Seattle City Council Briefing 1/31/2022

January 31st, 2022. Council meeting will come to order.

The time is 12, oh, I'm sorry, 201. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Peterson?

Here.

Swant?

Present.

Strauss?

Present.

Herbold?

Here.

Lewis?

Present.

Morales?

Mosqueda?

Present.

Nelson?

Present.

Council President Morales.

Here.

Present.

Good.

So we'll loop back for, oh, Councilor Morales is here.

Can't hear you.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Hi.

Okay, so let's go to approval of the minutes.

If there's no objection, the minutes of January 24th will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the minutes are adopted.

President's report.

On today's agenda, we will be signing a proclamation proposed by Council Member Strauss.

We'll also be hearing from our Office of Intergovernmental Relations.

I see that Leslie Pullner's here today from DC.

As a reminder, when we get to our individual reports, as you all know, we'll just hand it over to our colleague.

Before we get started, I would like to provide two reminders regarding the 2022 Council Work Plan.

Central staff is working to finalize by February 22nd.

So a solid draft of the work program for each committee is due this Friday.

That's the fourth.

If there are projects or policies you would like included in the work program that fall outside of your committee or the committee you chair, you need to work with the council member who is the chair of that committee with oversight of that particular topic.

With that, I will move to sign in of letters and proclamations.

Council Member Strauss has a proclamation for signature.

Council Member Strauss, do you want to go ahead and lead the discussion on this proclamation and see if there's any additional feedback or questions?

Thank you, Council President Juarez.

Colleagues, we have a proclamation before us regarding a person that has staffed the third and second floors here at City Hall working for many different entities within the second and third floors.

I'm being a little bit coy, uh, because this is supposed to be a surprise once it's delivered.

So if you do see in your emails, and I'm sure on the official records, it is reflected, uh, but would love to honor this person who has served us by honoring them with a proclamation.

Thank you, council president.

Happy to answer any questions of my colleagues.

Okay.

Well, I guess with that, then, um, we will go, um, Won't there be any discussion about the proclamation before I can request signatures to be affixed?

I'm happy to say more.

I don't, I guess I would look to the clerks if I'm required to say more or if Council President, you want me to stop being corny and just be out with a surprise, happy to do that as well.

I kind of would because I can't, I can't ask people to affix their signature until they know what your proclamation is about and if they want to add anything.

I believe that it was circulated to all offices, was it not, as per your rules?

Yeah.

Okay.

So this individual has served both the City Clerk's office and the City Council's office, has worked for mayors, has worked for council members, and has made an improvement upon everyone's lives around here.

I would say if If there are more questions, I'm happy to answer them, or the proclamation should also be in your inbox.

OK.

I guess what I'm getting at, Council Member Strauss, is that in order to ask people to affix their signature to the proclamation, you might have to say, is there any more you want to add?

If you need me to be a little bit more specific, I'm happy to do so.

I was hoping to surprise this person since we are not bringing them to the full city council meeting or the council briefing.

Colleagues in the past, we have been able to do this in a little bit less of a formal way where the individual could show up at the end of council briefing and we could present it to them there.

But since we're now working in a remote fashion, it's a little bit more awkward.

council president, I'm looking for, you're telling me that I just have to be out with.

Yeah.

Well, um, the reason why is, um, in order to lead the discussion on the proclamation, your colleagues to sign, um, they would need to know, uh, who the, who it's about and if they want to add anything and then we can sign it, add to it.

Sure.

So I guess, colleagues, I'll be a little bit more out with it.

I guess I'm a little bit nervous that this person is watching our briefing.

One of the 10 people watching a briefing.

But and the reason I'm trying to be coy, Council President, is because I do know that all offices have received this, and so they do know what they are signing.

But this is a proclamation to honor the work of Lena Tebu, who has worked for both the front desk for the Seattle City Council for Councilmember Bagshaw for myself for Councilmember McGuire for Mayor Paul Schell and has recently accepted a job with the Human Services Department.

And she has the unique thing about Lena is she has not served just one council member.

She has served all council members on the floor and Councilmember Mosqueda I was flipping through some memories of And while you were being sworn in, I have a video of Lena actually affixing your name plate to your door with the mailboxes full of flowers next to it.

And I was like, wait, is that Lena?

That is Lena.

And so this is just an end of it.

I was trying to be coy because it's her birthday next month and I was gonna surprise her with this.

So Lena, if you're watching, cats out the bag.

So colleagues, I would love your signature if you would.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Is there any of our colleagues that want to share anything with our colleague, Lena, who served us well at the front desk and then worked for Council Member Bagshaw and then Council Member Strauss?

And she's a dear friend and has done great.

And we're happy that she has gone to another department on the mayor's side.

So is there anyone that would like to add anything else to this proclamation before I ask you to fix your signatures?

Council Member Scada.

Just to see how much we appreciate Lena's work, and Council Member Strauss, you were so good about these proclamations.

I know you wanted to keep it a surprise, but surprise!

It's a great surprise anyways, and I'm sure it is well-received, but you're a great example of a high-road employer, and very thankful that you are doing this, and Lena, I'm thrilled that we'll be able to continue working with you.

Thank you for fixing that nameplate and all you've done for the city.

So are we declaring a day?

I read it, but I didn't read the date on that.

This is the Lena Thiebaud Day?

We are.

It's going to be Lena Thiebaud Day on March 4, 2022, which is her birthday.

Yes, that's wonderful.

OK, well, the first round is on Strauss.

So yes, ma'am.

All right.

So knowing now that we have that and now we know the proclamation for signature and you all know what you're going to sign.

Council member Strauss has let us in the discussion on the proclamation.

We've already gotten our feedback.

So with that, clerk, will you please call the roll to determine what council members would like their signatures affixed to the proclamation?

Peterson?

Yes.

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nelson?

Aye.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Nine in favor.

Thank you.

The proclamation passes.

So with that, we are going to move to item number four on our agenda.

That's the state legislative session update.

And I know you guys all received Our memo from our folks at OIR, an update from what we discussed last week.

So with that, I will let Gail Tarlington take it over and introduce her team.

And we can go ahead with the overview.

Thank you.

Go ahead, Gail.

Thank you, Madam Council President.

I am delighted to bring forward today two members of our team whom I think many of you have met in the past, our Federal Affairs Director, Ciara, and our Federal Contract Lobbyist, Leslie.

And I'm going to have them start with giving you an update on all things in the other Washington.

maybe a subset of all things in the other Washington.

And then Elsa Brown will give you an update on what will be a final fast week of session before policy cutoff on February 3rd.

So Sierra, why don't you kick it off?

Great.

Thank you, everybody.

Sierra Howlett-Brown, the Director of Federal Affairs under Gail at our Office of Intergovernmental Relations.

Just wanted to do a quick intro.

And Leslie has been in front of most of you, but there are a couple of folks that she has not met.

So I wanted to give her an opportunity to introduce herself and talk through some of the work that we've been doing.

But before we get into what will be a very brief federal update, and happy to answer any questions from you all, just wanted to also highlight, I know I've touched on it briefly in the past, but we have been working through a strategic plan for federal funding, federal grants, and some of the anticipated funding that we are hoping comes out of the federal government.

You know, a lot is still to be depending on votes and appropriations and a lot of movement in D.C., but we are hoping to have some positions and some staffing that will really inform the process and have some high-level thinking around how the city is applying for funding, the relationships that we're working with both regionally and statewide and with our delegation, and just maximizing the city's opportunities and ability to apply for that funding.

We will be updating you all more once that procedure and process is in place, and we are running through that.

And I don't know if Gail wants to touch on any more of it, but we are looking to the mayor's office for some guidance around some of OIR's recommendations, but hope to have more updates for you all on that process as well very shortly.

So if there are no questions around that, I will kick it over to my colleague and our federal lobbyist, Leslie Polner, who is going to give us a quick federal update this week.

Great.

Thank you so much, Sarah.

Thank you, Gail.

And thank you, President Juarez.

It's so nice to see everybody.

And hopefully, we'll find some time this year to actually be together in person.

That would be the dream.

Just a couple of updates here.

This week, both the House and Senate are back in session.

The Senate is going to be really focused on nominations, getting through both judicial nominations and then also nominations for various federal agencies.

I also wanted to note that the Senate is going to be taking up a concurrent resolution that's being sponsored by Senator Murkowski expressing the sense of Congress that September 30th should be observed as a national day of remembrance for Native American children who died while attending a U.S. boarding school.

On the House side, the House is going to be working through the COMPETES Act.

And as many of you know, last summer, the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, passed the U.S.

Innovation and Competition Act, which is a really broad, far-reaching piece of legislation that aims to address the U.S. competitiveness with China across a wide variety of metrics.

And so it invests in the National Science Foundation.

It also puts some parameters around U.S. relations with China.

It provides significant funding for the semiconductor industry as well.

The House has finally unveiled their own legislation.

It is not bipartisan.

It is equally far-reaching.

And in addition to including funding for semiconductors, additional funding for the National Science Foundation also does a lot of work around workforce development, which is something that has not really been touched through the infrastructure bill that was recently passed.

