Seattle Park District Board Meeting & Public Hearing 7/14/22

Thank you so much, Council IT.

It is June 24th of 2022, and this meeting of the Seattle Metropolitan Park District Board will come to order.

It is 5.34 p.m.

I am Andrew Lewis, President of the Board.

Will the clerks please call the roll?

Council, Board Member Juarez.

Here.

Board Member Morales.

Here.

Board Member Mosqueda.

Board Member Nelson.

Present.

Board Member Peterson.

Board Member Sawant.

Present.

Board Member Strauss.

Present.

President Lewis.

Present.

Six present.

And board member Herbold, were you not called?

I was not called, I'm here.

She was not, board member Herbold.

Here.

And board member Mosqueda did contact me and indicate she is on her way.

So I expect her to be in chambers momentarily.

If there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Items of business.

We will now move on to the items of business and the public hearing before the parks board.

A presentation will be given by Jacob Thorpe on my council staff, and then a public hearing will be held on the proposed Seattle Park District cycle two funding plan for 2023 to 2028. Jacob Thorpe, you may begin the presentation.

I don't think your mic is on.

Jody, can you turn my mic on?

It should be on.

Thank you.

Seattle Park District cycle two funding plan.

Mr. Clerk, just one moment.

Council Member, or sorry, Board Member Peterson is now present.

Can you confirm, Board Member Peterson, your presence?

Yes, thank you.

Excellent.

Okay, Board Member Peterson to be noted in the record is present.

Mr. Clerk, you may continue your presentation.

In August 14th, voters approved the formation of the Seattle Metropolitan Park District.

The district is governed by the Park District Board, which is the city council members sitting as ex officio members of the board.

An interlocal agreement was adopted by resolution one in 2014, which governs operation of the district, establishes an oversight board, the Board of Parks and Recreation Commission, and that board's role It requires the city via Seattle Parks and Recreation to carry out activities of the district and requires minimum general fund support adjusted annually by inflation, which has occurred every year except 2020 and 2021. District funding.

Tax collection began in 2016, starting at $47.7 million, rising annually by 2.5% to $54.6 million in 2020. The first funding plan, the cycle one plan, supported more than 30 initiatives.

On average over the last six years, district funding represents 21% of Seattle Parks and Recreation's total budget.

The 2022 adopted district budget was $56 million.

On this slide, you can see the average impact to the medium homeowner and the total metropolitan district parks levy amount from 2016 to 2022. As you can see, the median homeowner paid $140.49 in 2016 when tax collection began and $154.76 in 2022, the last year of the Cycle 1 investments.

Anticipated funding plan elements in the Cycle 2 plan.

We anticipate the cycle two plan will have new investment proposals, pre-commitment projects, continued funding of cycle one initiatives and COVID and economic recovery funding.

The board of parks and recreation commissioners or BPRC's role in the cycle two plan development.

Per the interlocal agreement, the board of parks and recreation commissioners is responsible for holding public meetings, providing recommendations to the superintendent of parks and recreation, the mayor and the parks district board.

The BPRC held multiple subcommittee meetings to discuss recommendations and two meetings at which specific questions and comments were elicited from the public.

The BPRC adopted those recommendations on May 19th.

Number one, new investment proposals.

The BPRC recommended 38 new investments with a $30 million annual cost, including 81.18 new FTE full-time equivalent employees.

They also included pre-commitment projects These 11 projects are estimated to cost $25 million in cash financing, $110 million in debt financing, about $10 million a year in debt service for that debt financing, plus additional operations and maintenance costs.

This slide shows those pre-commitment projects, which includes six land-banked park development projects, the Amy E. Tena Center renovation, the Loyal Heights Community Center renovation, the Lake City Community Center redevelopment, the Green Lake Community Center and Evans Pool renovations and tenant improvements at the new 8th and Mercer Community Center.

Additional elements of the spending plan include continued funding of Cycle 1 initiatives.

The Mayor's proposed Cycle 2 plan could include funding to continue initiatives funded in the Cycle 1 plan that is estimated to cost $58.2 million in 2023. and COVID and economic recovery funding.

The mayor's proposed cycle two plan could include funding in first few years to address ongoing economic impacts to city revenues from the pandemic.

This has been referred to as supplanting in other meetings.

The estimated cost of that is $10 million in 2023. That's the end of the slide and I'm happy to take questions.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk.

I would just add to it.

It was mentioned the Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioner's recommendations in the slide deck.

I just want to clarify, because sometimes this can be confusing to members of the public.

The Board of Recreation's, Board of Park and Recreation Commission is the commission that the council appoints to advise the city government on the oversight and management of Seattle Parks and Recreation.

We are currently assembled as the Metropolitan Park District Board, which is your Seattle City Council sitting in our dual role as also the Board of Directors of the Metropolitan Park District.

Confusing, but I just wanna clarify that those are two different bodies.

So as the clerk just indicated, we have had a couple of hearings just to bring us up to date on where we are.

on the recommendations that we've received, the 30 plus new recommendations for spending from the Board of Park Commissioners.

That is starting our process now as we deliberate and get feedback from everybody here today in this open hearing and open hearings that are to come.

on what our final recommendation will be, or what our final spending plan will be.

So I just wanna clarify that even though we have that initial proposal from the Board of Park and Recreation Commissioners, that does not lock us in to what the final action of this board needs to be.

That is why we wanna hear from you, the members of the public, so that we can shape what that final proposal will be this fall.

So with that, I am happy to turn it over to the clerks in order to start the public hearing.

I will actually take a moment.

Do board members have questions for Jacob Thorpe on his presentation before we proceed to the open public comment?

Seeing no questions from board members for Jacob Thorpe, we will move on to opening the public hearing.

So colleagues, at this time, we will open the hybrid public hearing.

We are joined by a good number of our community members in council chambers.

And the remote speakers that have signed up will be heard, we'll hear the first 10 remote speakers, and then we will hear 10 in-person speakers and alternate accordingly until everyone who signed up has had an opportunity to speak.

So will the clerk please tell us how many speakers have signed up and if possible, how many virtual and how many in-person?

We have approximately 45 people signed up to speak remotely and we have 15 people signed up to speak in person.

So we could do 10 and 10, just let me know if you want remote first or in person first.

Let's do 10 and 10, and let's do, I'll switch it and do in-person first, and we'll do the first, and if it's actually only 15 in-person speakers that have signed up, why don't we do all 15, and then alternate to just going through all of the virtual.

Okay, well then our first in-person speaker is Andrew Echols.

Sorry, Andrew, it's okay.

We'll restart your timer, but could you maybe get a little closer to the mic?

Sorry, we're all, this is new for all of us to come back in person and I've got to get reminded to get my mic close to me too.

So here, try again.

Yeah, it might not even be on.

Oh, yeah, now there's a light.

Can, does this work?

Perfect.

Great, great.

Okay, we'll restart your timer there.

Great, so good afternoon.

My name is Andrew Echols.

I'm a member of 350 Seattle, a para-educator in Seattle Public Schools and a lifelong Seattle resident.

I'm commenting today to urge the council to support the demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign and prioritize climate action in the upcoming parks levy.

As a young person, I have really felt the urgency, anxiety, and rage of our society's lack of meaningful climate action on the climate crisis for all of my adult life.

The smoke events that started in 2018, followed by last summer's deadly heat dome, gave a visceral taste of what's in store for our region and our world.

Mistakes are intimidating, but what we all do in this decade matters tremendously.

If we are serious about tackling this crisis, we must see every area of public policy as an opportunity to move off of fossil fuels and attack the inequalities that make some of our community members dramatically more exposed to the deadly and disabling impacts of the climate crisis.

We can do that when the parks levy by meeting the demands of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign, which are as follows.

One, rather than doing some solar here and some electrification here as the current proposal has, we should focus on full upgrades to resilience centers where we give community centers micro grid solar so they can run when the power goes out in a heat wave or other power outage.

Heat pumps that move the buildings off of fossil fuel gas and allow them to be cooling centers and have AC.

Only two or three have community centers have AC right now.

And HVAC upgrades for clean air during smoke events.

as well as COVID.

We should absolutely prioritize the investments we do here in communities already most impacted by pollution, heat waves, and disinvestment that are more impacted by these events.

And three, we should invest in pathways to good green union jobs by doing this work under a project labor agreement and a community workforce agreement that allows for local hire.

And then finally, the city council and the government should uphold the city's commitment to move all city buildings off of fossil fuels by 2035. Thank you.

Our next speaker is Lily Frenette.

Hello, I am Lily Frenette, a Seattle resident and 350 Seattle member.

And I'm here to support the Healthy Through Clean and Smoke campaign and ask the city, the parks board to center the climate crisis when planning for spending in the parks levy.

I believe that we should be, Supporting our community with the parks levy, community centers should be able to help people in need regardless of the weather conditions.

If there's a heat wave going on and someone's apartment building is in air condition, community centers should be there to provide cool spaces to beat the heat.

