Well, good morning, everybody.
Thank you for joining us this morning.
I am joined, as Devin said, by elected leaders from across the state of Washington.
And we're here to call on our governor Jay Inslee to call for and the state legislature to call for a special session on June 1st to deal with the rent and mortgage crisis that we have in the state of Washington.
We know that the COVID pandemic has wreaked havoc on our communities all across the state.
And so we're calling for a rent and mortgage freeze across the state.
Again, I wanna thank the council members and our school board member who are joining us this morning.
Three months into the pandemic that has really upended all of our lives, we know that we're facing an uncertain future.
For nearly a third of American renters, some, by the way, who are still receiving rent increases, even during a pandemic.
For nearly a third of American renters, that means not being able to pay the rent.
And for most of us, it means facing a mountain of debt when this crisis is over.
Our family and friends and neighbors have been laid off, furloughed, many have even had to say goodbye to loved ones and to friends in their community.
While there is a great deal of uncertainty at this moment, what is obvious is that this economic crisis isn't just looming, it's here.
And business as usual is really what put us in this position.
On January 19th, the first U.S. case of COVID-19 was made right here in Washington, followed a month later by the first reported death.
Weeks after that, while the virus was spreading across our country, Wall Street was bailed out to the tune of $2 trillion.
To put that in perspective, that could have funded three installments of $2,000 for every American.
Instead, we got scraps, a one-time payment of $1,200.
Thousands of our neighbors are sick, and over 26 million Americans have filed for unemployment.
352,000 of them are from right here in Washington State.
We're talking about your sister, your neighbor, your friends.
These are real people with real worries, and they are still waiting for meaningful support.
Since the beginning of this crisis, we at the municipal level have heard from struggling tenants and landlords and small businesses and homeowners, cancel the rent and mortgage payments, they say.
How are rents getting raised during this crisis, even when people know that we've lost our jobs?
Something has got to give.
And if we don't act swiftly, our community and the security and the public health of our communities will be at even greater risk.
More people will lose their jobs, more people will lose housing, and the ability to secure that housing that will keep them safe will be lost.
I want to commend our governor for implementing an eviction moratorium right away and for extending it to freeze rent increases and to mandate payment plans.
Beyond that we know that Freddie and Fannie are offering mortgage forbearance and testing in our state has steadily ramped up too.
That's going to be a really important piece of keeping us all safe.
These are all steps in the right direction, but they fall short for many people in our communities.
An eviction moratorium won't save you after your workplace has shuttered.
Mortgage forbearance means little if you don't have a paycheck.
And a payment plan only works if you have an income to make a payment.
We're getting Band-Aids on these issues in our communities, and what we really need is a tourniquet.
This is not a time for incrementalism.
This is a time for radical change.
Honestly, this is what keeps me up at night, which is why I called on my council, on the Seattle City Council, on March 30th to pass a resolution calling on state and federal leaders to cancel rent and mortgages.
And I know I'm not alone in losing sleep over this.
All of us who are here today have called for the same thing in our communities because we've been hearing the same stories across Washington state.
This movement gets to the root of the problem that eviction moratoriums, forbearance and payment plans just can't solve.
You can't pay rent during a mortgage crisis or mortgage during a crisis if you don't have money.
And mortgage rent and cancellation will ensure that people stay housed during this pandemic.
That's why this is what we're advocating for across the state.
But more must be done to help our neighbors throughout this crisis.
Canceling rent and mortgage is just one side of the coin.
Here in Seattle, where nearly half of renters are rent burdened, we've seen rent skyrocket 70% in the last decade.
Communities across the state are feeling the ripple effect, which is why we must also join with the rest of the West Coast in curbing the predatory rent gouging that is happening right now.
That's why today, alongside leaders from Washington state, I'm calling on a governor and the state legislature to open a special session June 1st to address the following issues.
We want to cancel rent and call on Congress to pass the rent and mortgage cancellation bill that our own Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal is sponsoring.
We want to extend the rent increase freeze for six months following the end of the governor's eviction moratorium and permanently legalize rent control.
And I'll reiterate, if we don't take action now, our communities will be devastated.
will be sick or go hungry or lose homes and some will even die.