And so it creates a new telecom workforce investment program, also includes the National Apprenticeship Act, which creates funding for apprenticeships, also creates funding for the TACT program, which had been created through ARA.

So a number of really far-reaching and expansive bills.

The Rules Committee is supposed to take this bill up tomorrow.

It is unclear whether or not this is going to pass the House at this time.

There is at least two Democrats that have now come out against the bill.

And as you all know, there is really no margin to spare in the House.

But they are going to try very hard to get this through.

Senator Schumer has said that this is really one of his highest priorities is to then conference this legislation and to bring it back for a vote.

And that is supposed to happen by Memorial Day.

At the same time that they're working on this, they also are trying to get through appropriations funding.

As many of you know, the federal fiscal year ended September 30th, and they are now working on fiscal year 2022. We are now in a continuing resolution through February 18th.

And that is significant for a few reasons.

One, the city has earmarks that are in the House bill that would be very beneficial.

In addition, as Ciara alluded to, there is some funding for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that is also included in the Appropriations Bill.

And so it's made it very challenging for the administration to fully implement the bipartisan infrastructure law.

because they don't actually have funding to hire the enormous number of people that they need to actually do the work to get grants on the ground.

That said, and I'll touch on this in greater detail in a moment, the administration is pushing forward anyways.

As Sierra may have shared with you already, the White House put out a very comprehensive guide to all of the programs in the bipartisan infrastructure law, and DOT has begun rolling out some of their notice of funding opportunities.

You know, Department of Commerce has also released notices for comment, as has Department of Energy.

And I will note, as Sarah mentioned, there is a very collaborative group within the city working on that.

And so, for example, recently SDOT and City Light and OES and a number of other departments worked together to submit comments on the EV charging program.

Department of Energy had put out a notice for comment.

So the city, by providing that comment, is helping to shape those opportunities when they are finally issued from the agency.

In terms of Build Back Better, which of course is the last piece, and that's the human capital infrastructure bill that the Biden administration was trying to work on.

It had initially been as part of the bipartisan infrastructure law.

It fell apart in December when Senator Manchin said that he could not support the deal as it was currently being negotiated.

There are quiet conversations that are happening with Senator Manchin.

We're hopeful that we might hear something this week on what a new deal will look like.

I think it's become very clear that the House-passed Build Back Better Act is not going to be what is finally signed into law, but there is hope that some portions of that bill might be incorporated into a more streamlined, slimmed down version.

You know, parts that we've heard that Manchin may be able to live with child care and universal pre-K, some of the climate measures.

There's, you know, some hope that perhaps CTC could be some form of the child tax credit could be included.

So those conversations are happening.

We're watching that very, very closely as well.

And then, of course, finally, in the backdrop of all of this is the Supreme Court nomination.

Biden has said that he will nominate, you know, he will announce his nomination by the end of February.

I think Democrats are all praying with bated breath that nothing happens to any senator at this time.

They will be living in protective bubbles for the next few months.

But that, of course, is going to start to have a real impact on relationships in Congress as if they aren't already frayed enough, coupled with an election year.

So we've got kind of a narrow window right now in these next few months of spring to kind of get things done.

And then things will start to fall apart, possibly even worse than they have right now.

But let me stop on that note and see if there are any questions that we can answer.

I have a question, Leslie.

So on the Build Back Better, and I know that they're going to break it into, they say, different parts.

So I'm guessing you're not any closer to knowing how that's going to look or how that's going to roll out, if we're just going to sit for a while or?

Well, I think they're really trying to get something.

I don't think they have a lot of time.

And again, with the backdrop of the Supreme Court nomination there and with 2022 being an election year, I think there's a real realization that they can't, if they're going to do something, it needs to be soon.

One piece to reflect on in terms of breaking it out into component parts is that really, in order to do anything, they have to do it through reconciliation, and they don't get many bites at that apple.

In fact, they really only have one for this year.

They might be able to try to do a second one on FY23, but it's really, they've really got one chance at this.

And so I know there were lots of reports about like trying to break it up, but in terms of the things that they want to actually pass, they've got one shot at it.

And so that's going to be the hard part of this.

Thank you.

Does anyone else have questions for Leslie?

Okay, I'm not seeing any, so you want to continue Leslie?

You know, I would just mention that, you know, Sierra had said there is, you know, the name of the game right now is going to be around the infrastructure bill implementation.

And so we have been working really closely with departments, you know, with the process that Gail and Sierra have set up, to make sure that they are commenting on every opportunity before them so that they can help shape those opportunities.

They've been meeting with departments.

You know, we think that the city should be well positioned given the Biden administration's priorities, which really across all of these programs, as we've talked about before, are going to be really focused on equity.

He's got the Justice 40 initiative, as many of you know, climate change, and then really programs that have, you know, the support of labor as well is going to be a priority, particularly in DOT, looking at priority hire, looking at local hire arrangements, really all the work that the city is doing.

I mean, the city is kind of the poster child for what should be successful here.

Okay.

Madam President, we'd like to make sure all of you and our community know that the state legislature is zooming right ahead, both actually on Zoom and literally in the legislative process.

And this coming week is the cutoff of policy bills out of the House and the Senate.

And so we are going to see our narrowing down of which bills are still in play.

And so Elsa is going to give you a snapshot of the pieces of legislation you have been tracking as a body as well as individually.

And I just want to preface it by saying thank you to each of the council members who have made themselves so available for last minute testimony, for making phone calls, for ensuring that the OIR team is able to weigh in when it matters the most and timing is everything.

I just want to also add that this issue of where federal funding comes from and when it comes is so closely tied to the state budget process.

We will have state budgets identified by March 10th with the end of the regular session.

I do believe it will be on time.

And so this integrating of how we are looking at federal funding and state funding and local funding is really important right now.

And so I'll look forward for the OIR team to be helping all of you accomplish that goal of integration of our budget priorities and what we expect to see from funding.

And so Elsa will give you an update on what we think are some of the main themes coming through as policy cutoff arrives.

Yeah, thank you all.

I appreciate the chance to brief you.

Elsa Brown, state lobbyist.

So as Gail mentioned, we're approaching policy cutoff.

So if bills don't make it out of their original policy committee by the third, they're typically dead for the year.

That is never 100% true.

There's a process called necessary to implement the budget, where if a bill is deemed NTIB, it may have an afterlife.

But typically, if a bill doesn't make it out of policy committee by that time, it won't be moving forward this year.

One of the key priorities for many legislators this year was working through some of the concerns about the long-term care program.

The governor signed HB 1732 and HB 1733, halting a payroll tax collection for the program for 18 months and creating an exemption from the payment of premiums for certain people.

So that was a big priority for legislators from the beginning of session and they got it through quite quickly to the governor's desk.

And so that was encouraging for them to see and to get done.

So, um, You know, after policy cutoff, we will shortly thereafter have fiscal cutoff.

So bills that have made it out of their policy committee are not done yet, and they have to make it out of fiscal committees by February 7th.

So that's Ways and Means in the Senate, and Appropriations and Transportation in the House.

So, you know, they'll be continuing to be weeded out, not just on the 3rd, but in the coming week.

So Council President Juarez asked us to focus our presentation a little bit today.

We've sent you our typical bulletin, which includes a number of the bills that we're tracking on behalf of council members.

And we continue to be completely open to learning about new priorities for you all.

So if you have things you'd like to see added, please let us know and we're happy to do that.

But we will be focusing a bit of the conversation today on the governor's housing proposals.

In December, the governor announced a large suite of funding in the governor's budget for housing and homelessness.

These priorities included money for the rapid acquisition of affordable housing and shelter and for utility arrearages.

So we are continuing to support those budget items.

that the governor identified and believed they would be very helpful for the city.

They're statewide money, but we think we'd be quite competitive to get some of that for the city of Seattle.

In addition to budget items, the governor also announced policy items, including the missing middle legislation that many of you have contacted our office about and are aware of.

So the governor request bills are SB 5670 sponsored by Senator Mona Doss and HB 1782 by Representative Jessica Bateman.

There are several other additional pieces of legislation that touch on statewide zoning.

introduced by Jerry Paulette, the chair of the House Local Government Committee, and Representative Amy Wallin.

We do anticipate that the governor's request bills will be the ones that will be moving forward this legislative session.

That does not mean that they will be in the same form that the governor proposed them or that they were introduced to the legislature.

So I'll provide you some updates on that.

As introduced, the bills require cities planning under the Growth Management Act to authorize middle housing types or average minimum densities near transit based on the population of a city.

They also require the Department of Commerce to provide technical assistance to cities authorizing middle housing types or average minimum densities and to develop model middle housing ordinances.

So last week, the Senate passed 5670 out of committee on a 10-1 vote, which was quite a strong vote out of committee.

The bill made several changes in that committee.

But one of the most important, as far as the city of Seattle is concerned, is the bill was amended to provide explicit authorization for cities to require affordable units or payment in lieu, as Seattle does through MHA.

So that is not a requirement that cities do that, but it does provide the city's clear authority to do so if they choose.

on.

The House is scheduled to exec 1782 tomorrow in committee, in the local government committee.

