think about the long-term consequences, long being maybe three or four years.

So I just got my sly response from my request for a sly response on the underspends the past several years.

I haven't had time to read it, but I asked for this because we tend to always have, we tend to have a larger than average, when you think about industry standard being municipalities in general, underspends for the past several years.

And so the fact that we are underspending does make me question whether or not we are, you know, our decisions on how much to allocate to different programs is the right amount or what are the assumptions that are underlying the budget request in the first place.

So I think there is improvement to be made on how we budget and I think having a longer timeline just forces us to perhaps make more careful decisions in the short term.

Thank you.

Council Member Rink, final words, and we'll go to a vote.

Thank you, Chair.

I will be abstaining on this amendment, not because I don't appreciate the exercise.

I think it is certainly worthwhile and important and appreciate the sponsor's work on this, but rather I think this might be stronger as a standalone bill than incorporated in this legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Committee Clerk, will you please read the roll, call the roll on Amendment 5 to Council Bill 121028.

Council Member DiVetta.

Aye.

Council Member Sacca.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Abstain.

And Chair Strauss.

Aye.

Seven in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

We will now move on to amendment number six.

Council President Nelson, you are recognized to move your amendment.

Well, this is, thank you very much.

You recognize to move your amendment.

Oh, I move Amendment 6.

You're second.

Amendment 6 to Council Bill 121028 has been moved.

We'll now hear from central staff.

Again, move to the sponsor.

Council Member Rink, discussion, Rink, sponsor, vote.

Central staff.

Thank you, Chair.

So Amendment 6 would add reporting requirements regarding the use of net revenues generated by the bill.

This bill would allow up to $30 million of net revenue to be used to mitigate the impact of federal funding reductions in four categories.

This amendment specifically would require the executive report what programs received new or additional funding and what the outcomes were associated with that funding as a result of this restructure.

Thank you.

Director Noble, anything to add?

Director Eder, anything to add?

Thank you.

Council President Nelson, you're recognized.

Thank you very much.

This is a simple reporting requirement.

We as a council are the oversight body of the executive and that means that we ought to be informed about how this funding is being implemented and how effective it is at protecting us from federal cuts.

The request to provide this report annually in July would allow for a full, would allow full data from Q1 and Q2 but give the council almost two months with the information before a budget is transmitted.

If the report is transmitted with the budget in September, it would still only have data from Q1 and Q2.

I'm saying this because I was considering whether or not the date should be in July or September.

But the driving force is to give us information to make some budget decisions, and also this should be standard practice.

in general, not just with this measure, but we should always be looking at how well are our investments performing and are there any adjustments that should be made.

And so I would just say that I think that this is a good mindset to get into to always look back before we make future decisions about our budget.

in general, especially with this one, because this is an additional revenue source.

This is additional revenue, and so therefore we have to be mindful of the impacts, not necessarily the impacts, but the benefits generated by what we are going to be allocating the revenue to.

Thank you.

Council Member Rink, you're recognized, and then we'll move back.

I see Director Eder has his hand now.

Chair, if it's all right, I actually would like to just go into questions regarding this amendment during my time.

Totally.

Director Eeder.

Council President, if you would be open to considering moving the date to September along to be timed with the delivery of the budget, that would be a welcome change from the executive's perspective.

only because we would have more time to analyze and provide answers to the information that you are after, which we regularly provide to the public and to the council.

The lag in data is greater than a month, so I fear that we would not have a full two quarters of data with a 7.31 due date for the report.

So it's only from that perspective that I would ask for consideration to move the date a little bit later in the year to be timed with the delivery of the budget.

But we will do whatever works best from the council's perspective.

That is fine.

I have to say that I went back and forth amongst my staff and also with central staff, just trying to determine what was the best timeline.

And I didn't realize that Q2 information would take that long on a sort of generally to compile.

Okay, that is fine.

So I then would allow for a, I guess, a floor amendment to- Council president, may I help you?

Yes.

At this time, do you want me to run the motion?

I move to amend amendment six to council bill 121028 to change the date from July to September 24th.

23rd.

The last...

No.

23rd is the Tuesday.

It always...

So I'm going to now have a little bit of discussion.

It always kind of moves.

So I'm going to say the 25th because that's the date that it must be done by.

I haven't really seen it come...

I think that's fine.

Intent will be clear here.

Okay.

So again, I move to amend Amendment 6 as presented on the agenda to Council Bill 121028 to change the due date from July to September 25th.

Is there a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded.

Council President.

May I ask Director Eder, knowing our interest in having information and when you can get us information and knowing that we won't have Q3 by September 26th or 24th or whatever, what would you suggest to be a date that would serve our interests?

Any time in September is better than any time in July.

So there's a motion on the table to amend your amendment to change that date to September 25th.

It's been seconded.

Is there any issue at this time?

Yeah, I was just thinking about maybe putting it sooner because if it's not going to have, because that's right when we get, I would like to be able to read before we actually get the budget transmitted.