If there's a wildfire with smoke choking the air, people should be able to gather at a community center and breathe easy.

Right now only three Seattle community centers are outfitted to accomplish this with the AC and it's imperative that this levy budgets to outfit all Seattle community centers now to help people in need.

Not in five years or 10 years but with this levy right now.

You have the opportunity to stand for community members who are living in situations that make other climate crisis changes of wildfire smoke and obscene amounts of heat make their lives better.

And on the whole, the lives of all people in Seattle by providing community centers that can accommodate people during these times of need.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Emma Coopersmith.

Hi, I'm Emma, and I'm a 17-year-old high school student in Seattle.

I'm here to support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

Two years ago, when going outside made our heads hurt from the wildfire smoke, California was burning, and people were dying of heat stroke.

I decided to do everything in my power to protect the people and places that I love.

Since that summer, I've watched the climate crisis get worse and get ignored, sidelined, and placed on the back burner in policy.

This is a climate emergency.

It's costing jobs and houses and lives.

And right now, through the Parks Levy, we have a chance to limit the impact of climate catastrophe and help sustain and create thriving communities right here in Seattle.

So I'm asking you to do everything in your power to protect the people and places that you love and protect us.

Please support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Kristen Smith.

Good afternoon, my name is Kristen Smith.

I am a member of 350 Seattle.

I live in the southwest corner of West Seattle where I'm also a teacher.

And during the heat waves last summer and wildfire smoke in the past years, when I've checked in on my students and their families who mostly live in traditionally marginalized communities like High Point and South Park, most of them do not have access to air conditioning.

And during the summer school isn't in session, so they don't have access to our building either, which has AC and HVAC.

Many of them have not had good options where to go.

Last summer, our community had to scramble to even open up private spaces so that there were enough places for people to go during that time.

Additionally, I mentor a group of students who have started an organization at our school that is fighting the climate crisis and are engaged in and it's alongside them that I'm supporting the full demands of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign.

I do believe that our young people understand the urgency of this crisis and in order to do right by them, we need to do better and we need to act more urgently and that is why it is important and I'm asking you today to please support the full demands of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign.

Investing in these upgrades to our community centers, using clean energy, reducing climate pollution will make a huge difference in the community where I live and work.

And it is frankly what my students and their families deserve.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Brad Earl.

Hi, my name is Brad Earl and I live in Southwest Seattle where I also teach in the community.

I'm here because I experienced the heat wave last year.

I did not have air conditioning.

And when I checked in on friends and students and their families, I found that we were all struggling with not having enough options for places to go.

Many of my families of the students I teach could not afford to check out a hotel room where air conditioning was available.

So they just had to suffer through the heat wave.

I want to see the city invest in upgrading community centers to be climate resilience hubs, which is why I support the healthy through heat and smoke campaign.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Neil Anderson.

During last year at C-DOME, a lot of people took shelter in libraries or other public buildings with air conditioning.

But what if those hadn't been available due to widespread power outages?

That's not a far-fetched scenario.

These heat waves put enormous stress on the grid from increased electricity demand, and several nearby counties had to resort to rolling blackouts.

But the extreme temperatures can also cause power outages more directly.

One challenge with underground power lines is that it's difficult to dissipate the heat in enclosed space.

they become more likely to fail when it gets hot.

And during the heat dome, this resulted in over 6,000 people here losing power.

And because it's so much hotter in these underground tunnels, it becomes dangerous to send in workers to repair them.

At the time, a Seattle City Light spokesperson said, quote, we need to balance the speed of restoration with the safety of our crews and limit the amount of time each individual is underground.

As the climate continues to heat up, these kinds of life safety trade-offs will become more common and even more severe.

To keep people safe, we need public spaces like community centers that have onsite battery backup so that heat pumps can continue to provide cool and filtered air to our most vulnerable residents during future heat and smoke events.

So I ask that you support the demands of this campaign, especially prioritizing centers in the most marginalized communities.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Aline Fortgang.

Hi, my name is Aline Fortgang.

Tax dollars from Seattle Parks District should be used to support our public and free parks rather than private organizations like Woodland Park Zoo and the aquariums.

The city's general fund supports these venues quite adequately.

It's important for you to know when making funding decisions that citizens do not support the zoo as they once did.

paid gate attendance to the zoo has declined for well over a decade.

In fact, in 2019, before COVID, paid gate attendance was at the 2004 level.

In those 15 years, Seattle's population has boomed.

Also in 2019, the zoo gave away 100,000 free tickets.

Only 37% of those tickets were used.

So even when it's free to go to the zoo, the majority of people did not go.

This is likely because people have learned that caging wild animals causes suffering.

They no longer want to look at a despondent animals who suffers day after monotonous day in a cage and acts nothing like their counterparts in the wild.

Lastly, there is no scientific peer-reviewed research that supports the time-worn claim the education or conservation gains occurs when one visits a zoo.

In fact, the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums own research found that attitudes towards protecting wild animals and protecting wild habitat actually decreased after a zoo visit.

The zoo is primarily an entertainment venue.

Let's reallocate Seattle Parks District funds away from the zoo and aquariums and to the free public parks for all to enjoy.

And let's not put more of a tax burden on homeowners, some of whom cannot afford it.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Derek Bonafilia.

Hi.

My name is Derek and I'm a renter in district six.

I'm here commenting in support of upgrading Seattle's community centers for climate resiliency and clean energy.

When I hear climate resiliency.

I first think mostly about the heat wave last year, and in particular, I think about waking up at 5am.

and opening up my cooking thermometer in my living room and finding that at the coolest part of the day it was still above 90 degrees inside.

And then I think about how later when it was 108 degrees out in the middle of the day, neither the library nor the community center were open in my neighborhood or able to be used as cooling centers.

And after that, I step back and I remember that I actually had it pretty good compared to a lot of people in our region.

Some analysis have shown that it's likely that hundreds of people across the state died during this heat wave.

And some of these were people living outside with no place to go, and some of them were here in Seattle.

Many others had to be treated at our local hospitals for unprecedented amounts of heat-related illness.

I think when we look at what we went through as a city last summer, it feels obvious that we haven't really built up the infrastructure that we need as a city to live through the type of extreme weather events that are becoming more and more common.

Given all that, I strongly urge you all to get started on building that infrastructure and to increase the levy and use the levy to support upgrading our community centers with electric heat pumps and HVAC systems and solar grids and use them as climate resiliency centers for weather events.

Yep, and also to do so in a way that puts equity first.

Our next speaker is Bell.

Bodley.

Hello, my name is Belle Bodley.

I'm a high school student who lives in a small residential neighborhood, so small that you have to zoom in pretty far on Google Maps to see it.

One thing I see when talking about climate change is talk about desolate dystopias and collapsing democracies.

It is important, though, to remember to connect the impacts that climate change has on our local community.

An example of this is the dangerously high temperatures and air made unbelievable by smoke in the summer months.

Climate resilience hubs funded by the Parks and Rec Levy would provide sanctuary for the people most impacted.

I have lived in Seattle my whole life.

And I have always been proud of my modern city, which has been the forefront of climate actions.

Seeing the impacts of climate change on my city has been devastating.

I am hopeful though, that by making sure that this levy is taking climate change as seriously as it is affecting the majority of the people, that Seattle can continue to be a place where kids can be proud to call home.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Sean Moran.

Um before I start, is it possible you can switch the screen to the zoom meeting?

Well, for whatever it counts, I think it's kind of awkward to just talk to a clock like a timer and not the people that I should be talking to.

So my name is Sean Moran.

I live in district six.

Got it pretty good up there, but I'm here to support the healthy through heat and smoke action.

I wrote this thing today and I believe it is the duty of elected officials to implement policies that serve the public.

These responsibilities are most crucial when concerning life and death and the wellbeing of the citizens who reside in your districts.

The city is blessed with natural abundance that resembles tales of Eden.

It's part of why I fell in love with this area.

I believe it is your high responsibility to ensure that we, as a community, move legislation that is bound to action plans, which ensure cleaner air, water, and minimize further damage to the natural world around us, while simultaneously protecting the health of the people you have been chosen to lead.

The gaps in adequate coverage in South Seattle and lower income areas must be addressed with well-funded action plans.

Upgrading Seattle's community centers for climate resilience will do that.

Upgrading community centers is a subject of emergency.

The city will likely not be exempt from drastic impacts of climate change.

Ensuring adequate public facilities that can support citizens in need during extreme weather events is baseline city infrastructure.

Only two of 26 facilities in Seattle are equipped with adequate AC for heat waves like we had last year.

This is a failure.

We cannot afford to be a city that fails to fall behind the call to adapt to a changing ecosystem that threatens the lives of Seattle's population.

Let our abundant natural beauty be a daily reminder that we cannot fail in our duty as a community to invest in clean energy, to preserve the health of the Pacific Northwest and its residents.

