Sustainability & Renters' Rights Committee Special Meeting 6/24/22

you

Thank you, everyone.

Good morning.

This is the meeting of the Sustainability and Renter's Rights Committee of the Seattle City Council.

Today is Friday, June 24, 2022, and the time is 9.43 a.m.

I am the chair of the committee, Council Member Shama Sawant.

First, I wanted to start with profuse apologies to my fellow committee members and members of the public for the delay in starting this committee.

This committee should have started at 9.30, but just to quickly explain the reason for the delay.

As I'm sure everybody knows by now, the Supreme Court just delivered their ruling overturning Roe v. Wade abortion rights completely.

And so my office had to urgently get to work in terms of responding to this unfortunately and utterly shameful ruling.

And my office will be doing a press conference at noon on this issue, but that was the reason for the delay.

So I really appreciate everybody's patience, especially my fellow community members.

Would the clerk, Ted Verdone from my office, please call the roll.

Council member Sawant.

Present.

Council member Nelson.

Present.

Council member Lewis.

Present.

Council member Morales.

Council member Juarez.

Three present.

Thank you, Ted.

And welcome members of the committee.

And I think for the record, council members Morales and Juarez have been excused today.

Before beginning the topics of today's committee, I just wanted to make sure everybody, as I mentioned earlier, have heard about the Aurovii Bay drooling.

And as I said, I will have more to say about that later at the press conference at noon outside City Hall.

but I expect that today's committee meeting will be short.

On the agenda, we have seven appointments and reappointments, the Green New Deal Oversight Board nominated by the executive, by the mayor's office.

I appreciate everyone's time today.

and also again apologize to the presenters today for the delays in starting this committee and appreciate your patience in waiting for it.

But before we begin the discussion on appointments, we do have public comment.

We have two people signed up for public comment.

Speakers will have two minutes each.

Ted Verdone, clerk of the committee, will read out the names.

For people speaking remotely, when your name is called out, you will be prompted to unmute yourself.

When you hear that, please hit star six on your phone to unmute yourself and begin.

Ted, go ahead.

Chair Sawant, may I just say a word?

Yes, go ahead.

Council Member Nelson.

Yes.

I admit that I am preoccupied by the magnitude of the decision this morning from the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade and am having trouble expressing, as I'm sure many people are, my outrage and disappointment and sadness.

So I just wanted to note that the dissent, the language of the dissent, which is uncommonly personal, I think says it best, and I just wanted to read that.

With sorrow for this court, but more for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection, we dissent.

So what does this have to do with Seattle?

We just have to ensure that our city is a safe place that fully guarantees these rights and can handle the influx of people coming to Seattle from states that will immediately outlaw abortion.

And I look forward to working with my council colleagues on this.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

The two people signed up for public comment are both signed up in person in chambers.

Alex Zimmerman followed by the honorable Michael Fuller.

And I need to share the timer screen.

Yeah, Mr. Zimmerman, you're up first.

Thank you.

It's working?

You sure?

Microphone working?

I don't hear microphone working.

Yes, it's working.

Why I don't hear myself?

Okay, again, it's working.

It's working?

Yes.

Okay, no problem.

I don't hear, but it's okay.

Yeah, my question is very simple.

Why you don't show my sign, my yellow David star and my face?

And I don't understand why this happened.

You know what it means?

And maybe because I am a Jew and you, Consul, have a very long history of Nazi antisemite principle, you know what this means, I'm totally confused about this.

But this is not okay with me, but what else I can do about this?

It's about an agenda right now.

I want to speak about abortion, but I don't know, can I speak about abortion because it's not an agenda.

Consul, can I speak about abortion?

Can I speak about abortion?

You have a minute and 16 seconds left.

Can I speak about abortion?

You can speak about whatever you want to speak about.

Thank you very much.

I very appreciate it.

Yes, I cannot make abortion because I have a not woman genitalia, you know what I mean?

But abortion totally confused me because most people who make abortion is a white people.

White population right now in America falling down.

You only one white race what is go down because more is this pure discriminatory, not proportional.

You know what this mean?

White woman go for abortion.

It's very unique situation.

The government very quiet about this.

When we come to black, life matter protection, you know what it mean?

Everybody talk, yeah, it's not proportional discrimination.

But when it come to white woman abortion, you know what it mean?

Nobody quiet.

For my understanding, almost 100% of abortion is come from woman, from white woman.

For this, white race down.

I spoke right now to everybody.

We need talking about this because it's a pure racism.

Stand up, America.

Stop this.

Stand up, white people.

Thank you very much.

Next up is the Honorable Michael Fuller.

Yes, this is Honorable Michael Fuller.