So I appreciate you trying to help me out by amending my amendment, but I just don't know what the precise best date is.

Okay.

I'm going to withdraw my amendment.

So we're now back to the amendment six to the underlying bill.

We've had a fair amount of this discussion this week since seeing this amendment as it was attached to the agenda.

I didn't have awareness of it beforehand.

So the conversation about what I am hearing from presenters and from you, Council President Nelson, is that there is a desire to have the right amount of time to have this information, the information collected to have true analysis.

I'm hearing from the executive that transmitting this with the budget is the most desired outcome because it is part of the overall package.

No matter what, when we receive the budget, we always spend that first week of deep analysis, hearing from departments and then hearing from central staff.

And so for ease of budget process, I recommend that we require this report to be transmitted alongside the budget.

Okay, I hear that, if I may respond.

Council President.

I just heard that any day in September is better than July 31st, so I would like to amend my amendment and say September 1st.

Is there a second?

May I do that?

So again, as your facilitator, as the chair of this committee, Council President is offering amendment September 1st.

I have offered September 25th.

I'm gonna stick with the position of September 25th.

Council President has moved with requiring it for September 1st of every year, which is oftentimes Labor Day or over Labor Day weekend.

Is there a second to Council President's motion?

It has been moved and seconded to amend this date to September 1st, which is usually in Labor Day weekend.

If you believe that it should be September 1st, you will be requested to make a yes vote.

If you think that it should be September 25th alongside the budget, you will need to vote no at this time.

and then we will come back to the next amendment in just a second.

Are there any questions about what we're doing right now?

Mr. Chair.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Would you just repeat the last thing you said about a yes and no?

Just one more time, please.

proposals on the table right now.

Either September 1st as the due date or September 25th with the rest of the budget documents.

I withdrew my amendment.

Council President put her amendment on the table.

So if you think that it should be September 1st, you vote yes.

If you think that it should be September 25th, you vote no.

And then I will, if this amendment fails, I will then bring my amendment for September 25th.

Council President, I see you now have a hand.

Well, I'm just saying that I would like it recognized that I'm trying to be a...

I'm going to bring us back to the vote because everyone's on the same page up here.

I don't know if everybody's on the same page.

I want it recognized that originally my amendment says the 31st.

I am trying to compromise with the executive and have it be in September, but have a little bit of...

wiggle room between when we get this report and when we get the budget, which is its own project in itself.

So I'm just asking for some grace here while I'm trying to also be compromised and work with the executive.

Yes, I am seeing shaking heads of affirmation across the table.

So again, if you believe that the due date should be September 1st, you vote yes.

If you believe that the due date should be September 25th, you vote no.

And then I would bring that next amendment.

Any last questions?

Will the clerk please call the roll on the amendment to Amendment 6 to Council Bill 121028 as presented on the screen right now.

With the September 1st date.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Sacca.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Yes.

Chair Strauss.

Abstain.

Seven in favor and none opposed.

Thank you.

The amendment to amendment six passes and the due date has been changed to September 1st rather than July 31st.

We still have the underlying amendment to vote on, is there any further discussion on amendment six to council bill 121028?

Council member Rink, I see your hand.

You'll also have last word before the sponsor, unless we have, I think we are still on the sponsor.

So over to you, council member Rink.

Thank you, Chair.

A question for the executive and central staff related to this amendment and certainly appreciate the intentions here as it relates to ensuring that there's accountability for these dollars and we're seeing outcomes.

The outlined areas describe, you know, metrics to be reporting on.

Is this consistent with information that HSD is already collecting at this time?

I'm trying to get an understanding of how much additional staff work and work we're asking of our providers to be providing this information.

Generally speaking, especially in this climate, I prefer folks are working on delivering services.

I'm trying to get a sense of how much additional work this creates to generate this report.

I'll jump in.

We are reviewing this in the last couple of days, and I don't have a firm answer to that question.

I believe this is roughly consistent with the types of information and data that we already collect.

So I don't think that it is a new staffing burden to produce this.

But I can't speak any more definitively than what I think is the case.

And I also cannot speak definitively, but I do know Stafford General Brecht drafted this, and before she did, she did contact some of the offices and city departments.

And again, many of them have existing dashboards and the like.

My guess is that it is some new work, but it is not designed to be an entire body of new work.

It is designed to be something else, in fact.

Thank you.

Additional discussion?

Additional discussion?

and I have the last, I didn't know.

Discussion?

Council Member Rink, any final words?

Thank you, Chair.

And thank you for providing that clarity.

Of course, when there's always new reporting requirements, I'm always curious to understand how much that may take away from staff and folks doing the work of serving communities.

I'm also appreciative of the real-time amendment with consideration for delivering the executive delivering information to this body.

And in spirit of hearing the public comment today, also in support of this amendment, wanting to ensure that there's accountability over these dollars, I will be supporting this amendment.

Thank you.

Council President Nelson, last word.

Yeah, just so that for the viewing public, what does this do?

