Seattle City Council 9/20/21

Thank you so much, Eric.

Okay, folks, thanks for your patience.

The September 20th, 2021 meeting of the Seattle City Council will now come to order.

It's 2.09 PM.

I'm Lorena Gonzalez, President of the Council.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Sawant?

Present.

Council Member Strauss?

Present.

Council Member Herbold?

Here.

Council Member Juarez?

Here.

Council Member Lewis?

Present.

Council Member Morales?

Here.

Council Member Mosqueda.

Present.

Council Member Peterson.

Here.

Council President Gonzalez.

Here.

Nine present.

Thank you so much.

Presentations.

We have two presentations this afternoon.

The first one is a presentation from me in my office, so I'll go ahead and present that now.

I do have a proclamation declaring September 2021 as Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

I will first present the proclamation, and then I'll open up the floor to comments from council members.

After we hear from council members, we will suspend the rules to allow our guests to accept the proclamation and provide some brief comments to the council and members of the viewing public.

Okay, let's see.

Here we go.

Apologies, I'm having trouble locating my...

actual proclamation that's not linked in my materials.

Give me just a second.

Okay.

My OneNote is not cooperating with me.

Apologies, folks.

There it is.

Got it.

Too many clicks of too many buttons, folks.

Thanks so much for bearing with me here.

OK.

Proclamation.

I'm going to go ahead and read from the proclamation before presenting it.

Whereas the American Cancer Fund for Children and Kids Cancer Connection report cancer is the leading cause of death by disease among US children between infancy and age 15, this tragic disease is detected in more than 16,000 of our country's young people each and every year.

And whereas one in five of our nation's children loses his or her battle with cancer, many infants, children, and teens will suffer from long-term effects of comprehensive treatment, including secondary cancers.

Whereas we know that the impacts of cancer hit communities of color and low-income communities disproportionately due in part to a lack of culturally responsive providers.

And whereas this impact includes the battle against childhood cancers.

And whereas addressing these disparities has been the work of community advocates, practitioners, and institutional investments such as the National Cancer Institute's Equity and Inclusion Program.

And whereas the work of focusing on childhood cancer interventions gained traction over 27 years ago with the founding of the American Cancer Fund for Children.

and Kids Cancer Connection.

by Steven Feierstein, a member of the philanthropic Max Factor Cosmetics family.

These institutions are dedicated to helping children and their families by the battle of cancer.

And whereas the American Cancer Fund for Children and Kids Cancer Connection provide a variety of vital patient psychosocial services to children undergoing cancer treatment at Seattle Children's Hospital, Mary Bridge Children's Hospital in Tacoma, as well as participating hospitals throughout the country, thereby enhancing the quality of life for these children and their families.

And whereas the American Cancer Fund for Children and Kids Cancer Connection also sponsor toy distributions, family sailing programs, pet-assisted therapy, KCC supercar experience, educational programs, and hospital celebrations in honor of a child's determination and bravery to fight the battle against childhood cancer.

So now, therefore, the mayor and the Seattle City Council proclaim September 20 excuse me, September 2021 to be Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

So thank you so much for the opportunity to be able to read the entire proclamation into the record for today.

I do want to allow other council members who might have comments to make to make those comments now before I formally present the proclamation to our guests.

Any comments?

Hearing none, if there's no objection, the council rules will be suspended to allow Dr. Amy Fierstein to accept the proclamation and provide remarks.

Hearing no objection, the council rules are suspended.

And I'm gonna go ahead and hand it over to Dr. Fierstein to accept the proclamation and make remarks on behalf of the recipients of this proclamation.

Welcome and good to meet you and good to hear from you today.

Thank you all so much for having me today.

First, I'd like to say thank you to the mayor and all of you council members in the city of Seattle for recognizing Childhood Cancer Awareness Month in September.

We truly appreciate your support.

It really allows the children we work with and their families to know that they are remembered and cared for, especially in extenuating circumstances like we've had the last couple of years across the country.

So again, thank you.

It's through raising awareness that there have been so many advances in childhood cancer over the last years and decades.

Raising awareness about childhood cancer allows organizations such as American Cancer Fund for Children and Kids Cancer Connection to be able to provide for these families when they're going through such a difficult time.

So I just wanted again to say thank you for your time and supporting these brave and courageous children.

Thank you so much for all of your important work in our community and really appreciate the opportunity to acknowledge that important work.

And of course, acknowledge the bravery and the courage of these children who survive and live with cancer every day.

And of course, their family.

So thank you so much for being with us.

Really appreciate it and look forward to continued partnership between us and you all.

As do we.

Thank you so much, Doctor.

Thanks so much for being with us.

OK, colleagues, we're going to move to the second presentation.

We have another guest with us.

It is none other than Mr. Lenny Wilkins, who is being recognized in item 5, resolution 32019, which provides an honorary designation of Thomas Street between 1st Avenue North and 2nd Avenue North as Lenny Wilkins Way.

Council Member Peterson is going to provide some opening remarks, and then I'll open up the floor to comments.

After comments, we will move to suspend the rules to hear brief remarks from Mr. Wilkins.

And at this point, I'm going to hand it over to Council Member Peterson to provide some opening remarks.

Thank you, Council President.

Colleagues, this resolution originated with our Seattle Department of Transportation and will convey an honorary designation of Lenny Wilkins Way onto Thomas Street between 1st Avenue North and 2nd Avenue North in order to celebrate the basketball legend.

The Transportation Committee unanimously recommends passage of SDOT's resolution, which is later on today's agenda.

And I'm hoping Lenny Wilkins' way helps to lead the way to several honorary streets around Seattle Center, such as for Lauren Jackson of the Seattle Storm and other superstars.

As many of you know, Lenny Wilkins was not only an award-winning professional basketball star in Seattle and across the nation, but also an inspirational coach and leader.

His leadership was instrumental when, in 1979, the Sonics went all the way and won the NBA Finals.

Eleni Wilkins continues to live in and serve the Seattle community as the founder and chair of the Eleni Wilkins Foundation for Children, where he has raised over $7.5 million for disadvantaged youth in Seattle.

And we are, I think we're trying to get Dr. Wilkins on the line here to speak.

Good afternoon.

Great, thank you so much, Councilmember Peterson.

I do have to suspend the rules before we can hear from Dr. Wilkins, but give me just a moment to do that procedure and we'll make it happen.

Are there any additional comments on this item before I suspend the rules?

I'm not hearing any, so if there's no objection, the council rules will be suspended to allow Mr. Wilkins to provide brief remarks.

Hearing no objection, the council rules are now suspended, and I want to welcome Lenny Wilkins to our city council meeting.

And I'm going to go ahead and hand it over to him to provide the council and members of the viewing public some brief remarks.

Well, thank you for letting me be a part of this.

I haven't heard Dr. Wilkins in such a long time.

I mean, I remember getting that honorary degree, but it's nice to know that it still exists.

I just want to say thank you.

Thank you for having us.

Thank you for this great honor.

As a youngster, I was taught always to give back to your community, and certainly Seattle has been a wonderful community, and I give a lot of credit to my wife, especially Marilyn, who has always pushed me to give back.

To a couple of ladies, I would feel remiss if I never mentioned their name, who I met when I first came here.

One was Dr. Blanche Lavizio, who ran the Odessa Brown Clinic at that time.

and another lady by the name of Freddie Mae Gaultier, who was very active in the community.

And when she showed me what the Odessa Brown Clinic did for young people, they didn't have to say it but once, because I believe that young people are our future.

They're tomorrow's doctors, lawyers, politicians, athletes.

They're our future.

And if we make sure that our community is secure and these people have a place in making it better, then it will be better.

So I want to thank you.

I want to you know, I don't want to take up all your time, but I want to say that this certainly is an honor for me and my family and and all my friends, because I wouldn't be here without them.

So thank you so much.

Thank you so much, Mr. Wilkins, for those wonderful remarks and reminder of how important it is to give back to our community.

We really appreciate an opportunity to recognize the contributions you have made to our community and look forward to being able to consider the resolution in our agenda further along today.

So thank you so much for being with us.

Appreciate your time and your comments.

Okay, folks, we're gonna go ahead and move to approval of the minutes.

The minutes of the city council meeting of September 13th, 2021 have been reviewed.

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

Hearing no objection, the minutes are being signed.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the minutes?

If there is no objection, the introduction and referral calendar will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the introduction and referral calendar is adopted.

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

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Colleagues, at this time, we will open the remote public comment period for items on the City Council agenda, introduction and referral calendar, and the Council's work program.

As a reminder, there is a separate public hearing on Council Bill 120157 relating to affordable housing on on property owned or controlled by religious organizations.

That public hearing will begin after the conclusion of this general public comment period.

I want to thank everyone for their ongoing patience and cooperation as we continue to operate this remote public comment system.

It does remain our strong intent to have remote public comment regularly included on meeting agendas.

However, as a reminder, the city council reserves the right to end or eliminate these public comment periods at any point if we deem that the system is being abused or is no longer suitable for allowing our meetings to be conducted efficiently and effectively.

I'll moderate the public comment period in the following manner.

The public comment period for this meeting was scheduled to be 20 minutes with each speaker having up to two minutes to speak.

However, we have over 50 people, I think we're almost over 60 people at this point for the public comment today.

In an effort to hear from as many, if not all of those individuals who signed up for public comment, I'm going to extend the public comment period but shorten the amount of time provided to each person from two minutes to one minute.

This should allow us to hear from just about everyone who pre-registered for public comment.

So if there's no objection, the public comment period will be extended to a total of 60 minutes for today.

Hearing no objection, the public comment period is extended to 60 minutes.

I'll call on speakers in the order in which they pre-registered to provide public comment on our website.

Speakers must call in from the phone number used for this registration and using the meeting phone number ID and passcode that was emailed to them upon confirmation.

This number is different than the general meeting listen, line, call-in information.

Once I call your name, staff will unmute your microphone.

You're going to hear a prompt of you have been unmuted.

After you hear that prompt, please press star six before speaking so we can hear you.

Please start by stating your name, the item that you are addressing, and then you are welcome to give us your public comment.

Please remember that your comment should relate to an item on today's agenda, the introduction referral calendar, or the council's work program.

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

Once you hear the chime, please begin to wrap up your comment.

If you don't end your comments at the end of the one minute you've been allotted, your microphone will be muted to allow us to call on the next speaker.

Once you've completed your public comment, please disconnect from the line.

And if you plan to continue allowing this meeting, excuse me, if you continue following this meeting, you can do so via Seattle Channel or the listening options listed on the agenda.

public comment period is now open.

We're gonna go ahead and begin with the first speaker on the list.

Again, after you hear the prompt of you have been unmuted, you have to press star six first before we can hear you.

So the first speaker is Howard Gale, followed by Jonah Silverstein.

Good afternoon, Howard Gale, District 7. In support of the bill before you today to end Seattle police training in countries that violate human rights, I, as a Jew with family and friends in Israel, would like to help you better understand the people you will hear from today who claim to be against this bill and claim to be defending Israel.

You will hear repeatedly that this bill is really designed to single out Israel.

Well, this bill does not single out Israel.

This decades-old form of sophistry is used against anyone and anything that tries to hold Israel accountable for human rights violations.

Countries, like people, always need to be held accountable for the wrongs they commit.

No individual anywhere has successfully argued before a court that they should be immune from prosecution because there are people out there that have committed worse crimes.

Neither should countries.

The folks making these absurd arguments stand against the efforts of Israeli human rights workers to make Israel a better country.

pass this legislation and hold all countries to the same standard.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Jonah Silverstein, and then after Jonah will be Daniel Kavanaugh.

Okay, Jonah, if you're with us, you need to press star six so we can hear you.

There you go.

Sorry, can you hear me?

Yep, we can hear you.

Go ahead.

Hi, I'm Jonah.

I am a resident of District 3 and I'm a student at the University of Washington.

I'm a proud Jewish constituent and a proud member of Congregation B'Esholam in Seattle.

I am calling in support of CB 121.42, which would end SPD trainings with countries that consistently violate human rights.

I wanted to make it clear that I support the amendment pushed by Council Member Solant, which would make this legislation much more coherent and set a standard for international law and human rights around the world that SPD could not find a loophole for.

And you're going to hear a lot today from people who are against this legislation, who say that this is singling out Israel and that the SPD needs to train with countries that violate human rights.

And that is false.

And I completely reject it, support this bill.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Next up is Daniel Kavanaugh.

Wait for Daniel to get on the line here.

Hey, my name's Dan.

I live in First Hill.

I'm a renter.

Dan, can I interrupt you just really quickly?

Sure, yeah.

So I have you registered as both wanting to give comment in general public comment, but also related to the public hearing, which is a different council.

Yeah, you can just put me down for general public comment because I just wasn't sure what that meant.

Yeah, understandable.

Go ahead.

Go ahead.

Yeah, go ahead and start over the clock.

Yeah, my name is Dan.

I'm a renter in first hell, and I'm a member of Socialist Alternative, and I really want to say thank you to the hundreds of rank and file activists and organizers within the Deadly Exchange.

Full Astana Yacht, Jewish Voice for Peace, the Seattle Education Association, Socialist Alternative, Democratic Socialists of America, and Councilmember Sawant's office, who have been fighting to ban Seattle police from training with nation states that have violated internationally agreed upon basic human rights.

And I also want to thank Council Members Morales and Mosqueda for announcing today that you are co-sponsoring this legislation.

But I, you know, I actually just learned that Council Member Strauss is proposing a hostile amendment to this bill that would create a giant loophole.

His amendment would allow some of the worst human rights violators to train with Seattle Police Department.

So I think Council Members should roundly reject this.

And you know vote no on Strauss's amendment but vote yes on Sawant's amendments that are also supported by Morales and Mosqueda.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Peter Condit followed by Shelby Handler.

Good afternoon.

This is Peter Condit in District 6. I'm calling to ask City Council to pass the end of the Deadly Exchange Bill, CB-120-142, today and adopt Councilmember Swann's amendments, which makes the policy its strongest and most coherent.

SPD should never train with countries that have demonstrated violations of human rights.

Passing this bill is an easy way for our city to demonstrate respect for the human rights and dignity of all people.

We need to invest in community, not racist and militarized policing.

This legislation will also be precedent-setting.

The crisis of racist policing is present all over the U.S., and we know other cities are looking for good models for common-sense policy like this.

Let's be sure Seattle serves as that model.

Thank you, and I yield my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Shelby Handler, followed by Samaya Saliba.

Hi there, my name is Shelby Handler and I'm a proud Jewish renter from District 2 and a member of Kadima Reconstructionist Synagogue.

And I'm also calling on council to pass CB 120-142 today.

I know that you all agree that Seattle should be a city that honors the human rights and dignity of all residents.

So are you ready to really walk that talk and pass this bill?

And don't get distracted by any arguments about hypothetical trainings that SPD will miss out on.

It is common sense and really clear that SPD should not train with any countries that are under investigation for genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, no matter the content or topic.

And I know that you all can get on board with this and really do what we want this city to be about, which is honoring the dignity of all residents and all people.

So please pass it and pass Council Member Sawant's amendment.

Thank you all so much.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Samaya Saliba and and then after Samaya will be Navette Basker.

Hi my name is Samaya Saliba.

I'm a resident of District 3 and I'm calling in support of CB 12142 to end the deadly exchange.

I also urge you to adopt Council Member Sawant's amendment to make the policy as strong and coherent as possible.

We know that a safe and healthy Seattle must be grounded in our city's respect for the human rights and dignity of all people.

SPD has already shown documented patterns of violence and racism in our undercourt supervision for excessive force and racially biased policing.

The current exchanges with militaries such as the Israeli military the second most common destination for these trainings after Canada are an opportunity for SPD to exchange worst practices.

Worst practices for the Israeli military means decades of documented human rights violations surveillance and torture practices.

This violence has no place anywhere, but we can make sure it does not become common practice here.

We must stop using our resources to support violations of international law.

Instead, we should invest in Black-led, community-led safety.

Investing in community makes us safe, not racist, and militarized policing.

Please support CD1-2142 with Council Member Sawant's amendment.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Nivet Basker, followed by Maxima Patashnik.

Councilmember Herbold and the Public Safety and Human Services Committee rejected the original anti-Israel bill, anti-Israel version of Council Bill 120142. Instead, they banned SPD cooperation with multiple international police forces.