The longer we wait, the worse it will get.
If we could open a special session virtually overnight to give Boeing a tax break in 2013, we can certainly move swiftly to open a special session to address this pandemic that is affecting every single one of our constituents.
Right now, Governor Idsley and our leaders in the legislature have the power to amplify our voices and the voices of our community members and provide relief to the communities that we all represent.
Elected leaders from both sides of the Cascades are here today, united, asking for a special session, and we urge our leaders at the state level to unite to enact these measures for all of us.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member Morales.
Up next, we have Deputy Mayor Crystal Marks from the City of Burien.
Thank you.
Good morning.
As the Deputy Mayor of Burien, I wanted to let you know that we are more than just a city immediately south of Seattle geographically.
but it often feels like we are a world away in terms of resources and need.
On March 9th, the city of Burien proclaimed a state of emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
This was days before the federal government did so, and this is because we knew what all cities know, that our people require immediate help.
While Burien is a city facing a projected revenue loss of 14 to 16% due to this pandemic, we have reserves and the ability to adjust course through budget cuts to help us weather the storm.
However, Burien, like all cities, is made up of people.
People who are struggling and failing because they cannot work, cannot make rent, cannot pay their bills, and cannot afford health care that should be their right as members of this society.
and cannot see a path forward after this state of emergency has been lifted, and they don't have the luxury of reserves to fall back on or any further that they can cut into their budgets.
We know that there are less protections for our Black, Brown, Indigenous, and LGBTQ communities in Burien and all of South King County than there are in Seattle.
We see these communities fall into homelessness, drop out of school, and show up in our prison systems at a disproportionate rate for no fault of their own.
We simply do not have the resources Seattle does.
We never have, despite having the most culturally and ethically diverse population in the entire state of Washington and in South King County.
Our safety nets are now a free fall through systems that were never working to protect us fully in the first place.
That is why in March, Burien was one of the first in the state to pass an eviction and late fee moratorium to stop the immediate flow of our barely housed community members into homelessness.
And that is why I am joining with Council Member Morales and the other elected officials gathered before you today to call for a June 1st special session of the Washington State Legislature.
a six-month extension to Governor Inslee's rent increase moratorium after the end of the declared state of emergency, as well as a nationwide cancellation of rents and home mortgage payments through the duration of the coronavirus pandemic.
Cities and the communities we formed to govern, protect, and support need these actions now.
We can't wait for January for the next session to start because by January, that free fall I mentioned earlier will end in a shattering crash that our already struggling communities will not be able to recover from.
Thank you.
Thank you, Deputy Mayor Marks.
Up next, we have Seattle School Board Director Brandon Hersey.
Good morning.
As a school board director in Seattle, but also a second grade teacher in Federal Way, I am joining my colleagues calling on the governor and state legislature to open an emergency special session on the COVID-19 crisis by June 1st.
Across the county, the stories are the same.
Working families and their children are struggling as hours get cut and unemployment rises.
During this time, schools have become the primary social safety net for many of our families.
Here in Seattle alone, we are providing thousands of meals a week, necessary hygiene and cleaning materials, and even paying rent for some of our families through Right Now Needs funding.
The simple truth is that learning cannot happen if our students don't have a roof over their head or a place to sleep at night.
Washington currently has the fifth largest opportunity gap in our nation.
If we don't take bold action to alleviate the economic hardship that this crisis is placing on our students and their families, our state's crippling opportunity gap will continue to grow.
I'm calling on Congress to cancel rent immediately because it will provide our students' families with the basic security needed so that they can focus their attention on what matters most right now, their children, their health, their safety, and most importantly, their education.
Not only that, but we need to extend the rent increase freeze for six months following the end of the governor's eviction moratorium.
Lastly, I'm calling on the governor and the state legislature to open that special session in response to COVID-19.
These are unprecedented times and we must act swiftly to protect our children of our state from any further harm caused by this crisis.
Thank you.
Thank you, Director Hersey.
Up next, we have Councilmember Daniel Hamel from the City of Bellingham.
Good morning, and thanks everyone for your leadership.