And yeah, for whatever it's worth, I don't know, if things get really bad, you have to ask yourself, are we gonna be prepared?

I think where I am now in district six, I have it pretty good, but I think there's a lot more people that don't, so we should probably do something.

Our next speaker is Jessica Roxanne Jones.

Hello, thank you for meeting with us today and discussing this important opportunity to use park levy funding to support community center upgrades.

I see this opportunity as a way to bring people together collectively rather than individualizing, which having personal home upgrades, like people putting AC units in their individual houses is an individual fix that I'm sure many people will swing for.

A lot of people just won't be able to make those kinds of upgrades.

A lot of people don't even have a house that they can shut doors in and put fans with air filters in front of them in their windows to try to mitigate smoke that comes through, which is what I do in my group house that is a hundred year old house in district six.

and we're able to get by through smoke events by doing that and having a way to channel air through our house.

But I think that protecting the most vulnerable people in this way will help everybody.

And we see that with other efforts to support people on the streets and what they need, people who are living unhoused.

And with that, you also get a good opportunity for volunteerism and other collective means of coming together and speaking with each other, seeing each other, looking each other in the face during moments of crisis.

And we can come together in community centers instead of scrambling to run anywhere that we're able to to survive.

So thank you so much and I hope that some of this funding for the parks will get used.

Hopefully a large amount of it will get used to upgrade community centers in this way.

Our next speaker is Susan Hildreth.

Thank you.

I'm happy to be here.

I am a retired engineer and a 28-year property owner in District 4. I'm here to support the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

We read sickening articles about rainforest destruction in Brazil and the Congo as if the Global South were responsible for climate change.

Rather, the wealthy of the developed countries bear an outside responsibility for carbon emissions globally, cumulatively.

We have emissions reductions targets all over the place with negligible action relative to the need and our ability.

The city of Seattle passes a Green New Deal resolution that stalled out while Seattle DOT spent millions planning and designing to replace carbon-free Metro buses on Madison, that is trolley buses, with emissions spewing hybrid buses.

Now 350 Seattle and others are offering you a perfect opportunity to do something that while tiny, gets the gears in motion to do something right and significant for climate justice in the city.

Please take that opportunity.

Please implement the four demands of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign as articulated by others.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Renaissance Rev. Is there a Renaissance Rev here?

Renaissance in the house.

I'm Renaissance and I'm one of two co-directors of campaigns at 350 Seattle with Jess Wallach.

Some of you may already have met and worked with and I'm helping to steward the Healthy Through Eat and Smoke campaign.

I'm really glad that we're doing hybrid meetings and that you've opened it up for so much comment.

And I really appreciated the way in which the meeting was opened and by saying that the decision for the parks levy is not completed yet.

And that the reason for having these hearings is so that we can discuss together and come to negotiations about what it is that we need in our community.

And we believe that more should be done with the parks levy campaign as has already been stated here.

but to assert how much of the community is working with us, we'd like to name that we are working with How's Our Neighbors, Stop the Sweeps, Whose Streets Are Streets, Martin Luther King Labor Council, Beacon Hill Council, Atlas Action Alliance, Prospect United Church of Christ, Duwamish River Community Coalition, People for Climate Action, Our Climate and Real Change, and many others.

because these issues are vastly and vitally important to us.

Now, there are many things that we can do with the money that is raised by a parks levy campaign.

And what we are imploring and hoping that this body will decide is to focus on the things that will actually address the real-time concerns that many of our community members will be facing as more impactful climate change occurs and severe weather situations impact our people.

So that's what we're advocating for.

And we would hope that it would be done through a workforce agreement to make sure that people in our communities are being employed and trained up and strengthened through this.

And I look forward to meeting with all of you as we're scheduling new meetings with everybody that's on this council.

Thank you very much.

Our last in-person speaker is David Ward.

Hello, my name is David Ward.

I'm a 15 year member of the Lifelong Recreation Advisory Council, speaking only for myself.

I urge the MPD board to stop the proposed parks cuts to many community center morning hours.

They'll eliminate half of parks, lifelong recreation, senior, older adult programs and destroy the program.

We'll also eliminate much city provided daycare programs, replacing it with private homeschool programs.

Lifelong recreation has been a part of parks for decades represents the people who are 50 plus which is 29% of the population in Seattle it's a popular program with attendance of 100,000 in 1999 prior to coven.

It was a rapidly growing program, increasing 30% from 2015. It had 247 weekly programs then, plus many dozens of other programs, and it's going to eliminate 117 of those.

It's won awards for both its dementia-friendly program and its LBGTQ program, Rainbow Recreation, and had food and fitness programs for immigrant seniors for 15 years.

Lifelong Recreation, and senior program is supposed to be a priority for the city.

Programming for seniors is also part of the city's race and social justice initiative.

Parks recent recreation director Justin Cutler said the reduction in morning hours were due to public requests for more night and weekend hours, which by itself isn't really true, but no one asked for fewer morning hours.

That was strictly a parks decision.

Also, no one asked for private groups to replace city provided services.

That was strictly a parks decision.

In addition to cutting morning hours, Parks is not allowing volunteer drivers for their field trips, one of the most popular and income producing of lifelong's programs.

I asked why Parks is picking on lifelong recreation and why is Parks replacing it and provided services with private groups.

Again, I asked the MPD board to stop this reduction in morning hours.

And I have paper copies of all the documentation from nine board members.

Thank you.

We have one additional in-person speaker and that's Pamela Nee.

Hello, council members.

Thank you for two minutes this time.

Thank you for making a commitment to move all buildings off of fossil fuel use by 2035. However, in the face of severe climate change or climate crisis, so we call it, at present, I urge the council to make credible plans towards the commitment.

One of which to consider seriously is to incorporate three elements in those buildings, including community centers.

the three elements.

I call them trifecta.

Uh our solar panels linked to microgrids that supply electricity to third element heat pumps.

Um an example of the threesome, the trifecta of solar panels, microgrids, and heat pumps is the Miller Community Center in Capitol Hill.

Um however, for other community centers that are more affected, the communities that are more affected.

And of course, beside the trifecta, the council can think about other green structures, for example, green walls, green roofs, so forth.

The example of Green Mall is the one in South Park, close to the South Park Library.

An example of the Green Roof is the roof on the Ballard Library, where I frequent.

However, if these projects may show red figures, which most people are worried about, but I may remind the council that the cost, which will be equalized by the revenue from these valuable investments.

Revenue will include electricity from the sun, clean air for the community and more resilient communities.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We'll now move into the remote public commenters.

Our first remote public commenter is Chris Woodward.

Good afternoon.

My name is Chris Woodward.

I'm the Community Development Director with the Alliance for Pioneer Square.

I'm providing comment today in support of increased protected funding for Seattle Parks and Recreation facilities.

The last two years of pandemic disruption have made it clear just how important it is to have equitable, accessible, safe, and well-maintained parks in our city, such as Pioneer Park and Oxnell Square in Pioneer Square.

While the Alliance agrees with the majority of the recommendations from the Parks and Recreation Department and the Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners, we believe there are areas where the current proposal could be improved, including funding for critical public safety needs.

Active personnel in high-issue parks is underfunded in the current proposal.

Presently, many private, nonprofit, and quasi-governmental agencies are paying close to $4 million annually for security and activation in public spaces, particularly downtown.

These services are proven to reduce negative behavior in public spaces.

Currently, there is no long-term commitment from the city to address this public need, and it's unsustainable to expect nonprofits to do this work.

I encourage you to meet and exceed the recommendations of the Park and Commission.

I encourage you to meet and exceed the recommendations of the Parks Commission and pursue an increase in the levy to $0.40 per $1,000 in assessed value and commit to $200 million in bonding to ensure we have a long-term investment in our park system.

Thank you for your leadership of our public spaces.

Your support for this level of funding will help make the critical investments we need to meet the needs of our growing city, our diverse population, and protect a vital community resource for years to come.

Thank you so much.

Our next speaker is Ben Osterland.

Hi y'all.

My name is Ben Osterlin and I'm a Seattle resident living in Council District 6 in the Crown Hill neighborhood.

I wanted to give voice to the proposed plans for the parks for the city's park levy and what I as a resident and voter would like to see.

Although I haven't lived in Seattle all my life I've found friends like no other here and a special community I hope to deepen and enjoy.

At the same time I'm keenly aware of the effects of climate disaster.

I was here last summer living in an older home when the heat waves hit.

Like many others, it was an awful time.

I was dehydrated, struggled to do my job, and almost fainted on a drive to help a friend.

I knew I was the lucky one, one of the lucky ones, though.

Unlike others, I had friends who I could stay with in the evenings and be able to fall asleep.

But I know there were many people throughout the city who did not have that opportunity.

I'm urging the council and our elected representatives here today to accept the recommendations from the Healthy for Heat and Smoke campaign.