Now Councilmember Sawant found another way to attack Israel.

Her underhanded amendments redefined the scope of investigation and jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court to apply it to Israel.

which was always the intended target.

Council Member Sawant is inventing international law creating an imaginary human rights doctrine and applying global treaties in ways they were never intended simply to vilify the world's one Jewish state.

If passed this bill will be weaponized against Israel again making the Seattle Jewish community a target for anti-Semitism.

Please reject the proposed amendments and the unnecessary Council Bill 120142. Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Maxima Patishnik, followed by Jeremy Voss.

Maxima, just remember to press star six.

I'm still seeing that you are muted.

So I will need you to press star six in order to unmute yourself.

Still not able to hear you, Maxima.

Try star six one more time.

Okay, let's, let's move to Jeremy Voss, and then we will struggle back to Maxline and see if we can work through these technology issues.

Go ahead, Jeremy.

And then, Jeremy, I am showing that you are unmuted, but maybe your actual device is muted.

Oh, yes, you're right.

Thanks.

Hi, my name is Jeremy Voss.

I'm a Jewish resident of District 2 that grew up in the Sioux Park community.

I'm speaking in favor of CD 120.142 to end the deadly exchange.

Also, please support Council Member Sawant's amendment that would clarify and strengthen the rules of this legislation so that SPD cannot use any loopholes.

to continue these hurtful trainings.

These trainings are bad both for the indigenous communities of partner countries as well as for Seattle BIPOC.

They're a place where SPD can sharpen and extend their brutality, surveillance, and suppression of Seattle protesters.

And even to the extent that a theoretical training could not include tactics, they still legitimize the brutality of both countries by treating both countries as groups that the other can look up to.

So yeah, please support Sawant's amendment to strengthen the rules of this legislation and support the legislation as a whole.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Okay, let's see if we can get Maxima on the line and hear from Maxima.

Okay, Maxima showing up is not present now on my end.

So we're going to go ahead and move to Clara Prezant, followed by Dante Miola.

Go ahead.

Hi, my Hi, my name is Clara Prezant.

I'm a Jewish resident of District Two that also grew up in the Seward Park community.

And I'm speaking in favor of the Bill 120-142, and specifically Council Member Sawant's proposed amendment to it, which would make it legally enforceable and close any loopholes that would allow SPD to continue these trainings.

These trainings connect our city to the international community around the issues, around the abuses of human rights and the mistreatment of minority groups.

And they militarize the SPD even further which endangers our own community and specifically the BIPOC members of our community.

So the council has an opportunity in this moment to create legislation that can be used to help our city end this and also can be used as a model for other cities around the country to end the deadly exchange.

So the council should vote yes on Bill 121.42 and specifically should support council members to want amendment to it, which strengthens its legal coherence.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Dante Maiola followed by Amanda Foreman.

Good afternoon.

My name is Dante Maiola from District 6 and I am speaking in support of Council Bill 120142. This bill like many many others have said really is common sense.

SPD should never be training with militaries, police, surveillance, or security forces of countries with grave violations of human rights.

I don't believe there is a scenario where Seattle police increase public safety by training abroad with other armed forces.

And it's very important to not leave loopholes in that, because SPD has trained before, and I'm certain they will again unless we prevent it.

No matter what name is given to the exchanges, they are dangerous and unnecessary at best.

So let's be sure this policy can be the strongest possible model legislation that is clear and coherent.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Amanda Foreman, followed by Alicia Lewis.

Hi there.

My name is Amanda.

I live in District 4 and I'm speaking in support also of CD 120-142 which would make it illegal for the Seattle Police Department to train with any country that violates human rights.

As a Jewish Seattle resident who supports a free Palestine it's extremely upsetting to hear people call this bill that would protect the rights of Seattle residents and persecuted Palestinians anti-Semitic.

It is not.

We cannot fight the real and deep threat of anti-Semitism if we falsely equate protecting human rights with anti-Semitism and I urge City Council members to recognize this.

Please pass Council Member Sawant's amendment and reject Council Member Straus' amendment that would create loopholes.

We need to take seriously the harm that SPD and police across this country have caused to Black and Brown communities and sending police to training countries that have violated human rights according to international law reinforces that the use the idea that the use of violence against communities is okay.

We need to move away from militarized policing and said our city should invest in community-led solutions for safety.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Alicia Lewis followed by Blythe Serrano.

Alicia, I see that you are unmuted.

Just make sure that your actual phone device is also unmuted.

Oh, now you are muted.

So press star six, and then make sure your actual phone is also off of mute.

Alicia, one more time, press star six.

See if we can get you back.

OK, I am not seeing Alicia come up on my end, so we are going to.

Move on to Blythe Serrano and then I think we need to try Maxima again.

Maxima is now showing up as present, so let's let's hear from Blythe next.

Welcome.

Hi, my name is Blythe.

I rent and work in the central district, and I'm calling in to urge the committee, the council, to support the legislation banning Seattle police from training with countries that have violated international human rights.

I want to particularly urge all council members to support the two amendments that council member has brought forward, which are co-sponsored by council members Mosqueda and Morales, which make it clear that human rights abuses occur not just within a nation's borders, but also within territories it occupies.

I also urge the Council to reject Councilmember Strauss's last-minute amendment, which would create a giant loophole and allow SPD to train with Israeli police in Israel or here in the United States, which is how these deadly exchanges frequently happen.

It is particularly outrageous that Councilmember Strauss brought this amendment forward at 2 p.m.

today after all of these months of discussion in an attempt to prevent our movement from being able to respond.

Again, I urge the Council to support this legislation without Councilmember Strauss's and stand in solidarity with those who oppose police violence against Black Americans and Palestinians alike.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Let's try MaxMak, caller number 11, and see if we can work out those technology issues.

OK, MaxMak, I show you on my screen.

There we go.

You are unmuted.

Go for it.

MaxMak?

resident of District 2 and speaking this afternoon on behalf of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle in opposition to Council Bill 120142. We believe that every.

Safety for this measure is not the solution to disproportionate police violence against black and brown people including black and brown Jews.

While we appreciate attempts to improve the bill through amendments it's still deeply flawed and potentially harmful.

The definitions of training and partnership are still vague.

leaving room for unintended consequences.

Second the criteria to ban police exchanges still prohibits SPD from working with other U.S. law enforcement agencies which is problematic.

And lastly while a specific reference to Israel has been removed it's clear the intent behind this law and legislation is to find a way for Seattle to boycott Israel not to improve the real and current problems with Seattle's police police.

Please vote no.

Thanks for calling in today.

Let's see if we can get Alicia Lewis back on the line.

And then there we go.

We can hear you.

Okay, great.

Yeah, my name's Alicia Lewis.

I'm also calling to demand that City Council listen to hundreds of rank-and-file organizers, including Jewish Voices for Peace, by passing the Edley and the Deadly Exchange legislation with Councilmember Sawant's amendment, and also rejecting the last-minute amendment from Councilmember Strauss that would significantly undermine this legislation.

This amendment would allow the SPD to train with police and the And I think it's really outrageous that Council Member Strauss brought this amendment at 2 p.m.

today after months of discussion.

I really urge all of the council members to reject this amendment that would do the bidding of the ADL and the Zionist forces.

The council needs to take a strong stand for the human rights.

Thank you for calling.

Next up is going to be Margo Stewart followed by Sonia Ponath.

Hi my name's Margo.

I work in Renton District 3 and I'm also calling in support of the ban on Seattle Police training with nations with a history of human rights violations put forward by council members want in solidarity with hundreds of rank and file activists and community members.

I support the members that Fawcett has put forward, which closed dangerous loopholes, and I'm pleased to hear that council members Morales and Mosqueda have done the same.

And I strongly oppose Strauss's last-minute maneuver, which would amend the bill to allow SPD to train with human rights abusers so long as it takes place on U.S. soil.

As Lisa just said, we know the ADA will sponsor such training.

I think all council members should reject this attack on the movement for police accountability, because that's what's at the core of this question, you know, who are the police accountable to?

Since George Floyd last year, the Democratic establishment has utterly failed to hold police accountable.

And I think if ordinary people are going to feel safe in their communities, they should have a clear Democratic say in how their police are being trained, what officers are hired and fired, and how budgeting decisions are carried out.

So I think we need full community control over the police like Ben fought for in Pittsburgh, Philly, and Chicago.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Sonia Ponath, followed by Henry Luke.

Hi this is Sonia Ponap.

I wanted to thank all the activists who've been organizing with Council Member Sawant's office to ban Seattle Police from training with nation states that have violated these internationally agreed upon basic human rights.

And I really want to thank C.M.' 's Morales and Mosqueda that you are co-sponsoring this legislation along with C.M.

Sawant and have also agreed to co-sponsor the amendments put forward by C.M.

Sawant.

and emerging the entire council to vote yes on this legislation and to amendments.

However, I'm deeply concerned that CM Strauss is proposing a hostile amendment to this bill that's going to create a giant loophole.

His amendment would allow the SPD to train with the police from even the worst human rights violators around the world.

And honestly, it's really outrageous that Council Member Strauss brought this amendment so late after months of discussion.

It's really typical of democratic establishment maneuvers and doing the bidding of the ADL and Zionist forces.

We really need community control over the police now.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Henry Luke followed by Mary Seipred.

Hello.

I'm here on behalf of Unaccompanied South Seattle a local Filipino youth and student organization.

We're here to say we stand with our comrades in the Denli Exchange in Palestinia, and we wholeheartedly support the introduction of legislation banning SBD training with the IDF and other foreign militaries who are well documented for their violations of human rights, international humanitarian law, and the Geneva Convention.

Unless the intention is to train SBD to violate human rights and commit war crimes, There is no reason to send them to train with countries who are internationally recognized and condemned for doing so.

We are confident that it will be remembered who was on the right and the wrong side of history.

And the deadly exchange passed council member Sawant's amendment stopped the violations of human rights from Seattle to the Philippines.

Thanks.

Thank you for calling in today.

Before I call the next speaker, I just want to note that we do have several speakers who are showing up as not present.

On my list that were signed up previously, we have Nishan Burns showing up as not present.

We have Trevona Thompson-Wiley also showing up as not present on my list.

Again, if you are listening, please double check that you are calling in to the right number with the ID and password given to you in your email confirmation and that you are using the exact number that you used to register to call into that that information.

If you call in, I'll make sure you have your your one minute.

OK, next up is Aisha Mansour.

Followed by Sonia Ponath.

And Aisha you are muted so you need to make sure you press star 6 to unmute yourself.

There you go.

Hi my name is Aisha.

I'm a resident of Seattle and a founder of Palestinia and a core organizer with Seattle's and the Deadly Exchange.

I'm calling to urge you all to support CB 120 142 and the three amendments made by Kshama Sawant today to the legislation.

Dan Strauss's amendment includes the police within security agencies, then we absolutely stand by this amendment.

So if Dan can recirculate this, we absolutely support it.

If not, we would like to remind you all that you received a legal analysis by the Center of Constitutional Rights this morning indicating the importance of implementing the Rome Statue as a standard for human rights.

This statue created the ICC, so it goes hand in hand with Lisa's amendment that she made last week.

Please support CB 1242. Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Sonia.

Oh, I'm sorry.

We just did that.

Next up is Miri Seipred, followed by Carolyn Hathaway.

Hi, my name is Miri Cypers.

On behalf of the Anti-Defamation League, we strongly oppose CB120142.

This ordinance has unintended consequences for public safety.

Many countries would be restricted from partnering with SPD, and the term partnership is ill-defined and theoretically could prohibit SPD from extraditing foreign nationals, communicating with foreign law enforcement on sensitive public safety matters, liaising with law enforcement of local embassies and sharing best practices.

Additionally the U.S. does not recognize the International Criminal Court essentially creating a situation in which Seattle would recognize the jurisdiction of an international body the U.S. government has rejected.

We hope our leaders including law enforcement are collaborative open minded and innovative when it comes to our challenging issues.

Instead this ordinance speaks to stifle and cut Seattle's law enforcement off at a time of needed collaboration.

I also just want to note, in a time of heightened anti-Semitism and bigotry, the many references...

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Carolyn Hathaway, followed by Kimberly Nesta.

Carolyn, just make sure you press star six.

And for those of you who are waiting to get into a public comment, you have to hit star six after you hear the prompt that you have been unmuted.

So Carolyn, I'm still showing that you are muted.

If you press star six, hopefully we'll be able to hear you.

Still not able to hear Carolyn.

Let's move on to Kimberly Nesta and we will circle back to Karen.

Oh, I think we might have to go ahead.

You can hear me now.

OK, my name is Carolyn Hathaway.

I would like to ask you to please refer those last minute amendments proposed by council members who want this morning back to the committee.

These amendments substantially change the ordinance and they do require discussion.

It's not right that the amendments were not available for public viewing until this morning.

With those amendments the City of Seattle foreign policy is not just contrary to the United States Department of State but also conflict with the United Nations ordinance.

The amendments widened its application to include many more countries such as India and the United States.

It's an unfair and it's dangerous to religious communities.

Evidence is clear that this kind of ordinance has increased anti-Semitism locally and in other parts of the country.

It's disingenuous.

Please vote no or at least refer the last minute amendments back to the committee.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Kimberly Nesta followed by Eliana Horne.

Hi can you hear me.

We can.

Thank you.

My name is Kim Nesta and I live in District 3. I'm also calling in support of CB 120.142 prohibiting the SPD from participating in training programs with foreign security forces that violate human rights.

And I urge you to include Amendment B in the final legislation.

I'm supporting this ordinance because I'm concerned about the negative effects that the militarization of police forces has on the human rights in our communities.

And I don't think that Seattle should normalize relations with any forces that are committing human rights violations.

It's worrying to me that the SPD does participate in training programs with organizations like this, such as the Israeli Security Forces, when these organizations are enforcing a brutal occupation that violates human rights.

I've been to Israel and occupied territories and witnessed some of the violence, oppression of peaceful protesters, mass surveillance, and incarceration of Palestinian people.

So I really urge the council to support this bill and protect human rights around the world.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up is Eliana Horne, followed by Nikhil Lonberg.

Hi, my name is Eliana Horne from District 2, and I'm speaking in support of Council Bill 121-42, ending Seattle Police training with any country committing international human rights violations.

I'm a Jewish resident of Seattle and defendant of Holocaust survivors, speaking out in support of this bill and urging you to accept council members the Wants Amendment, which builds on the items made in committee with small changes that will make a big difference in the legislation being clear, coherent, and enforceable.

The crisis of racist and militarized policing is true all over the US and continues in Seattle.

This this bill is a common sense and really a bare minimum policy given Seattle City Council's commitment to end racist and militarized policing.

This will this bill will ensure that Seattle police are not learning worst practices from human rights abusers.

This bill is not anti-Semitic and will not result in increased targeting of Jewish community as the really minimal commentators have claimed.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Nikhil Lomberg, followed by Stephanie Fox.

Nikhil, you are still muted, so you'll need to press star six to unmute yourself.

There you go.

And then you just need to make sure that your actual device is not muted.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Hi, my name is Nikhil Lundberg.

I live in District 2 and I'm speaking today in support of Council Bill 120-142.

I'll share a brief anecdote from my time in Israel.

I was speaking with a Jewish-Israeli citizen about our different cultures and he said the following to me.

In Israel, our police can detain suspicious Arab boys without fear of being criticized.

How can you feel safe in America if your police are afraid to do the same to black boys.

I share this disturbing quote with everyone as a reminder that our fight for racial justice for community justice is an international one.

Passing 120-142 is a moral imperative.

A required commitment to Seattle's constituents that plainly acknowledges that police fraternization with genocidal government makes us less safe.

I advocate for the bill to be passed in its most coherent and enforceable form.

which I believe needs to include Council Member Stanley's amendment and cannot include Council Member Strauss's amendment.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Stephanie Fox, followed by Purcell Johnson.

Hi, this is Stephanie.

I'm the executive director of JVP, which is a Jewish Voice for Peace, which is a multiracial intergenerational movement of Jews with hundreds of thousands of supporters and members across the country, and with a chapter here in Seattle for 15 years, and thousands of members here.

I'm calling on behalf of those constituents in very strong support of CB1-2142 and the three amendments from Councilmember Sawant that would strengthen the bill with small edits, making for a stronger, more legally coherent policy.