As a Bellingham City Council member for a ward that encompasses our vital downtown, our port, our waterfront, and working-class neighborhoods, I am deeply concerned about renters and homeowners who are an unemployment check away from trying to figure out how to pay for their housing.
For asking governor Inslee to call a June 1st special session of the state Legislature to further address the economic distress as a result of COVID-19.
For renters that make up 53% of Bellingham, we hear you.
for service workers, for people who lost their jobs seemingly overnight, for frontline workers at the grocery stores that keep us fed, for every healthcare worker, emergency worker, first responder, we see you and we hear you.
This request is about you and your families and about the community that you serve.
Residential renters need relief at least through November if the renter is unable to pay due to direct impacts of COVID-19.
This is wholly dependent on lending institutions acting in good faith and federal and state governments extending ongoing sustained relief through at least November.
We support the April 9th letter to governor Inslee from a bipartisan mix of senators and representatives, including some of our own from the 40th and 42nd districts that articulate these goals.
COVID-19 does not know political parties.
We are all in this together.
Small businesses are the lifeblood.
They make up over 80% of our jobs.
We want those businesses to reopen, hire back workers, and get our economy fired back up again.
We can't do that without ongoing assistance in the form of grants or non-repayable loans.
Repayable loans won't work for businesses that face uncertainty in future outbreaks or further social distancing restrictions.
Businesses need predictability and we need businesses because our workers need to get back to work.
Thank you for including Bellingham this morning.
Thank you Councilmember Hamill.
Up next we have Councilmember Holly Huffman also from the City of Bellingham.
Thank you.
So I was a co-sponsor with Councilmember Hamill on a residential and commercial rent and mortgage moratorium resolution that was passed earlier this month by our council.
With so many things that are uncertain in our lives right now, the potential for losing our housing shouldn't be on that list.
The security of our housing shouldn't depend on the luck of having an accommodating landlord, or whether or not we happen to have a job with an organization that can allow us to work from home.
Financially, for both individuals and businesses, the situation and predicted potential help are changing by the hour.
We're finding that the financial relief that's been rolled out at the federal level doesn't even begin to cover the need or the variety of ways some people generate their income.
My own business a live music venue has been closed for a month and I'm seeing predictions that businesses like mine where large groups of people congregate might not be able to fully function up till even a year from now.
Many people involved in the creative economy.
The theater film and music that and are the Washington state holds dear.
Our risk of not being able to make a comeback without significant financial lifelines.
Restaurants bars other small businesses and nonprofit organizations that make Washington buzz one main factor that could mean opening or not a monthly rent expense is currently turning into a black hole of debt.
Individuals need to feel secure that they'll continue to have a roof over their head.
Our businesses need to at least have the security of knowing that the rental expense accruing on a closed business isn't the thing that will keep them from reopening.
During a time when we're being given solutions that are turning out to be far from equitable or fair, rent and mortgage relief are one solution that could more fairly help those in need.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilmember Huffman.
Up next, we have Councilmember Varisha Khan from the City of Redmond.
Thank you, and thank you to everyone for their leadership in this time.
As mentioned, I'm a city council member in the city of Redmond, which is actually one of the first cities that was impacted by the coronavirus deaths, those being the first deaths in the entire country.
Our first responders had showed up to the Life Care Center to help with the cases in Kirkland when we first received those reports of the first coronavirus death cases.
And ever since, our community has been impacted directly.
The city of Redmond is known for being an affluent city, for housing Microsoft, for being this regional technological leader.
And yet that does not reflect the reality of the thousands of residents who live here.
The reality living in the city of Redmond is that thousands of residents are impacted by the affordability crisis.
The cost of rent in the city of Redmond for a two-bedroom is one of the highest in the nation at $2,300 a month.
And that number is increasing as we speak.
Constituents in our city that are directly impacted reach out to us on a regular basis, not only during the coronavirus pandemic, but prior to it, sharing stories about how they're impacted by their inability to afford rent, how they're unable to feed their families.
how seniors are struggling when just living on social security to deal with the increasing rent and property taxes of their increasing property values of their homes.