I want to see community centers throughout this city that are cooling centers, heating centers, places of weather refuge, that run on 100% renewable energy, with special attention paid to neighborhoods that are most impacted by rising temperatures, and all this transition to be done with clean, green jobs through union labor.

I believe these changes will bring safety, equity, and a more climate secure future to our city.

Thank you for your consideration and your leadership.

Our next speaker is Alice Lockhart.

Hi Park's board, can folks hear me?

Hello?

We can hear you.

We can hear you Alice, just hit, there we go.

Oh, thank you so much.

Hi Park's board, I'm Alice Lockhart, resident of Licton Springs in D5 and my daughter Eleanor went to the ER in last summer's heat dome.

And after an IV and a couple hours of air conditioning spent the next three days in our un-air conditioned but somewhat cooler basement, I'm requesting upgrade of all Seattle community centers for climate resilience and clean energy, including installing solar microgrids, electric heat pumps, and HVAC system upgrades.

The proposed park district budget has $3.1 million for sustainable buildings.

This is a drop in a very hot, dry bucket.

I ask council to imagine the deaths associated with the worst heat dome accompanied by power outages.

And after such consideration to ask parks for a new spending plan that electrifies and solarizes not just one, but all of our community shelters, I mean, community centers, so that they may be shelters, so that they can save lives during heat events.

We can't afford to wait for the next funding cycle.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Shia Tini.

Hi, my name is Jay Teeley, and I'd like to make a couple of quick points about climate resiliency in Seattle City Building.

As we all know, the threat of the climate crisis is impossible to ignore or deny at this point.

The recent Supreme Court decision to severely restrict the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases makes this issue even more urgent than it was previously.

We're already experiencing severe weather and intense smoke from nearby wildfires, which is why I'm here to urge the Parks Board to upgrade Seattle Community Center's HVAC system by installing solar microgrids and electric key pumps to power AC and provide clean, breathable air.

This will ensure that people have safe, cool places to stay during extreme heat and smoke that don't just perpetuate our reliance on fossil fuels.

I also think it's reasonable to expect the City of Seattle to transition all city buildings off of fossil fuels by 2035, and upgrading our community centers would be a great step in that direction.

The only thing scarier to me than not doing enough to prevent the many negative and potentially catastrophic effects of climate change is not doing enough to deal with the effects that we're already experiencing and will experience going forward.

I grew up in the Seattle area but lived out of state throughout the 2010s and whenever anyone would ask, so what's Seattle like?

I would never hesitate to tell them about all the ways that Seattle is incredibly forward thinking.

Seattle can, and needs to be a leader and a model for the rest of the country to follow when it comes to making sure we're prepared for severe weather events such as extreme heat waves and wildfire smoke.

I support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign, and thank you very much for allowing me to comment.

Our next speaker is Grace Hope.

Hey, everybody.

My name is Grace Hope.

So glad to be here.

I'm a single parent.

I'm a scientist.

I'm also an organizer with 350 Seattle.

I'm here to share my heatwave experience from last year and also to share my support for the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

It's so important that we spend this parks levy on real support and shelter for our communities so we can take care of each other when extreme climate events hit our region again.

I spent the heatwave hold up with my family and my sister's family.

our three dogs, our five teenagers, because we didn't have anywhere else to go.

We were all together in my little two bedroom house because I could borrow an air conditioner from my neighbor.

And that's how we made it through the heat dome, but we were really lucky because so many people with less access to resources didn't actually have anywhere to go.

As a scientist, I wanna remind us that the heat wave was a once in a thousand year event and the climate crisis made it 150 times more likely to happen.

And it was also a regional event that affected folks outside of Seattle.

It's estimated that actually 1,408 people died during the heat dome last year across the Pacific Northwest.

And during that time, Seattle had the lowest percentage of air conditioned households among all major metro areas in the United States.

So this was considered one of the most extreme temperature events in recorded history.

And we know that the climate crisis is accelerating and making events like this more common.

So my question to the board here is for you all to consider is what does it look like for the City of Seattle to be a leader in such unprecedented times like these.

And I thank you all for for listening.

Our next speaker is Peter Lehmann.

Peter Lennon, it looks like you're unmuted.

Are you ready to speak?

Yes, thank you.

I'm Peter Lennon of 350 Seattle.

I'll start by saying that I support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Snow campaign.

Seattle has made commitments to move its buildings off of fossil fuels, but I don't see an urgent plan or the budget to do this.

The city's buildings, and this includes our 24 community centers, need to be transitioned off fossil fuels to reduce carbon emissions.

So I'm aware of Seattle's emerging building performance standards.

This is important long-term work, but climate change is now.

We need Seattle to take action now to upgrade our community centers.

Like everybody's been saying, solar microgrids, electric heat pumps with AC.

When it's 108 degrees outside, like we experienced last summer, or with wildfire smoke, our most vulnerable people need centers for climate resilience.

Thank you for your leadership.

Our next speaker is Tori Westman.

Tori Westman.

I believe you need to press star six to unmute your phone.

Okay, we'll come back to Tori.

Our next speaker is Dawn Harper.

And Dawn, please press star six.

Hi, yes, this is Don Harper and the 85% increase in property tax being requested by the Department of Parks and Recreation is far too high.

The increase for the next six years should be based on the rate of inflation.

Before there's an increase beyond the rate of inflation to support the many new projects suggested, there needs to be a performance audit of parks to show how well the previous $300 million in additional funding over six years was used.

As an advocate and user of the parks system, it is hard to see that the money was well spent.

It took less than five years for the mayor of the parks department and the city council to break their campaign promises about how the funds of the parks district would be spent as spelled out in the interlocal agreement.

Now parks is requesting an additional 10 million a year for two years to backstop the funds that are required to come from the general fund that the voters of Seattle were told would not happen if they voted for the Parks District.

This request should be denied.

Also please keep in mind that there is a King County Parks levy on the ballot that is also requesting additional funding and has benefits for Seattle.

We need to be careful about the total amount of new property taxes that for many people whether renters or owners will be an additional financial burden.

I thank you.

Our next speaker is Jenny Tsai.

Hi I'm Jenny Tsai.

I'm a Seattle resident in Capitol Hill and I am in support of the parks levy being used to upgrade community centers to be resilient hubs through heat smoke and snow.

Last year during the heat wave there were so many people who had nowhere to go to relieve themselves of the heat.

Climate change is here happening now and it is disproportionately affecting communities of color and the poor or unhoused.

It should be a public right to access clean air and not just for those who have the means to get an AC unit in their house or who can afford to get a hotel room, which during the heat wave was up to $500 a room.

I slept on my balcony last year as a young person was uncomfortable but did not affect my health.

For many people, this is not the case.

So I'm urging the council and the parks board to prioritize funding for community resilience hubs.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Charlie Holbein, Holbein, excuse me, Charlie Holbein.

And thank you.

Hi, my name is Charlie Holbein and I'm calling in today to urge the city to upgrade our community centers to climate resilience hubs.

I've been a lifelong Seattle resident and after what we experienced last summer and we are already experiencing a heat wave this summer, It's clear that the smoke and the extreme heat is inevitable.

This is the reality that we live in.

Heat waves and wildfire smoke are only becoming more common.

It is time for the city to walk its talk and provide a bare minimum resource for these extreme events that impact low-income communities, communities of color, houseless communities, and already pollution-burdened communities disproportionately.

People need a place to go when staying home or being outside just isn't safe.

They needed it yesterday.

Let's please not put this off any longer.

Upgrading Seattle's community centers to be climate resilient hubs is a great opportunity to put Seattle's Green New Deal to action.

Let's meet the need for clean air and cooling centers, and let's get our public buildings off of fossil fuel.

I support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

Thank you.

My next speaker is Paul Tankhill.

And Paul, you may need to press star six.

Try pressing star six.

Okay, we'll come back to Paul.

Our next speaker is Julia Buck.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Hannah Lindell-Smith.

Hello, council members.

My name is Hannah Lindell-Smith.

I'm a constituent of District 1, a community organizer, and a rising junior at Summit Atlas High School, here in support of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign demands.

One night in August 2020 I woke up to smoke blowing in.

We closed the windows and stuffed towels under doors as the wind changed and the smoke from eastern Washington wildfires covered the city.

Over the next 10 days community political and mutual aid groups I worked with organized around the clock to provide safety supplies as the sun turned red.

Extreme weather events like this are becoming more and more common.

I was privileged enough to have a safe place to be inside and wait it out.

But this isn't the reality for many people and the effects are dangerous especially in BIPOC and low income communities already affected by environmental racism.

The climate crisis is here and community is how we survive it.

Upgrading Seattle's community centers in the upcoming parks levy is a strong step toward our Green New Deal commitments and a city where resilience is a priority.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Alana Killeen.

Hello this is Paul Tankle.

Okay, we will take Paul Tinkle and we'll take Alana after Paul.

Thank you, Paul.

Go ahead.

Yes, thanks.

Thank you so much.