We do not yet have a final version of that legislation that will be considered for executive session, although we do anticipate that the House version will have significant changes from what the governor introduced.

So that is the current status of the bills, and we do expect that both of those may be moving out of committee and considered in fiscal committees.

um after the third um also you were so that was just 1782 and house bill 1981 correct those two that was 1782 is the house version of the governor's missing middle legislation the senate version is 5670 okay 1981 is representative paul watts um fight at this conversation.

And we expect that some of the concepts that he considered in that legislation may be in the version of the 1782 that comes out of committee tomorrow.

Again, we haven't seen a final version of the substitute that they will be considering in that committee, but we expect that some of his concepts will be in there.

But it will likely be the governor's bill that moves out.

So we will get like an update from you before Friday so we can discuss again on Monday?

Yes.

Sure.

Happy to provide that.

Okay.

So anything, um, I'm, I'm sorry, go ahead Elsa.

You had more to share.

Nope.

That was it.

Thank you.

Oh, okay.

Um, colleagues, is there anyone that has any questions for Leslie, Elsa or Sierra?

Oh, there we go.

There we go.

Councilor Mosqueda.

I just wanted to say thank you to both the teams in this Washington and the other Washington.

I think that the reports highlight the importance of the investments in infrastructure.

both human infrastructure and the brick and mortar infrastructure.

And I know that that's a conversation that's been had in the halls of Congress over the last few months, but how important both of those investments are to our recovery and a more equitable recovery, I think was just very nicely outlined.

And, you know, looking forward to working with these teams as we get legislation over the finish line to address the infrastructure needs for both the individuals and our cities.

and really appreciate the work you all have been doing.

I'm excited as well that, as I was mentioning to Leslie and Director Charlton and Elsa have heard me talk about this as well, we were able to reference a National League of Cities report that talks about the importance of cities working with state legislatures and Congress to lift the floor on important policies like housing and zoning so that cities can still respond locally but have a great partner in our state legislative partners and Congress to help build upon that floor, quite literally build upon the floors that they're helping to elevate so that we can respond to the needs of our community.

So just want to say thank you and look forward to working with you to get so much more done this year and appreciate our congressional delegation and our legislative champions who've been working to try to respond to this moment.

I know we're all eager to make sure that the dollars received have been implemented appropriately and that was a great conversation we had two weeks ago, too.

I don't think it could have been more succinctly said how important both infrastructure and brick and mortar and human infrastructure is in this moment and appreciate all you're doing.

Wrap it up for us, sir.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you for your work.

And we will keep you posted as a policy cut off will give us a much clearer picture.

We will look forward to that.

Thank you so much for your time.

Great.

And good seeing you, Leslie.

I'll talk to you offline as usual.

Council President, there's a hand from.

I'm sorry.

Yes, I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you, and I'm sorry, I think I'm tracking the conversation as well as I would like to be.

I was, I thought, Council President Uras, you were seeking comment on the housing bills that And not, but it sounds like we're wrapping up the entire state legislature.

I didn't have any questions or comments on the two housing bills.

Appreciate the conversations I've been having with OIR and Council Member Mosqueda on those two bills.

But it sounded to me like we're trying to wrap up the entire conversation about the legislative agenda or are we gonna hear more?

So if I have other questions.

We're done on the legislative session.

You are?

Unless you have questions, and we're happy to answer.

I'm sorry.

I thought we were going to be going through additional bills.

So yeah, I do have, I mean, the opportunity to talk about other bills with the understanding that the presentation wasn't intended to cover them today.

My apologies.

We're happy to take them up offline, Council Member, any time.

If you would like us to give you a call later on today?

With Council President Juarez's understanding, I would love to just take the time now.

I just, are we changing something about how we go through the legislative agenda?

I thought we looked at sort of the legislative agenda as like a sort of a blue sky opportunity to talk about all the bills that we're interested in.

Well, we can certainly do that Council Member Herbold.

I think when we had talked offline or before this meeting started with Director Tarleton, and we talked about some of the bills, my understanding was that Gayle and team would go over them, but remind us that a lot is going to change between now and In fact, the one that I was more concerned about.

You're not going to get to tell tomorrow morning.

It sounds like 1782 and my understanding from this team is that there's gonna be a lot of change and some of them are going to make it past So I thought, well, you know, that's kind of what they shared with us this morning.

So if there's more there that Council Member Herboldt wants to find out a little bit more.

Council Member Herbert, are you referring to those specific, the House Bill 1782 and the Senate House Bill 1880?

Are those the ones in particular?

Because we started off thinking that we would do like a compare and contrast of where we're at with language for the city.

But my understanding from the OIR team is that a lot of what we know from last week has changed a lot, and it's gonna change even more.

So I didn't wanna take up a lot of time if we know that there's gonna be a lot of change, and they're gonna bring it all back to us next Monday.

So no, that those aren't, I heard you solicit a conversation about those two bills.

Those aren't the bills that I, I have questions about the same bills that I typically had questions about, ones related to public safety, so.

We can certainly, no, go ahead Council Member Herbold, this is, I apologize.

I recognize that there's two different catalytic converter theft bills.

There's the Senate bill and the House bill, and it's not unusual for there to be two bills, and actually it's typical, but there are two, as I understand it, there are two bills that accomplish different things.

And I'm wondering if you have information about that and whether or not the city, I know we have signed on in support of the bill, focused on requiring marking or not requiring making marking of catalytic converters possible and then requiring a task force but then there's a second bill that relates the requirement for scrap metal and recycling entities to provide documentation similar to what we do for wire theft.

So one, I'm just very, very interested to know what the city's thoughts are about the second bill and whether or not we're supporting that as well.

And just also wondering whether or not you have any updates on my request from last week related to looking into whether or not we need to deal with the preemption issue.

Thank you, Councilmember.

I'm happy to answer that question.

We will be meeting with bill sponsors this week with Representative Ryu in the House, who is sponsoring the House version, about updates on preemption and getting her feedback on whether that might be possible in the context of her legislation.

We also are tracking the Senate version, which, as you mentioned, is not a companion bill and contains different provisions.

I think the inspiration is just the need across the state and many legislators kind of seeing the need for addressing catalytic converter theft in their communities.

So we are continuing to track both pieces of legislation and have signed on in support of both the House and Senate bills with the hope that one of them will be able to move forward and address some of those concerns that we have.

They both are, you know, the inspiration I think is similar for the two of them, just different angles taking a bite out of that apple.

Did you have a follow-up?

A follow-up about a separate bill?

One more bill?

Thank you.

And so this is a bill I did not flag last week but I'm very interested in.

1412, and that's the bill related to legal financial obligations, sometimes known as LFOs.

There was a study done by LFOs that are assigned by Seattle Municipal Court, done by Dr. Alexis Harris and SOCR a couple years ago.

The findings, as you might expect, showed that there are negative impacts related, resulting from LFOs imposed by the Seattle Municipal Court, police, and traffic officials.

found that the consequences are disproportionately borne by people of color.

And the study itself examined consequences that included length of court debt and likelihood of triggering effects associated with LFOs, such as the loss of driver's licenses, garnishment of needed wages, and the issuing of warrants and further incarceration.

The other thing that the study found is that Seattle Municipal Court, in its wisdom, is waiving almost all of the LFOs that they can waive, but there remains to be some state-required LFOs that some of them, if they could waive them, they would.

Others, you may not want to do so.

question is, in addition to the city's support of this bill and signing on, I'm wondering if we have engaged with Seattle Municipal Court as well on this, because this is an area of a focus for them in trying to reduce the disparities there.

And it just seems that an opportunity of our municipal court judges to weigh in on this might be really helpful.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember.

That bill has moved quite well through the process.

It's passed out of its policy committee already, and it has been heard already in the House Appropriations Committee.

So, you know, typically with this type of legislation, funding and the termination of budget writers will be part of what determines whether or not it will make it to the end of the process.

As with many pieces of legislation, we send this piece out to our department counterparts, so we have shared it with Seattle Municipal Court, and I'm happy to follow up with you more on that.

Thank you.

Thanks so much, Elsa.

I really appreciate it.

Thank you.

I have a follow-up question that I'm going to go to Councilmember Nelson.

Hey, Elsa, on the bill that Councilmember Herbert was just bringing up, the legal financial obligations to LFOs, who do you work with in Muni Court, Municipal Court, for all that?

Is it an administrator?

You know, I'll have to get back with you offline on that.

I would need to look up who our legislative liaison is from.

Okay.

That's a good point.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold, for raising that.

Let's go to Council Member Nelson.

Thank you.

I am following up on Council Member Herbold's comments about the catalytic converter bills because I think, Elsie, you said we're hoping that one of those moves forward, and because they do both address different things, and it's possible that the Senate Bill 5495 would have some immediate impact sooner rather than later, I'm just, and we can take this offline, because I think we have a meeting after this, but I would like both to proceed.

So perhaps we could talk about whether or not that needs any support from other council members.

So you can answer that in our meeting.

And then also, I would like to know how the House Bill 1015 on creating the Washington equitable access to credit is doing, because if there is a need to weigh in during any hearing this week.