Immigrant communities in the city of Redmond are also directly impacted as well as our low-income community where 25% of the city of Redmond is considered cost-burdened and does have to pay significant of their salaries to housing.
So in a time of crisis, these issues become exacerbated, as we know.
Small businesses, as mentioned earlier, are being shuttered or at risk of being shuttered.
And as a city that flourishes on small business and is directly connected to larger tech companies that are also impacted, this has cost a significant barrier to the lives of our community members who are struggling to eat pay their bills and continue to afford their businesses and their homes going into the future.
So for that reason, the city of Redmond introduced a resolution for a ban on rent and mortgage, as well as in order to supplement the previous resolutions that we introduced and did pass to ban evictions in the city and to call on the state to open up the special session for impacting, that impacts our community right now.
So at this time, I would call on our leaders, our state legislators and our governor to open the special session to cancel rent and for our federal legislators to pass the House Bill 6515, co-sponsored by Pramila Jayapal, and to extend the rent increase freeze six months following the emergency.
This is not only going to impact and benefit our communities across the state right now, but going into the future to help us alleviate a lot of issues and a lot of the struggles that brought us to the position that we're in, like the affordable housing crisis.
Knowing that 70% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, we can't afford to continue on this way if we want to succeed and come out of this crisis together.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member Khan.
Up next, we have Council Member Kate Burke from the City of Spokane.
Thank you and thanks to all my colleagues who are joining me today.
It's great to see all of you and thanks for all your hard work during this strange time.
As was mentioned, my name is Kate Burke.
I'm on the Spokane City Council.
I'm here today to echo my colleagues on this call.
We need a special session to address the needs that COVID has exacerbated.
The budget should be adjusted and help our most vulnerable populations.
Unfortunately, great budget items were cut due to COVID-19, and we should take a look at the numbers again, provided that the revenue outlooks have changed.
Rent needs to be canceled, and we should present a unified call to the Washington State Congress to cancel rent and mortgages nationwide.
We need financial assistance now from our federal government.
And I want to be explicitly clear, a lot of these issues are not new to my constituents.
I serve the lowest income, highest diverse population in Spokane.
And I get calls and emails every day before COVID-19 about rent increases, evictions, and all of these things that are that were already happening are now happening at a higher level.
And so the ban on rent control should be permanently lifted and rent freezes should continue through the duration of COVID-19 pandemic.
Housing is the most important way to ensure social distancing and push our recovery efforts forward.
I also want to mention that some form of universal free healthcare must be provided to Washingtonians affected by COVID-19.
It is unreasonable to expect Washingtonians that have been infected by the virus to contribute any out-of-pocket expenses, especially while we are seeing people out of jobs.
This is really important for our governor and our state legislature to take seriously, and we need your support at the city level.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilmember Burke.
I thank you to all of our speakers today.
Now we're going to open up to questions from the press.
For those of you who hadn't been on at the beginning of the call, Just to reiterate, we are answering questions that have been sent to us via email.
So if you would like to send a question, you can send a question directly to me, devon.silvernail at seattle.gov.
And the first question is to all of our panelists here from Natalie Swaby at King 5. And she's asking that, I'll read it verbatim for you.
So we will also be hearing from landlords today who say they are struggling too.
They are concerned about how they will pay their bills.
As city leaders, what assistance are you prepared to offer or advocate for to help landlords?
And that's open to anybody on the panel.
Well, I'll start.
Thank you.
I think what we're calling for here is for congressional action.
When we're talking about mortgages, very often what we're talking about is the need for the banking system to address these issues.
And so that's why we're excited that Congresswoman Jayapal a lot of If tenants aren't paying rent, if small business tenants aren't paying rent, then the property owners, the mortgage owners are also burdened by this.
I don't think there's any misunderstanding about that.
And that's why what we are doing here as colleagues from across the state is calling on our congressional delegation to act on that level to make sure that mortgage holders are also seeing the kind of relief that we need.
This crisis has compounding and cascading effects throughout the economy.
And so everybody is going to need some assistance to weather this storm, and that includes property owners.
I'll take a shot at this question, if that's OK.
My wife and I, my wife's also an elected official.
She's school board director for a school district.
We are both landlords.