I thank God for being here, but We have a very serious problem with the city councils, all of y'all from other countries, and then come here and state too many.

What authority do you have over we the people?

You don't enforce the Older American Act, July 14, 1965, that was signed by President Lyndon Johnson.

And I'm so hurt that y'all making me unconstitutional law for unauthorized, undocumented, and won't enforce the American with Disability Act, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. That was amended in 1988. So when it's a conflict in a state constitution, it's active.

So why state must yield to federal constitution, it's active.

United States versus First Bank, September 27, 1983, and Bivens versus six unknown agents.

Thirdly, L-O-Y, period, L, period, A, period, L, period, A, period, R-E-V, 977. 1996 and 97 means no one is above the law when it comes to the America with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act.

And you haven't enforced it since you've been the city council.

You say you're fighting for black folks.

I'm black and I'm proud, but I don't like what you're doing to we the people.

Black Lives Matter, this is not to change it or to dream.

Black Lives Matter, can't believe it's a lie.

That's the final speaker and public comment.

Thank you.

So public comment is closed.

We will now move on to the appointments and reappointments.

The Green New Deal Oversight Board, we're joined by Sara Cubillos and Ximena Fonseca Morales, sorry if I didn't pronounce your names correctly, from the Office of Sustainability and Environment, who will introduce the appointments and reappointments.

I will read the items into the record and then we'll ask our presenters to introduce themselves.

Appointment 02211, appointment of Eunice Howe as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th, 2025. Appointment 02212, appointment of Nina A. Olivier as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th, 2025. And then we have appointment 02213 and appointment 02214, the first of Hebo Sahal and the second of Ken Weltman, both as members of the Green New Deal Oversight Board to a term to April 30th, 2023. Then we have appointment 02258 of Peter Hasegawa as a member of the Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30, 2025. Appointment 02259, reappointment of Steve Gelb as a member of the board for a term to April 30, 2025. And then appointment 02260, reappointment of Keith Weir as a member of the board for a term to April 30, 2025. So I will stop there.

Presenters, please introduce yourselves and take it from there.

Hi, I'm Sarah Cubillos.

I'm the Green New Deal advisor at the Office of Sustainability and Environment.

Thank you for having us.

We're excited to get these appointments and re-appointments today.

So I'm just going to give a quick two minutes about that the Green New Deal is working towards a climate pollution-free city and aims to create jobs in advance and equitable to transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy by prioritizing investments in communities historically harmed by economic, racial, and environmental injustices.

The board is focused on bringing frontline community-led voices to this program, and they do this by recommending systemic changes and budget priorities to the mayor, council, city departments, and other advisory boards.

They also support departmental planning and implementation, and they coordinate other efforts with city departments related to their work.

So what I'll do is I'll start with the new appointments and I'll just call on the folks that are here for them to introduce themselves and share about why they want to join the board.

So I'll start with Ken Workman, who is an executive.

And hello, and thank you, Sarah, for that introduction.

Hello, everybody.

My name is Ken Workman in our native Lushootseed language.

I am workman of the Duwamish tribe and great, great, great, great grandson of Chief Seattle.

I'm currently a Duwamish tribal member and a Duwamish tribal council member and a longtime resident of Seattle.

I was born on the shores of Elliott Bay And I grew up in the woods of Puget Park, which is the West Duwamish Waterway Greenbelt.

And so I would like to say that it's an honor to serve on the Green New Deal in the capacity of tribal representative.

I am retired from the Boeing Company, Flight Operations Engineering Department for seven years now.

And as a direct descendant of Chief Seattle, I bring this combination of modern science and ancient wisdom to the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

And so in my capacity as a tribal representative, I do ask many questions and I have been inquiring and jobs, jobs, jobs keeps coming up.

And so in the capacity as a tribal representative, these are the things that our people are asking for.

And so I would offer that it's an honor to serve on the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

And with that, I'll return it to Sarah.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ken.

Next, I'll have Hebo share.

Thank you so much, Sarah, for the introduction.

I would like to thank everyone for the opportunity today.

I am happy to be serving at the Green New Deal.

I am Hebo.

I'm from Somalia.

I came here in Seattle as a young adult nearly 20 years ago.

I love this city.

I'm passionate about social justice.

I'm currently working for a nonprofit.

I've been working in the nonprofit industry for the past 10 years.

I am very much passionate about social justice as well as climate justice.

I want to be the voice for my community and the local community I'm living in, my Seattle community as well, to bring forth all issues that are affecting our communities and advocate for what my community's concerns are, as well as bring my financial background.

I'm an MBA holder.

I have a finance undergrad from UW as well.