Yes, I live in West Seattle and I often take my four-year-old grandson and his now 14-week-old brother and little sister on outings to enjoy the parks.

And I particularly, we live pretty close to Hiawatha Park and such a nice place to take them.

And it's certainly one of Seattle's treasures.

And one of the things I'm doing, I'm beginning a study of the trees in Hiawatha Park to see which ones have been around for a hundred years or even more than a hundred years, some of those trees.

And so that we can better understand what species they are and the success that they're having and how we might be able to use them in parks in the future.

What we're working on is to develop a plan for adding trees to newer parks in other communities that are not as fortunate as what we have here in West Seattle with Hiawatha.

And we want every neighborhood to be beautiful and welcoming and to provide shade to escape and to help folks mitigate the threat of heat domes.

So as you budget decisions for the park district and the general fund, please find ways to increase the need for trees in the developed parks.

Uh, there needs to be a sustained funding to address the loss of the trees and to add new ones.

It's important to me, but it's even more important to, of course, the future of my four year old grandson and his recently arrived, um, twin brother and sister, uh, to plant these trees now, and certainly for their future.

So I thank you for your consideration.

Our next speaker now is Alana Kareem.

Hi.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

Oh, sorry.

Hey, this is Alana Killeen.

I'm calling from Fremont.

The heat zone last year was a scary experience for many reasons.

For me, one of the reasons it was particularly unsettling was because of the isolation.

Many of the places I would normally go together with others were closed.

And because we don't have air conditioning and our friends don't have air conditioning, it was too hot for us to get together because we didn't want to add more body heat to spaces that were already really hot.

My partner and I ended up going to Green Lake to sit by the water.

And even though it was only marginally better there, if anything, it was a couple degrees cooler.

It made such a big difference to be with other people and feel less alone.

We need community to face the climate crisis.

So we need to make our community strong.

And this is why I support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

Thank you for your time.

Our next speaker is Taylor Warner.

Hi my name is Taylor Warner out of District 7 and I'm calling in support of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign.

I'm also a union electrician out of IBEW 46. I was working construction outdoors in September of 2020 when according to the air quality index Seattle briefly had the worst air quality in the world.

I had some reprieve.

Obviously many Seattleites did not.

I was born in the Pacific Northwest and have seen the development of stunning erraticism of the climate in my lifetime.

But even recent transplants can have tracked the dramatic advancements of our apocalyptic weather conditions.

We are watching the planet choke in real time and nationally our leadership on the left wastes months and years.

Frankly they've wasted decades seeking a solution that doesn't affront their business alliances.

Seattle should be different.

Seattleites, especially young Seattleites, like so many of the inspiring people participating in this meeting, are paying attention and can distinguish between efforts that are qualitatively substantial and lip service politicking.

If Seattle City Council purports itself to be in the service of Seattle's most vulnerable populations and to be pro-worker and pro-union, and if Seattle City Council members want to enjoy the confidence of Seattleites, which is in crisis right now for a number of reasons, then they should absolutely leap at the opportunity to support a campaign like this one that moves Seattle even a little in the direction of carbon neutrality and could set a positive example for other cities.

I also just really want to urge everybody who's participating in this meeting to pay attention as this situation develops, but also just pay a lot of attention to our city council and see what they're doing, what they're deciding about different issues that come up.

and participate in our local politics.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Douglas Luchin.

Thank you.

Thank you.

My name is Douglas Luchin and I'm providing my comments tonight as the president of the Friends of Seattle's Olmstead Parks.

I also serve as the vice chairman of the National Association for Olmstead Parks as well as being a longtime resident of West Seattle and have for many years served as a volunteer for the Friends of Dakota Place Park We serve a neighborhood park near the Alaska Junction.

As part of the national bicentennial celebration of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted, a visionary considered the founder of the American landscape architectural profession, the Friends of Seattle's Olmsted Parks has formed a collaborative team with Seattle Parks and Recreation and the Seattle Parks Foundation to determine the extent of and the solutions to the growing loss of trees in Seattle's developed parks.

Our undertaking is currently referred to as the Trees for Seattle Parks Project.

In the last several months of this work, we have learned that Seattle's developed parks are losing more trees than Parks and Recreation has the funds to replace.

The result is that in net Seattle is losing hundreds of trees per year in its developed parks.

The consequences will include the further degradation of our environment, further damage from the effects of global warming, and further inequitable and disproportionate impacts on the areas of our city and its populace least able to withstand these disruptive changes.

We've also learned that with the backlog of replacing our current damaged, diseased, lost trees, combined with the growing future loss of trees, it will take an aggressive funding plan to reach a status of no net tree loss in the next 10 to 18 years.

Thus, the longer we wait, the longer it will take us to achieve our goals.

Without aggressive funding, there will never be a point of no net tree loss as climate change impacts will only continue to worsen the problem.

The current funding allocation from the Seattle Parks District is calculated to be a mere 13% of the annual need to address the loss of trees in Seattle's developed parks.

Without substantial funding from the Seattle Parks District, we are destined to experience a dramatic net loss of trees in Seattle's developed parks, a loss and resulting condition we believe will be unacceptable to us all.

We are therefore asking you as decision makers for both the park district and the city's budget to look for ways to increase and sustain the funding for trees in Seattle's developed parks.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Linnea May.

You're good, Linnea.

Hi.

Hi.

My name's Linnea May.

I'm a renter in District 3, and I'm here to urge the board, excuse me, to meet the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

I'm a transplant from Austin, Texas, where both 100 plus degree temperatures and access to AC units are common.

It was only once I moved here and sat in my home in 110 degree weather last summer that I truly understood just how vital access to AC is, not just for your sanity, but for your survival.

And yet, out of the 26 community centers in the city, only two of them have AC.

This is unacceptable, and we need to direct funding from the Parks Levy towards fixing this.

The heat waves of last summer will be back, but if we invest in climate resiliency hubs at our community centers and meet the demands of the campaign, we can guard ourselves from the worst of its effects.

Thank you for your time.

Our next speaker is Erin Mando.

Hi, good evening, council members.

My name is Aaron Mandel.

I'm a Seattle Public Schools teacher, renter, and lifelong resident of Seattle that currently resides in the Interbay neighborhood of District 7. I'm commenting today in support of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

We want to make sure that the parks levy funding is used to upgrade Seattle's community centers for climate resilience and clean energy.

prioritize investments in communities already most impacted by heat waves, pollution displacement, and other environmental justices, make sure that we invest in pathways to good green union jobs, and make sure that we move all city buildings off of fossil fuels by 2035. As the extreme heat and smoke events become more common because of the climate emergency, it's imperative that Seattle invests in keeping the most vulnerable folks safe while also transitioning away from fossil fuels as fast as we can.

We must be prepared for when this happens again, because it will.

I've dealt with asthma my entire life.

As a kid, I went to Children's Hospital a handful of times due to asthma attacks.

And for many years now, my asthma has been mostly under control, but the extreme smoke events we've dealt with were really scary and made my asthma as bad as it's been in a really long time.

And so many people struggled through that time and had nowhere to go and hundreds of people died.

It's not okay for us to not have community spaces ready for dealing with both extreme heat and smoke.

We need to act with urgency to invest in keeping people safe and being leaders in moving towards a fossil free future.

Please support the demands of the healthy through heat and smoke campaign.

Thanks.

That's all I got.

My next speaker is Jimmy Lee.

Hi my name is Junie Lee.

I am a health care worker and resident of West Seattle an organizer with 350 Seattle.

I'm here to support the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

The heat wave last year on top of the sky turning scarlet red and the air becoming thick and gray from wildfire smoke was absolutely unbearable.

I didn't have it as bad as our neighbors in South Seattle though.

where studies have already revealed the worst environmental health outcomes due to the close proximity to industrial carbon-heavy facilities namely in Georgetown South Park and Beacon Hill.

My family had nowhere to go and couldn't even open the windows to let hot air out because of the downright hazardous air quality outside.

We couldn't afford to stay at a hotel which inherently makes surviving the climate crisis a matter of wealth and class.

The City of Seattle has already planned to move all city buildings off of fossil fuels by 2035. So what better opportunity than to use the parks levy to upgrade existing community centers with green energy and do it with union labor and living wage jobs in our most impacted communities first.

I fully support the demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign and I urge you to do the same.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Barry Westbrook.

And Barry Westbrook.

You may need to hit star six in order to unmute your phone.

Hi, my name is Barry.

I'm a social worker with King County, a shop store with SEIU 925, a Democratic Socialist of America member, and a 350 member.

And I'm here to speak on behalf of my community, my neighbors who are homeless, and to voice support for good paying union jobs.

The city must do a better job to address the climate crisis and meet the needs of our neighbors who are most impacted by it.

I've been working with people who are homeless for 10 years, and I've often seen how Seattle makes a crisis even more unbearable through neglect, if not outright oppression.