Over the past week, I've spoken with at least a dozen renowned experts in international humanitarian law, including multiple lawyers who've argued before the very bodies we're discussing.

And they all agree that this bill and Sam Sawant's amendments are strong baseline policy to begin reflecting our stated commitment to the human rights and dignity of all people in Seattle and around the world.

The exclusions in the bill and in Sam Sawant's amendment let's be very clear establish only a bare minimum.

They address violations of the gravest crimes of concern to the international community including genocide war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Banning trainings with these forces is simple.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Purcell Johnson, followed by Benjamin Danielson.

My name is Purcell Johnson, and I'm president of Castle Incorporated in Bellevue, Washington.

I served with Lenny Wilkins as a lieutenant in the U.S.

Army at Fort Lee, Virginia in 1960. Because of his commitment to young people as an Army Lieutenant, Lenny has been recently nominated and accepted to the U.S.

Army Quartermaster Hall of Fame.

I would like to commend the Council for recognizing Lenny for all that he has done for the youth of Seattle.

Lenny's devotion to the youth has been very special, donating from his foundation millions of dollars to Odessa Brown Children's Clinic from his days as a player to today.

Kudos to you for your recognition.

Thank you so much for calling in today.

Next up is Benjamin Danielson followed by Abby Brooke.

Hi my name is Ben Danielson.

I'm a pediatrician and I was the director of the Odessa Brown Children's Clinic and I just want to lift up my voice along with Purcell and so many others in support of Lenny Wilkins.

Coach has lifted up and guided and supported and inspired Seattle for over half a century.

That's who he is thanks to the lessons of his childhood from his mother who told him to let honesty and integrity define his character and from his neighborhood residents like Jackie Robinson.

We taught him that you had to complement your talents with character and intelligence in order to make a difference in the world.

Now Lenny has received way too many professional accolades to mention in this timeframe but for Coach I think the gifts and honors you receive also have to be matched by the gifts and honors you bestow on others.

And that's what he's done for Seattle.

Lifting up our future.

Lifting up our youth.

That's his true life's work which is the greatest gift any municipality should hope to receive.

A street will carry everyone forward towards their future.

It's most well-known and it's most unseen.

Coach is that way, too.

I've seen him show up for the most famous person, but also when a teenager needed guidance.

Now, if it were up to me, we would name the whole city in his honor.

But a street is also having its own special significance.

I picture street signs with his name on them, reminding us what integrity and character truly mean.

A street reminding us that we are a city made even greater by the greatest, like Lenny Wilkins.

A street getting you that much closer to your future, no matter who you are.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in, Dr. Danielson.

Next up is Abby Brooke followed by Tazur Shupak.

Abby, I show that you're on the line.

I just need you to press star six.

Can you hear me?

Yep, go ahead.

Okay.

Hi my name is Abby Brooke.

I'm a Jewish resident of District 3 and I'm speaking today in support of Council Bill 120142. This ordinance is in line with all of the calls for defunding and demilitarizing over the past year and it would be a shame to miss this opportunity to show Seattle's commitment to its residents' safety.

This is simple.

SPD should not be training in any capacity with countries under investigation for genocide war crimes and crimes against humanity.

or any countries that have not committed to condemn these things by not ratifying their own statute.

We must vote in support today of Council Bill 120142 and Seanless Amendment or any amendments that will ban training with police and military of countries that violate human rights.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Tazur Shupak, and I am showing that Michael Malini is not present, so we will move on to Nina Kranzdorf.

But first, we will hear from Tazur.

Hello, my name is Tazur Shupak.

I was born and raised in Seward Park, and I'm a current resident of District 4. I'm a Jewish resident of Seattle.

I speak to support the Amendment 12142 because it helps prevent for future cooperation between violators of human rights.

As a Jew that has been to Israel, has family members in Israel, and was educated in international human rights law in Israel, I can tell you that this nation is fully compliant with international human rights and recognizes the jurisdictional authority of the ICC as it has decided itself.

It is also not anti-Semitic in any way to uphold any country or group of people to their international human rights obligations, despite the fact that they might not want those obligations to be upheld, as the United States and Israel have rescinded from the International Criminal Court and the Rome Statute.

That does not mean that they are off the hook for their violations.

Please pass this legislation, along with the Kshama Sawant Amendment, which closes the loopholes and rejects Strauss's

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Nina Cranstaff, followed by Tamar Wilson.

Okay, Nina, you just gotta press star six so we can hear you.

Hi this is Nina Kranzdorf.

I am a resident of District a Jewish resident of District 6 and speaking today in support of Council Bill 121-42.

I would also like to speak in support of Shama's amendments that add ratification of the Rome Statute as a necessary qualification for SPD training.

This amendment is actually in line with Herbold's amendment in public safety which uses the ICC as the basis for humanitarian law.

According to international law expert and attorney Katherine Gowder Shama's amendments make this legislation in much stronger alignment with international law and must be adopted.

This bill is common sense and we do not need the FBD training with any foreign military, any police, any security forces or intelligence agencies that are violating in any country or violating international law.

This is illogical for the militarization of police and human rights in Seattle.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Tamar Wilson followed by Susan Kopelman.

Hello, council members.

My name is Tamar Wilson.

I live in Beacon Hill and I work in the Central District and I'm also a Black Lives Matter organizer.

Thank you for allowing me to speak in support of council members who want two amendments to end the Deadly Exchange and thank you to council members Morales and Mosqueda for co-sponsoring.

I also want to say thank you to the hundreds of Rakefell activists with Deadly in the Deadly Exchange Jewish Voice for Jewish Voice for Peace Socialist Alternative and DSA for helping to fight this battle.

Last year's historic protest put a spotlight on the role of the police in the state under an exploitative system of capitalism.

In many Democratic Party controlled cities like Seattle the police were allowed to carry out brutal and violent repression and peaceful protests.

And Seattle is the only city in the country, thanks to Council Member Sawant, that police were temporarily banned from using such oppressive tactics on protesters.

For the last eight years, SPD has sent top officers to Israel to train, and many human rights organizations have confirmed that the Israeli government is heading an apartheid state and currently aggressively committing human rights violations against the Palestinian people.

In the past four years, SPD has killed 11 people, and it's clear that we don't need SPD learning whatever apartheid and human rights abuses tactics

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Susan Koppelman followed by Debra Misaki.

Susan Koppelman, Council Bill 120142 and the three amendments from Council Member Sawant.

So once amendments one and three merely delete a word and add in a few phrases, but these small changes will make a big difference in the legislation being legally clear, coherent, and enforceable.

Herbold Amendment, which passed on Tuesday, does some good things.

It sets the ICC as the standard of human rights to determine SPD training partners.

It is a no-brainer and makes perfect policy sense to add the treaty that created the ICC to the list of human rights treaties already included in the bill that passed out of committee.

Like with ratification of the treaties on civil and political rights and economic, social and...

Ratification of the Rome Statute, which created the ICC, is a simple and easily verifiable criterion.

Reject red herring arguments about hypothetical...

Thank you for calling in today.

Deborah Misaki, followed by Kelly Johnson.

Hi, my name is Deborah Misaki, and I am a Jewish resident in District 2. My family is from both Eastern Europe and Iran, and all branches of my family have had to immigrate to either the US or to Israel.

due to persecution or the threat of persecution.

I'm calling today to speak to urge you to pass CD-1 21-42 to end deadly police exchanges with all foreign military and police forces of countries that violate human rights.

It's time to invest our energies and resources on making the people and communities of Seattle more safe.

And that does not include using tax dollars to send members of SPD to train with the military and police forces of countries who are violating human rights, sharing tactics and practices of oppression.

Serious, thoughtful, and meaningful investment in our communities is what brings us all safety.

And I thank you all for doing the right thing and supporting the human rights of people.

Thank you.

Next up is Kelly Johnson.

And I'm showing that Shani Zuniga is not present.

So then we will then hear from Jade Jost.

Okay so Kelly Johnson is next.

Star 6.

Hi my name is Kelly Johnson.

I am a Jewish resident of District 2 and I am calling to express my support for Council Bill 120-142.

Passing this bill explicitly commits our city to the safety respect and dignity of all community members.

We've seen over and over again the crisis of racist and militarized policing in our city and throughout the U.S.

We need to take seriously the violence committed at the hands of the SPD.

Human rights violators are not representative of best practices.

This is common sense and we should not be collaborating with them in any way shape or form.

This is why it's imperative that we pass this bill with Council Member Sawant's amendment as it makes it makes the policy its strongest and most coherent.

I strongly urge you to pass this bill and demonstrate your commitment to the safety of the Seattle community and your rejection of violent and racist policing.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is going to be back here to looks like we have Cricket Keating followed by Jade Jost.

Hi my name is Cricket Keating and I live in District 2 and I'm speaking in support of the bill 120142. I urge the council members to please pass this bill.

It's an easy way for our city to demonstrate respect for the human rights and dignity of all people.

And it's common sense as well.

SPD should never trade with militaries or with the police surveillance and security forces of countries with grave violations of human rights.

So please pass this bill.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Jade, followed by Linda Seltzer.

Hi there.

My name is Jade, and I'm calling from the Central District in support of Bill 120142. So we need to pass this bill to stop upholding the racist violence of colonialism and its impacts across the globe.

I do not believe the people of Seattle would agree to letting Seattle Police Department train with the military rooted in ethnic cleansing and occupying land that is not theirs to begin with.

Not to mention the absolute torture Israeli Israeli military carries out on Palestinians on a daily basis.

This bill that this bill will set a precedent along with the amendments from Council Member Schwantz and make differences that are coherent and enforceable.

It can be held as a model for more cities across the United States who are seeking similar guidance in regards to military training with the Israeli Army.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is going to be Linda Seltzer.

Linda Seltzer opposing 120142 and Sawant Amendment 1. The UN and ICC and similar bodies have disproportionately targeted Israel.

This bill rigs the system and criteria to target Israel despite claims to the contrary.

Deadly exchange is a made up conspiracy theory, whitewashing the history of U.S. racism and scapegoating Israel for excessive use of force.

Read the history of the Jews in Iraq and Arab countries.

We don't hear anyone here talking about police brutality in Arab countries.

Let's hear some balanced reporting.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is, sorry, this list is rather busy, so my apologies, colleagues, as I filter through this.

The next speaker is Randy Kessler, and I'm showing Jim Silt is registered but not present, so then we will move to Randy Wilkins.

Next up is Randy Kessler, star six.

Hi, good afternoon, council.

I'm asking you today to vote no on Council Bill 120142. This misguided ordinance is based on a false narrative that too many people have accepted as truth.

The narrative blames the centuries-old issue of police brutality and racism in America on police exchange programs between America and law enforcement, and if we're being honest, only other one country is blamed, and that's Israel.

Now, since there's been zero SPD training in Israel since 2015, and there are no plans to conduct any, this ordinance wastes valuable time solving a nonexistent problem while creating a host of new public safety issues.

The ordinance would have unintended consequences that would further jeopardize public safety, such as limiting the ability of SPD to coordinate with foreign police agencies on important issues like human trafficking, or coordinating security for foreign leaders who may wish to visit Seattle.

So at a time when we have real pressing issues relating to public safety in this city please oppose this.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Randy Wilkins and then Melvin Pender.

Yes hello.

Can you hear me.

We can.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

This is Randy Wilkins calling on behalf of the Lenny Wilkins Way Street Naming.

And on behalf of the Wilkins family my mother Marilyn my sister Leisha and my sister Jamie we're grateful that my father is being honored for his longstanding service commitment and support of the Seattle community health field and sports industry for more than 50 years.

We're extremely grateful for this opportunity for him to be honored in such a way.

Thank you.

I yield back my time.

Thank you so much for calling in today.

I am showing that next is Melvin Pender and then Debbie Pender is also signed up but showing up is not present.

So let's go ahead and hear from Melvin.

Just press star six so we can hear you.

There you go.

Go ahead.

Okay, Melvin, you should be unmuted now.

Just make sure your actual device is also unmuted.

Can you hear me now?

Yep, there you go.

Can you hear me?

Yes, yes we can.

My name is Dr. Mel Pender.

I'm a two-time Olympian and a retired disabled vet, Vietnam vet.

I was able to get a job during the time that Lenny was coaching at Atlanta.

Not only did he coach the team in Atlanta, he was very busy in the community helping young people.

He's one of the top coaches that I ever met.

And also, I'd like to say that when I was in Vietnam, I followed his career.

But while in Atlanta, he showed a lot of pores and love for young people.

He was one of the top coaches and top basketball players in the history of the game.

I heard someone say he should not be named by one street, but should be named for every street in Seattle, Washington.

Thank you very much for this great honor for Williams.

Thank you so much.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Our last speaker is Manmit Singh.

who signed up for both general public comment and public hearing.

And I know it gets a little confusing when we have a couple of different options.

So let's get Manmeet Singh in the room.

And when you're ready, you can press star 6. Again, this is for general public comment.

If you have comments about the land use legislation, we'll have to ask for you to hold on those comments for that public hearing.

But for now, you can make general comments in this public comment period.

Go ahead.

You have one minute.

Cool.

Thank you.

Dear City Council members, I'm a resident of District 6. And I'm calling to ensure that Dan Strauss supports CB 120142 and the proposed amendment from, to want to ensure that the policy is strongest and most coherent to serve the general public that it has promised to serve.

As you all sit here today, you have the opportunity to make history and guide local and even state governments across the nation in adopting such a policy that is not just historic, but long overdue.

It is common sense that the police department should not be training with military, police, and other surveillance and security forces of countries with grave violations of human rights.

Now, you have this opportunity and the responsibility to demilitarize the police, and I'm asking you to be on the right side of the history and pass Council Bill 120142 with Council Member Sawant's amendment.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you for calling in.

I'm going to also call into the room now Shamir Tana.

Looks like there might have been an accidental sign up for the public hearing on that.

But the desire is to give public comment on other matters.

So let's go ahead and pull up caller number 56, Shamir Tana.

OK, Shamir, go ahead and press star 6. We'll go ahead and unmute you.

Go ahead.

Thank you for taking my call.

My name is Shanir Tan.

I'm a resident in District 7. I'm calling strong support of CB120142 to stop SPD training of militaries that are in violation of human rights according to international bodies like the UN.

These are not opinions.

This is international law.

Passing this bill is a necessary way for our city to demonstrate respect for human rights and dignity for all people.

It's common sense and there's absolutely no reason that SPD or any police matter for that matter.

should be training with militaries or police or security forces with internally documented grave violations of human rights.

I also strongly urge to adopt Council Member Sawant's amendment, which makes the policy its strongest and most coherent.

Thank you for the time.

Thank you.

Okay, I'm going to do one quick scan here.

I do appreciate your patience.

I know that it was a little confusing.

There were a couple different options for folks to sign up for public comment this morning.

I think folks got a little confused between the land use bill and the legislation that is sponsored by Councilmember Sawant.

So I just want to do one quick review here to make sure that those who wanted to give general public comment on this and not the land use bill are actually going to have an opportunity to do that before we go ahead and close out public comment.

So I'm doing a quick scan here just to double check.

Okay, I have someone who called in, who's actually wanted to call in in favor of the resolution related to the designation of Lenny Wilkins as caller number 41. That's George Northcroft.

George, why don't we go ahead and bring you into the room and give you your one minute.

Go ahead, George, we can hear you.

George, I thought we could hear you a second ago.

Now we can't.

Make sure your actual device is also unmuted.

Can you hear me now?

We can.

Go ahead, George.

OK.

Yes.

I've been blessed to have Lenny Wilkins as a very close friend and extended family member for over 40 years.

He is a gracious and inspiring man who has been recognized throughout the world as one of the greatest athletes, coaches, humanitarians, world ambassador, and advocate for children throughout his life.

It's had the opportunity to meet Nelson Mandela, Bishop Fulton Sheen, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Prince Rene of Monaco and Prince Grace Kelly, Dr. Martin Luther King, Ted Turner, Andrew Young, Maynard Jackson, Jackie Robinson, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama.

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden and Muhammad Ali and many others throughout his life.

He's been guided by his mother, Henrietta's words, your honesty and integrity to find your character.

Those that know many well know he is a spiritual man and that his life aspirations surround his dedication to his wife and three children and seven grandchildren.

He's a model, humble, very competitive, He never quits or gets discouraged.

He's cool under pressure.

He's a world ambassador with an innate passion to help less fortunate.