I would like to bring in my work experience as well as my education and be that voice for my community and make change in the environment that we're living in so we can all live in a healthy environment where all communities thrive.

Thank you very much.

I'm happy to be here.

Thank you, Eva.

Also, I just want to mention that Eva was a council appointee as well.

And Nina, would you like to go next?

Thank you, Sarah.

My name is Nina Olivier.

I currently serve as the program coordinator for Built Green, Washington state's leading residential green building certification program.

I have been appointed by the Green New Deal board to serve as the climate resiliency and greenhouse gas reduction specialist.

I also serve as the program coordinator for the Northwest Eco-Building Guild, a nonprofit green building and design education organization.

I have a lot of passions in green building design, climate resiliency, sustainable planning, and environmental justice.

My passion for this work grew from my experience serving as a coastal resource management Peace Corps volunteer for three years in the South Pacific.

where I worked with local communities to develop resource management plans, climate resiliency initiatives, and outreach and engagement programs for populations most severely impacted by climate change.

My passion for this work also stems from my involvement currently with Facing Homelessness, a Seattle nonprofit focused on solutions for homelessness based on developing relationships, and its partner organization, the Block Project.

I'm also organizing with Green Seattle Partnership, the Housing Development Consortium's Housing Affordability Committee, and I'm also an active member on K4C.

I want to serve on the City of Seattle's Renew Deal Oversight Board to support policies and initiatives that advance an equitable transition to renewable energy by 2030 through centering the expertise of our Black, Indigenous, people of color, immigrants, refugees, people of low incomes, youth, elders, and workers most detrimentally impacted by climate change.

Through my experience in green building, as well as participation in multiple committees and organizations surrounding affordable housing, environmental justice, and green building innovation, I am excited and would love to support the Green New Deal Oversights Board work in supporting the community-driven strategies to implement the Green New Deal for Seattle.

Thanks all.

Thank you, Nina.

And Peter, would you like to go next?

Yeah.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Peter Hasegawa.

He, him pronouns.

Yeah, I would be honored to serve on the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

I've been working with workers and labor unions since 2006. And I can definitely imagine a future where in, in our renewable economy, the economy works better for workers than it than it does now, and want to be a part of helped making it turn out that way.

I'm also a parent and I have a one year old son who was born about a month before the heat dome.

And it was a really awful experience for us.

We don't have air conditioning in our home.

And so we had to get a hotel with air conditioning and also find shelter for our pets that had air conditioning.

And it was just a really awful experience.

And so I am particularly concerned and want to help make sure that, you know, families in the city of Seattle and other vulnerable people are not in those kinds of positions like we were last year.

Thanks.

Thank you, Peter.

Um, we also for our new appointments, we have Eunice Howe, who's unable to join us today, but I'll just read a short thing about Eunice.

So Eunice is an environmental justice representative on the committee.

She's a community organizer at Unite Here Local Aid.

the Hospitality Workers Labor Union.

She's also the president of the Seattle chapter of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, and she brings so much experience and even without voting ability has just been a strong voice and awesome participants so far.

And so she will be a great addition to the board.

I am now going to move us to the two reappointments, and I'll have him and my colleague share a quick slide for the two appointments, but I can get started to.

about them.

So for two reappointments, Keith Weir is an executive reappointee in a labor union position.

So Keith is currently the business representative and political director of IBEW Local 46, covering all project labor agreements and community workforce agreements in Seattle and King County.

He is passionate about building careers, not just jobs, and wants to ensure that projects coming out of Seattle's Green New Deal be good family wage jobs to ensure a better future for our kids and grandkids.

And he has definitely brought that lens throughout his first term, and we're really happy to have him for another term.

Our second reappointment is Steve Gelb.

Steve Gelb is also an executive reappointee in a position reserved for workforce training representative.

Steve is currently the Northwest Regional Manager for Emerald Cities Collaborative, where he promotes decarbonization projects and policies bringing benefits to underserved communities.

This is just one aspect, but Steve works with many different city departments, especially City Light, to bring good jobs and he has been a true asset on the board and we look forward to his continued participation.

And I think that is it for our appointments.

Thank you, Sarah.

Thank you to all the potential appointees who have been present here and who added their thoughts.

I'll open up for questions or comments from my fellow committee members in a second, but just wanted to first thank those of you who have been serving already, the reappointees and those who have been willing to get on this Green New Deal Oversight Board.