Improving community centers to be climate resilient helps us decarbonize and invest in the health and well-being of our community.

Please include this goal in Seattle Parks Levy.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Peter Condit.

Peter Kahn, that's not present.

Our next speaker now will be Taylor Minter.

Hello, my name is Taylor Minter.

I'm a Seattle resident of District 7, and I'm here to advocate for an increase in accessibility in Seattle Parks bathrooms.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, it was extremely isolating for many families.

I myself am a stay-at-home father of a two-year-old, and many of my fellow caregivers and I struggled to see friends, family, and socialize throughout the pandemic.

Throughout our isolation, we found many Seattle parks to be safe places to take our children, to join parenting groups, and to socialize with other kids.

We, and the group that I lead, fundamentally believe that parks bathrooms are public bathrooms and should be accessible to all.

Speaking on behalf of my fellow caregivers, I would like to advocate for Seattle Parks Department to be more focused on addition, maintenance, and cleanliness of Seattle Parks bathrooms.

The group that I am a co-lead of has begun a parks audit of bathrooms, focusing first on District 7, but spreading throughout the city.

And we have found that many bathrooms lack changing tables for children or adults.

Many bathrooms are welded shut or locked indefinitely.

And we have also found that many bathrooms are in an unsanitary state that is not welcoming for families.

And these factors do not make parks or their bathrooms a safe place for Seattle families, and this further isolates parents and caregivers from the rest of the community.

When parents and families travel, we need access to restrooms.

We believe that parks bathrooms should be a priority for the parks levy, and that bathrooms should be made more accessible.

Thank you for your time.

Our next speaker is Bobby Rehe.

Can you hear me?

Thank you.

Thank you.

My name is Bobby Riggi.

I'm a retired teacher and a resident of Seattle for about 42 years.

I'm speaking in support of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

I'm in my mid-80s, and two years ago, right at the beginning of September, I was awakened in the wee hours of the morning by smoke coming in my window.

the bedroom window, and I got up in my jammies and slippers and walked around the block looking for the house that was on fire so I could be a hero and save people.

But it wasn't a house.

It was the forest in D.C., Washington, Oregon, and California that were on fire.

And we breathed that smoke for weeks afterwards.

And then last year, doing a heat dome here, I was shocked at how much the heat affected me.

I'm very active, but the heat was debilitating.

I felt that if I sat down too long or went to sleep, I'd never wake up.

I was worried about friends and called them to make sure they were okay.

Some were, some were not, and one died from being isolated in the heat.

I only made it through that period by putting, somebody told me this, putting towels in the freezer and then wearing the cold cloth around my neck, even to sleep.

And here's the thing.

I live on Finney Ridge with seven big shady trees on our lot.

There are constant breezes through the garden, but so many people in Seattle neighborhoods.

For them, there are few trees, lots of pavement, and the air is clogged from traffic exhaust.

My experience, stressful, was minimal in comparison.

And I'm from Texas.

I don't want an individual air conditioner.

I think they're a huge waste of energy, and they spew heat.

on to your neighbors.

A community response is what we need.

Cooling centers that are open 24 hours where neighbors can check in and make sure that everyone is okay.

Heat waves are now ravaging populations around the world and even here on our cool Pacific Northwest.

We must plan for and pay for climate resilience and do it now.

I'm asking the council to fully fund a healthy food, heat and smoke program Thank you.

Our next speaker is Tim Mozart.

And Tim, if you hit star six on your phone, it should unmute you.

Okay, we may come back to Tim.

The next speaker will be Suzanne Grant.

Hello, this is Suzanne Grant.

The Park District needs to focus on basic maintenance of our parks.

Do not divert the general funds meant for parks to other purposes.

The Park District promised that the funding would not be used to fulfill what should be coming from the general fund.

But during the pandemic, the Council broke that pact.

About $10 million was cut from parks in 2020 and 2021, and the money was never paid back.

There should now be a performance audit.

What did the Park District accomplish with the $300 million it received in additional funding during the past six years?

Doubling our property taxes is inequitable and unsustainable for many.

it will also likely hurt the King County Parks Levy that is coming up for a vote soon.

The SPR strategic plan promises the quote, restoration and maintenance of forests and the forest canopy.

75% of all their poll respondents prefer natural forested parks to green open space.

Parks currently has only two tree crews, possibly only three people taking care of all of our trees in our parks.

There needs to be more attention paid to preserving and maintaining the health of the trees in our parks.

Even 350.org knows that keeping mature and exceptional trees in the ground will help with our climate crisis as the tree canopy provides cooling during heat dome events and they help clear the air of smoke as they provide oxygen for us to breathe.

Please increase and sustain the funding for trees in Seattle parks.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Rebecca Bear.

And Rebecca's try pressing star six.

Okay, we'll come back to Rebecca.

Our next speaker is Katie Weber.

Hey, my name is Katie, and I'm led the panel for over 10 years, but I am not from here.

I may volunteer with 350 Seattle, and I am here to talk to the people about supporting the Healthy Communities Initiative.

Oh, sorry.

One second.

Of the City Council, I know you are asked to consider a lot of things, from schools, to medicines, to the well-being of taxpayers.

But if the worst of climate change affects us, our city, knowing that those things will matter.

Offering this levy means funds to update our community centers to fight some of the worst effects of climate change.

I know this levy and its uses mean higher costs for taxpayers but teachers pay to live in a society that stands for justice and doing the right thing.

Community centers are often used by the most vulnerable of populations among us, the same populations that are disproportionately affected by climate change.

We include trying to make community centers a refuge for families and people.

Seattle has always been a holistic curve and been an example for what's possible in the city.

My city needs kind of changes.

Seattle can show.

that climate change is something to be taken seriously.

Let's not let this opportunity pass by.

I support the full advance of the Healthy Sophia and Smoke Committee and so should you.

Include funding for environmental upgrades in the blessing.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Lucinda Stroud.

And Lucinda, if you haven't yet, please press star six.

Great.

My name is Miss Linda Stroud.

I'm a renter supporting the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

I rent in an older building because that is what I can afford that does not have AC.

During the worst days last year, it got close to 100 degrees inside my apartment.

The only options for finding cooler places were to either personally know people who have AC and were willing to let me hang out in their homes, pay almost $20 per person to spend a couple of hours in the movie theater, Checking the heat to the central library since the library branch nearest me doesn't have air conditioning.

Rent a hotel room with A.C.

or hang around in a store with A.C.

for as long as employees would let me without my making a purchase.

There are almost no public places for air conditioning in Seattle where there is not the pressure to buy something.

That is a public health issue especially for families with children elders or others who are most vulnerable to dangerous effects from heat exhaustion who are least likely to have the capital to afford access to bearable temperatures.

We desperately need air-conditioned community centers to act as cooling centers to fill this need, and we need these centers built using the green technologies already described so that they do not further worsen the root cause of why we urgently need these air-conditioned venues in the first place.

I support the full demands of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

Thank you for your time.

Our next speaker is Donald Harris.

Donald, you may need to press star six.

Okay, we'll move on.

Our next speaker will be Kathleen Connor.

Kathleen.

Hi, I'm Kathleen Connor.

I'm a 30 year Seattle resident.

We need adequate funding to maintain an equitable and quality park and recreation system for all.

And as we are considering the cycle two funding package, I support the overall direction of the projects in the Board of Park and Recreation Commissioners recommended funding package with the following exceptions.

I urge you to add more funding for annual tree planting in developed parks in order to stave off the loss of trees and assist with climate change adaptation.

I urge you to add more funding for landscape restoration, including for Olmstead landscapes.

Passive recreation, including sitting in the grass, picnicking, birding, et cetera, needs a healthy landscape in order to be enjoyable.

And this investment also helps with climate resiliency.

Third, I suggest that you add more funding for off-leash area renovation and new sites, particularly in urban villages.

During the pandemic, we were all encouraged to go to our local parks and those with dogs tended to use the ballparks and other ball fields and other parks because they were conveniently located and there weren't many, it's not convenient for some of the locations of the off-leash areas.

And as the city increases its density, the damage caused to play fields and other park land due to lack of convenient off-leash areas will only be exacerbated There are also safety issues too with children trying to play on the fields with dogs running loose on them.

So we do need to add more of those.

I would suggest as you're looking at the package that these elements could come from the funding for these elements could come from racket sports maintenance and expansion that's currently under the continuing to fix it first area.

And it has 1.55 in the recommendation.

So I just take at least a half million from that to spread out over that.

Finally, I support the 33 cent solution as an alternative funding approach, as a pay-as-you-go approach to save money on debt service and interest in the long run, therefore allowing for more projects to be completed without incurring debt.

It also doesn't encumber the park district budget for 20 years.

The array of projects in the- Our next speaker is Dakota Rash.

Donald Harris.

Donald Harris.

Yes Donald.

Go ahead.

We'll take Dakota after Donald.

Donald.

Thank you.