Thank you very much for designating Lenny Wilkins Way for Lenny Wilkins.

God bless him and you, the council.

Thank you so much for calling in today and for those wonderful remarks.

OK, we have next, it looks like Shawnee Zuniga is now with us, so let's go ahead and give Shani their one minute.

Good afternoon and thank you for the opportunity to speak as a Jewish Seattle resident.

My name is Shani Zuniga.

I am here today to implore you to vote no on the Anti-Semitic Legislation Council Bill 120142, which would prohibit SPD training with certain foreign governments.

Not only does this legislation discredit racism in our policing system, but it will prohibit our police from working with countries on very important issues such as the cooperation between Seattle Police Department and the Chinese government in combating sex trafficking.

As a woman and for that reason alone I am struggling to believe that this legislation is even being considered.

So instead of considering this legislation our elected representatives should be focusing on real policing reforms that our city desperately needs.

So please vote no on this legislation.

It will not fix the deep-rooted problems in our system of policing.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for calling in today.

Okay, folks, I'm gonna do one last scan here.

I think we have made it to our hour and also through everyone who signed up to speak on matters of general public comment.

I'm just checking in with our IT folks just to make sure there isn't anyone else in the waiting room who signed up for general public comment in the interim.

There's nobody else.

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

Okay, folks, let's go ahead and end our period of public comment.

We'll go ahead and go to other items of business on today's agenda, which is the public hearing on Council Bill 120157. Will the clerk please read the title of Council Bill 120157?

Council Bill 120157 relating to affordable housing on properties owned or controlled by religious organizations, modifying affordability requirements adopted in Ordinance 126384 and amending Section 23.42.005 of the Seattle Municipal Code and Section 10 of Ordinance 126384.

Okay, it appears that technology is not our friend today.

Just as we're about to do this, I see that Councilmember Strauss was having some need to reconnect.

It looks like Councilmember Strauss is with us again.

So before I open the public hearing on this item, I am going to go ahead and turn it over to Councilmember Strauss, who is the sponsor of this bill.

Councilmember Strauss will provide us with introductory remarks before we go ahead and hold the formal public hearing for which we do have a handful of members of the viewing public registered to make public comment.

So thank you so much.

Council Member Strauss, over to you.

Thank you Council President Gonzalez and apologies for the technological issues that we just experienced.

Just wanting to highlight that Council Bill 120157 is before us today and it makes changes to Council Bill 120081 which the City Council passed On June 28th, and this will increase the affordability requirements from 60% AMI to 80% AMI.

Council Bill 120081 implemented a new state law that allows for larger buildings than zoning would otherwise allow for affordable housing developments on sites owned or controlled by religious institutions.

The state law defined affordable housing as affordable to 80% AMI, as did the original version of Council Bill 120157, That was transmitted to Council.

The Land Use and Neighborhoods Committee considered the amendment to lower AMI requirements to 60% and decided against and rejected that amendment after hearing from stakeholders.

The full City Council ultimately passed a similar amendment and lowered the affordability requirements to 60% AMI, making Seattle's law more restrictive than the state law.

Following these votes, my office and others were contacted by churches and community organizations expressing deep concern with the amendment, which works with it, including from Nehemiah initiative, which works with historically black churches in Seattle to save the black church in the central area.

and to combat displacement.

These stakeholders shared that the 60% AMI requirement threatened the viability of church affordable housing projects, meaning that we would lose affordable housing units that would otherwise been developed under this ordinance.

Additionally, I heard that churches plan to use this ordinance in ways that are more broad than what the city council discussed during full council.

In some cases, churches may wish to build affordable housing to allow their members to return home to communities that they have already been displaced from.

Some of these members may not qualify for a 60% AMI unit and they still have been displaced.

I do not believe the city needs to micromanage how religious organizations best serve their congregations.

Finally, I was reminded of the great importance, historically and today, of the black church as more than just a religious organization.

But as Donald King, President of Me and My Initiative put it, as the largest African American financial, emotional, physical, spiritual service provider, and the largest African American landowner, period.

We added much more, and I know that many more people will be speaking during the public hearing today, so I will end with this, just noting that this legislation will amend the previous council bill to provide more flexibility to churches to serve their congregations, build the needed affordable housing, and maintain themselves financially so that they can continue serving their community.

Thank you, Council Presidents.

Those are my remarks before the bill.

Thank you so much, Councilmember Strauss.

Appreciate that context setting and additional information both for the viewing public and for us as councilmembers.

So as presiding officer, I am now opening the public hearing on Council Bill 120157 relating to affordable housing on property owned or controlled by religious organizations.

The online registration to sign up to speak opened at 12 o'clock noon today, and I am going to call on speakers in the order of registration.

The online registration will remain open until the conclusion of this public hearing.

The same rules that apply to the public comment period will be applied to this public hearing.

Each speaker will be provided up to two minutes to address the council.

And speakers are going to hear a chime when they only have 10 seconds left of the allotted time.

Your microphone will be muted at the end of your allotted in their comments by stating their name.

And again, you have to press star six after you hear the prompt of you have been unmuted.

Sorry, folks, I'm continuing to experience internet stability, so I'm going to have to turn my camera off here.

Again, public comment on this particular section is only related to the council bill just described by Council Member Strauss, which is the bill related to affordable housing on property owned or controlled by religious organizations.

So we're going to go ahead and open up the public comment period.

I'm going to go ahead and start calling on folks who are both present and signed up to speak on this subject matter.

The first person is Kirsten Smith followed by Donald King.

Good afternoon.

My name is Kirsten Smith.

I live in District 1 and I am policy staff at AIA Seattle the American Institute of Architects.

I apologize to Joel King for getting in on the list ahead of him because he should go first.

He is a fellow of the AIA and we are pleased to support Council Bill 120157. We also appreciate the Council's willingness to take a second look at the legislation's EMI provisions.

Architects strive to apply our professional skills to advance racial and economic justice.

One way we do this is to identify policy changes that make development work for BIPOC individuals and communities both to combat the risk of displacement and to generate wealth building opportunities.

Adjusting this legislation to make it achievable for Black churches to allow them to participate in the program without giving up control of their projects to larger developers is an example of exactly this kind of policy adjustment.

It also supports the city's commitment to eliminating racial disparities and achieving racial equity.

While deeper affordability programs are essential and needed to achieve additional city goals we believe in this case these goals could be addressed elsewhere.

We ask you to support Council Bill 121-57.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Donald King followed by Joey Lopez.

Good afternoon, this is Donald King.

I am president and CEO of the Nehemiah Initiative of Seattle.

And again, you have to press.

Sorry, no, that's OK.

We're all having it is.

It is definitely let's start the clock over again minute.

It's I feel like today is extra Monday, so no worries.

You have the full two minutes.

Go ahead.

Good, thank you.

Again, my name is Donald King.

I'm president and CEO of the Nehemiah Initiative.

And it is the mission of the Nehemiah Initiative to primarily, one, save the historically black churches, the predominantly black churches of Central Seattle.

And as part of that mission, we have two objectives in mind.

One is to develop affordable housing on underutilized properties of the churches, which is quite abundant.

And the second is to provide the church with income from the development of those properties for the churches to survive.

So the churches can continue to do good, but also being well financially.

We are supporting the passage of CB 120157, because it corrects a previously passed bill and ordinance 12081 that was flawed.

It had a late amendment added to it that required an eligibility of 60% area median income, which does not particularly work for our black churches.

We applaud those that work in the low and very low income housing provision market, But with the objectives that I just told you about, and the second objective of that is being able to make the black churches stronger through the development of their housing, a threshold of 60% or a limit of 60% AMI does not financially work for that objective.

So I am urging you to pass this ordinance, to pass this bill into ordinance 12015. Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Really appreciate it.

Next up is Joey Lopez followed by Benjamin Moritz.

Council President Gonzalez and members of council, my name is Joey Lopez, a resident of District 3 and the Faith Land Initiative lead at the Church Council of Greater Seattle.

I appreciate the time to speak today on behalf of the Church Council in favor of Ordinance 120157, to modify the affordability requirements adopted in a past ordinance as relates to affordable housing on properties owned and controlled by religious organizations.

As many of you know the Church Council of Greater Seattle is a century old organization that is committed to making transformational transformational change for liberation and justice in partnership with Seattle's faith communities and community organizations much like the Nehemiah Initiative.

As part of this work we facilitate a network of congregations and faith leaders through our Faith Land Initiative.

Our initiative trains and develops faith leaders to cultivate deeper relationships within their congregations and neighborhoods and a practice toward community stewardship of faith-owned land.

We also mobilize Seattle's faith communities to take action by practicing transformative stewardship of faith-owned land and engaging their lawmakers and elected officials.

As we look and legislate the terms of affordability we have to realize the impact for people with the most need like BIPOC families.

We know that families that are families are what will reverse the impact of displacement from gentrification and policies that contribute to housing exclusion like the city's history of urban renewal.

Past debate focused on rental rates for studio and one bedroom unit.

However 80 percent of AMI for a three bedroom unit is $2,295.

A reality is that housing of this size is almost nonexistent at this cost or lower.

You must be mindful of the long term impact of our development decision providing space for the return of displaced Black renters in a sustainable way that does not contribute further racial and economic segregation.

I urge you to vote yes on the passage of CB 120157. Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today, Joey.

Next up is Benjamin Moritz and then after Benjamin will be Alicia Ruiz.

Hello, my name is Benjamin Moritz and I'm a housing developer in Seattle.

I'm here today to answer the specific question of what is the difference between 60% AMI and 80% AMI.

It is a difference between many homes and no homes.

For a family of four, it's a difference between earning $63,000 and about $83,000 a year in income.

And for a housing provider, it's a difference between being able to charge that family a fair rent of about $1,600 a month or about $2,100 a month for a two-bedroom home.

But for someone who aims to build housing and for whom, like most of us, must borrow money to do so, it's a difference between being able to pay off your construction loan and not being able to do so.

And if you can pay off a loan and you are a church, then it's the ability to have a bit of money left over afterwards to pay other bills and keep your community going.

Now, not everyone needs to fund their operations in this way.

Large nonprofits with access to federal tax credits and local subsidies can do just fine building at 60% AMI, and they should.

But no one, not even the church with modest profit expectations, can build housing at 60% AMI without subsidy in Seattle.

We now have the opportunity to allow smaller faith-based groups, especially the black churches, the opportunity to revitalize themselves through housing and to do so on their own without subsidy.

For that, they must be able to bill the 80% AMI.

Please approve this bill.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for calling in today.

Next up is Alicia Ruiz, followed by Gary Tyson.

Hi, my name is Alicia Ruiz, and I'm speaking today on behalf of the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish County, and our nearly 3,000 members.

Today, we stand in strong support of the amended version of Council Bill 120159 that would modify the eligibility criteria to require that all affordable housing units built on property owned by religious organizations serve households with an average income of 80% of AMI.

The passage of this amended bill is an important step forward towards racial equality and also provide desperately needed affordable housing in our city.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Gary Tyson.

And then the last person I have signed up for this public hearing is Barb Coulson.

I'm looking for Gary Tyson, who is speaker number, oh, I'm sorry.

It says we've already done Gary, but I think I just called on him.

Do we still have speaker 50?

There we go.

Okay, just press star six and we'll be able to hear you.

Gary, if you're with us, we just need you to press star six on your end, and then we will be able to hear you.

I am not hearing the caller, so let's go ahead and move over to Barbara Wilson, who is number 58 on our list.

I'm Barbara Wilson District 6 speaking in favor of 120157. Increasing the permissible AMI to 80 percent would make it financially feasible for religious institutions with less land to build the missing middle housing at virtually no cost to the city.

This approach to increasing Seattle's affordable housing exists because a dedicated group of small historical black churches advocated for a state law requiring increasing density for such buildings on religious property.

Our own church in Ballard has been exploring building affordable housing at 60% AMI on our property.

We're privileged to have a very large piece of property, but you should know that the part of the property used for such affordable housing will be reduced in value by half.

The reality is limiting the definition of affordable housing to 60% AMI and below reduces the land value so much that it's financially prohibitive for the very churches who brought Seattle one solution to increase much needed affordable housing for Black historic churches.

If you wish to support the Black community and their continued presence in their historical neighborhood please pass 120-157.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Okay, our last speaker is Gary Tyson.

Let's see if we can get Gary unmuted and available to give us his comment.

All you have to do is press star six for us to be able to hear you.

Okay, I'm still not able to hear.

Gary, I apologize for that.

Sometimes these Zoom features don't work as well as we'd like them to.

I would encourage you to email your comments to the full council at council, that's C-O-U-N-C-I-L at Seattle dot G-O-V.

I'm sorry you waited this long and we're not able to get you on the line.

But I am going to go ahead and close out the period of public comment.

I don't have any other individuals signed up to speak for this public hearing and we're going to go ahead and move to other items of business on the agenda.

agenda again.

That was our last speaker remotely present to speak at this public hearing.

The public hearing on council bill 120157 is now closed.

This bill is scheduled for a vote at the September 27th, 2021 city council meeting, and the council is still accepting comments via email at council at Seattle.gov.

Thank you so much.

Let's move to payment of the bills.

Will the clerk please read the title?

Council Bill 120179, appropriate amendment to pay assignments and claims through the week of September 6th, 2021 through September 10th, 2021, and ordering payment thereof.

Thank you so much.

I move to pass Council Bill 120179. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded.

The bill pass.

Are there any additional comments?

Hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Go ahead, Madam Clerk.

You can call the roll.

It could just be me, but I am not hearing the roll call.

That's correct, Council President Gonzalez.

You can just wait just a quick second.

I apologize for the pause here.

No worries.

Council Member Kwan.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Mosqueda.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Aye.

Council President Gonzalez.

Aye.

I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. It's been moved and seconded to confirm the appointment.

As sponsor of the item, I'll go ahead and address it first before opening the floor to comments, if any.

Colleagues, this is an appointment to the Families Education Preschool and Promise Levy Oversight Committee.

It is a mayoral appointment.

Mr. Gittens brings over a decade of education advocacy with him to this appointment.

He's worked extensively with youth to keep them on track to graduation through a number of roles at the Puget Sound Educational Service District, Peace Community Center, and most recently with the Seattle Housing Authority.

Mr. Gittens brings a dedication to building systems that lead to equitable outcomes in education, and I am glad to support his appointment to the Levy Oversight Committee today.

Are there any additional comments on the appointment?

Hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the confirmation of the appointment?

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Aye.

Peterson?

Aye.

President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the appointment is confirmed.

Will the clerk please read item two into the record?

Agenda item two, appointment 2033. Reappointment of David G. Jones as city auditor for term to December 13th, 2025. The committee recommends the appointment be confirmed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

As chair of the committee, I will provide the committee report and then open the floor to comments.

Before us is the reappointment of David Jones to a fourth term as our Seattle City Auditor.

I am thrilled to support this nomination and he did receive unanimous support on his reappointment in my Governance and Education Committee last week.

Mr. Jones has spent nearly 40 years in public service, and his work has been instrumental to good governance for our city, and he leads a team to help the City of Seattle better understand some of the most complex issues facing the city with an eye for nuance that is so critically important to governing and our overall accountability to the people of the city.

As I noted this morning at council briefing since January 2020, our city's auditing team has published 16 reports across critical issues facing our city from homelessness to public utilities to transportation infrastructure spending.

These audits include recommendations that can help the city reduce the $27.4 million annual funding gap for maintaining Seattle's bridges, improve services for customers with high electricity bills, improve services for in-house neighbors, and improve oversight of SDOT surveillance technologies.

And for those of you who may have missed the news, the City Auditor's Office has also been nationally recognized for much of the work that David has led.

And I know David well enough to know that he will cede all credit to his staff for all of that tremendous award winning work.

His staff is a key part of his vision and his work at the city auditor's office and I've always appreciated David's willingness to give credit where credit is due, and that is to the folks who work for David who don't oftentimes get the opportunity to be on the camera, but are always doing the really important work.

But of course, Mr. Jones' leadership is vital.

to their ability to continue to meet our goals of good governance.

And I hope that you all join me in supporting his reappointment today.

Are there any comments from my colleagues on the appointment?

Council Member Strauss, please.

Thank you, Council President.

Just ahead of Auditor Jones's reappointment, I want to thank you for allowing him to provide his annual report in your committee last week for the viewing public.