It basically says this amendment would require the executive to report on what programs received newer additional funding and outcomes associated with that funding.

And so for the the categories of funding that are already defined in this resolution or whatever ends up receiving this funding.

The questions, it's very simple, just so people don't think that this is really overwhelming.

The newer existing funding, so for example, when it comes to For example, number of people placed into permanent supportive housing from emergency shelter, the number of people receiving homelessness prevention services, et cetera, case management to stay housed, unduplicated small businesses receiving assistance.

complicated reporting.

And again, I will say that this is information that we should always require about our programs, but it's simply spelling it out for these particular ones.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 6 to Council Bill 121028?

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Sanka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Yes.

And Chair Strauss.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

Amendment six to Council Bill 12028 passes and will be attached to the underlying bill.

We'll now move on to amendment number seven, which I am the sponsor of.

I am not gonna move this amendment at this time, but I would like to have central staff still brief us on the content so that we can be ready for Monday.

Colleagues, my amendment here is to the underlying bill.

This underlying bill as a package is here to protect us against triple cuts.

We've even seen our right-of-way teams from the state that address homelessness, receive cuts from the federal government, receive cuts from the state government, and with a $250 million deficit, the likelihood of them receiving cuts from the city is quite high.

We also do not want to, as a product of this bill, add to additional international and domestic economic volatility or doubling or tripling the pain.

With the sum of these next three amendments, the sum creates a sizable reduction in the revenue that we are seeking to use to stabilize our municipal government against the federal instability.

for the amendment that I have before you is regarding stevedores.

For everyone who doesn't know what a stevedore is as defined in the RCW, you can think of it simply as cargo and freight that is coming in on the shipping containers that you can see out the window here.

And in the international market, as we saw at the federal committee, cargo can simply turn left and go to Vancouver In the following two amendments, we see Fred Hutch and cancer research being protected because they have already received significant cuts from the federal government.

We can't be adding to this pain, in my opinion, and we also cannot be undercutting ourselves from the stability that we are seeking to provide for Seattleites during these uncertain times.

And so for these next three amendments, seven, eight and nine, they will give tax relief to our maritime sector and cancer research.

These are absolutely worthy causes.

And they also means reducing the amount of funding available to backfill the federal cuts for things like emergency housing, shelter and drug treatment.

I understand that council member Rink is working with central staff to bring an amendment to the August 4th full council that would minimally raise the rates to cover the added cost of these amendments and protect that funding.

For that reason, I'm going to withdraw my amendment seven for now.

I will bring this back on Monday with changed rates to offset the reductions that I am creating.

I also encourage Council Member Rivera to do the same.

We'll come to your amendments in just a moment so that we can take the votes on these tax credits alongside with the full analysis from council member ranks rate adjustments to pay for them at the same time.

So that is my take on how we can make a fully informed process before we get to individual amendments.

I guess first council member Rivera, are you interested in taking that path or do you want to take your votes today?

Okay, we will come to your amendments in just a second.

If we can brief Amendment 7 so that on Monday we don't have to have a lengthy discussion about what it is, we just have to understand that it is this with a B&O rate change to offset the reductions.

So with that, I'm gonna go to council central staff.

I've already made opening remarks.

I'll turn it over to council member Rink, open it for discussions back to council member Rink myself, and then we'll not take a vote and we'll move on to amendment eight.

Okay, so this is Amendment 7, sponsored by Chair Strauss.

It's a tax credit for stevedering activities, which are, as the chair described, generally the loading and unloading of ships at port.

So the credit is designed to offset the impact of the restructure, and only that.

It is a tax credit that's equal to the difference between the rates that are charged now and the rates that would be imposed with the restructure times the amount of stevedoring revenue activity that a taxpayer has.

So it's not a full exemption, just the portion that would be a higher tax because of this restructure change.

The amendment also adds a recital, and the credit would expire in tax year 2029. The Office of Economic Revenue Forecast did provide an estimate of about $750,000, though I have received additional information since then from City Finance that the impact is perhaps double the size.

The original request for the estimate used a business category that was too narrowly tailored, and based on the expertise of tax administration, we feel it's probably logical to expand that to a higher number.

Said another way, sorry, I'm just gonna jump in here.

Said another way, we had based the original estimate off of water-based cargo transport, and it is now our understanding that that would also apply to land-based cargo transport, which doubles or more the size of this hole in our ability to backfill federal cuts.

Director Noble, Director Eder, anything more to add here?

I think it is worth saying, The constraints of state law, this approach we think is available for some types of industries, this being one of them, but not all, just to be clear.

So this works in this limited circumstance, and perhaps in other limited circumstances, but not generally.

And I think further questions about that might be better addressed to the city's law department in an appropriate venue.

Thank you.

Director Eder.

Nothing further to add.

Thank you.

Tom?

Thank you, Chair.

I do have one additional piece to add, and this applies to this amendment and Vice Chair Rivera's next two amendments that all deal with credit programs.