I'd like to know if my help would be helpful and let me know when.

Thanks.

Yes, thank you, Councilmember.

Because that bill has already passed out of its house of origin, I think it hasn't been prioritized for a hearing during cutoff week because it's made it past some needed deadlines and maybe other pieces of legislation and committee aren't there yet.

But it has been referred to the Senate Business, Financial Services and Trade Committee, and we will definitely be in contact with your office and let you know when it's scheduled for a hearing in the Senate.

Thank you.

Councilmember Nelson, are you planning on providing public comment on that one?

I don't know.

I mean, I'm happy to, because I do think that this would be an important tool for our our nonprofits to give out important grants and it's federally funded, 60 million dollars.

So I am happy to provide testimony.

But if it's on the Senate version, so That's what that's why I'm asking this question, but I'm prepared to to support if necessary.

And if I'm not in another important meeting, so I'm really glad you brought that out.

This one got by me, but thank you.

This is something that our office was monitoring on equitable access to credit and like, when they do, you know, credit checks and backgrounds and whether or not people use banks and when they do credit scores.

So I'm going to look to you, Council Member Nelson, to kind of keep us in line on this one, if you wouldn't mind.

I'm happy to give you the highlights of the bill and be in dialogue with anybody who's interested.

Thank you.

Is there any other questions for our team or OIR team?

Okay, so I think we are, Director Charlton, I think we are done now.

Thank you, Madam President.

Have a good afternoon.

You guys too.

Good seeing you guys.

Okay, Council Member Herbold, thank you for bringing us back to some of those other, I apologize, I was kind of moving through the calendar on some of those housing bills.

So thank you for bringing us back to the ones that you wanted and then the ones that Council Member Nelson wanted.

And in the future, please feel free to interrupt me or tell me what I'm doing wrong or if I'm not, if I'm missing something, there's no problem there, because I can't keep track of everything.

Well, I can, but I don't wanna show off.

So with that, let's move to this part of our agenda.

the preview of City Council Actions Council and Regional Committees.

The roll call order this week, Council Member Peterson will be up first, then Council Member Sawant, Strauss, Herbold, Lewis, Morales, Mosqueda, Nelson, and then myself.

So with that, Council Member Peterson, you want to kick us off?

Thank you, Council President.

Colleagues, on tomorrow afternoon's full City Council agenda, there is one item related to our Committee on Transportation and Seattle Public Utilities, a reappointment to the Moved Seattle Levy Oversight Committee.

Kevin Werner has been a valued member of the Oversight Committee, and his peers recently selected him as Vice Chair of the Oversight Committee, and so we're eager for his reappointment by the Council tomorrow.

Our first meeting of 2022 for the committee on transportation and Seattle Public Utilities will also be tomorrow morning, Tuesday, February 1st at 930 a.m.

This committee will include an after-action report from both the Seattle Department of Transportation and Seattle Public Utilities to assess the executive's response to winter storms that hit our area between December 26th and January 4th.

This will include information on SDOT's ongoing response to the post-storm plague of potholes throughout our city.

This past Friday in District 4, I welcomed several other city officials to the University District to hear firsthand the gut-wrenching stories of violence and vandalism against small neighborhood businesses owned by women and people of color and their customers.

This crime prevention walking tour was organized by my office and the University District Partnership, which is the nonprofit manager of the business improvement area.

very much appreciate being joined by our new citywide Councilmember Sarah Nelson.

I was also impressed that the new administration under Mayor Bruce Harrell is taking seriously this disturbing spike in crime by bringing together public safety and economic development experts to try to expedite short-term and long-term solutions, which I hope includes community policing targeted where it can be the most impactful in preventing crime.

I believe solutions must also include responding proactively and compassionately to mental health challenges before they become a harmful crisis, and making available more enhanced shelter and low-income housing with case management throughout our region.

The U District has so many assets that require community safety to thrive, including our world-class university, light rail stations, a global diversity of restaurants and shops, and residents who all deserve to feel safe.

I want to thank the Seattle Police Department officers in our north precinct who leveraged their extensive training and professionalism to apprehend suspects involved in violent assaults and robberies last week in the University District, as well as just yesterday arresting a suspect involved in a domestic violence-related murder in the Bryant neighborhood.

We rely on the hard work of these officers and detectives to solve these violent crimes.

That concludes my report.

Any questions before we turn it over to Council Member Sawant.

Okay, thank you very much.

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you Council Member Peterson.

Good morning, good afternoon everyone.

There are no items on I would like to welcome you to the next regular meeting of the committee.

The next regularly scheduled meeting of the committee is this Friday February 4th at 930 a.m.

at this week's meeting we will hear a briefing from city Council and staff on the legislation from my office supporting the demands from the climate the new fossil fuel infrastructure projects.

My office is sponsoring the legislation that the climate movement has requested to give the green new deal oversight board, the city of Seattle green new deal oversight board the option to rate financial institutions that have that bid on city projects based on those institutions ties to the fossil fuel infrastructure.

If the Green New Deal Oversight Board chooses to rate bidders, then the city of Seattle's Finance and Administrative Services is instructed to give those ratings a weight of 20% of the decision of which bid should win the city contract.

The bill was sent to city council central staff to the clerk's office for introduction one week ago.

and it was sent to the committee members along with the city council central staff memo this morning.

My intention is to have the bill discussed in this Friday's committee meeting and then voted on at the following committee meeting.

Of course, committee members had an introduction to this issue through a presentation that was made by indigenous and climate activists at the last committee meeting.

On tomorrow's introduction and referral calendar is the resolution from my office in support of Starbucks workers who in Seattle and nationwide are struggling to form a union.

And we know now that over 55 – workers at over 55 stores around the nation have declared their intention to be part of this union movement.

We've already had three stores in Seattle and probably more now as we speak that have declared their intention to unionize.

By voting yes on this resolution, Seattle City Council members would take a stand with Starbucks workers.

The resolution calls on Starbucks Corporation to accept card check neutrality, which means recognizing a union when the majority of a workforce signs union cards.

in committing to allow employees to discuss unionization free from threats, intimidation, anti-union propaganda, anti-union meetings, and lawsuits.

If Starbucks workers in Seattle unionize, the resolution further urges Starbucks to bargain a fair contract such that the workers can have good standards of living and the company's overwhelming wealth does not flow just to the top executives and shareholders.

Last but not least, the resolution recommends all workers in Seattle organize into unions to collectively fight for better wages, benefits, and working conditions.

I joined Starbucks workers not only for the press conference on Tuesday morning last week where we unveiled the resolution, but also for a fantastic rally Tuesday evening, which was attended by nearly 200 people, many of them union members, many of them non-unionized workers.

despite the cold weather.

And this rally was co-hosted by my office alongside Starbucks Workers United and local unions such as Protech 17, UAW 4121, UFC 1488, CWA 7800, and the Book Workers Union.

Workers talked about the fact that they have no democracy in the workplace, no voice to push for decent wages or COVID safety procedures.

They need a union to have the power to negotiate for the wages, benefits, and conditions that they need.

And in fact, they've already – workers have already shown what power there is in getting collectively organized.

The store – one of the stores in Buffalo that won the union, which has inspired Starbucks workers around the nation, also followed up that action by carrying out a five-day – started it with a walkout and then ended up with a five-day strike action that won them an incredible victory, which is the paid COVID quarantine if you're exposed to COVID.

This is – and this is for workers company-wide.

This is an incredible victory, and it is a testament to what is possible to win when we have workers that are willing to move into collective action.

We've seen Starbucks workers talk about the long history that the company has of brutally repressing unionizing drive.

We've learned from the experiences of the two locations in Buffalo.

We've heard how Starbucks sent literally hundreds of managers, many of them from Seattle, into those stores in Buffalo to try to intimidate and browbeat the workers into voting no. and also using other kinds of actions like trying to whine and dine the workers, taking them out to fancy dinners to get them to back down, immediate managers telling – store managers taking workers aside and telling them, I will be personally heartbroken if you join the union.

So they're using all kinds of tactics to get the workers to back down.

Workers are showing incredible courage.

It's important that the progressive elected officials and also labor councils and labor unions stand with the workers and pass such resolutions.

This is a really exciting nationwide unionization drive.

Starbucks workers are inspired by what has happened so far and what is possible to win, but they are also aware of how fiercely opposed Starbucks executives and billionaires like Howard Schultz are to their Demands winning the union will be difficult.

Winning the first contract will be even more difficult.

We know that hundreds of Starbucks locations will need to unionize to have the power to force the corporation to agree to any kind of decent contract.

Also, We have a DSA, the Democratic Socialists of America, Alderman in Chicago, Byron Siccho-Lopez, who is going to be unveiling a similar resolution for the Chicago City Council.

I will be joining him for that press conference as well, virtually, obviously, but they will be standing outside a Starbucks store there and announcing their own resolution there for – led by socialist Byron Siccho-Lopez, but urging the whole city council to sign it.

Please let my office know if you have any questions or any kind of input on the resolution.

We did get one edit from Council President Warris' office correcting the date of an article that we've quoted in the resolution.

Thank you for that.