It is a testament to his and his team's work over the years, and this year in particular.

His team does audits on the sweetened beverage tax, secure scheduling for the two-year impact, and they did both the sweetened beverage tax on the first year and two years.

He's got the bridge impact report, city light billable polling attachments.

He does audits on the homelessness contracts, which came out favorably, and so much more.

Council President, you are correct.

He continues to always raise up his staff And it's a testament of a true leader.

Also, there were a couple of retirements from his team this year.

Megumi Sumithani and Robin Howe.

So I just want to take this moment to lift up Megumi, Robin, and David.

Auditor Jones, your incredible work.

Excited to have you reappointed.

Thank you so much.

Council Member Strauss, solidarity, you know, today's one of those Mondays and I appreciate that I'm not the only one who's struggling today.

Next one, next up is Council Member Peterson and then we will hear from Council Member Lewis and then Council Member Herbold.

Council Member Peterson, please.

Thank you, Council President.

I did want to commend David Jones and his team for the audit they did on the city's bridges and also when we do receive the budget proposal from Mayor Durkin.

I hope we take a hard look at the funding that's being proposed for the city auditor's office.

It's likely to require us to beef that up.

I appreciate during the mid-year budget that there was an amendment to help to start that process, which was very helpful and hope that we take a hard look at that budget going forward because it really expands our bandwidth as a legislative branch to be able to have the auditor go in and verify information just makes sense out of complicated issues when we're trying to make policy decisions.

It helps us to make those decisions correctly.

So look forward to supporting the reappointment and also supporting the office with the budget coming up.

Thank you.

Thank you so much Council Member Peterson.

Appreciate that.

Next up is Council Member Lewis.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just want to briefly speak to my great enthusiasm today in voting to confirm Auditor Jones for another term.

I have had an excellent time working with Auditor Jones on a variety of projects that overlap in the homeless space, where the council has used its position to request a number of really critical audits, driving everything from we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

we have a lot of work to do.

I think it is really critical to take this opportunity to highlight that Auditor Jones is an officer of the legislative branch of government and is part of the oversight apparatus in our system of countervailing powers to provide adequate oversight of whether things are getting done, whether services are being delivered efficiently.

and that we as a council should continue to enhance, expand, and protect that institution as we go forward to make sure services are delivered in the most effective, efficient, and impactful way.

And I look forward to figuring out ways that we can give more resources to the auditor to expand the scope of how they can do that impactful work and fully intend to support those measures as Council Member Peterson has indicated in the budget cycle.

So thank you.

Thank you so much Council Member Lewis, Council Member Herbold.

Thank you so much.

You know, I think sometimes we think of the role of the city auditor to be really focused on making recommendations, and that's true, but I have found the city auditor's office to be very, very helpful in guiding my efforts in seeking to implement the city auditor's recommendations.

It's really up to the executive and council branches of government, legislative branches of government, to implement those recommendations.

And sometimes that can be very, very challenging.

And with both the annual tracking recommendation reports, as well as some good thinking from the city auditor's office, I have found them a great assistance to me in my efforts to develop policy that actually acts on that implementation.

Everything from the 2016 SPD Overtime Controls Audit, the 2015 SPD Public Disclosure Process Reports, recommendations from, I believe, to the Human Services Department to improve outcomes for youth violence prevention programs, and shifting what we previously did, which is monitor navigation team outcomes, to think about how we can look at monitoring HOPE team outcomes.

I think that's really important work to lift up, again, not just making the recommendations, but working with us to brainstorm around how the city auditor's office can assist us as policy makers in ensuring that those recommendations are actually implemented.

So really, really appreciate creative thinking out of that office and all of the staff working for the city auditor.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold, well said.

Okay, any additional comments on the appointment before we call this up for a roll call?

I'm not seeing any additional comments.

I would just say, Auditor Jones, that a reappointment hearing where you're hearing not just this much affirmation of your work, but also pre-commitments to budget ads for your office is a pretty good sign of of where this is headed, but also a good sign of the amount of respect that we have for your work and the work of your staff and the city auditor's office.

So with that being said, debate is now closed, and I'm gonna ask that the clerk please call the roll on the confirmation of the appointment.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Juarez.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

Peterson?

Yes.

President Gonzales?

Aye.

9 in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and Mr. Jones is reappointed as City Auditor.

Congratulations, David.

I'm now going to ask that the city clerk, Monica Martinez-Simmons, who is with us, administer the oath of office.

And then we're going to allow Mr. Jones to provide some brief remarks to the council members of the public.

And just for the record and the benefit of council members, I did want to note that David's wife and partner, Vicki Weeks, is in the meeting with us today.

She's now being highlighted and pinned here.

So just in case you were wondering who Vicky is, this is David's better half.

And she is here to bear witness to this really momentous occasion in which David has agreed to serve the city for another term.

So I'm gonna hand it over to the city clerk to administer the oath.

And once again, congratulations.

Thank you, Council President.

David, it is my distinct honor to administer your official oath of office.

Congratulations to you.

I would ask at this time for you to raise your right hand and repeat after me.

I, David G. Jones.

I, David G. Jones.

Swear or affirm.

Swear or affirm.

That I possess all of the qualifications.

That I possess all of the qualifications.

prescribed in the Seattle City Charter, prescribed in Seattle City Charter, and the Seattle Municipal Code, and the Seattle Municipal Code, for the position of, for the position of, City Auditor of the Office of City Auditor, City Auditor of the Office of City Auditor, that I will support the Constitution of the United States,

That will support the Constitution of the United States.

The Constitution of the State of Washington.

The Constitution of the State of Washington.

And the Charter and Ordinances.

And the Charter and Ordinances.

Of the City of Seattle.

Of the City of Seattle.

And that I will faithfully conduct myself.

And that I will faithfully conduct myself.

As the City Auditor of the Office of City Auditor.

as the City Auditor of the Office of City Auditor.

Congratulations once again.

And David, in front of you are two original oaths of office.

I would ask that you sign both of those and show your signature.

I will do that.

Thank you.

Here's number one.

Thank you.

And here comes number two.

Here is number two, city clerk.

Thank you for that.

Thank you for that.

And on return of those to my office, I will attest your signature.

We'll return one of those originals back to you for your record and retain one for the municipal archives.

At this time, I'll turn it over to the council president and to you, David.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk, for that.

And David, I'm just going to hand it right back over to you and allow you to make some remarks to the viewing public and members of the council.

Congratulations.

You're welcome.

And thank you so much, council, for your support.

And I will keep these remarks brief.

If I've learned anything, that's a good thing, given the many meetings that you all choose to go through.

I just have four things I want to say.

One, I want to, and I really mean this, and I know someone mentioned this before, but I really mean it.

It's the staff.

Our office is not called Office of the City Auditor.

It's Office of City Auditor because it's a team effort.

And, you know, I work hard, but the staff in our office, you know, do the lion's share of the work, and I never want to lose sight of that.

So thank you to all of them.

And as Councilmember Strauss said, I just want to single out Magumi Sumitani and Robin Howe, who worked for us for many years, I think about a total of 40 years, served us in the city of Seattle.

I want to thank them and hope they have a wonderful retirement.

And then I want to alert the council.

We have a new member of our team.

He's not actually really new because he was funded under a federal grant.

He's been working on the work we've been doing in Rainier Beach to try and prevent youth violence.

and I'm really glad I'm thrilled to have IB join our team and hope that you all get to see him at some point, but really, really glad that he's going to be with us.

Second, I'd like to thank you all of you on the City Council.

You've had been great.

You've had steadfast support of our office and more importantly, performance auditing the city of Seattle.

And you know, there are a lot of jurisdictions, local government jurisdictions in the United States that don't have that.

And having this function, which is a distinct function, really promotes transparency and accountability, equity, efficiency and effectiveness does a lot of good things.

And I just I'm so grateful to work in a place that supports that.

So thank you very much.

Third thing, I want to thank city departments, city departments, you know, they're the ones we have to come in, we come in and critique them, you know, and we're kind of a pain, quite honestly, we ask for a lot of stuff.

And, um, but for the most part, with some exceptions, but very few, I would say they've been really good about want, you know, taking our recommendations to heart, having a good dialogue with us, and then implementing them.

You know, about 70% since 2007, I believe, have been implemented, and a larger percentage are sort of pending or waiting to be implemented.

So I just want to thank all the departments in the executive branch and the court, Seattle Municipal Court, because we do some work with them, for, you know, being so open to improvement, because we're all striving towards the same goal, you know, make the city as good as possible, do as good a job as possible.

And last thing, last but not least, I wanna single out my wife, Vicky, because as you know, service in the public sector sometimes can be a little chaotic on the family life, and she has been totally supportive about our office's work, and I just really appreciate that.

And as a distinguished educator in her own right, I really appreciate that, and she gives me some pretty good advice sometimes, and a great set of ears, so thank you, Vicky.

And again, I just, I feel honored to be reappointed.

Thank you so much for your confidence in me and more importantly, our entire office.

So thank you.

Thank you, Council President Gonzalez.

Absolutely.

Thank you, David, for being with us and for your willingness to continue to serve the people of this great city.

I appreciate it.

Congratulations once again.

Okay, folks, we are going to move to item three.

Will the clerk please read item three into the record?

Agenda item three, Council Bill 120172, relating to city employment, commonly referred to as the third quarter 2021 employment ordinance, returning positions to the civil service system and amending classification titles.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you so much.

As chair of the committee, I'll provide the committee report and then open the floor to comments.

If there are any.

Colleagues, this item passed unanimously out of committee last week.

I have talked about this council bill, I think about three times now to all of you.

Once again, it is routine legislation regarding third-quarter city employment.

Karina Bull of our central staff provided the full council, including members of the committee, a detailed memo on all of the particulars related to this technical council bill.

I don't have anything else to add to this council bill that I haven't already said, so I'm going to go ahead and leave it there and ask if there are any additional comments on the bill.

Hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

So what?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Aye.

Peterson?

Aye.

President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf.

Will the clerk please read item four into the record.

The report of the Public Safety and Human Services Committee, agenda item four, Council Bill 120142, relating to the Seattle Police Department, prohibiting training, exchanges, and partnership with certain governments, and adding a new section 3.28.141 to the Seattle Municipal Code.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended with Council Members Herbold, Morales, and Sawant in favor, with abstentions from Council Members Gonzalez and Lewis.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

OK, folks, this is going to be a long discussion and there are several late breaking amendments, so I appreciate in advance your patience.

I encourage you to go get a snack if you can.

Need 1, but we will get through this and appreciate in advance your patients and the patients of members of the public as we work through what might be some.

Challenging procedural issues, but hopefully everything will go as smooth as possible.

We do have for this discussion available council central staff.

I will need to suspend the rules in order to allow for that.

to occur, but if it needs to happen, please do not hesitate to signal that need to me, and I am happy to do that.

Not our preferred method of doing it.

Our preference is obviously to have all of the policy conversations occur During committee, but there are several amendments that have come out since committee and want to make sure that we, as council members and members of the public are getting the benefit of our central staff analysis before we take a vote.

So, with that being said.

I am going to acknowledge Council Member Sawant who is the sponsor of this bill.

The chair of the Public Safety and Human Services Committee thought it was appropriate to allow you to have the first and the last word on this bill as the sponsor of the bill and a member of the committee.

So I'm going to hand it over.

Thank you, Council President Gonzalez and Public Safety Committee Chair Herbold.

This is an ordinance that, as you all know, has been months ago requested by the End the Deadly Exchange Movement.

It comprises a large number of organizations that have been in solidarity with it, which I will acknowledge later.

But this is an ordinance requested by this movement, which bans the Seattle Police Department from sending officers for training in countries with a track record of human rights abuses.

This bill originally banned the Seattle Police Department from training specifically in Israel, but because they have done so in the past, learning the tactics brutally used to repress Palestinians.

My office originally drafted this bill to support the Under Deadly Exchange movement several months ago when thousands of Seattleites marched to protest the bombing of the Gaza Strip by Israel's right-wing political establishment.

Since then, we have expanded the bill to ban the Seattle Police Department from training in any country that has a track record of human rights abuses, as documented by established and mainstream international human rights bodies.

Thank you to Council Members Morales and Mosqueda for co-sponsoring this bill.

I especially want to thank the hundreds of community activists from a wide range of movements who have brought forward and demanded that the City Council adopt this legislation, Black Lives Matter and Palestinian rights activists, Indian American activists, members of the progressive Jewish community, along with other faith communities, socialists, and human rights activists who have been engaged in a wide range of struggles around the world.

They have spoken with many voices, but one singular powerful message.

Seattle police training practices must align with the human rights values that this city council has repeatedly declared are paramount to our city.

On behalf of the activists leading this struggle, I am bringing three amendments this afternoon to the bill.

And just to clarify, none of the amendments from my office are late-breaking.

They have been in process and I've been completely transparent about them, not only with members of the public, but also in successive city council briefings on Monday mornings.

So the amendments from my office are to amend how the bill defines what countries have committed human rights abuses, to close loopholes that may have been created in the amendment that passed in committee last week, and a third amendment that came out of the discussion during council briefing this morning.

These amendments preserve a country-neutral, even-handed approach to limiting police training.

If these amendments are adopted, the Seattle Police Department would still have viable training partners with nearly 100 countries around the world, including Canada, the UK, Sweden, France, Germany, and Italy, among others, while honoring the commitments to human rights that this city council has gone on record as supporting.

If Council President Gonzalez agrees, I will move those amendments now and then we can have a general discussion on the bill itself after.

Yeah, I think that makes sense.

There are your amendments plus amendments from Council Member Strauss.

So let's do what we ordinarily do, which is go through all of the amendments before we have a conversation about the underlying bill.

If that's okay with you, it's okay with me.

I do see that Council Member Strauss has his hand raised, so I will go ahead and acknowledge Council Member Strauss before we go through the movements related to the amendments.

Thank you, Council President.

There was a drafting error in the email and the amendment that I sent around at 2 p.m.

There should be in the new amendment in your inboxes now as long as law has appropriately reviewed.

So if you don't see that now, you'll see it in just a second.

Just wanted to alert that before we brought my amendment forward.

Okay, your amendment is, we got a little bit of time here.

We've got two amendments to consider and debate before we get to yours.

Appreciate the heads up on that.

And we will keep an eye out for that email.

Okay, so let's go ahead, Council Member Sawant, why don't you go ahead and make your motion and see if it gets a second, and then I'll hand it back over to you to address the amendment after it has received a second.

First, I will move Amendment 1, Version 2 as emailed to council offices this morning.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the bill as presented on Version 2 of Amendment 1. I'm going to hand it back over to Councilor Solano to address this amendment.

So for members of the public, this amendment is in substance the same as Amendment 1 that was linked on today's agenda earlier, with one word, technical correction.

This amendment makes it clear to include in the definition human rights abuses occurring not just within a nation's borders, but also within territories that the nation occupies.

There are numerous instances of the military or police forces of a nation abusing the human rights of others outside that nation's borders.

And this amendment simply reflects that reality.

Thank you to council members Morales and Mosqueda for co-sponsoring this amendment.

Great, thank you so much.

I'm looking for comments now on the amendment and I see the council member Herbold has her hand raised, please.

Thank you.

This was language change that we had discussed a little bit in committee, but sort of talked about what the intent was, but decided to wait and give central staff an opportunity to actually draft it.

This is the amendment that I characterized this morning in council briefings as an amendment that I felt was a friendly amendment.

And when I asked central staff what impact this amendment would have, the central staff response was that looking at the purview of the ICC and how that body defines and organizes its work, that the ad does not make any substantive change.

And I'm just adding that I do support the clarification that the amendment provides with the understanding that there's no substantive change.

Okay, thank you so much.

Are there any additional comments on this amendment?

I'm not seeing any additional comments.

Council members, want anything else to add?

No.

Okay, thank you so much.

In that case, debate is now closed on the amendment.

So will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of version two of amendment one.

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

No.

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

No.

Lewis?

No.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Aye.

Peterson?

No.

President Gonzalez?

Sorry, I'm having internet issues.

Are we still on the First Amendment?

We're still on the First Amendment.

Yes.

Okay.

Sorry about that.

Yes.

That is five in favor and four opposed.

Okay.

The motion carries and the amendment is adopted.

And I'm going to hand it back over to council member Salon to walk us through amendment two.

I move amendment two as emailed to council officers this morning.