So if you recall back to the original briefing on the bill, we talked about the risks to our legacy financial system as opposed, you know, to implement the changes in the underlying bill.

And they did in our back and forth with city finance, they indicated that if there were scope changes, that they would have to reassess what the impact was to their operations to accommodate those changes.

So this is in that realm of a scope change.

So a credit is something new that they would have to administer.

All that being said, that they say they can do that, but they would need additional staff to do so.

And that applies to any and all of these credits that would be added to amendment.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rank.

Thank you, Chair.

Colleagues, as I mentioned in my opening, I do not support advancing any exemption or credit that will reduce the funds available to the Seattle Shield initiative without an actual analysis of the full fiscal impact and an identified rate change to accommodate.

So I thank the sponsor of this amendment for holding this, and so we can do our due diligence here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And to Tom's, actually, discussion.

We are now at discussion.

Any discussion?

Seeing no discussion, Council Member Rank, any last comments?

Seeing none, I will just say that when we were looking at the maritime sector, which is highly transportable because it is on water and, or Our sales and use tax, for instance, is made up of a third of the activity based on the port and maritime and manufacturing activities.

This is an incredibly important thing to protect against.

But the only reason that an amendment was able to be created was because Steve Adoring, is clearly defined in the RCW and within the B&O tax at the state level.

And so that is the only, and that's why we need to do this further analysis regarding the land-based versus water-based activity, because a truck on land is harder to move to Vancouver, British Columbia, than the cargo ship that is coming through the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

So with that, I am going to withdraw Amendment 7 today.

We can now move on.

Again, I've requested that Amendments 8 and 9 be held until we have full analysis on Monday.

But Council Member Rivera, this would be the time that you would move your amendment should you desire to.

Thank you, Chair.

I move Amendment 8 to Council Bill 121028.

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to amend the bill as presented on Amendment 8. We're gonna go with central staff, Council Member Rivera, Council Member Rink, discussion, Council Member Rink, Council Member Rivera, and then for a vote.

Council Member Rivera, you are recognized.

Central staff, sorry, thank you.

Central staff, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Chair.

So Amendment 8 would apply a tax credit for comprehensive cancer centers.

So under state law, federally tax exempt income received by comprehensive cancer centers is exempted from the state's B&O tax.

However, it is taxable under the city's B&O tax.

This amendment, as I explained with the prior amendment, would apply a tax profit, so tax relief for any business operating in Seattle, operating as a cancer care center, that tax credit would be equal to the additional revenue impact of the B&O restructure.

So it basically multiplies the amount of eligible revenue times the old rate or the new rate minus the old rate.

and it's just intended to offset the impact of this bill.

There's strict confidentiality requirements around disclosure of taxpayer information, so given that there's a low number of taxpayers that would be eligible for this credit, we're not able to use city data to confirm, though we have heard from one of the cancer research centers operating in Seattle that this restructure would add an additional $3.3 million of tax burden to them.

So in some sense, that can be viewed as the impact of this credit.

Central staff did look at publicly available information to kind of verify those taxpayer reports, and it did generally align with what you can see publicly.

Thank you, central staff.

Thank you, Tom.

Council Member Rink, I guess it's sponsor, you're next to speak.

Thank you, Council.

Oh, no, sorry, Council Member Rink, I guess I'm next.

Apologies, I'm the sponsor of the bill.

I'm covering for Chair Strauss.

All right, so actually, I'm gonna speak to this and the next bill at the same time in the interest of time because they're very similar.

These tax credit amendments were worked on by central staff.

I really wanted to thank Tom for all the work he did.

It was vetted by law.

There was no issue with these two, with this one and the children's hospital one.

It is within our power to move these forward.

Additionally, and for clarity, and you heard Tom say this would provide these institutions with a tax credit for the proposed increase, not exempting them entirely from the full B&O.

just the percentage that's being increased with this legislation.

Essentially, it keeps them at the rate they're currently paying.

But it helps mitigate for the federal impacts that they're experiencing based on federal cuts to research and Medicaid cuts.

These amendments address comprehensive cancer care institutions, such as Fred Hutch, who's a nonprofit, and nonprofit pediatric hospitals, which is essentially Children's Hospital in Seattle, both providing critical research and patient care.

Both organizations are experiencing federal impacts, as we have said, due to cuts to research and severe Medicaid cuts.

It is critical that we ensure we are taking care of cancer research on patients including those who can't afford care and for children who need dedicated specialized care in the face of federal research and Medicaid cuts.

This is the very problem this bill is claiming to address that is impacts to our residents including our kids based on federal cuts and policy changes attacking those who need these critical services.

When this B&O increase was proposed, it was not clear that nonprofits pay B&O tax.

Once that became clear and the impacts to these nonprofit institutions providing critical services to kids and cancer was discovered, I felt strongly that we at least provide some relief, particularly in light of those federal impacts that I've already discussed.

I hope that I have your support or join me in supporting kids in Seattle and cancer patients and the research associated with these institutions for these important populations.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

I was listening along.