We would be in trouble if our renters would be unable to pay.
But the direction from the question is entirely the wrong way.
Cities are not capable of providing rent relief for landlords.
That's just the wrong direction.
The direction was the injection of dollars into the banking and lending institutions of the United States.
The agreement was that landlords or homeowners would have some form of relief, both of our house that we live in and the house that we rent.
Both, we've requested mortgage relief, pardon me, for both of those residences, and we've received that.
However, the mortgage relief must go to the end of the mortgage contract.
It should not be lumped in right after this pandemic is over, quote unquote over, because it's just a mountain of debt that was brought up before that homeowners are gonna have to pay for later.
So that agreement has to come from the banks.
The banks need to fund that part of it.
And do we have any other council members or elected officials that would like to answer that question?
Okay.
Well, we will go ahead and move on to the next question here from Dan Beekman from the Seattle Times.
And Dan's question is, how would the legislature cancel rent in Washington and for how long?
Do the speakers believe there should be a fund to pay landlords back as in Representative Jayapal's bill?
Uh, so I'll, I'll, I'll take a stab at that as well.
I think, um, you know, we are, what we are talking about is needing to, as I think, uh, council member Burke said, um, look at the budget.
We know that there are issues that need to be addressed, reallocating, uh, uh, the way we spend is going to be important, um, and making sure that we're protecting people, uh, protect from being unhoused.
I mean, this is a, this is a public health crisis.
a priority is making sure that people can be safe, can be in their homes.
And so that means that we need to make sure that people don't get evicted.
That process is already beginning.
But the rent freeze, the mortgage freeze is just that.
It is payment forgiveness without the accumulation of debt.
And so Throughout this economic system, we're going to have to understand that this is a radical call, but it is for the purpose of protecting people from keeping this health crisis from being exacerbated by people being out on the street.
And really making sure that we are protecting people in their most acute way possible, which is making sure that people don't lose their housing during this crisis.
I'll jump in on that if that's okay.
I think another thing that we're talking about is it's not just protecting all people, it's also making them whole again after that protection has gone away.
So what we're asking for is for that session to start June 1st.
So we're not waiting until January when the next regular session is scheduled to start.
So we may not have the perfect answer as city elected officials.
That's why we're calling with our collective ability here on our state representatives to amplify our voices and to find the right solutions.
And we're giving options.
We're saying this is what we know would work for our people who are suffering right now that can't wait until January.
The city of Burien just last night voted to show our support for Congresswoman Jayapal's bill.
And I'm proud that we did so.
So we are trying to make our voices heard and amplified and show support to our federal electives during this time as well.
Great, thank you for that.
So those were the questions that we did have from the press today.
So I would like to thank all of the press that's on the call and the folks that contributed.
And I would also like to just let the members of the press know that if you do have any follow-up questions, please, again, feel free to reach out to me, Devin Silvernail, Council Member Tammy Morales' office.
And that goes for any of the council members or elected officials on the call today.
I'm happy to route those questions to them.
Right now, what I'm going to do is bring it back to Council Member Morales for closing remarks.
Great.
Well, thank you.
Thanks, Devin.
I want to thank my colleagues from across the state for being here.
I think it's really important that we show that there is no east-west divide when it comes to how we're going to protect our communities.
And so we are all here together to show that we're organizing across the state to make sure that people are protected in our communities.
I also do want to thank the press for being here.
In this time, it is really important that we have a free press and that we have these issues covered so that our communities know that we are looking out for them and that we are able to share information to our constituents, but also across the state about the work that folks are doing to try to protect our communities and keep them safe.
And I do want to thank our state leaders in advance for taking action to open a special session.
We know that this work is important.
This is the only way some of these things can happen is if it happens at the state level.
So we're really counting on our statewide leaders to advance this request.
And I want to extend an offer to those leaders.
This coalition of elected municipal elected leaders is very willing and eager to work with you to make sure that this happens so that we can do what's best to serve our community members.
I want to thank everybody for being here.
Have a good rest of your day and please feel free to contact our offices if you have questions down the line.
Thanks everybody.
Thank you.
This concludes the press conference for today.
Thank you everybody for joining us.