Is there a second?

second.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the bill as presented on amendment two.

I'm going to hand it back over to Council Member Sawant to walk us through this amendment.

Thank you.

This amendment was drafted in response to the discussion during this morning's council briefing.

Council Member Strauss said he wanted to make sure that our bill does not preclude the Seattle Police Department from providing executive protection to the Mayor, I don't know if the mayor was mentioned, but public officials on official visits to other countries.

This amendment makes it clear that this bill is not referring to the times that the Seattle Police Department may act as the security detail for any elected officials from the city.

So it simply adds a sentence that says, quote, SPD is not prohibited from providing executive protection to city elected officials on an official trip to a country meeting either are both exclusion criteria in subsection 328.141A and 328.141B, end quote.

Thank you so much, Council Member Sawant.

So that is the underlying amendment.

My understanding is that Council Member Strauss has an amendment to the amendment.

And that's what my notes are telling me anyway.

So I will open it up to comments on this amendment first before I recognize Council Member Strauss on his amendment to the amendment.

Council Member Herbold.

I don't know if this is a point of order, maybe it's not a point of order, but it's a question about an email that we received at 1234 p.m.

from Councilmember Sawant's staff.

I was under the impression that Councilmember Sawant was only putting forward amendments one and three.

We did receive earlier an amendment two as described by Councilmember Sawant, but I was under the impression that Councilmember Sawant was not moving that forward.

So should I respond?

You're welcome to.

I'll just sort of note that regardless of what was communicated before, the motion has now been made.

So we have a motion for us.

Unless the sponsor wants of the amendment would like to withdraw that motion, it is now officially before us.

So customer Swann, I'll go ahead and hand it over to you to provide any additional clarification about your intent.

Maybe we're talking past each other, maybe there should be some clarification, but as far as my office's emails are concerned, as far as I understand, we were clear that we were moving three amendments and we shared them at 11.45 a.m., I believe, including this one.

And as council members will remember, the context of this one only came up this morning, so it was added today.

So I'm actually not sure where the source of the confusion is.

Great.

I just want to make sure, so that the record's clear, it is your intent, Council Member Sawant, to advance Amendment 2 as you just described it.

Yes.

Excellent.

OK.

We are all on the same page.

Slate is clean.

We are considering and debating Amendment 2. Are there any additional comments on Amendment before we consider the amendment to the amendment.

No additional questions.

So I'm going to go ahead and recognize Councilmember Strauss who indicated that he has an additional amendment which was not distributed by 12 noon today.

Because it was not distributed before noon today, the council will need to first suspend the rules before this amendment can be moved.

If there is no objection, the council rules relating to distribution of amendments two hours before the city council meeting will be suspended to consider an additional amendment.

Hearing no.

Oh, sorry.

I thought you needed a second council president.

I apologize.

Okay, just making sure that was not an objection.

No, not an objection.

Okay, thank you so much.

Hearing no objection, the council rule is suspended and Council Member Strauss is recognized in order to move amendment.

I think it's still 2B.

That's what I was hoping to confirm.

I believe it is now 2C.

Anne, could you help me with this?

Or Allie?

We cannot.

Hold on a minute.

We cannot.

hear from non-council members or the city clerk without a suspension of the rules.

So if you need to hear from Allie and or Anne, I'm happy to suspend the rules accordingly.

Just one second, please.

Are we needing a second?

No, we are looking, Council Member Strauss is confirming the version of which amendment he would like to move before we solicit a second.

2B or 2C.

Yeah.

Sorry, I promised you all that it might get a little messy with these last minute amendments.

Council President, I am moving if you.

Let me just a second.

I moved to amend count Amendment 2 by substituting it with the corrected version of Amendment 2B, which was distributed at about 415 this afternoon.

OK, so hearing no objection that Council will assist and then in Councilmember Strauss is recognized in order to move the corrected version of Amendment 2B.

Councilmember Strauss over to you.

Thank you, Council President.

Do I need to make another motion or just speak to it?

We hadn't yet suspended the rules.

We were waiting for you to confirm which version we were suspending the rules in order to hear.

So now is your opportunity to actually make your motion.

And then I will ask for a second if there is a second.

If there is a second, then we can hear from you on the substance of the proposed amendment.

Great, thank you.

I move to amend Amendment 2 by substituting it with corrected Amendment 2B, which was recently distributed.

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to amend Amendment 2 by substituting it with a corrected version of Amendment 2B, which was recently distributed.

I'm going to go ahead and hand it back over to Council Member Strauss to address the substitute version of the amendment.

Please.

Great, thank you, Council President, colleagues.

As I'm not on the Public Safety Committee or the committee in which this has come from, I was only beginning to review what came out of committee late last week.

I thought some of the concerns that I had shared months ago had been addressed, and alas, unfortunately, they had not been addressed, and so I worked quickly this morning to address those.

We did create a drafting error before distributing the original amendment to be.

And my apologies for any confusion that that has created.

The amendment before you and Council President, if we are able to see it on the screen, I would ask central staff to put it on the screen.

One of the drafting errors, we were just trying to make the sentence flow more correctly.

So the corrected version retains the formatting of the original version and simply makes this nation neutral by being by including all nations in the world.

Rather than engaging in an attempt to understand which countries have or have not signed on or are in accordance with UN declarations or committees, this simply says all nations, period.

It does not change any of the other content.

And can I confirm, can we pull this up on the screen so that colleagues can see it?

Yeah, if somebody from central staff is prepared to screen share, I have no objection to that.

And then also including SPD is allowed to provide executive protection.

My apologies.

If I had had more time with this, I would have included British Columbia because they are our state to the north, our province to the north.

But unfortunately, We're out of time today.

Thank you so much, Council Member Strauss.

Colleagues, you do see the language that is being proposed to be I am happy to suspend the rules to allow them to address the

Yes, Madam President, I would so move to suspend the rules to talk to central staff for just a moment, if possible.

Great.

If there's been a formal request for that, colleagues, if there's no objection to hearing from our council central staff on the proposed corrected amendment as described by Council Member Strauss, I would like to provide them an opportunity to do that.

Hearing no objection, the rules are suspended and we can hear directly from our Council Central staff, which at the moment is Allie Panucci and Anne Gorman.

So please feel free to respond to Council Member questions as appropriate.

Go ahead, Council Member Lewis.

Thank you so much, Madam President.

On the question of to be or not to be, I'm not sure which of the two central staff folks I should be addressing it to.

So just take it however you will.

In the way that this is crafted, are we assuming in the underlying, like the text that is not crossed out above that that that is going to stay consistent regardless of what we decide has been reading that the scope is limited to military forces and not to foreign police so it's a foreign military on a sorry or partnerships with the police forces intelligence agencies resources then this would ban trainings with Canadian officials.

And I think Council Member Strauss alluded to that, but I just wanted to ask that at the top here.

Correct.

Yes.

I'm sorry, go ahead, Council Member.

Oh, Anne, you're great.

I was just going to say, yes, that's correct.

If I'd had more time, I would have created an exemption for British Columbia as our province to the north, but alas, out of time.

Okay.

And so, Anne, are we going to rest then on Council Member Strauss' answer to that?

I don't have anything else to add.

As written, this would ban training programs, exchanges, or partnerships with police forces in Canada.

All right.

I don't have any additional questions.

Thank you.

So much, I see that Council Member Herbold has her hand raised, and then Council Member Morales.

Council Member Herbold, please.

Thank you.

Is this exclusively to ask questions, or could I make a statement?

It's any comments on the proposed amendment.

Right.

Rules are suspended, however, so if you had a question to Council Member Stroud, you may pose that question, but this is an opportunity for any and all comments on Council Member Stroud's proposed amendment.

Thank you.

So just to sort of underscore the issue raised by Councilmember Lewis, we received information from central staff that from 2013 to 2021, SPD took 48 trips to Canada.

To be clear, though, a trip is one incident of travel by a single staff member.

It looks like 13 trips were to attend a conference, two to provide executive protection, which would be exempt by this amendment, and two to support a partnership, and 30 to receive training.

In addition to the fact that this amendment would scoop in Canada, I've spoken to Seattle Police Chief Diaz and understand that the Seattle Police Department is currently working with agencies both in the United Kingdom and Sweden on crowd management processes, which have been along the lines of recommendations of our police accountability agencies.

And as drafted, it appears that this amendment could potentially impact this work.

There are about 195 I'm just very concerned that the impact is very broad with this amendment and is not, and I understand it's the intent of the amendment sponsor, it's not tied to an objective assessment of human rights violations and the human rights records.

be listening for my colleagues' arguments on this, but I am unlikely to be able to support this amendment.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold.

Councilmember Morales, do you still have a question or comment?

Well, I was just pointing out as Councilmember Peter, sorry, Councilmember Lewis did, that the first sentence here and the second sentence seem to say slightly different things.

The first sentence says, shall not participate in training programs, exchanges with military forces.

And then the second one goes on to say, intelligence agencies or security services.

So my real question is, Does that matter, or will the broader interpretation be what is adhered to here?

Yeah, and I think just to be clear on my understanding that might be relevant to context for that question is that that language exists in the underlying legislation.

So the only parts that are being proposed to be changed are those are sort of the strikeout of A and B in the addition of the last line SPD.

So the part that you're identifying that may have a inconsistency is included in the baseline bill.

Thank you, Council Central staff, whoever's doing this, for highlighting the text that is in yellow is what Council Member Strauss' amendment is proposing.

Everything else is included in the base legislation that we are considering today.

So, Council Central staff, any response to that particular question as presented by Council Member Morales?

No, no response.

I agree with her characterization generally.

Okay.

Councilmember Sawant, please.

So I have two questions.

It's possible that At least one of them has already been answered, but I'll go ahead and ask that just, you know, just to make it make doubly, triply clear.

So, and my two questions are.

Under this new amendment, would this ban all training programs, exchanges or partnerships with the police forces of all other countries, including countries with whom SPD has had exchanges in the past?

So just Canada, it seems like the answer is yes, we had this exchange between you and Constable Harbaugh, so just confirm that.

And then secondly, under this amendment, would the SPD be permitted to attend training inside the United States that involves police forces, intelligence agencies, or security services of foreign countries?

Those are my two questions.

President Gonzalez, I do have comments about this amendment, but I'll reserve them for a bit.

Council President, may I respond and then central staff?

Council members want what I will say is that as to your second question, whether or not those trainings can or cannot occur on domestic soil is a question left for your base bill.

That's not under consideration for this amendment.

That doesn't have this amendment simply removes the characterization of which types of countries we can work with to just say all countries.

Otherwise, it is not truly nation-neutral.

This is a nation-neutral amendment.

And to your first question, yes, the answer is yes.

Thank you.

And if – and if you have follow-up, please

it's or on in in response the first question and yes this this amendment would ban such uh...

work with canada as as as p g is currently engaged in and uh...

this with respect to the second question uh...

the way i read partnerships with the military forces of any country that would exclude United States military forces, but all of the other descriptions of types of units, foreign military, police forces, intelligence agencies, those all have the qualifier foreign attached to them.

The only one that does not is military forces of any country.

Sorry, but I don't know, and if you address the, my specific question was, would the SPD be permitted to attend training inside the U.S.?

That, like, if the training happened on U.S. soil, that in a training that involves police forces, intelligence agencies, or security forces of foreign countries.

So, for example, could SPD officers go to a training in Chicago, say, to train with some foreign police forces?

The way I read this bill, the operative word is with here, training programs, exchanges, or partnerships with the police forces.

To me, this does not specify geography.

Certainly, we could work to clarify that, but that is the way I understand the bill as currently written.

And what I might say is that this has been a process at full council that should have been taken up at committee.

Council Member Sawant, it seems like you might also have questions about the base bill.

I might ask- No, I don't have questions about the base bill.

You have provided this amendment at a very last second.

It's about your amendment.

It's the base bill that you have the question about though.

No, absolutely not.

Your amendment is sweeping, as Council Member Herbold also alluded to with other words, but so that's why these questions are coming up.

This is not a minor amendment.

That's why it's- The question that you just had was about the part not highlighted.

No, it was not about the base bill, it was about your amendment.

Council President, my apologies.

I'm gonna, just like, if we could, this is not council briefing or committee meetings, so we do need to just take a pause, and instead of going back and forth, if we can, you know, work hard to not interrupt each other in the spirit of having an open democratic debate.

I recognize and appreciate that these are, several of these are last minute amendments.

And those of us who have not been on the committee are working hard to catch up.

And so I appreciate the opportunity for us to extend grace to each other as we are trying to catch up on some of these amendments, some of which are more substantive than others.

And again, as I stated at the top, my preference is always to do these kinds of work sessions in the midst of committee work.

But alas, we are in a situation now where that is not the situation.

So we are going to go ahead and do our best to get through all of these amendments in a way that is hopefully useful to those of us who have to make decisions on the underlying bill and on these respective amendments.

I really appreciate you all working together to hopefully achieve that.

So again, I want to make sure that Council Member Sawant, you got answers to the questions that you asked.

Not yet.

No, I don't think so.

If you don't mind, I just want to follow up.

Yeah, I don't – it's not clear to me, actually, what the impact of this amendment is.

I – again, just to ask that question again, can the SPD be permitted to attend training inside the United States?

And I heard what Anne said, that the amendment does not comment on that, but that's the whole point.

It does not.

That is why there is this ambiguity.

that I think is here.

And so, for example, can the SPD participate in a training session in Chicago where the Israeli police shows up?

I mean, I, the problem is that Councilwoman Bush-Chavez's amendment removes all of the human rights standards out of the base bill, which is the, which is the basic, which was the main and fundamental criterion for the existence of the bill.

And by doing that, it creates ambiguity.

And I just feel like the question I'm asking is a yes or no, should have a yes or no answer.

Can the SPD, for example, participate in a training session in Chicago where the Israeli police show up if this amendment were to pass?

And because of this amendment, there's ambiguity about whether or not that hypothetical Chicago trip can happen because we know, I mean, at least I know, I don't know if council members will agree, but I believe that introducing any ambiguity is problematic, which is why the base bill as amended was taking great pains and we went through a lot of discussion with community, with council members.

to make sure that we remove these ambiguities.

And from my standpoint, that was extremely important, not only to make sure that everybody is genuinely in agreement, but also because I am very much afraid, given the track record, the overwhelming track record, that the Seattle Police Department will, if we introduce ambiguity, will interpret it in a way that they want to, given their established practices, as opposed to what the community wants to accomplish with this legislation.

So I would really appreciate some clarity.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And I'm going to invite my colleague Ann Gorman to jump in if I'm getting this wrong.

But I'm going to attempt for just a moment, if you can bear with me, to just do a bit of a close reading of the text on the screen.

So sentence one in the base bill would prohibit SPD from participating in training programs, exchanges of partnerships with the military forces of any country.

or engage in the travel.

So I read that to mean you cannot travel to that country to engage with the military forces, nor can you participate in a training, whether it's within the United States or housed elsewhere.

Similarly, the base bill as currently written would prohibit SPD's participation in any training programs or exchanges with police forces etc.

And then it limits which countries you are talking about from which they are participating in.

Council Member Straus' amendment doesn't change whether or not the Seattle Police Department can participate in trainings with military forces or with police forces within the United States.

So as in your example, a training in Chicago where uh, military force for another country was participate participating.

The base bill nor the and the amendment would would prohibit that.

What council member stresses amendment does is it removes any specificity about the countries that this ban is, um, applied to and broadens.

It makes it neutral.

It says SPD can't do this with any police force.

and clarifies that they can, however, provide executive protection if city officials are traveling to those countries.

Please, Anne or Council Member Estrella, correct me if I mischaracterize.

Agreeing with Anne, that sounded correct to me.

OK.

Council Member Sawant, this was your line of questioning, so I just wanna circle back and make sure you have finished your line of questioning here so we can, I can call on Council Member Mosqueda next.

Yes, I was just gonna thank Ali for that clarification.

Great, okay, thank you so much, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Mosqueda, your hand has been raised for a while, thanks for your patience, go ahead.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Council President.

Thank you, colleagues, for this dialogue.

I want to thank Council Member Sawant for initially bringing this legislation forward, Council Member Herbold for all of your work in committee, and Council Member Strauss for this amendment in front of us and really just bring us back to the answer that Ali just provided.