We will make sure to incorporate that.

And my staff will be happy to meet with any of the offices to provide any needed answers.

Do council members have any questions before I end the report from my office?

I do.

Please go ahead, President Morrison.

Council Member Sawant, thank you.

I want to let some people know what some of the discussions have been offline about the resolution and some of the rules that the new rules that we had passed on city council voting, whether or not you can abstain from a resolution.

And, you know, the rules that we did pass are that abstentions are not allowed on actions other than resolutions that in the sole discretion of the council president, are not materially related to city government.

So basically, the council president would have to have some kind of objective or subjective ruling that something is not materially related to allow our colleagues to abstain on particular resolutions.

And I think we're going to have more discussion about that.

Before I actually get to that, though, let me just share this.

Council Member Sawant, thank you for pulling this resolution together.

Layla, our intern, went through to look at the language that you had put into your resolution to, um, just to make sure that's how we knew that one of the dates were off just so we could go back and look at where some of the, um, statements that you were making in the resolution, uh, what they were coming from the U S bureau of labor, um, from the Bloomberg article that came on, came out on December 6th, um, Starbucks financial report article that came out in New York times and Rutters.

And again, the New York times, So I guess my point is this, whether we agree or not agree, what you did put in there are facts.

They're facts that you believe are important that should be in a resolution.

And I know that there are some discussions among some of my colleagues about exercising our rule about what is material and what isn't.

And I just wanted to share with my colleagues that historically and traditionally, this council has been more liberal.

in allowing particular resolutions to go forward that aren't quite materially related.

Because again, that would take some notion, some subjective notion, I would believe, for me unilaterally to decide what comes in and what comes out.

And I don't believe my job is as a gatekeeper.

And I'm more inclined to err on the side of allowing more because we traditionally have done that.

We did that for the Restaurant Association when they were concerned about the mining up in Pebble, the Pebble Mine up in Canada, because they believed it was affecting the quality of their restaurants and food.

We've done that with the Dakota Access Pipeline, where this city council passed a resolution opposing what was happening in North Dakota.

So we have a history of taking a position that maybe isn't quite, that some could arguably say isn't material, but we believe that it was.

And so I want to kind of disabuse people of the notion that that rule is passed to just to ferret out everything that we don't want to have to vote on, but that's why we get to vote.

But I also want to share the other side of that is, I would not interpret anyone who votes yes or no on this as either being anti-business or pro-business or pro-union or anti-union.

And I would hopefully encourage all of you, however you decide to vote and the questions that you have for Council Member Sawant, that we've submitted a few to her and some corrections, that you be prepared to have a statement by why you're voting the way you're voting.

I don't wanna color resolutions with people's personalities.

I appreciate that Council Member Sawant and her staff put together what they believe is factually relevant in a resolution.

But I also want to be clear that every one of us has the opportunity to state why we're voting yes or no.

I'm not inclined to declare this not material relevant and then therefore allow people to abstain.

And I know we've done some of that in the past.

And I think we should just be open about that.

And I'm open to having more conversations with my colleagues about this.

So I know that this is going to come up, so I kind of want to nip it in the bud since we passed this rule in December that we're going to start looking at how we move forward on resolutions and what they mean.

And I think we're going to have different opinions, but I think that's OK.

I don't I don't mean we're basically a labor town.

We basically support labor, but we also support business and know how important it is to us.

So with that, I wanted to just share that note and in regards to what Council Member Sawant has brought forward in this particular resolution.

And Council Member Sawant, we got the fiscal note and summary of that this morning, I think, from, is it Mr. Goodnight and Messel?

Messel, right?

Goodnight?

Oh, Eric McConaghy, I'm sorry.

That's the member you're talking about, right?

No, that from Eric, that was the about the climate bill.

That's a climate one.

I'm sorry.

Okay, so we have it and we don't have a copy of the Chicago one, right?

No, no, that and we're not voting on that one.

I just mentioned that as a point of information that I've put this resolution forward for Seattle City Council, but that council member in Chicago is putting forward for his city council.

So that's not something we will be voting on.

Right, but I just want to know if we had a copy of that or if that's out yet.

Oh, not not out yet, but it will be soon.

And I will.

Yeah, I'll be happy to love to see it.

Yes, of course.

Yes.

OK, good.

Is there any.

I'm sorry.

Go ahead.

Oh, no, no.

I was I was just going to ask for any comments.

And also, I just wanted to clarify something that I had said earlier.

But I'll wait for any other questions or comments.

I'm not seeing anyone wanting to speak, so I'll just close out by saying I really agree, Council President Borges, that it is better, I certainly prefer, as many of you know for years, that we be open as elected officials, as elected representatives, why we vote yes or no on a certain question.

I think that we owe that to constituents, and I certainly think that this resolution is material because it directly – union – having a union would directly support many of our constituents.

And of course – and also, it's important to mention, which I forgot to mention earlier, Actually, inspired by the Starbucks union movement that has begun, coffee shops – workers in other coffee shops are also moving into action.

So it really has a ripple effect as well.

And just to clarify, on the date of the Bloomberg article, President Juarez, actually, my office is just informing me when they heard me speak that actually we weren't wrong with the date because articles are sometimes updated and they get a new date when they are updated, and this reflects that date.

But we can correct that.

look at that again to make sure that it is correct.

But you're right.

And I was wrong.

Why?

It's just a question of data.

I just want to clarify that the data is accurate.

Because you may get surprised when you see the same date.

And you may think that we've neglected to change it.

Yeah, I do see I do see Council Member Nelson's hand up.

So I'll wait for that.

Thanks.

Over the weekend, I did try to find that article, and there are a lot of articles with those keywords in the quote that you used.

So could you please send a link to that article?

That would help.

Thanks.

Yes.

We will make sure to send the article out as well.

That's not a problem at all.

Thank you.

Yeah, of course.

Any other questions?

I don't see anything.

So if there are no other comments or questions, that ends the report from my office.

And Council Member Strauss is next in the rotation.

Council President.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Council Member Scata, you had a comment?

Yes, thanks, Council President.

I also wanted to let our colleagues know, obviously, I'll be supporting the resolution, happy to support that and think it is relevant to our city businesses, has been discussed at the request of UFCW 21 MLK Labor Teamsters 117 Metcure Local 8. I'm going to be sending some amendment language over to add another resolve to acknowledge the thousands of Starbucks workers who are already unionized in airports and grocery stores.

I'm sure that it will be seen as a friendly amendment, so we'll make sure to share that with the sponsor as soon as possible and work directly with Karina as well.

Yeah, definitely.

willing to add that for sure.

I think we should add that.

And also I wanted to make sure I mentioned, which I forgot to mention, that the resolution that my office has put forward is a product of the effort that we have made alongside Starbucks workers themselves to understand what conditions they're facing.

And we've been very much, it has very much gone through the The input of Buffalo workers who are involved in the unionizing struggle there because they know firsthand what has happened.

And also the input of Starbucks Workers United, which is the union organization that Starbucks workers are working with.

So I just wanted to make sure council members know that it's something that has gone through a lot of review, and I would be happy to add the language that includes the Starbucks workers who are already unionized in airports and other locations.

And also, I just wanted to share that I sent a letter to the MLK Labor Council to urge them to support this.

And of course, I'm happy to report that I did get a response from the Secretary Treasurer, Katie Garrow.

And hopefully, they will also be sending a letter of support for this resolution.

And of course, I've also appealed to them that the Labor Council should pass its own resolution and that Labor Councils nationwide should be doing a similar thing.

Thank you.

That's Member Strauss.

Thank you, Council President, colleagues.

Good afternoon.

Here in District 6 last week, I continue to hold operational coordination meetings with community leaders, government entities, and non-governmental entities to make meaningful interventions and impacts, address homelessness in specific places in District 6. For D6 residents who'd like to meet with me for status updates or more information, please do sign up for my office hours as I meet with residents every week.

I hosted D6 office hours last Wednesday, met with six people from Ballard, two from Crown Hill, and one from Finney where we discussed the need for the tree ordinance.

We just discussed homelessness and public safety.

An area I spoke with a few people about is the quadrant between Market Street and Leary Way, between 15th Avenue and 3rd Avenue.

I want everyone to know this is very clearly and high on my radar.

I was able to go down and tour Greg's garden key patch and some of the adjacent areas that I spend actually quite a lot of time in before these meetings.

So this is an area that I am very aware of and is one of the many areas I'm working on to bring immediate relief to the neighborhood as the mayor's quarterly plan to address homelessness is created and shared with the public.

But not related, I also met with Seattle Goodwill's CEO and President Darrell Campbell regarding the Goodwill site on 8th Avenue where we discussed the long queuing lines on 8th Avenue and vehicle residency in the area.

It was a really productive meeting with follow-ups occurring this month.

For residents in the area, you may have also experienced the queuing on 8th Avenue.

And one of the products of this is because two other drop-off stations in the very close adjacent area are no longer available.

And so this is picking up the load for three drop-off areas.

Also in D6, I attended the North Seattle Industrial Association monthly meeting.

Thanks for Councilmember Peterson.