I also wanted to I want to thank Matt who has been a long-time indigenous rights and climate change activist in the region who also played a big role in advocating for the board as a whole, but also making sure that we had indigenous representation and a really special thanks to Ken Workman for being here and I really appreciated how you pointed out that we need to marry the ancient wisdom, which actually were very scientific, many of them were scientific, that with modern science That's why the Green New Deal Oversight Board is so important because many of you bring a lot of specific expertise, not only community voices in general, which is absolutely important, but specific expertise.

It's really important, for example, that Nina has agreed to be on the board because we know building emissions are a crucial component.

Just to quickly quote from the Greenspace blog of the Office of Sustainability and Environment from May 12th of last year, and I've quoted this before, we've talked about this before, I've certainly mentioned this many times before in my committee here.

But just to quote once again, Seattle's buildings are responsible for more than one third of the city's core greenhouse gas emissions and rising according to the most recent greenhouse gas inventory, climate polluting emissions and buildings increased.

increased 8% between 2016 and 2018, given by burning fossil fuels like fat gas and oil for heat, hot water, and cooking.

So that's from the office's blog.

I mean, the reason I bring this up is because I just wanted to throw out one general question, and wherever appointees, if you want to respond to it, that would be great.

But the question I'm asking is – and it's really an observation, and I was hoping you could weigh in on this – is that the urgency is just enormous.

I mean, you can't possibly overstate the threat that the planet is facing.

The most recent reports on the IPCC the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, again, once again, gives new dire statistics.

And these statistics have become more and more dire with every new study that we get.

And at the same time, you're seeing that actually things are not going in the correct direction.

Seattle is just a microcosm for what is happening globally.

Actually, things are going in the opposite direction, really.

extremely concerning.

It is just really dangerous.

And the statistic on building emissions is just one example, where it should be decreasing, but they're actually increased in the last few years.

So my question is, how do you see a role in shaking things up?

Because it's no longer a question of giving new statistics to elected representatives and saying, hey, do something about it.

It's actually a political question, in my view.

How do you shake things up to make Governments like Seattle's but globally, nationally actually act on this because it's not like elected officials don't know what's happening, but really it's a question of putting political pressure.

And how do you see the Green New Deal oversight board playing a role in that direction?

Go ahead, Ken, and then we'll have Nina.

Councilwoman, that's a very good question.

And so from a native perspective, I talk about trees a lot.

And so we know that through science that the DNA of all those living things, the biologic material ends up in the ground and in the soil and then eventually in trees.

And so we also know that large trees sequester large amounts of carbon.

Now, this isn't the cure for reducing carbon, but this is a way that carbon can be sequestered.

And we recognize that our ancient ones are in the trees at a molecular level.

And so really, if we can just remind people that they're part of the planet, they're not separate from it, that might be enough to say where people will take care of their house a little bit better.

And the house being, of course, the planet Earth.

So thank you.

Go ahead, Nina.

Thank you so much, Council Member, for your question.

And I'd like to thank Ken, too, for your input and as well as your information.

And I want to mention that currently the Washington State Energy Code Technical Advisory Group are meeting to approve amendments to the current Washington State Energy Code to help inform what new construction, commercial multifamily and single-family buildings will be built.

And you have an extremely important point that most of our buildings are accountable for 30 to 40% of greenhouse gas emissions.

I'm hoping that the Green New Deal board with expertise from local community members most impacted by climate change can team up with green energy and green building experts in expanding programs like the priority green incentives that are already in place in the city of Seattle as well as their green building standard, which are mandates for green building requirements, such as energy efficiency, water consumption, and site and materials definitions and requirements.

And you pose the question, how do you see your role in shaking things up?

I'm hoping to bridge the gap between those two entities.

folks who are struggling to these days get even just gain access to affordable housing, and also this labyrinth of fantastic green builders we have locally here in Washington State.

In fact, the Department of Energy Housing Awards, out of all of those awards that were provided, 30% were won by local builders here in Seattle.

We have all of this technical resources and innovative builders that I look forward to bridging together.

affordable and addressing affordable housing and the expertise of our communities most impacted by climate change and issues such as environmental injustice and those technical expertise of our green builders and most importantly remodelers.

We cannot leave existing building infrastructure out of the question.

Weatherization, heat pump campaigns, and other cited materials need to be addressed for these aging buildings here in our city that are also taxing our greenhouse gas emissions.

So thank you so much, council member.

I look forward to discussing this more with our team and our awesome Green New Deal oversight board.

Thanks.

Thank you so much, Ken and Nina.

I really appreciate your responses.

And just to note a couple of things quickly before I turn it over to I'm going to make a couple of comments.

So many of our fellow community members are struggling just to have a roof over their head, let alone in an affordable manner.

And I also wanted to echo a point that Ken made earlier, which I meant to earlier, which is the question of jobs, jobs, jobs.