I think the underlying goal here, as many community partners have continued to underscore, is to really keep us focused on making sure that as we re-envision community policing, it's really done through the community's lens and that we have a chance to hit a reset button when we think about what training looks like for our police personnel.

It doesn't and it shouldn't be done only by military personnel.

And we are making a value statement here that going forward training will not include partnership with other military entities.

or other countries and their military bodies.

So I just want to orient us to the why we're doing this, which is to really refocus us back on community orientation to what public safety should look like.

And I think this is an important piece of legislation in that longer term goal.

I also think that the legislation was enhanced in committee and appreciate the clarification that's been offered by central staff here today about both the underlying bill and the amendment in front of us.

Council Member Strauss, appreciate the line that you've walked here to help make sure that we have a full understanding of how both the police forces, intelligence agencies, security forces, all of which we want to make sure are not getting trained by other military personnel or with other countries and their military personnel, regardless of where they are, including to our friends in the north.

We do want to continue to reshape our trainings in the future to be focused on community strategies and partnerships with community, especially those upstream investments to create greater security so fewer folks ever interact with police officers to begin with.

I appreciate the clarification that's been offered on this amendment.

And with that, I believe that there's support in the community for this.

With that clarification that's been provided by Alliance and central staff, thank you, Anne.

And I look forward to supporting this amendment as well.

Okay.

Just to be clear, Council Member Muschietti, you're supporting Council Member Strauss' amendment?

I wasn't...

The amendment, yes, which I also support the other amendment, but I'm happy to support this amendment that I think adds additional strength, especially given what central staff has just said in their clarification on Council Member Strauss' amendment.

Councilmember Herbold, your hand has been raised for a while.

I'm not sure if that's new or a holdover.

Holdover?

Okay, Councilmember Lewis, you are next.

Thank you, Madam President.

My comments will actually be somewhat similar to Councilmember Herbold, so I guess you could have called on her again.

But I would just reiterate and lift up what Councilmember Herbold had said earlier.

I appreciate what Councilmember Strauss is trying to do here, and I appreciate anything that makes this conversation less about any particular country and more about a generalized set of our values as a city.

The issue that I have, especially as this is broad enough to include any foreign police force, is there are examples of police forces in other countries that do have practices that we might want to study, that we might want to emulate, that might benefit from some kind of foreign exchange where our police can go and talk with their officials about what they do.

A great example being crowd control practices in Sweden or other Nordic countries.

Obviously, the United Kingdom historically has stood out as a place that is generally considered to have a good model of community policing by international standards.

And then certainly our biggest trading part, probably trading as well, but our biggest training partner is Canada, as demonstrated by the historic foreign trips taken.

And I don't really know enough right here in this session about the nature of our training exchanges with Canada.

So given those things, I do think at this time, without knowing more information, I can't support this amendment, given the broadness.

Thank you, Council Member Lewis, Council Member Salon, and then Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Council President Gonzalez.

I firstly want to congratulate all the activists and community members who called into public comment in opposition to the original version of the amendment that Council Member Strauss had sent out at 2.01 p.m.

I just wanted to let all the members of the public who spoke and have been paying attention to this issue that you're organizing clearly had a powerful impact.

The 2.01 p.m.

version of this amendment would have removed the restrictions on training with police forces of human rights abusers.

This 4.17 p.m.

draft has been updated to now put police forces back in.

That does close a substantive loophole, but and that's good, but I But I also, but I still have concerns about the whole point of this amendment.

So at this point, really the only difference is this amendment also prohibits the Seattle Police Department from training with the police of countries that are not human rights abusers, in addition to those that are human rights abusers.

And I, and keep in mind, I am defining human rights abusers as per the mainstream independent international human rights organizations define these issues.

So my intent and the intent of the Inter Deadly Exchange activists and with whom we have worked closely to draft this legislation was to focus on human rights abusers as defined as that.

And this amendment does not change how the bill impacts human rights abusers.

But I am concerned that if this amendment passes that it will be used to you know to overall undermine the law even if it went in place because then it would be sort of a blanket sort of law which will not be accepted by a lot of forces in the, you know, in the political establishment.

And for that reason, I will be voting no on this amendment.

And I just wanted to clarify, Council Member Strauss said that he brought this amendment because he didn't think that the base bill brought in the idea of nation neutrality.

I just want to clarify the idea of nation neutrality was in the context of human rights abuses, not just in general.

The objection to the very original version of the bill was that it only mentioned Israel and not other countries that might have also been recorded by the international human rights organizations as having abused human rights.

We agreed with that and we changed it accordingly.

So in that sense, it is nation neutral.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, and Council President, if there's no other further comments, hopefully this is my, I will close it out for you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Lewis, to answer your question about being too expansive or restrictive as you sit on the committee, I would suggest voting yes in favor of this amendment today and then separately creating a list of countries that are allowed to train with the Seattle Police Department.

So being specific and proactive rather than looking backwards and trying to define.

Council Member Sawant, in response to your comments about my amendment, without this amendment, there is a large loophole in your bill.

And that loophole is being able to ascertain or understand whether or not the country in question does or does not comply with international standards amongst a number of different lists that even we here at Council have had a difficult time understanding today.

And so I urge all my colleagues to vote in favor of this amendment to make it to remove the loophole that is in the bill to make it nation neutral.

And if further refinements to these policies are needed in the future, to take that up in a proactive way.

Thank you, Council President.

Okay, thank you so much Councilmember Strauss.

Colleagues, I do think it's time for us to wrap up debate on this particular amendment.

I appreciate the opportunity to have additional conversation about it and thought that it merited having a little bit more time than perhaps we would ordinarily have.

if for no other reason than the fact that we all just are learning about this proposed amendment in the last hour or so.

So thanks so much for your patience.

Really appreciate your openness and willingness to have that public debate.

Okay, there are no additional comments on this amendment.

So will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the substitute presented on, excuse me, on the substitute presented on the corrected version of amendment 2B, recently distributed by Council Member Strauss.

Samai?

No.

Strauss?

Yes.

≫ Aye.

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≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

≫ Aye.

Try turning my camera on, see if my internet will cooperate with me.

Great, the motion fails.

The substitute is not adopted and amendment two is before the council.

Are there any additional comments or questions on amendment two as previously described by council member Salant?

And hopefully we all still remember what amendment two is.

So maybe council members want, in an effort to close out debate on Amendment 2, you can just quickly remind us what it was about, because it's been a while since we talked about it, and then we can take a roll call vote.

Thank you, Council President Gonzalez.

That is exactly what I was going to do, just remind everyone because it's been a while.

This, as I said earlier, this amendment was drafted in response to the discussion we all had during this morning's council briefing.

Council Member Strauss had said at that time that he wanted to make sure that our bill does not preclude the Seattle Police Department from providing executive protections to city public officials on official visits to other countries.

This amendment makes it clear that this bill is not referring to the times that that happens.

It simply adds a sentence that says, quote, SPD is not prohibited from providing executive protection to city elected officials on an official trip to a country meeting, either or both exclusion criteria in the two subsections.

Great.

Thank you so much.

OK, folks, if there's no additional questions, I would like to go ahead and call the roll on this.

So will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment 2?

So what?

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Juarez.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

Peterson.

Aye.

President Gonzalez.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the amendment is adopted.

Council Member Sawant, you have a third amendment that you would like, that I understand you would like to make a motion on.

So I'm gonna go ahead and hand it over to you to make your motion.

And again, if it's seconded, we will have a discussion.

Thank you.

I move amendment three as emailed to council offices this morning.

There's a second.

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the bill as presented on Amendment 3. Council Member Swan, I'm gonna hand it over to you to address the amendment.

Thank you.

And thank you to Council Members Morales and Mosqueda for also co-sponsoring this amendment.

This third amendment adds a reference to the International Criminal Court Statute, which was left out of the amendment that the Public Safety Committee approved last Tuesday.

The current draft of the legislation cites two multilateral human rights treaties, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, as indicators of a government's intentions to abide by human rights and international law.

However, the amendment left out the International Criminal Court statute, also called the Rome Statute, as another indicator of a government's intentions to abide by human rights and international law.

Since the bill's exclusions provision in subsection B immediately below relies on the International Criminal Court as the body determining the violations of humanitarian law, it's only logical to cite the ICC statute along with the other treaties.

So that's simply what this amendment does.

Thank you so much.

Colleagues, any comments on Amendment 3?

Hearing no comments on Amendment 3, will the clerk please call the roll on the...

Oh, I'm sorry.

We're not calling the roll.

Council Member Herbold, go ahead.

I'm so sorry.

So, important objective satisfied with the criterion that passed out of committee was easily verified criterion that are both based in the foregrounding of human rights and are easy for staff to apply.

As it relates to the ICE, s the r in the i c c p r there are less associated with those two treaties that establish those countries that are not signatories to the trees uh...

as it relates to the rome statute it is in the inverse whereas the list that exists uh...

are indicators of nations that uh...

uh...

uh...

signatories to the treaty.

I also have some confusion about what is a signatory, what is a party to, what is ratifying, what does it mean to not sign.

There's a lot of confusion about this addition at I'm really sorry.

I'm not comfortable supporting right now.

Currently available data suggests this amendment would expand the bill's exclusion criteria to an additional 48 countries beyond the approximately 35 countries that would be excluded by the criterion in the base bill.

That's about 45% of the world's nations.

And I'm just, I'm very uncomfortable with, again, broadening the scope of the exclusions beyond the exclusions that I moved in my amendment, the amendment that is being proposed The language that is being proposed to be amended is a mandatory language to an amendment that I offered last week, specifically, again, with the intent of making sure that the exclusion criteria are verifiable and simply implemented by the Seattle Police Department.

I don't want the Seattle Police Department to have to do Google searches to figure this out.

And I just, again, I'm uncomfortable with this expansion and I feel really strongly that we're kind of making the perfect, the enemy of the good here.

Um, and we have legislation that, um, it accomplishes the goals of, um, of the bill sponsor as well as community members who have been working, um, support efforts.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Council Member Salant.

Thank you.

As of 2019, 123 countries are party to the International Criminal Code statute and therefore would remain viable training partners unless, of course, in the future they fail other criteria in the ordinance.

actually not clear at all what the problem is.

I mean, as far as I can understand, it would take a police bureaucrat about 30 seconds to search this.

It's easily verified.

You go to the ICC website and you can see all of the participants.

And just to clarify, also, my staff member did send Councilmember Herbold and others the link this morning when Councilmember Herbold first raised this question.

I don't understand why the police should not be doing a search because it is it is a very it's a verifiable data on a reputed website.

It's not some random Google search.

And also I will add that this is an amendment that has been advocated for strongly by the community activists who first proposed the legislation.

We referenced the ICC in the following paragraph.

So it's also about just technical clarity and consistency.

It only stands to reason to include the statute in the earlier section because ICC is already being referred to in the following paragraph.

The Center for Constitutional Rights experts say that this will help clarify the legislation further because it eliminates these inconsistencies.

And that's where this amendment is coming from.

It's not just the social activists who've been pushing for it and the Deadly Exchange.

They've also been in consultation with people who have some expertise on international human rights law.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Are there any other comments or questions on Amendment 3?

Hearing none, I will accept Council Member Sawant's closing remarks to be just that, closing remarks on Amendment 3, unless there's anything else you'd like to add.

No.

OK, I'm hearing no.

OK, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment 3?

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

No.

Herbold?

No.

Warris.

No.

Lewis.

No.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

Peterson.

No.

President Gonzalez.

No.

Three in favor, six opposed.

The motion fails.

The amendment is not adopted.

Colleagues, now the amended bill is before the council.

Are there, and now is the time to make, this is, let me back up.

This concludes the amendments that I'm aware of that were slated for discussion and consideration today during full council meeting.

So now is the opportunity to to hear general comments on the amended bill.

I do want to acknowledge that we had two council members during the council briefing this morning request an opportunity to be added to this underlying legislation as co-sponsors.

Those two council members are council member Morales and Mosqueda.

In your comments on the amended bill, to the extent you intend to make comments, Please indicate now in open session that you'd like to be added as co-sponsors to the amended bill, so the clerk may make that notation and legislate accordingly.

So, colleagues, now is the time to make general comments on the underlying bill.

Council Member Sawant, because you are the sponsor of the bill, you'll have an opportunity to make final wrap-up comments at the end of debate.

And we have had a lot of discussion about this particular bill, so hopefully we'll be able to get through this quickly and take a final vote on this proposed legislation.

First in line is Council Member Morales, followed by Council Member Mosqueda, and then Council Member Peterson.

and then Council Member Lewis.

Thank you, Council President.

We have had lots of conversation about this bill.

I've had conversations with constituents who support this piece of legislation and those who oppose it.

And I've tried to be really clear that my support for this comes from a place of really deep commitments to human rights, as well as a firm belief that we as a city should not be spending public dollars to send police abroad for the purpose of training with countries that are violating human rights.

I also firmly believe that we should be moving our police department away from militarization.

And really, as Council Member Mosqueda was mentioning earlier today, really moving away from a militarization and towards more community-based alternatives and toward a different way of policing.

And that requires that we invest in the department in a different kind of way as well.

I don't think they should be training with militaries or security services in countries that are engaging in human rights.

So I do want to express my interest in co-sponsoring the legislation.

And the last thing I want to say is that to those who condemn this bill as anti-Semitic, I don't believe this is about the Jewish people at all.

It's not about the Jewish religion.

This is about the policies and practices of jurisdictions and of states and governments.

And as a municipal official, I don't think we should be spending resources to send our police department to other states and other countries for the purpose of any sort of training.

So I look forward to supporting this bill and I want to thank Councilmember Sawant for sponsoring it and the activists and advocates who have been working with her office and I think with all of our offices to garner support for the legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you Councilmember Morales, Councilmember Mosqueda, and then after Councilmember Mosqueda will be Councilmember Peters.

Thank you very much, Council President.

Colleagues, I want to thank you all for all of your work to get us to this day and really to the community partners, folks that I've met with on all sides of the issue as well.

But mostly want to say thank you to Palestinian and Jewish Voice for Peace, who I know have done a tremendous amount of research on this legislation in front of us.

And I will continue to work with folks who we might not agree on this piece of legislation to continue to find pathways forward for greater support for humanitarian rights locally and across the globe.

This is an important piece of legislation, and I want to thank Councilmember Sawant for bringing it forward and Councilmember Herbold for your work in committee.

Again, I think that is important to really lift up that amendment that you made in committee that I know had quite a bit of support to help get this bill across the finish line here today.

Councilmember Strauss, thank you again for the legislation that you were aiming to amend today.

Happy to have supported that.

And Councilmember Sawant's amendment number three, That included the Rome Statute.

I did support that.

I do support it.

I think would be helpful for us as a body and as a community to continue to look at the Rome Statute.

This Rome Statute quite literally led to the creation of the ISTC International Criminal Court.

And so I think it would have been a good addition to this piece of legislation.

It would have still allowed for us to have trainings with other countries, over 100 additional countries, including countries that we lift up as good models, including Sweden, Canada, and some may include Britain as well.

So I know that there will be ongoing work as we continue to try to make sure that this piece of legislation is adhered to, and I will continue to do additional research on the Rome statute to see if we can further strengthen in the future.

But this is a piece of legislation that I think is a really important component to our ongoing work to redefine what community safety looks like and the different types of trainings that we want our officers to receive.

trainings that are rooted in community alternatives to traditional responses, trainings that are not led by military entities, and trainings that, no matter the country, are in line with our values of really wanting to have harm reduction strategies and to make sure that we are not pulling in militaristic styles of engagement nor militarizing personnel.

I do appreciate all of the work that has been undertaken to move this legislation in front of us today, and thank the organizers, the community, and again, the council members that I noted for all the work that they put into making this legislation possible for us to vote on today.

I look forward to supporting this bill in its current version, and thank you very much, council members, for your engagement as we consider various strategies to have public safety really rooted in community.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Council Member Musqueda.

Next up is Council Member Peterson, and then after Council Member Peterson will be Council Member Lewis, and then Council Member Herbold.

Thank you, Council President, and thanks for guidance through all the parliamentary procedure with the various amendments.

While we actually share common ground to demilitarize our police force, I believe this legislation has been not only distracting, but also divisive.

We have heard from the Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, and leaders and synagogues in our city who are very concerned about the origin, intent, and impact of this legislation.

From a policy standpoint, I believe the legislation seems to be an errant solution in search of a problem.