I've been involved with Seattle Parks both as an employee and as an advocate for literally five decades and have watched with concerns we are losing trees in our parks.

This has become a more more severe in recent years with the growing impacts of climate change.

And you certainly heard a lot about that this evening.

I'm dedicating my time to this effort because it is so critical for the future of our city's parks.

I'm currently on the team that's tackling the challenge of how to reach a goal of no net loss of trees in our developed parks before it is too late.

Developed parks are those parks that people use and we're providing shade is so critical as well as all the other health benefits that trees provide such as helping clean the air and reduce our carbon footprint.

We are looking at these impacts citywide but also wanting to be certain that the funding allocation addresses equity needs for underserved communities.

Thus trees for Seattle Parks is critical for both confronting climate change and addressing equity.

We need to be planting 500 or more trees per year in developed parks and providing funding for a five-year establishment period of watering to reach the goal of no net loss in 10 to 18 years.

Trees take time to grow.

to where they can provide the lasting benefits for Seattle's park users.

So please don't delay the needed funding.

We need it now.

It is as important as any funding allocation you're going to make to parks.

Each year of delay means more backlog and the backlog grows, making it no less loss further.

We believe that adequately funding With adequate funding, we can also use the city's contribution to this to raise significant private funding.

In closing, I wanna also support the 33 cents solution as you heard.

It's an alternative funding solution to the commissioner's recommendation.

It provides a solution to the problem of the last cycle.

It provides an alternative to the debt financing and provides long-term funding for aging parks and facilities.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Dakota Rash.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes.

Great, thank you.

Sorry, there was a little disturbance earlier.

My name is Dakota Rash and I come from actually a family of teachers.

And because of that, summer used to always be a time when we could come together and go out and enjoy things in Washington like our sun and our clean water and our beautiful mountains.

but over these past few years that enjoyment in summer has eroded.

Slowly the smog and smoke from wildfires has crept into our lives and made us wonder if we're going to need to shut our doors and windows.

And then last year with the heat dome, that confidence in summer and that joy that it brings was completely broken.

One of my parents actually suffered greatly due to an asthma attack from the heat wave.

I haven't really shared that with folks because it's been something that really impact my ability to enjoy the summer.

And they were people that could access cooling and could access air conditioning.

And so while we're reminded of, while we're thinking of where we want to spend our funds, we really want to make sure, and we really need to make sure that it goes towards things that allow us to have hope for the future, because the future is going to change.

It's going to be more climate disasters, more heat waves, We inspire hope and we preserve it by preparing for those impacts.

So please use these funds to invest in the community, build climate resilience hubs, and build every element of climate resilience hubs.

Make sure that those cooling centers and those centers that clean the air are powered on solar energy.

We need to make sure we're not exacerbating the problem by trying to seek short-term solutions.

We need to look towards the future and be resilient.

So please, support the healthy through heat and smoke campaign and preserve our hope in the future of our summit.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Thatcher Bailey.

And Thatcher, you may need to press star six on your phone.

Okay, we will move on.

Our next speaker is Cassidy Giampetro.

Good evening.

My name is Cassidy Giampetro and I'm here on behalf of the Washington Trails Association to talk about the Seattle Metropolitan Parks District Levy.

WTA is the state's largest hiking advocacy and volunteer trail maintenance organization representing more than 27,000 members.

And I want to start by thanking the City Council for allowing community voices to inform this process.

We're asking that the Seattle Metropolitan Parks District levy be raised to the maximum allowable or $0.40 per $1,000 of assessed value property in order to fulfill the promise made to voters to invest in the city's parks.

Currently, the levy is set at $0.20 per $1,000 of assessed value.

And it leaves Seattle's parks stressed and ill-prepared to carry out a vision for parks that accounts for the needs of our current and future residents.

Underfunded parks can lead to poor experiences outdoors and we can't allow the lack of funding to be the reason people don't access parks.

Funding for Seattle Parks is really important to WTA as we partner with Seattle Parks and Rec to help maintain the city's trails and bring more equity to the outdoors.

WTA has contributed thousands of hours of volunteer work to 14 different Seattle parks in the past five years.

And we want to expand our partnership with Seattle Parks and Rec, but we need parks to be funded in order to help address these park access and equity needs.

We need the levy raised to 40 cents per $1,000 of assessed value and an increase in annual funding to equity investments, as the currently planned million annually is not enough.

We also encourage the council to reverse the approach that was used over the last six years and ensure funding gradually increases annually.

The Metropolitan Parks District needs the levy rate to prioritize public safety needs expressed time and time again by our communities, to provide support for parks for equity projects, and address maintenance and capital project backlogs.

We need this to support WKA's mission of Trails for Everyone Forever, which includes quality park access for people in their own neighborhoods.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Kitty Craig.

Good evening.

Good evening, Board President Lewis and fellow board members.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide public comment today and for your public service.

My name is Kitty Craig.

I'm a lifelong resident of District 1. and an avid park user here in West Seattle, as well as a community center volunteer and a property owner.

In my day job, I work with the Wilderness Society, a national public lands advocacy organization with more than a million members, and we're focused on ensuring equitable access to parks and public lands.

I'm here asking the commission to make a historic investment in our park system.

This is critical to keep pace with current demands and projected growth across the city.

We know that parks and community centers are essential infrastructure in our communities, are places to keep our bodies and families healthy, where we connect with our neighbors, where we exercise our democratic rights, where we keep cool on hot summer days, and so much more.

We encourage you to meet and exceed the recommendations of the Parks Commission, and pursue an increase in a levy of 40 cents per thousand in assessed value, and commit to 200 million in bonding to ensure we have long-term investment in our park system.

The commission must be bold to meet the demands that are facing the city.

We are actively increasing density across the city, yet we are not keeping pace with investments in parks and green space to meet this demand.

If we don't grow and reinvest in our system, our communities will suffer.

Please use the power you have here in the commission to make a bold investment in our future.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Thatcher Bailey.

Thatcher, are you there?

OK, we will move on to Ruth Williams.

Ruth Williams.

OK, you can hear me.

Yes, this is Ruth Williams.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak today.

I live in District five in the Northgate area.

Growing up, my daughter spent hours every week climbing, running, swinging, and splashing in Seattle Parks Playgrounds.

I was a forest steward for 20 years, beginning in 1994, before there was the program we know today as Green Seattle Partnership.

While I'm here as an individual, I am an active member of Short and Quick Alliance, have been for over 30 years.

Obviously, I value and feel a strong connection to Seattle's parks and our expanding role in keeping Seattle livable for all.

I have two matters I would like to address.

I appreciate the attention and support our natural areas have received over the years, but I'd like to draw your attention to Beaver Pond Natural Area, south of Northgate Way and east of 8th Avenue Northeast.

This is the largest park in the Northgate Urban Hub in a neighborhood short of social justice measures The park is now badly squeezed by new traffic, and with no sidewalks, it has become hazardous to reach it on foot.

With better consideration, this would be an ideal site for handicapped access to nature and wildlife in the city.

Second issue, having read through the documents for this new budget cycle, I'm truly impressed with the ideas put forward by Tim Mozart in his 33-set solution.

I like it because it appears to me to meet present and future needs And I really appreciate the wisdom of avoiding that $10 million in debt service.

Let's do this.

Thank you.

Our next speaker, if he's now available, is Tim Mozer.

Tim, were you able to unmute your phone?

Can you hear me?

Yes, we can.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes, we can.

My name is Tim Mozer.

My name is Tim Mulcher, longtime resident of Lake City and advocate for funding for the Park District.

I'd like to expand the reasons why you should consider the $0.33 solution based on the questions raised at your June 24th meeting.

Concerns were expressed about increasing the level of taxation for the commissioner's recommended spending.

The $0.33 solution requires a lower increase in the tax rate than the commissioner's recommendation of $0.379.

The $0.33 solution rate continues the promise of the first cycle that the property tax bill for a park district resident valued at $440,000 will not be more than $145 a year.

Based on the current tax rate of $20.4, that would increase the current tax bill by $55.24 annually, which is only a 61.6% increase.

The other tax increase issue that needs to be identified is the commissioner's recommendation to do long-term debt financing for $110 million.

This loan would be for 20 years costing approximately $10 million a year.

That indebtedness will have to be added to whatever spending is approved in subsequent cycles.

The $0.33 solution provides a pay-as-you-go program that avoids interest costs and long-term debt financing.

There was a question asked about the future funding for new off-leash areas.

It was indicated that there was only $123,000 for existing off-leash areas renovation in 2023. The $0.33 solution provides increased funding for off-leash areas, both existing and new, with an allocation of $525,000 in 2023. I want to thank the Park District Board members for consideration of my comments supporting the $0.33 solution as an alternative and possibly a better funding solution than the Commissioner's recommendation you are now considering.

Thank you.

My next speaker is Beth Purcell.

Good evening.

My name is Beth Purcell.