We're coming and presenting to the group as our Transportation Committee Chair.

It was a great presentation and it was great to be there.

I also facilitated a meeting for District 6 businesses and restaurants to meet with the Seattle Police Department to discuss solutions and practices as it comes to organized criminal enterprises in District 6. We were joined by North Precinct Captain Grossman, Crime Prevention Coordinator Joe Ellenbaas, Captain Wong from Coordinating Criminal Investigations, and Megan Westphal from the Seattle Attorney's Office, along with community leaders, business owners, and restaurant owners.

This was an opportunity for us to come together and discuss what each of us, as separate entities, can do collectively to interrupt organized criminal activity in D6.

And it is important to note that we are aware of organized criminal activity hiding behind homelessness.

And for us to be successful, we will need to separate predators and intervene in organized criminal enterprises.

There's more work to be done in this area, and the group will be meeting again in a few weeks.

I was also able to attend a walk of North Aurora, hosted by Senator O'Carlyle and Senator Elias in partnership with the Aurora Reimagined Coalition.

I also saw Council Member Peterson there as well.

Great to see you there, Council Member Peterson.

And it was great to hear from these partners about the desire to work together as a state and city to address safety and vibrancy issues along the Aurora Corridor.

I'm excited to keep working with them on this.

This week, and also Council Member Juarez's team was represented there.

I did see Murphy.

Murphy was great.

I had a great conversation with him.

This week in District 6, office hours are on Thursday from 2 p.m.

to 6 p.m., and as always, if you'd like to meet with me, please sign up.

I am also meeting with SDOT this week regarding 14th Avenue Northwest safety improvements.

to bring short-term changes and to bring short-term changes to Ballard Avenue in the next few months.

Or as you all have heard me say time and time again, we're using Ballard Avenue as the model and pilot for forthcoming permanent regulations for street dining across the city.

Outside of District 6 last week, I was heavily involved with the Washington Association of Washington City's work.

We had an audit committee on Monday, Board of Directors meeting on Tuesday, City Action Days on Thursday and Friday, and I'll be attending the AWC Board Steering Committee tomorrow as well.

Last Wednesday, I was able to meet with SPD Chief Adrian Diaz, as I do on a monthly basis.

We also discussed organized crime impact in local businesses.

I was happy to hear about this retail theft program that is forthcoming.

This coming week, I will also be attending the Puget Sound Regional Council Growth Management Policy Board, and I'll be speaking with the Seattle Planning Commission co-chairs to discuss 2022 work plans and their upcoming major update to the comp plan.

In the land use committee, the next land use committee will be held February 9th and we will include legislation sponsored by Councilmember Peterson and myself requiring registration for tree care providers, arborists.

We'll be legislating the legislation extending the temporary floodplains regulations and quasi-judicial contract rezone of a property in Northgate area.

Colleagues, central staff will be sharing our work plan later this week as I reviewed with them this morning.

So please do let me know if there's anything we missed.

It is a very comprehensive document at the moment, and I'd love your feedback if there are additions that you would like to make.

Council President and colleagues, that is my report.

Any questions, friends?

Seeing none, I will pass it off.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you, colleagues.

I'll now pass it off to Council Member Herbold.

Thank you so much, Council Member Strauss.

So there are no items on our full council agenda from the Public Safety and Human Services Committee, and the Public Safety and Human Services Committee is not meeting this week.

Just a few updates from the departments that are in my committee in public health.

Just want to lift up the fact that the Washington State Department of Health is reopening an online portal that allows people to order free COVID-19 rapid tests online and have them shipped to their house.

You might recall that that was happening a couple weeks ago.

Residents had the opportunity to order up to five free tests.

Those were sent out and exhausted their capacity very quickly.

So the Department of Health anticipates another 120 households will be served with this next batch.

Recipients will get those tests delivered at no cost, but again, only while When more supplies become available, the state will open the portal again and I'll be sure to let you know.

You can also order a free testing kit from the federal program at covidtest.gov.

On the Seattle Police Department side, I really want to appreciate many of the remarks of my colleagues this afternoon regarding the organized retail theft.

In addition to recognizing last week that SPD made arrests in a recent carjacking in the university district that is suspected to be linked to other unlawful activity, and also arresting a person who was found at the scene or near a scene of a homicide in the Bryant neighborhood.

report that I, too, continue to discuss with Diaz the organized retail theft, the open-air resale of these stolen guns, and the violence that often accompanies this activity.

As some of you have said this afternoon, it's occurring throughout cities – I'm sorry, in neighborhoods throughout the city.

a couple words about 2nd Avenue South and South Jackson Street in Little Thigon and 12th Avenue South and South Jackson Street.

and then 3rd Avenue in Pike Pine.

I recognize those are only two neighborhoods in neighborhoods throughout the city that are again experiencing this.

These are neighborhoods that have been in the public eye.

The chief reports police activities at both of these locations.

SPD, I think as many of you know, is in touch with neighborhood groups.

in these areas and in touch with STAT as well about how to make changes that may allow for SPD to observe suspected criminal activity in a more efficient way.

As I recently shared in my weekly blog post, we know that rates of shots fired in Seattle continue to be high, a 40% increase overall in shooting incidents over 2020, and an 86% increase compared to 2019. In 2021, 31 of these incidents resulted in a fatality.

143 resulted in a nonfatality injury.

I really appreciate Chief Diaz, in a recent Seattle Times article, his recognition that there is no single cause for the increase in gun violence in Seattle and a recognition that these increases are happening in jurisdictions throughout the nation.

We know nationally the rate of gun purchase over the last two years shows that Americans bought more guns in 2020 and 2021 than they did in previous years.

The guns purchased in 2020 seem to be using crimes more quickly than firearms bought in previous years, and Americans are more likely to carry guns illegally in 2020. Each of these findings that I just mentioned are supported by specific studies.

And in short, Americans had more guns and were possibly more likely to use and carry them.

Research generally shows that when there's more guns, there's more violence.

In Seattle, SPD reports seizing 1,237 guns last year.

Just want to also recognize how important that work is, getting these guns off the street, but also want to recognize the efforts under the leadership of King County Executive Dow Constantine and Renton City Council Member Ed Prince to pull together the King County Regional Violence Prevention Leadership Group.

Really appreciate their work to ensure that we're taking a public health approach to community safety and well-being while interrupting instances of violence through prevention, intervention, and restoration.

on the Human Services Department front.

I want to lift up that A-TREM in Seattle will be holding its first civic cocktail of 2022 on February 3rd.

And this inaugural coffee for the year is featuring Black History Month, Seattle's African descent communities.

There'll be a panel panel presentation, led by Emmanuel Mvuni of the International Rescue Committee.

And the panel itself will feature Pamela Williams, member of the Mayor's Council on African American Elders, and Fayza Hamza, the Social Service Specialist at the East African Cleaner Center, and also Luanda sorry, Luanda O'Rye, a community outreach specialist with the Seattle Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs.

The cocktail is a monthly event by the Human Services Department where older people can meet community leaders and local government officials, ask questions, and provide feedback.

You can find more information about Civic Coffees at seattle.gov forward slash aidfriendly.

Let's see, one last quick update from the Human Services Department.

The Seattle Youth Employment Program, SYEP, is preparing to launch its school year Lunch and Learn.

Sorry, that's not Lunch and Learn.

It's a learn and earn program.

This provides low-income young people with virtual free employment and life skill development sessions, including interactive job readiness, support from active counselors, and practical tools to build a portfolio.

Young people can receive stipends totaling nearly $600 for the 12-week program.

And as part of the application process, SYEP received 159 applications and 115 young people completed the eligibility process.

There was a virtual orientation.

and virtual learning sessions will start on February 2nd.

And then lastly, I just want to let folks know that on Wednesday evening, I will be attending a District 1 Community Network meeting.

It's a District 1 Community Network is a community organization that represents a number of different community associations throughout District 1, and the topic will be a discussion about public safety, and we'll be having some guests that represent the city's investments on community safety.

And that's all I have.

Do any of my colleagues have questions or comments?

Seeing none, I will pass it to Council Member Lewis.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold, for your report.

So jumping into it, not that much to report on this week, but I do want to give people updates on upcoming committee meetings.

We do have a committee meeting on February 2nd of the Public Assets and Homelessness Committee.

We are only going to have one substantive agenda item to consider some legislation from the Parks Department.

to change use permit policies or adjust use permit policies to better reflect vendors who want to use parks as part of their recreational or private activities.

So we're going to hear that information via a discussion on Council Bill 120264. I've told the department that this seems to be a good time in the calendar to consider this legislation given that things are going to heat up considerably as we go into March.

So this seemed to be a bill that we would benefit from discussing this week and potentially if there's no issues identified from committee members voting out and referring to full council for consideration at this early part of the calendar.

For the February 16th meeting, as this is currently coming together, we're going to get an update from Climate Pledge Arena on how things have been going since the completion and opening of Climate Pledge Arena last fall.

And there's just a lot of folks, as everyone here can appreciate, who are very proud about landing that project, which I know Council President was very instrumental in when she had leadership of this committee.