Okay, great.

Over to you, Council Member Rink.

Thank you, Chair.

Colleagues, again, to reiterate what I've already stated a bit, I do not think we should be exploring special carve-outs in this legislation without an actual analysis of full fiscal impact and an identified rate change to accommodate.

So again, I appreciated the Chair.

asking the sponsor to hold this amendment until we can do that due diligence.

If amendments eight and nine move forward today, I will be bringing a walk-on amendment to full council on Monday to further raise the rate on businesses not exempted here to offset the roughly $10 million in lost net revenue that these amendments create.

Again, the goal of this legislation is to raise $90 million in net revenue to be able to balance these things.

This is nothing personal against Fred Hutch of Seattle Children's for clear reasons because of the important work they do, but rather trying to create a balanced package and really move forward with the underlying intent of this initiative.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, I'm gonna call on Director Eder, but I'm gonna do a little bit of ground laying right now, which is I typically do not welcome walk-on amendments.

I typically do not welcome amendments at full council because I believe that it is the committee's duty.

Today I am asking for an exception to this policy for two reasons.

One is that the bill needs to be voted out on Monday.

This has been long discussed for about a month now.

And the second is that we are not allowed to know detailed P&L profit losses and detailed information about businesses.

And so the way that we are able to create public policy is that we have our person in the Office of Economic revenue forecast able to provide us this information so that we are able to create rates that are correct.

that individual is putting together the revenue forecast and is busy until Saturday.

So what we have are a number of amendments that have fill in the blank for until we can get his time, and then we will have that amendment.

And I hope that we are able to post on Sunday, even though I don't know that we will be able to, but that is why there's potentially a walk-on amendment for Monday.

Director Eder, do you have anything that you'd like to share?

Yeah, we are of course in favor of the bill that we transmitted that was originally before the select committee as is without amendments.

That said, just in terms of the overall impact of the amendment that is currently before you, I understand there's a potential for a change that would come on Monday.

The central staff has identified approximately $9 million from the combined two bills on hospitals.

That would simply mean that there is not $90 million on an expected basis to work with.

So we would have to either make some changes to the mayor's proposed budget to accept more reductions, or we would have fewer resources available to backfill federal funds.

And that's a tradeoff that I understand is a challenging one and that is in your hands to consider.

But that would be the practical implication of the amendments that are currently up for discussion.

Thank you.

Colleagues, discussion?

Council Member Juarez.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to say, first of all, thank Council Member Rivera for these two amendments.

And so I had some time to do some digging and I want to say that I will be supporting both eight and nine because even though we look at the original intent, Council Member Rink, thank you very much for putting this forward in the mayor's office, pages 10 and 11. And then of course the, six and four, nine items.

And even though they're nicely labeled, we all know that good policy when it turns into legislation can be a bit broader and does encompass.

And so we are looking at and we have been talking about the cuts to Medicaid and community health centers and who's going to be hurt.

But again, and I will say my closing comments are at the end of the bill, but I appreciate that we are actually looking at the basic needs of people in this city beyond just Maslow's original hierarchy of needs, food, water, shelter, sleep, but safety and health, of course, is in there.

So it may not look like it's listed in the actual bill, but the policy itself to me is good policy.

It's good governance.

So I will be supporting Council Member Rivera's amendments eight and nine.

Thank you.

Council President Nelson.

As will I.

You'll remember my shock when we were discussing this last time when I didn't realize that hospitals also had to pay B&O, and it would be my preference to exempt all hospitals.

I understand the rationale that you're making for these particular ones, but it is...

they're really having a hard enough time already with Medicaid cuts coming from the other end.

And so I would just simply say that although I wish it would be all health care, I appreciate that you are targeting the ones that will be doubly hurt by the lack of funds from the research dollars that feed into the work that's performed in those hospitals.

So thank you very much for that.

I also think that I think it's fine to, you know, whether or not the rate is adjusted to accommodate the impact that this will have or if this impact is knowable on the overall collections and what ends up happening.

We're probably not talking about more than, I don't know, 1.5 million or something like that, and that is definitely something that's an amount that can be found elsewhere in the budget.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Director Noble.

Just to clarify, based on the information from the taxpayers themselves, we think the impact is in the order of $9 million.

So I'm not- Oh, nine.

Okay, yeah.

And Council Member Saka.

Thank you, Chair.

Colleagues, it is well established that Seattle is a tech leader in the global context.

And what goes unnoticed by some is that we are also a biotech leader, not regionally, not at the state level, not nationally, but on a global scale.

Seattle is a biotech hub of innovation.

And it is because largely of the contributions of organizations like Fred Hutch, Seattle Children's and others.

We need to maintain our dominant position in this area while also defending against these harsh and cruel attacks by the Trump administration.

I want to thank Councilmember Rivera for putting these forward today.

Honored to be able to support them and therefore support cancer research and children in our city.

Thank you, Councilmember Rivera.

Thank you, Councilmember Saka.

Any further discussion?