And the legislation has definitely been a time-consuming distraction away from pressing matters such as our homelessness crisis.

Countless hours have been spent trying to analyze which nations are or are not included in this legislation, and it appears that our Office of Intergovernmental Relations was not appropriately consulted by the original sponsor of the bill.

Rather than veering into international law and international relations, we have plenty of ways right here in Seattle to deepen reforms and safety, and that includes revamping the police union contract which expired eight months ago.

I'll be voting no on this final bill.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Peterson.

Next up is Councilmember Lewis, and then after Councilmember Lewis will be Councilmember Herbold, and then Councilmember Moritz.

Thank you, Madam President.

So I will also be voting against this ordinance today.

And I want to say at the outset that I've appreciated the access that the advocates of this ordinance have maintained with my office.

And I have gone throughout this process with an open mind to hear folks out.

What was really dispositive to me was getting the information back from central staff, particularly this email we received from Anne Gorman on September 16. detailing the training that is occurring internationally, at least over the last decade, to illustrate the bottom line of what we're even talking about.

You know, this does not, I would add, still substantively go into what exactly these foreign trips entailed, just numbers that foreign trips occurred.

I don't know the nature or of the trainings that have occurred that we're ostensibly banning.

There's been assumptions and presumptions made by members of the public and other stakeholders attributing perhaps that we learned, the Seattle Police Department learned, poor crowd control techniques that have led to the recent extreme and unforgivable abuses that we have seen in recent months in regards to the demonstrations last summer.

But I've not actually seen anything indicated anywhere that there's any causal relationship between these trips.

But in any event, we do have quantitative or we do have quantitative information about the trips that have occurred.

So from 2013 to 2021, SPD apparently took six trips to Israel.

Four of those trips were for tactical training, and they occurred in 2013-2014.

So there has been no training trip to Israel that's occurred in over seven years from the Seattle Police Department.

Again, we don't have the particular nature of those trainings, except that they were tactical in nature, and I'm not really sure what they were or what bearing they have on the current department and the activities of the department.

There were two additional trips to Israel, but they were for executive protection.

They would, therefore, with the amendments, fall outside of the scope of this ordinance and would not be banned by this ordinance.

There has not been a foreign travel event like I said to Israel of any kind in the last seven years.

It's notable that the 2016 trip that Chief Best took that has been discussed extensively by advocates of the ordinance was not cited by the department as a trip that would be preempted by this ordinance.

Presumably there's some loophole we're not aware of, or for some reason that falls outside of the scope of what the department considers a training trip.

uh...

that was a trip unjustice background that was sponsored by the anti-defamation league that she passed up in two thousand and sixteen and uh...

involved visits with uh...

israeli and palestinian officials in various capacities in the military uh...

that was not cited in the report that and gave us one trips not really sure why that is but given that scant record of trainings with Israel.

And I'm not aware in the last 10 years of any other international trainings aside from with Canada, which involved 48 trips of various types, by far our largest training partner.

And given the amendments that passed and were considered, those trips are not banned by the ordinance.

It seems that there is no ongoing or, frankly, concerning practice that this ordinance would prevent or stop.

I'm not aware of any pending or planned trainings that the department is going to undertake in Israel.

Indeed, it's been seven years and they have not.

It does not seem like that is an ongoing exchange that the city has.

Were there a briefing or more process in the committee providing more detailed information about the nature of these trainings, why they are concerning?

what the Seattle Police Department is learning in Israel or similarly situated countries, that might change my analysis.

But from what I'm seeing here, it's been seven years.

We don't really know the substance of the trainings that did occur before then.

And that seems to be the bottom line.

Given that, I don't think I need to go into any more detail.

Those are my primary concerns.

And for that purpose, I'm not going to be voting for this ordinance.

Thank you.

Council Member Lewis, appreciate you walking us through that rationale.

Next up is Council Member Herbold, and then after Council Member Herbold will be Council Member Juarez.

Thank you.

Just very briefly, as background, when this bill was first brought to my attention, I did tell advocates that I would only allow a bill to be heard in the Public Safety and Human Services Committee if it were nation-neutral, focused on human rights standards as applied to all countries.

I would not permit a bill on my committee agenda that singled out Israel because of the concerns that I heard from members of our community that told me that they were worried that legislation specific to Israel would inflame hate crimes against the Jewish people already on the rise.

My support for this bill is very simply based in Seattle Council's statements in Resolution 31858. and 31928, and centered in the very first recital in the bill that Seattle is a human rights city.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold.

Councilmember Juarez.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you, everybody, for all your work.

I will be voting no today as well for many of the reasons that some of my colleagues have already shared.

But in general, let me just share a little bit of what my analysis is and then what my thoughts are.

I don't think this is the right arena, if you will.

And I think today's discussion that started at 415 underscores of the discussion the confusion in the disagreement uh...

we are not an international tribunal it isn't our job to go through the international covenant on civil and political rights or the international covenant on economic social cultural rights we're not the u n we're not the big i'm not gonna go back and read the fourth geneva convention and what happened in switzerland we're not the international criminal court of the rome statute i'm familiar with out of the international criminal court statute I do agree with what Councilmember Mosqueda said, and that was always my thought and intent, including what Councilmember Herbold said.

If the focus and the intent was on our values for human rights and that we get away from the militarization of our police force, but based on what Councilmember Lewis said as well, we have scant facts, quite frankly, that convinced me that we actually need to pass an ordinance, because I think what we're doing is we are punishing Israel.

I think that this creates division.

I think that we're not being intellectually honest about what's actually going on here.

Obviously, there is a bigger picture here of human rights.

that these issues, these human rights issues, have been going on for decades.

We have spent an inordinate amount of time on this when we have 16 items on today's agenda.

And let me just share this with you, which really concerned me.

I received three phone calls from three national organizations, Jewish organizations, that wanted me to know, and I also looked it up, that The recent FBI hate crime statistics study for 2020 of the 57% religious-based hate crimes were all focused on Jewish people.

And that to me is alarming when Jewish people make up 2% of the population.

So again, I don't want to go into this about what-ism, about going down this rabbit hole of international law.

I think what we're really saying here is we're weaponizing our vote.

And one thing that's always disturbed me, and most of the time I'm quiet about it or I listen, but sometimes we go and we weaponize our votes to hurt, to punish, to retaliate, to humiliate.

I think that's what we're doing today.

And I don't think it's to enlighten, to lift, to educate, to lead us into a better place in the right direction.

I understand the principles of human rights.

I understand why we want to have those values spoken to and addressed.

A little known fact about Deborah Juarez here, I did study international law and human rights in Strasbourg, France, in Geneva, Switzerland.

So I know a little bit about some of this.

And again, this isn't that people are against all of these principles and values that we want to uphold as a city, but this shines more, it doesn't shine more light on the issue.

It creates heat.

And those of you who are familiar with this saying, as I show you our Council Member Gonzalez, When something creates more heat than light, then there's a problem there.

And we don't need a law to say this.

And this is, you can hide behind it all you want, but the reason why we had to change it and we should have, and I made a mistake by the way, I wanted to make this country neutral as Council Member Peterson was saying, I'm sorry, Council Member, yeah, I'm sorry, Council Member Lewis was saying.

I just think that it's intellectually dishonest to put something forward when I know what we're really trying to do.

I'd rather that we get right to the facts and be honest about it and have that discussion.

And I just want to end on this note.

I'm not saying that what council members want is doing is a bad thing.

What I'm saying is that we need to be honest about what we're really talking about.

And I think that, and thank you council president for walking us through all of this and all of the different changes I created.

But again, I think it underscores my purpose and the point that I was making, that it does create division.

And I believe as leaders that we have to do more than that.

So thank you.

I'll be voting no.

Thank you, Council Member Juarez for walking us through your rationale.

I also really wanted to sort of emphasize my agreement with many of the comments expressed by Council Member Juarez and Luis in particular.

Like, Councilmember Lewis, I was 1 of 2 council members during the committee meeting that abstained in hopes of being able to do some sort of curing of some of the issues that we discussed in committee.

And unfortunately, I just don't feel like that curing has occurred and.

And like Council Member Juarez, I really am committed to addressing the realities of not wanting to be part of a city that actively participates in practices in which other nations are supporting and advancing human rights violations.

And I just don't have a sense of confidence that the formula as described in this bill is actually going to have the intended effect.

And I also worry that it is, that the intent is actually about the ongoing dispute in the Middle East.

become very concerned about the impacts of our local actions in that space that could ultimately result in some harm, whether we intend it to or not, on our local community.

And I, too, like many of you, have engaged with a lot of people in our community on this and have heard heard a lot of differing opinions, but I think the overwhelming number of folks that I have spoken to have pleaded with us to find a different way to accomplish the underlying goals of demilitarizing our police department.

of remaining a human rights city.

And I think that there are ways for us to accomplish that, that will be both meaningful and productive and not divisive, to use Council Member Juarez's words.

And I would encourage us to do that.

So with that, I'm going to hand it over to Council Member Strauss, who I now see has his hand raised.

I'm so sorry about that.

For disclosure, I've had to switch to my phone because my internet has been so unstable.

So I apologize if I skip you in seeing the hand features.

But go ahead, Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Council President.

Colleagues, in July, when I met with both the Jewish Federation and Jewish Voice for Peace in the same week, I told them both that I would be putting forward a nation-neutral amendment and that if it was truly expansive to all nations, that I would vote in favor of this ordinance.

I told Council Member Herbold, as chair of the committee, I told you this about the same timeline, at least over a month ago, and I've been consistent in my position that that is where we needed to be.

It is not your fault or my fault that I was not consulted last week in preparation for this bill to come out of committee.

It is important for me to make it nation neutral by not attempting to understand international law, to not create loopholes for countries to slide through, And it's important for me to also put on the record that it is important to be said another way.

We are able to be critical of Israel without being anti-Semitic.

There are many ways to be critical of Israel that are anti-Semitic.

It is important for us to understand that The way that Israel is operating now is not in line with how the United Nations initially found Israel to be with a two-state solution.

It will help Israel by having a two-state solution.

What is before us today is a bill about police and training.

And I have been very clear about my position since the beginning of this conversation.

I've been consistent with each person that I've spoken to about how I will vote with what is presented.

That unfortunately has not come before us today.

And the bill that I have said that I could support is not before us today.

Council Member Peterson and Council Member Lewis, some of your commentary was very hurtful.

I'm gonna sit there with that because I don't really think that anyone else on this committee knows.

I'll take a step back.

I'll share with you in private how how your comments were purple to me today.

I'm gonna leave it with that.

I won't be voting for this bill.

Thank you, colleagues.

Thank you, Councilmember Strauss.

I appreciate you sharing your comments and your perspective with us and hope that you have an opportunity to connect with your colleagues offline as you process ways.

Clearly been hurtful to you.

And with that being said, I do think we're ready to conclude debate on this.

And so I'm going to hand it back over to Council Member Sawant to close out debate and to then allow us to take a vote on this proposed ordinance.

Thank you to council members Morales and Mosqueda for adding yourselves as co-sponsors on this legislation.

I really appreciate the organizing work of many community members to bring this legislation forward.

Over the summer, hundreds of people wrote letters, testified, and demanded that the city council pass this ban on police training with human rights violators.

Seattle's End the Deadly Exchange struggle has been working on this legislation for years.

Palestinia, the collective of Palestinian feminist activists, whom I've been proud to march alongside in recent months, played a pivotal leadership role as well.

And I also must commend the active role played by members of Socialist Alternative, my organization, who have been absolutely dedicated to this issue, both attending the organizing meetings, helping the efforts on the ground, and also being active in public comment.

I have especially appreciated the discussions our office has had over the last several months with rabbis and Jewish activists from throughout our community.

My council office, which includes staff members who are themselves involved in Seattle's Jewish community life, are acutely aware of the insidious and dangerous nature of anti-Semitism, as are our allies in the Palestinian community, and as am I, as a socialist and as an immigrant woman of color.

We all, and they all, fight alongside us against anti-Semitism because they understand the common struggle against all forms of oppression internationally.

But the presence of this ideology of hatred does not absolve any nation or any government, including the city of Seattle, from calling out human rights abusers wherever they are and from aligning policies such as police training with our declared human rights values.

As a matter of fact, failing to do this, failing to pass legislation of this kind actually creates more openness for divisions, and hate of various kinds, which then adds impetus to oppressive forces.

I want to highlight the many groups that have backed the efforts here for this legislation.

Jewish Voice for Peace, the Seattle Education Association, whose Rack and Pile members adopted a resolution supporting the bill.

One America, 350 Seattle, Maps Amen, Transit Riders Union, Veterans for Peace, Chapter 92, Real Change, Social Justice Fund Northwest, Socialist Alternative, Democratic Socialists of America, the Freedom Socialist Party, the American Friends Service Committee, Alki United Church of Christ, the Rachel Corey Foundation for Peace and Justice, the Center for Constitutional Rights, CARE Washington, The Coalition of Seattle Indian Americans, Palestine Solidarity Committee, Palestine Legal, Decriminalize Seattle, If Not Now, Kadima Reconstructionist Community, La Resistencia, and many more groups that signed on to a powerful letter in July circulated by end the deadly exchange.

These are the tremendous community organizations that together I have no doubt represent the voice of tens of thousands of Seattleites and those are the voices that are going to be rejected it seems like by a majority of the council getting ready to vote no.

But I do want to appreciate every community member who spoke up in the last six months and joined our council office in demanding action.

Collectively, our voices matter, and I'm going to say something about this in a second, and we can demand accountability from the political establishment.

Today, the city council has a bill in front of us that establishes a transparent and even-handed police training policy that is aligned with the city council's previously stated and professed human rights values.

To fail to adopt this legislation would be to give a pass to Seattle Police to continue to train with forces of human rights abusing nations.

That would be appalling.

The choice is clear and that is why I am proud to stand with the community and with human rights activists everywhere to urge a strong vote to adopt the legislation.

I do want to respond to some of the points that have come up by councilmembers in their closing comments.

Councilmember Juarez said that we are weaponizing our vote to hurt, punish, retaliate, humiliate.

I'm sorry, I literally don't understand what that means.

I mean, as opposed to the actual weapons that are hurting, punishing, retaliating, humiliating, and killing not only Palestinians, but so many oppressed groups around the nation, not to mention the oppressive tactics and repressive tactics used by the police department here on the Black Lives Matter protests.

President Gonzalez said she didn't see the things that she wanted cured in the legislation, but we never heard any specific things, not one thing, on what needed to be cured.

repeatedly reached out to all council members and I don't accept Council Member Strauss saying he was not consulted.

What does that even mean?

You know there's a bill to be voted on.

You get all the emails.

It's your responsibility to let us know if you have specific objections that need to be dealt with.

You brought up one thing in the City Council briefing today and my office immediately moved to address that.

which we agreed with, and that amendment was passed.

So I'm just not understanding how these arguments can be taken as genuine.

And I just, you know, Council Member Strauss said three months ago, he would put forward an amendment.

He did that at 2.01 p.m.

and then he was forced to revise it- Council Member Sawant, stop talking.

Because of community pressure.

And Council Member Strauss also said- Council Member Sawant, stop talking about me.

I'm sorry, these are political points.

You made points, I have to respond.

You said that Council Member Strauss said that the bill creates loopholes for nations to fall through.

I literally have no idea what Council Member Strauss is talking about.

What loopholes?

We don't know what this is about.

These are just talking points that are being said with no explanation as to why these are the objections that have been put forward.

Back in July, we circulated legislation and invited feedback and ideas for improving the bill.

We never heard back from Council Member Strauss, not once.

We have not heard back from President Gonzalez either.

I still don't know what needed to be cured in the bill.

And my last point, but this is the most important point as far as members of the public are concerned, who are my main audience, as a working class elected representative.

You all are listening to this debate.

You know that it sounds like it's not going to pass.

This should be a grim but important lesson to us all.

There is no substitute for mass organizing by rank and file community members, labor union members, all of those of us who are committed to social justice.

There is no substitute for mass organizing by all of us, independent of the Democratic party establishment, because you see what happens.

You rely on, you know, private conversations with council members, you rely on what you consider cordial conversations, you don't want any kind of real fight back, and this is what happens.

When we do have a fight back, we do win.

This whole year, we have won incredible renters' rights victory after renters' rights victory.

That was not because all these council members...

Call the question, Madam President.