And we look forward to having her report back to kind of discuss We are also going to hear from the board of parks and These are going to be for Council appointments drawn from several districts.

And in addition to those two agenda items, there may be an additional substantive item added.

So don't lock me into that being the full agenda for February 16th, but I will duly let the Council know at briefing if there will be more that is anticipated to be discussed at that meeting.

On some homelessness updates, I'm pleased to report to the council that over the weekend, all of the folks currently still staying at the Executive Pacific Hotel, one of the City of Seattle's rapid rehousing homelessness initiatives during COVID, where just to get everyone up to speed, this was the general idea of having a hotel-based shelter for a limited period of time hooked up to a rapid rehousing provider.

In this case, Catholic Community Services is the rapid rehousing provider, and Low Income Housing Institute is the operator of the Executive Pacific.

That hotel shelter had to wind down by the end of January, and my understanding is over this weekend.

Lehigh was able to meet that goal without displacing any of the still living residents in the hotel and finding them placements either in permanent supportive housing or in some other form of enhanced shelter that was a desirable placement.

with I believe only a couple exceptions of people who chose to leave the hotel rather than take another offer of a place to go.

My hope, as I've said before, is to have a pretty detailed after-action report on the Executive Pacific Hotel and the rapid rehousing function to determine what lessons we can learn and transmit over to the King County Regional Homelessness Authority.

as part of our ongoing effort to lean in to sheltering and rapid rehousing and cooking up our shelters to rapid rehousing models of moving forward.

I really just want to thank the King County Regional Homelessness Authority for their partnership and adaptability in working with Lehigh to meet this important goal.

And of course, our partners in the Human Services Department who helped convene those discussions, as well as the Low Income Housing Institute itself, for their ability to nimbly provide for and determine plans of action for folks who were still in the Executive Hotel without a new placement as of January.

So hopefully sometime in February or early March, we'll be able to hear a fairly detailed after action of the executive civic and the lessons that can be learned from that.

But otherwise, I don't currently have.

I look forward to any additional updates, the RFP that we have been discussing, the request for proposals from the regional authority I believe is closing this week for three new enhanced sheltering assets funded by this Council and in our budget last fall.

I look forward to being able to report back on the decisions that RFP.

So with that, I don't have any additional briefing updates to give this afternoon, so I'm happy to take questions on my report items or hand it over to Councilmember Morales.

Seeing no questions, I will hand it over to Councilmember Morales.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Thank you, Councilmember Lewis.

Let me see.

Okay, last week, I had my first committee of the Neighborhood Education, Arts, Rights, Refugee Affairs Committee.

Sooner or later, I will come up with a short way to say that.

We met to hear presentations from three departments.

We heard the 2022 work plans from DEEL and from the Department of Neighborhoods.

And then we heard a review of 2021 activities from the Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs.

Our next committee meeting is Friday, February 11th at 9.30.

I also did have my first committee meeting of the FEPP Levy Oversight Committee last week.

We discussed 2022 work plan items, including some possible legislation that I believe Council President Gonzalez had been working on.

So we will likely see that this year.

And then the Oversight Committee will be reviewing the intersection of city and county funding and programming, particularly as it relates to youth and education investments, including Best Starts for Kids, the sugary beverage tax, and the PASTA money, which you may remember is for funding facilities development for child care centers.

as well as K through 12 mental health investments, homelessness investments, and possible spending modification for the Seattle Preschool Program.

All of those are on the work program for the year, so I will keep folks posted as we start to approach each of those items.

Not a lot from my other departments.

I meet with them monthly and we did not meet in the last two weeks, so that will be for next time.

In terms of districts, last week the DESC had their grand opening for Hobson Place, which was very exciting.

It is a new facility in District 2. It's now open to 85 people who are escaping chronic homelessness.

The facility includes a total of 177 new homes or will when it is completely done.

We'll also have a clinic that will serve on-site tenants.

We'll also be open to community members and the goal is to be able to serve up to 10,000 community members throughout the year.

The clinic at Hobson Place is a partnership with Harborview, so they're establishing the first local full-scale clinic specifically designed to meet the very complex needs of people who are living with disabilities, who've experienced the longest periods of homelessness.

So this is a really important new space for this population who we know are struggling and have a lot of high needs.

And this facility is designed specifically to be able to provide support to them.

So I'm really excited that it is available and happy to have them in District 2. Last week I also met with neighbors from Mt. Baker as I do every two weeks.

We reviewed the community action plan that the folks have organized around and created.

We've scheduled a tour of Kings Hall to investigate what rehab might be needed so that we might turn that into temporary use space, perhaps as a small business incubator for the cultural sector.

There's a lot of interest.

Mount Baker Lofts is an art space.

Many of the residents there are artists and so there's a real interest in perhaps providing an opportunity for them to incubate a small business while we are waiting for that development to proceed.

And I do wanna thank Mayor Harrell for sending Pedro Gomez to participate.

Pedro went to the mayor's office from the Office of Economic Development and he was a huge asset, particularly during COVID as we were trying to help small businesses to stay afloat.

He was truly a frontline worker in the last couple of years.

So I was really happy to see him there as we're having this conversation about supporting artists in the community.

I was also invited by the Vietnamese Mutual Association to attend their Tet Lunar New Year celebration this weekend.

So I was really happy to be at Joy Palace with others who were celebrating and really honored to be invited to help celebrate the year of the water tiger.

And we will be meeting this week with neighbors in the Little Saigon area to talk with residents and small businesses in the community about addressing some of the issues that we all know have been going on there.

We are organizing this first few rounds with King County Council Member Zachalai.

who has been districted out of Little Saigon.

So we will also be meeting with King County Council Member Joe McDermott, whose jurisdiction now includes the neighborhood.

So I'm looking forward to working with both of them and eventually taking up that work with Council Member McDermott.

That is really all I have colleagues.

We do have office hours this Thursday morning.

Neighbors can sign up for a constituent meeting at my website and look forward to the new committee meetings that we've got scheduled for this week.

Thanks very much.

Yes, ma'am, Council President.

I'm glad you brought this up.

Are you still working with King County Council Member Zahele on the Sound Transit stuff?

Are you going to be working with Mr. McDermott on that?

Well, the things related to Mount Baker are still within Council Member Zajalai's jurisdiction.

So we have been working with him on those issues.

And then if it's in CID or if it's in Little Saigon, it'll be Council Member McDermott.

I have all kinds of colleagues to be working with.

I'm really glad you're doing this, Council Member Morales, because we've been working closely with them at Sound Transit, as you know, on all the safety issues and the fatalities also the ranking of what light rail stations have had the highest level of crime.

And it's not Mount Baker, it's all down south.

But anyway, I'm glad that you're, and if we can do any more and give you any more information, I know we've been sending information over to you when we're meeting with them on those issues.

So we'll continue to do that.

I'm still on the rider experience, I don't know, I don't know what it's called, REO operations.

Ridership experience operations.

So basically that is still an issue.

It's in like for me, it's in our top five, top three next to fair enforcement.

So I hope to give everyone an update on that stuff next week, but thank you Council Member Morales for staying on top of that.

Yep, thanks very much.

I don't see any other questions.

So I will hand it over to Council Member Mosqueda.

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, it's good to be back with you.

I appreciate the opportunity to have had last week off to be with family.

The updates that I have for you are that the Finance and Housing Committee meeting will have its next meeting on February 16th.

That is because this week's Finance and Housing meeting is canceled.

At the February 16th meeting, we will be considering the confirmation of Julie Dingley for the position of Director of the City Budget's Office.

This is a full two weeks notice that we are offering to councilmembers and members of the public.

Per the request and guidance from both councilmember, Council President Juarez that was circulated among the floor and is in alignment with the legislation that the council passed.

I think going on almost two to three years ago now as we consider new department directors, so I appreciate Council President Juarez sending out the reminder to our colleagues that we have a timeline and a process that has been codified into statute and appreciate the requirement for two weeks notice.

Again, February 16th is when we will be considering the confirmation of Julie Dingley as possible director for the city budgets office, and as per usual, our office has or will be sending out possible questions for the Council members to add to in advance of the confirmation meeting.

In terms of full council, there are no items from the Finance and Housing Committee on tomorrow's full council agenda for Tuesday afternoon.

And in terms of updates, they'd want to provide an update on behalf of the Finance and Administrative Services Department.

FAS is flagging a bill for us of potential interest.

FAS's Consumer Protection Bill is House Bill I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to go ahead and get started.

I'm going to guess that they should be working with the council as well to help us understand more of what their concerns or questions might be and look forward to sharing that with our colleagues as well.

In terms of frontline worker pay, FAS is also identifying for us their FAS business systems and citywide payroll rolled out their frontline worker pay attestation portal in forms to eligible employees.

with the help of City Department's Human Resources Team.

FAS is monitoring submissions, fielding questions, and working with Information Technology Department to finalize the payroll administration portion of the portal.

Employees have until February 11th to submit their forms.

Madam President and colleagues, that is my report from the Finance and Housing Committee meeting, and appreciate if you do have any questions.

I'll take this.

No.

Okay.

I like this new format.

I will hand it off to my new colleague, Council Member Nelson.