Any further discussion?

I will share my notes on this, which is absolutely, as I stated earlier, support the intent of this and the following amendment.

However, without offsetting the tax credits with a minimal rate increase, we again would lose about $9 million to backfill federal funding for emergency housing, for homelessness, for substance use and addiction treatment, and much, much more.

And so, We will be moving forward on this vote today.

I will be abstaining today and we will have walk-on amendments on Monday to address the rate change.

With that, Council Member Rink and then Council Member Rivera and then we'll go to a vote.

I'll be brief and just take a moment to remind this body that we can take up any type of tax breaks at any time.

We do not necessarily have to do it with this legislation.

We don't have to go to voters to do that.

It does not have to be tied to this time-sensitive legislation going to voters.

And for those who choose to vote yes today on these particular amendments, I sincerely hope you will consider rate adjustments on Monday to make sure we're collecting the full amount so we can fund services across all of the areas outlined in this legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rivera.

Yes, thank you.

I, this is a very narrow, there are a lot of other, first of all, let me just say, these are nonprofits.

These are not businesses.

Someone mentioned businesses.

They are not businesses.

They are nonprofits.

Many of these institutions provide care to folks who cannot otherwise pay for care.

And then they often subsidize care for those individuals.

So those are our most vulnerable folks in Seattle.

So I want to very clearly state that.

We cannot exempt them entirely.

Some of these institutions are exempted at the state level, but they pay B&O at the city level.

So this was just more a prioritizing the kids, all the kids in Seattle who need care and cancer patients.

And also both institutions are research, have research centers.

A lot of people don't recognize that Seattle Children's has a research center, they do, they have a robust, so thank you for your comments, Councilmember Saka, they have a robust research arm.

And with this federal administration's attacks on research and Medicaid and all that is happening in the healthcare space, this was a very limited way of managing for those impacts because this BNO increase was to address federal impacts to vulnerable populations in the city, so those institutions may not be named in this bill, but my understanding of this bill is to address impacts to our residents.

And I care deeply about kids, and then of course, are cancer folks that come to Fred Hudge for their comprehensive cancer care.

Of course, they're not the only institution in town providing cancer care.

But as I said earlier, we can't take care of everyone.

And I should say UW is in my district, and I had a great conversation with them.

They would have wanted to also get a credit, and they understood we just can't provide it to everyone.

So I do want to recognize them for their grace.

in light of these amendments and what we were trying to do here.

So I feel really strongly that we need to protect kids and cancer patients in our city and also the research associated with that because we are a leader in that space.

This is not a giveaway.

This is very much we are trying to support our populations in the light of the federal administration's Medicare, Medicaid cuts and research cuts.

So that is the purpose of this and I hope I have your support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 8 to Council Bill 121028.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Sanka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Abstain.

And Chair Strauss.

Abstain.

Six in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion passes.

Amendment eight is adopted and will be added to Council Bill 121028. Council Member Rivera, would you like to move Amendment nine?

I move Amendment 9 to Council Bill 121028.

and seconded to amend Council Bill 121028 as presented on Amendment 9. I know that we just bled over a lot of the discussion.

I'll note that we have one hour, nine minutes to go through another six amendments, an underlying bill, six more bills, and an amendment.

So with that, Council Member, I'm gonna go to Central Staff to brief the amendment, and then Council Member Rivera, you'll have the floor.

Chair, can we just go to a vote?

We've sufficiently, I think, covered it, unless someone has a question.

Council member Rivera, the, at that point you would ask for a point of order and I'm going to just have them brief it and then I'll turn it over to you and you can make, and we'll move forward.

Central staff.

Thank you, chair.

I can be brief.

Amendment nine is the tax credit for nonprofit pediatric hospitals.

The credit's equal to the amount of tax increase that would be as a result of the restructure.

Again, similar to the other tax credits, we can't divulge confidential taxpayer information though.

Seattle Children's Hospital has reported that the tax restructure would add $6 million to their annual tax bill, which would generally be seen as the impact of this credit to the extent that that number is valid.

And I would also offer, similar to the other credit, central staff did check through using public data that is generally in line with the level of revenue that you can see reported in publicly available data.

Thank you.

Director Noble, any further comments?

Director Eder will be right back in just a second if he has further comments.

Council Member Rivera, you indicated you don't have anything else to add?

No.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rink, do you have anything else to add?

Yes.

Thank you, Chair.

I know we've kind of taken up these two amendments together, and so I would note that between these two amendments, we're creating carve-outs for two organizations only, and the amendment sponsor, as well as all of us on the dais, will have to answer to why every other hospital and nonprofit in the health space, why they're not getting the same treatment.

I would argue that if this body wants to support the entire health sector, we should do so in a comprehensive way and separate from this legislation, and that's certainly something I would be supportive of.

I will be abstaining on this amendment.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Rink.

Further discussion, colleagues?

Further discussion?

Further discussion.

Further discussion.

I will just make the same statement.

I would support this with a rate change.