I think that's extremely crucial.

If we are to have any success in building citywide, nationwide, and global environmental movement, successful movement, that means succeeding in saving the planet – that does have to centrally pose the question of just transition.

On the one hand, there are no jobs on a dead planet, as others have said before me.

But on the other hand, there's no hope of building a unified movement unless we clarify that the only way to build such an environmental movement is to prioritize union living wage jobs, especially for those who are already in the fossil fuel sector, prioritizing them and making sure that the people understand that developing a clean, renewable energy sector would imply union living wage jobs.

And that's not automatic.

That's what we have to fight for specifically.

And that will really bring many working people who may otherwise understand the statistics but may not understand that actually jobs and the planet will go together, will have both together or neither.

It's a question of which direction society heads.

And that's why it's crucial that the Green New Deal Oversight Board has representation from environmental rights, indigenous rights, immigrant rights, and the labor movement, because union jobs in a renewable energy economy, clean renewable energy economy is so central to the question of climate justice.

I'll stop there for now.

Do other council members have any questions?

I'll look on Zoom to see if there's any hand raised.

I don't see any.

I'll just ask one last question before we go to the vote, which is to fund a new deal scale, you know, we're talking about large scale public investment in green infrastructure.

We will need revenues, you know, that's where the rubber hits the road, so to say.

So we will need to be willing to have more policies like the Amazon tax.

We will need it at the state level also, taxing big business.

They're super wealthy.

So do any of the prospective appointees have anything to say about what role the Green New Deal Oversight Board can play to fight for taxing big business in order to raise revenues for green infrastructure?

Hebo, I see your hand up, go ahead.

Hi, thank you so much for the question.

I think the way to address that issue would actually be to actually involve the voters and the communities on the issue in hand, because a lot of people usually oppose raising taxes on corporations.

So we need to mobilize our communities and inform them why we are doing this.

and let them vote on that and be on our side so that we can get the funds we need in order to get that vote.

So I think it's very important that we tax corporations so that we can provide our communities what they need.

And that involves a lot of work from communities and just informing our communities why it's important that we need this money and why we are voting on more taxes on these corporations.

Because I feel like in terms of taxation, there is a lot of unfairness.

local people pay more taxes than corporation.

And I don't think that's fair.

And a lot of people are just on the side.

Well, Amazon is going to take their business to a different state.

Well, they need to pay their fair share of tax so that we can provide livable wages for our communities, as well as just budget on everything that we need in order for our communities to thrive overall.

Thank you.

Thanks for the question.

Thanks so much, Hiba.

I really appreciate all the points you made.

They're all completely accurate.

One is, as you said, it's completely unfair.

In fact, as we all know, Washington state has the nation's most regressive tax system, which means working people and the poor pay a far greater proportion of their incomes as taxes and the largest corporations.

the wealthiest pay the least and in fact small businesses are also being over penalized and so in that sense also there's a real potential to build solidarity across working people across the state and also many of the marginalized and small businesses who overpay taxes while big corporations are paying nothing close to their fair share.

And I also completely agree with the very important point that Hebo made, which is that the way to win such taxes on big business and the wealthy is to mobilize our communities, explaining why we need this taxation.

In fact, you know, that goes to the heart of why we even won the Amazon tax in the first place.

We won it because ordinary people who are marching, especially communities of color, who are marching in the George Floyd protests completely agreed that we need to tax big businesses like Amazon, but all the largest corporations, the largest 3% of the corporations, in order to raise revenues for affordable housing.

And we've already talked about how affordable housing goes hand in hand with the fight climate change.

So I really look forward to my office.

Please, you know, all of you members should always feel free to reach out to my office.

Also for the Office of Sustainable Environment, please feel free to reach out to my office anytime, but especially the Green New Deal Oversight Board members in your role as climate justice advocates.

Please, I look forward to staying in touch with you.

Look forward to having you again and again in this committee for updated discussion, especially related to policy recommendations, because ultimately we're not a talk shop, we want action.

So your recommendations will be very much welcomed.

And if there are no comments from committee members, I will move appointments 02211, 02212, 02213, 02214, 0221, sorry, 02258, 02259, and 02260. Do you have a second?

Second.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Three in favor.

Thank you, committee members.

So the committee recommends that the city council confirm all those appointments and reappointments, and they will now go to the July 5th full city council meeting.

Thank you so much to all the appointees, the staff at the OSC, and again, apologies for the delays.

Thank you for waiting.

And you're not expected to attend the full city council meeting, but you're welcome to if you would like to, but keeping in mind, it will be on Zoom.

It won't be in person.

Failing any other comments, I will adjourn the meeting.

Thank you.