Thank you, everyone.

Well, my first committee meeting of the Economic Development, Technology, and City Light Committee, which for short I call EDTCL, went off without a hitch, and we passed three pieces of legislation unanimously out of committee, which will be on tomorrow's agenda.

They're all from City Light, and the first is Council Bill 120259, which authorizes the renewal of an interlocal agreement between the City of Seattle and the Kalispell Tribe, in which the city agrees to continue support for the Kalispell Career Training Center for the development of a skilled workforce for the members of the tribe and the community surrounding City Light's Boundary Dam.

So if you have any question about that, feel free to ask before tomorrow if you can.

Council Bill 120260 authorizes City Light to accept exclusive use of a fiber cable.

It's 9.9 miles long and that we share with UW right now and that University of Washington no longer needs that capacity.

And then finally, we have a resolution 32040, which would affirm City Light's first clean energy implementation plan, which is required under Washington's Clean Energy Transformation Act, which was adopted into law in 2019. So that's on the agenda for tomorrow.

I'll go through some of the meetings that we've that I've participated in this past week.

We love, my staff and I, field trips.

So on Wednesday the 26th, we went on a field trip to Columbia City.

It was a combined meeting with Michael Sirath, who is the Director of Southeast Effective Development, better known as SEED.

And we toured some of his facilities, a senior residential project called Lilac Hotel, and learned more about his decades-old nonprofit, which, fun fact, occupies a decommissioned City Light substation.

So it's got some really nice historical features, architectural features there.

We also, on that same day, were joined by Rob Moen with the Columbia City BIA, and he gave us a brief tour of downtown Columbia City and introduced us to the owner of the Jackalope Tex-Mex and Cantina, which has been open for about six weeks, and he's loving the energy and the welcome of the neighborhood.

And overall, the community is doing well, but they do ask for city help on being able to deal with people in crisis and also crime.

And on that note, we stopped by a small shop called the Smoke and Beyond Shop, and it's owned by East African immigrant family who's had three break-ins over the past six months.

And the most recent one was a truck breaking down their front wall.

to enter and steal the ATM.

And so when we got there, that was days before we got there, and they were just trying to rebuild the front wall and keep it secure until they can get the glass and the doors, et cetera.

So that was sad to hear.

And it's cases like this that led me to make some remarks in my first meeting last week about the impacts of escalating crime on small businesses.

across the city in every district.

You know, you can go to the meeting video, which is on Seattle Channel, and cue to the 10-minute mark to see those comments, or check out my Twitter and Facebook feeds because, well, at CM Sarah Nelson to see my remarks.

But really, it was It was validation that this isn't also just happening to small businesses because I was very happy to be invited to the tour that Council Member Peterson just mentioned in the U-District.

It was organized by the U-District Partnership because we also met with KOW staff and University Bookstore and a bank teller at the credit union in the neighborhood and heard a lot of stories about crime.

But what really struck me was that every single person talked about acts of violence to their employees or to customers.

And you could really hear the trauma as they were relating these stories.

So it kind of, really struck a chord with me because it reframed what I've been talking about, crimes against small businesses, because this isn't just about property crime.

This is about violent crime to people.

And we're talking about the frontline workers, the baristas and the janitorial staff, facilities, maintenance folks that are in these brick and mortar establishments that are also very much impacted.

So that really, you know, that made me think about a different way that I should be talking about this as well.

It's not just about property, it's about people.

And so to continue this conversation at my next meeting on February 9th, we'll have a panel discussion that includes representatives from some of our neighborhood commercial districts as well as some a couple small business owners and Kenny Stewart of the of our firefighters union local 27 will be there because he's got some documentation on on the kinds of things that they're responding to and so we'll hear their experiences but this is not a sort of an airing of grievances because I have asked for ideas for things that the city could do right now to help.

And some of those surfaced at the end of our meeting in the U district, because that was one of the things that council member Peterson asked for, like, what can we do?

What are some positive steps we can take right now?

So I will be putting out more information about that in the coming days, but market calendars, if you're interested, February 9th at 930 in the morning.

So other meetings that I had this past week, one of the most interesting one was with James Kebelis, who is the former director of the Office of Film and Music.

And because I'm really excited to get into the work to strengthen Seattle's film and music economies.

And so I'm likely to introduce legislation soon to for the formation of a film commission.

And I know that this is something that's familiar to you and that you always weighed in fairly positively.

I believe it was last year, the year before.

So I will be looking at that to bring forward and, excuse me, Melissa Purcell, Dan, that was a gift from council member Strauss, that nice cup so I don't have to use my, skanky water bottle.

But anyway, Melissa Purcell of IATSE reached out to me for a meeting because she has been working with Chris Swenson on a lot of these ideas.

And so in other ways, the city can help this sector that is an economic driver, because it creates jobs.

And in all stages of film production, and also the music community is a big part of this.

Looking forward to that work with the Office of Film and Music.

Another meeting I had was with Gene Wasserman of the North Seattle Industrial Association.

I was not able to join Council Member Strauss at the meeting that they had, their monthly meeting, but things that he mentioned that they're focused on is the station location, the Ballard station location, the Sound Transit, you know, spur to Ballard.

They're not really down with the 140-foot bridge.

They would prefer a tunnel, just voicing that, And they're focused also on the harbor patrol because they're down to one boat that's part-time, and so they're concerned about things that are going on the waterfront that need more support, especially in the summer.

One other thing that he talked about, I'm looking at my notes here.

Let's see.

Well, anyway, I'll get back to that later, but if you have any questions.

That was one good meeting, met with Monty Anderson, big supporter of my campaign, learned more about the strikes that are going on and some of the crime issues that he's hearing his members are dealing with.

And then finally, for my external committee meetings that are coming up, I will be attending the February 2nd meeting of the PSRC Economic Development Subcommittee.

And we'll be going over the scoping of their workforce development research project as well as discussing their industrial land study.

So that's on my plate for this coming week.

And if you have any questions, let me know.

Thanks.

And I will pass it to Council Member Juarez, Council President Juarez, excuse me.

Thank you.

Are you sure there's nothing else you want to add, Council Member Nelson?

I know I was in your committee last week, so well done.

Good job.

I enjoyed what we got done, so thank you.

I have a few items to share with you folks, and I will be brief.

There are no items from the Governance, Native Communities, and Tribal Governments Committee on tomorrow's council agenda.

The next committee meeting will be on March 17th at 930, and we're putting the agenda together now.

In regards to Native communities, this morning we attended an engagement session of the White House Council on Native American Affairs convened by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.

HHS was there, Secretary Buttigieg, DOT, DOJ.

We heard two presentations on the call.

The first was related to the implementation of the bipartisan infrastructure law, and the second was associated with the executive order on improving public safety, criminal justice for Native Americans, and addressing the crisis of missing indigenous people.

Tribal leaders then shared their guidance and recommendations for the future of these implementation efforts.

And I'm always kind of happy to say that we did it first at City of Seattle in 2019 with our law or ordinance and our funded position at SPD.

So it's nice to see the rest of the country catching up.

On that note, another reminder is that the city of Seattle is accepting applications for the Indigenous Advisory Council, a nine-member commission of indigenous representatives, including youth and elder positions.

The council will advise the mayor, city council, and city departments on policies, budgets, programs, services, and projects directly affecting indigenous populations, including American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian peoples.

The deadline, again, is Monday, February 28th at 5, For more information, please visit the Department of Neighborhoods website.

Sound Transit, last Friday, January 28th, Sound Transit released its draft.

Okay, what?

Okay, I'm sorry, I forgot how to do something.

Let me start again.

So last Friday, the 28th, Sound Transit released its draft environmental impact statement.

You guys all got that, that big, huge, color-coded EIS on the next major expansion of light rail.

The draft EIS for the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension highlights the possible alternative routes and station locations and the benefits and drawbacks of each alternative.

So we have a lot.

We have a long way to go.

I'm sorry Mr. Wasserman isn't down with a few things but I think we can work through some of that.

There are many ways to provide feedback to Sound Transit.

You can do so by email or phone.

However you can also provide feedback by attending one of the four community advisory group meetings.

They are as follows.

Interbay Ballard is Wednesday, February 2nd, from 5 to 7. Downtown is Thursday, February 3rd, from 5 to 7. West Seattle and Duwamish River Valley is Tuesday, February 8th, from 5 to 7. And the CID in Soto is Wednesday, February 9th, from five to seven.

So you can go to the Sound Transit website for the dialing information and all the other, how you can provide public comment for all those.

So those are four community, yeah, there are four.

Upcoming this week, let's see.

I think I'm pretty good for this week, except for my favorite holidays on Wednesday, February 2nd, Kathy Groundhog's Day.

I'll tell you that in advance.

And anyway, Council Member Strauss and I will be celebrating Groundhog's Day.

It's a big holiday for us.

So thank you, Council Member Strauss.

So anyway, we've reached the end of our agenda and this is what Wendell provided me with.

So we reached the end of our agenda.

Are there any questions or comments about what I presented to you today?

Okay, with that, we are adjourned.

Have a good afternoon, everybody.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Recording stopped.