As a supporter, citizen, and stakeholder in our parks, I recognize that the Metropolitan Parks District is critical to ensuring short and long-term maintenance and capital project investment dollars needed for improvements to our park system.

New investments in equity, climate change, park development, and major maintenance of community centers are valuable inclusions in the parks district.

And while I agree with the majority of recommendations from the Park and Recreation Department, I believe there are some areas where the current proposal could be improved.

Public safety is a number one priority for citizens.

Parks and Recreation Department focus on maintenance-related public safety fixes with strong investment in lighting, automatic bathroom locks at night, and more maintenance.

Also important to safety is having active personnel presence in high-issue parks.

This is currently underfunded.

Park security, activation, and park ambassadors were all trimmed by $430,000 from the original Parks Department request.

In addition, many private, nonprofit, and quasi-governmental agencies are paying close to $4 million annually for security and activation in public spaces, particularly downtown.

These services are proven to reduce negative behavior in public spaces.

Currently, there's no long-term commitment from the city to address this public need, and it's unsustainable to expect the nonprofits to do this work.

A prime example we are seeing is the potential loss of City Hall Park, as a Seattle Park.

The next one is equity funding.

These are historically under-resourced communities.

The current funding for equity-based work in parks is underfunded.

The allocation in the proposed package is $1 million annually, which doesn't address the capital project needs in most of our under-invested areas of the city.

To provide true equity funding, this line should be increased to at least $5 million annually.

The third category is major maintenance and capital projects.

The current proposal of bonding will only address a portion of the capital project backlog, much of which is already committed.

The result is a reduced vision for our community centers in terms of the quality of facilities that needs to be built for the next 20 to 30 years.

I encourage you to meet and exceed the recommendations of the Park Commission and pursue an increase in the levy to 40 cents per $1,000 assessed value and commit to $200 million in bonding to ensure we have long-term investment in our system.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Matt Pankow.

Matt, you may need to press star six.

Go ahead, Matt.

All right, well, if we don't get any volume out of Matt, that is our last speaker.

We can go back through, there's a list of about four that were present, but did not respond when we called.

I could try those four again, if you'd like.

Oh, yes, please.

Thank you.

Okay.

We will go back to the top.

Oh, is this Matt?

Yes.

Yes.

Go ahead, Matt.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, city council members.

I am calling to you from district six.

I've been a Seattle resident for the past year and a half and like, All of you, I experienced just unprecedented discomfort last summer during the heat waves, but I myself had the privilege of a home, running water, a working refrigerator, and electricity to curb the discomfort that our growing community of homelessness unfortunately did not have.

I am a full supporter of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign that will hopefully utilize this funding to create more renewable energy to help the growing homeless get respite and relief from the heat and cold that plagues our state and our city every year.

But hopefully, I would really like the budget to be expanded to include the homeless outreach programs and volunteer programs to work in conjunction with the union officials that will be overseeing a lot of the construction parameters around this whole build to hopefully bring this community into this building project because unfortunately one thing I've personally seen is a lot of garbage and a lot of human waste that tends to accumulate around these community centers that's costing the city millions and millions of dollars every year in order to clean up.

So hopefully by allowing this community to come on board and help by whether it's just sweeping up on the job site or carrying tools, this community can come together and take pride in their neighborhood, in their community center, by helping to build this facility that they themselves will be utilizing and hopefully curb some of this waste that has attributed to a lot of health hazards in the city that I have currently seen and been exposed to.

Yes, that's all I would like to say.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Tori Westman.

Tori, are you there?

Tori, you may need to hit star six on your phone.

Hi, my name is Tori Westman.

As a Seattle resident and as a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 46, I support the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

We need to take action on climate change.

We need to protect our community members and we're going to do that through union labor.

There's a lot of work to be done and there are plenty of people out there who can do the work or just an apprenticeship away.

By investing in these upgrades for Seattle Community Centers we're also investing in people having economic security through union jobs.

My life has completely changed for the better because of my union apprenticeship.

I want to make sure that even more people will have the same kind of opportunity I have had.

One of the many great things about this campaign is that it prioritizes hiring and bringing on apprentices from local Seattle neighborhoods.

So let's support the demands of a healthy through heat and smoke campaign and put people to work.

Our next speaker is Kevin Daly.

Kevin Daly.

Go ahead, Kevin.

Hi, my name is Kevin Daly.

I am a seven year member of the IBEW Local 46 and a strong supporter of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke campaign.

As along with everybody else last summer, I had strong issues with the discomfort of the heat and I could not sleep.

Not sleeping is not OK.

A lot of work was missed.

and going to work on minimal sleep in my particular industry is very, very dangerous.

Operating heavy machinery is dangerous on minimal sleep.

This is a domino effect that I see.

We hear about the deaths that occurred from the heat waves itself, but the domino effect, it goes deeper than just the heat.

My little sister's wedding was last summer as well right during the heat wave and we had elderly people that absolutely would not miss it for the world and they were nearly passing out.

I would like to see AC installs just become a standard for HVAC systems moving forward in new construction sooner than later.

The time is now and I mean we have a we have an arena named Climate Pledge.

So the time is now, thank you all for your leadership and thank you for your time.

Our next speaker will be Rebecca Baer.

Rebecca, are you there?

Rebecca, you may need to press star six.

And Rebecca, you may need to unmute Your showing is muted.

Okay, let's try Thatcher Bailey one more time.

Thatcher, it looks like you have unmuted by star six.

Are you there?

And our last speaker that we've tried calling, this is a new speaker.

Our last speaker right now is Kyle Capizzi.

Kyle, are you there?

Give us one minute to allow you to talk.

Hello.

There you go.

Hello.

My name is Kyle Capizzi, District 3 resident.

Thank you for the opportunity for community input on this critical to, livability in Seattle.

I live on Capitol Hill and visit the city's parks regularly with my nine-year-old son.

As he grows up, I want him to be able to be surrounded by parks with trees.

I'm concerned that we're losing more trees than the parks department is able to replant.

For instance, in Cal Anderson Park, we've lost more than 15 trees in the last 15 years.

There need to be sufficient resources for planting and maintaining park trees to keep up with this level of loss as well as add trees to parks throughout the city that are lacking those trees to begin with.

Please make sure the budget for parks both from the park district and the general fund includes significantly more money for planting trees in developed parks.

We need to invest now in recognizing trees as critical assets of our parks.

There need to be significantly significant sustainable funding allocation to assure that Seattle's parks all have the benefit of one of the more important assets, healthy trees to provide shade, clean air, and habitat.

I'll reiterate that we need to be planting 500 or more trees per year in these developed parks, provide funding for five-year establishment period of watering, and hopefully reach the goal of no net loss of trees in 10 to 18 years.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That concludes our speakers on the list.

Madam Clerk, thank you so much for presiding through at my count, 51 speakers.

Potentially.

Potentially, yeah.

Yeah, actually, I think there was closer to 60 when you count in the people.

Not present, people who aren't present.

Also, it looks like an unfortunate public comment session for current and former Park Foundation presidents.

So I'm sorry we couldn't hear from Thatcher Bailey and Rebecca Bair, but do please send your comments in writing.

We always like to hear from you.

Thank you so much to everybody who came in person to council chambers and signed up remotely to testify.

This was a very health session.

and your comments are really appreciated as we continue this work of working through the renewal of the Metropolitan Park District and the cycle two investments.

I do just briefly before letting us all go about our evening want to mention that we do have another Metropolitan Park District Board of Commissioners meeting this coming Monday at 9.30 a.m.

and that meeting is going to be, and that is July 18th to be more specific, that meeting is going to be a walkthrough of the various components to be considered for inclusion in the mayor's proposed six-year spending plan.

So some initial recommendations from the mayor's office for the park board's consideration.

Those components include continuing to fund the initiatives from cycle one's spending plan.

And as a reminder, that's $58 million worth of programming in the parks department budget, funding 38 new investments.

And initiatives totaling $30 million a year, and there's a lot of overlap with the Board of Park Commissioners recommendations.

Funding pre-commitment projects, similarly a significant amount of overlap with Board of Parks recommendations.

And funding COVID and economy relief.

and that includes potentially considering a supplanting plan.

Central staff is going to walk through the details of these components for discussion, and the next meeting following that on July 25th is specifically intended to be discussion of potential council member priorities being identified, or I guess I should say board member priorities.

So just outlining the next couple of meetings, I do want to state it is my intention to have at least two more public comment sessions like tonight's session, and to have those comment sessions at community locations, one in South Seattle, one in North Seattle.

These are still things being worked out between my office and the clerks, and strongly encourage members of the public to continue to engage, not just at these public hearings, but also in the meetings of the Public Assets and Homelessness Committee and the meetings of the Metropolitan Park District Board, both of which always have public comment.

So with that, with no more business before the Metropolitan Park District Board, I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

So moved.

So moved.

Thank you.

We are now, it is, sorry, it is 7.28 p.m.

and we are now adjourned.