I will abstain today, and we will have a walk-on amendment regarding this amendment for Monday.

Director Eder, anything else?

We are on Children's Hospital Amendment.

Anything to add?

Nothing that I didn't add for the last amendment.

Thank you.

Okay.

Council President, I see a new hand.

Yeah.

I have a question.

Okay.

This is the...

The walk-on amendment on Monday, will there be...

That is actually a scheduled full council meeting.

And so what kind of staff support will be at the table to support questions about the potential walk-on amendments?

Council President, I'm going to ask that we hold that until after the meeting.

We have one hour, six minutes to get through six more bills.

Can we take that up on the side?

In the past, I ask because there has been some resistance or...

I will then state that I would like staff to be present when these are presented at the full council meeting because usually we have all the amendments done and then we just full council it and there isn't staff.

But just for folks to know, I will be asking that they be able to present.

I cannot respond to you right now, but can say as past practice that I've seen many, for many, many years until last year, that council members were able to come to the dais prepared with the analysis by meeting with central staff ahead of that meeting.

I'm gonna move us on to call on this vote because we now have one hour, five minutes.

Is there any final comments from Council Member Rivera, sponsor of the amendment?

Actually, I do have one final comment, and that is I did work with, I did reach out to CBO about these bills, as I always do, as a courtesy and to hear their thoughts.

And I will say that at the time CBO did not or anyone recommend to me, if you want to offset the cost, maybe consider increase the amount.

So this is something I'm, of the, underlying bill.

So this is something I'm hearing today.

Um, uh, so, you know, to the point of council member, um, uh, Nelson's what information are we going to get?

We, we don't have any information for what that increased rate would be.

And we need obviously time for that.

So I will just say that part that I did share this information with CBO at the time.

And again, I just feel really strongly that, oh, and as to the other hospitals, I addressed that in my earlier comments.

Obviously, we can't give the relief to everyone, but kids and cancer patients were, you know, in this way, it seemed like a good, it's a good, great population to try to protect from these Trump cuts.

Obviously, we're not going to be able to protect everyone from the Trump cuts.

We've said that multiple times since January, but we're doing the best that we can.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 9 to Council Bill 121028?

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Abstain.

Chair Strauss.

Abstain.

Six in favor and none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion passes.

Amendment 9 is amended to Council Bill 121028. Council Member Rivera, would you mind reading both Amendment 10 and 11 in at the same time?

Sure.

Thank you.

I move amendments 10 and 11 to Council Bill 121028.

Second.

Thank you.

It has been moved and seconded to recommend passage of amendments 10 and 11. I've been alerted by the clerk that I did something incorrect.

As long as there's no objection from the members to hear them together and pass them at one time.

If a member would like to remove one of them for individual votes, we could do that.

Thank you.

Colleagues, any objection?

Seeing none.

Central staff, can you please brief us on amendments 10 and 11?

Will do.

So Amendment 10, so the underlying bill provides for allocation of the resources generated for the restructure.

There are two different areas.

There is backfill for general fund programs, and then there is amounts that are intended to offset the impacts of any federal cuts that we're not yet aware of.

The first amendment, Amendment 10, would add an example to one of the uses of the general fund backfill portions, specifically small business.

It adds examples of those small business supports that would be eligible for backfill.

Amendment 11, similarly, though in a different section, would add examples at Food Bank as an example of food insecurity programs that are eligible from the portion of the restructure that can go to offset federal funding impacts.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rivera, sponsor of the amendments.

You're recognized.

Yes, thank you, Chair.

On the small business supports, we've heard from businesses that they very much need more supports like the storefront repair program and also the BIAs do a lot in the districts that have BIAs and the neighborhoods that have BIAs.

This is saying including but not limited to, so this was just to provide an example of what the type of small business supports that we would be, you know, we would like to see.

Of course, it's not comprehensive, and it's more by way of example.

Similarly with the one for food insecurity.

Just giving an example, and this was not meant to be exhaustive either, but we've heard a lot from food banks across the city.

I have a food bank in my district as well that I very much support, but we've heard from food banks across the city that this administration has attacked food banks.

And so this was another example of the type of food insecurity that we were talking about, but it was not meant to limit it to any And it does not exclude meal, any kind of meal program or supports.

It was merely meant to give an example of that.

So with that.

Thank you, Council Member Rink.

Any discussion?

Thank you for bringing these amendments forward, Vice Chair Rivera.

As it relates to Amendment 10 on small businesses, I know in our engagement with small businesses on this proposal, storefront repair was the number one thing we heard.

So I think this amendment in many ways is consistent with what we've heard from stakeholders as well.

and I welcome it.

And as it relates to Amendment 11, understanding that how the language is written does not preclude, but rather just provides an example of a kind of spending, I'm wondering if you're amenable to adding meal programs to that list alongside food banks.

Actually, Council, yes, but I will say Council Member Hollingsworth had already raised this with me and I thought she might be bringing an amendment.

I'm not sure if you decided to or not, but.

But if not, I'm happy to add it here.

Thank you.

I'm going to, again, be your facilitator as chair of the committee.

I have heard a question from Council Member Rink, a response from Council Member Rivera.

Council Member Hollingsworth, would you like to add anything at this time?

No.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the sponsor of it.

We talked about it and wanted to offer it as a verbal amendment, potentially.

I know that I don't like to do that on the spot, but...

Thank you.

We are going to have an after-action review of this committee meeting because so many processes have gone sideways, and we cannot have this occur during the budget process.

So I am going to move to amend Amendment 11 to add food meal programs to the list after food banks.

Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to amend Amendment 11 to add the word food meal program after food banks.

Is there any discussion on this amendment to amendment 11?

Seeing no discussion, clerk, will you please read, call the roll on amending amendment 11 to add food meal programs afterwards food bank.

Before you do that, I see Tom has a question.

Just offer for grammar the word and after food banks.

And food banks with a comma included.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Actually, no comma because there's only two items in the list.

Yes.

Colleagues, we are going to have an after action review of this meeting because this is not acceptable in my book.

Will the clerk please call the roll on adding the words and food meal providers to amendment 11 after the words food bank.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Sanka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Yes.

Chair Strauss.

Yes.

Eight in favor and none of those.

Thank you.

Amendment 11 has been amended to add food meal providers after the word food bank, including the word and.

Is there any further discussion on either amendment 10 or 11?

Seeing no further discussion, I'm going to ask Council Member Rankin-Rivera to hold any further comments because this is really straightforward.

Any further comments?

Seeing none, and I will wait for just a moment until the clerk is able to call the roll on amendments 10 and 11 to Council Bill 12108. Voting on both.

We're voting on both.

And will the clerk please call the roll?

On Amendment 10 and Amendment 11 as amended.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Sanka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Rink.

Aye.

Yes.

Chair Strauss.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

Council Bill 121028 is amended to include Amendment 10 and Amendment 11 as amended.

We are going to move on to Amendment 12. Council Member Rivera, would you like to move your amendment?

Chair, I move Amendment 12 to Council Bill 121028.

Thank you.

It has been moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and second.

And Central Staff, would you like to brief us on the amendment?

Absolutely.

So Amendment 12, similar to prior to amendments, well, actually, it's dissimilar, but it adjusts the use of funds identified within the general fund backfill investments portion of the bill.

Specifically, it would add workforce development and job readiness training as eligible uses within that general fund backfill category.

Thank you.

Councilmember Rivera, as sponsor of the amendment, you're recognized.

Yes, it's pretty straightforward.

Workforce development programs are things such as apprenticeship, for instance, and then the job readiness training is meant to cover things like our summer youth employment programs.

So it's just expanding the list of uses.

Obviously, the list of uses are not, none of this is binding, none of these uses, but it is, these are important programs.

that I think we've all supported in the past, and I thought that they were important to be included here.

Thank you.

Council Member Rink, do you have additional comments?

Thank you, Chair.

I would just briefly note, colleagues, that we just voted to send a $1.3 billion levy to voters.

That includes some of our strongest investments in some of these areas the city has ever made.

That levy process was an opportunity to add more dollars into that area, I would argue.

And considering hypothetically these two things will be for voters at the same time, I think it's really important that we are strategic with our messaging about what each of these proposals is really dedicated to funding.

And for these reasons, I will be voting no on this amendment.

Thank you.

Colleagues, discussion.

Discussion.

Discussion.

Last call, Council President.

Just a question.

That comment that was just made by Council Member Rink made me think that maybe, is this for youth only or is this for, okay, so the FEP levy was K-12 and community college, okay.

All right, thank you very much for that clarification.

Thank you, Council President.

Colleagues, discussion, discussion, discussion.

I will just say that we need to have a full review of our workforce development programs, what is included in the levy, what is not included in the levy, and how we address citywide our ability to provide workforce development programs.

Because that review needs to occur and because we have quite a bit in the FEP levy, I will not be supporting this issue.

this amendment today as well as this will continue through additional amendments because what we've just seen is a $9 million reduction in the revenue and expansions in the categories that are set to be expended upon.

With that, Council Member Rink, I'm seeing no.

Council Member Rivera, last word.

Thank you.

I will say, yes, this is not meant to be for just kids.

And also a reminder that these are uses.

When you go to the voters, you have to tell them what you're using the money for.

These are potential uses.

It doesn't mean we need to use the money for this purpose, but it does provide the ability to do so when the executive is putting together their package.

They feel like they need to use some of the money for those purposes.

That's what the uses are for.

So again, it's non-binding, but it does indicate these are items that have been priority and continue to be priority for us.

And for that reason, I thought they were well placed here.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please call the roll on Amendment 12 to Council Bill 121028.

Council Member DeVetta.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Solomon.

Aye.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Abstain.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Wink?

Abstain.

And Chair Strauss?

No.

We have five in favor, one opposed, and two abstentions.