Seattle City Council Sustainability & Transportation Committee Special Meeting 9/6/19

Good afternoon, everybody.

Welcome to the Seattle City Council's Sustainability and Transportation Committee.

My name is Mike O'Brien.

I'm chair of the committee.

Today, we have a special meeting.

It's a rescheduled meeting from our normal first Tuesday of the month meeting, which got bumped because of the Labor Day holiday.

And the Monday meetings got moved to Tuesday, and the Tuesday meetings get moved to Friday.

And we have a start time of 1 PM today just because we have a number of agenda items to work through.

We're hoping to finish before the end of the workday.

We have six items on today's agenda.

The first is an ordinance related to possible sale of the Mercer Mega Block.

Had a discussion in this committee last month on this, on the proposal, and potentially voting that out of committee today.

Next we'll have, take up an ordinance related to the Green New Deal for Seattle.

This would establish the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

The third item is draft legislation called Healthy Homes Healthy Buildings about natural gas hookups for new buildings.

That we don't have introduced legislation on that but we'll be discussing the draft legislation and that legislation is slated to be introduced next week at the full council meeting.

Then we'll take up a couple street vacation ordinances, potentially voting on both of those.

One's related to our Near Armory Way, and the other one is Let's see, 2026 Madison Corner LLC is the location.

I'm guessing the address is 2026 Madison.

And finally, we have a resolution that would give conceptual approval for a below-grade thermal energy exchange system.

I believe it's a small district energy system, John Street and Eastbourne near Fairview Street.

I believe it's near the old Seattle Times location.

So with that, we're going to jump into public comment.

I guess the first thing I'll do is I'll go ahead and approve the agenda as I just described.

I'm expecting to be joined by a colleague or two later, but for now, I'll go ahead and move that we accept that agenda.

Folks will have up to two minutes to comment.

I'm staffed today by Kelly who will set the clock running.

You can see the timer in either place.

I just ask that you keep an eye on the timer and please wrap up at about two minutes so I don't have to interrupt you.

I'm going to call three or four people at a time.

So Phyllis Collins, then John Manella, then Doug Howe, then Alicia Ruiz.

Phyllis.

Do you want to pull that down so I can hear you?

Great.

Good afternoon.

Can you hear me now?

Yes, I can.

Thanks.

Yeah, my name is Phyllis Collins.

I've been a resident of Seattle since 1988. I've been a homeowner since 1993. I have been concerned about the oil heat issue.

And I'll address that in a minute.

And then I'm going to contrast it to the gas issue that's come up.

So there hasn't been much transparency.

We have oil, gas, oil, heat.

You know, I've actually gone online and looked at the meetings of your meeting from the middle of August, and then read things, including some things on the Seattle Climate Action, printed off a couple pages on that.

And I understand they're going to subsidize 1,000 low income households which I think is fine but it for the rest of us first you're going to tax us 24 cents a gallon for our oil and I mean that adds up to a couple hundred dollars a year and so we'll keep paying into that and then to convert to Oil gas is expensive.

You know, you got to convert your furnace.

We have an underground oil tank that's going to have to be removed following state ecology standards.

So I think there should be more aid, financial aid, for people that don't, the other 17,000 people that aren't going to get paid for by the city.

Okay.

And then additionally on the gas, I mean there's what a hundred and eighty thousand, you know, ten times amount of people are on natural gas as opposed to oil.

And none of them have to convert.

There's no penalty tax for them on their gas that they're using up.

And it's only going to apply to new construction.

So if you look at that, there's such a glaring inequality between how you're treating people with oil versus gas.

I understood your time is up Phyllis, but your time is up, your two minutes, but I appreciate your comments.

Thank you for coming out today.

I'm sorry, I didn't look at them.

No, that's okay.

If you would like to, if they're written down or if you'd like to email them too, we will take those and read those too.

Okay, thank you Phyllis.

John is next.

Hello members of the committee and my fellow citizens.

I'd like to address the Mercer Mega Block deal.

I live only a couple blocks away from the site and what the mayor's office is calling a generational opportunity is in fact a generational mistake.

We don't need a science campus or a community center that without rent control will only serve to drive our property values and our rents further upward.

We don't need 700 more parking spots for 700 more cars on Mercer, which will only make already horrible traffic and pollution even more horrendous.

What we need is actually affordable housing, and we need massive amounts of it, and we need it right now.

The urbanist concluded that we could instead use this site for 1,400 units of affordable housing.

And I think we can find the money here in Seattle, which is one of the richest cities in the entire country.

So please do not let this mistake happen to the city of Seattle.

Thank you.

Thank you, John.

I should mention I'm joined by my colleague, Council Member Swann.

Thanks for being here.

Doug Howell.

Thank you Councilmember O'Brien and Councilmember Swatt for the opportunity.

I also want to thank Got Green in 350 for bringing forward the Green New Deal.

I think that's awesome.

We're very happy about that.

My name is Doug Howell.

I work for the Sierra Club.

I'm the senior campaign rep for our climate and energy program across the Northwest.

But 20 years ago, about 20 years ago, I worked for Seattle City Light.

I'm very proud that we were the first to create a greenhouse gas inventory, then the city did, really led the charge.

So you have a wonderful history about being leaders, and you have that opportunity again today.

So now the next steps, the questions are what are we going to do about the Green New Deal?

I really hope that you do pass the Oversight Committee.

We are strongly supportive of that.

We hope you make that a priority.

The second piece I want to talk about is healthy homes, healthy buildings.

I want to give two perspectives.

We know that coal in the array of fossil fuels, coal, gas, oil, is going away now.

There is increasing scrutiny on gas, and one of the things that's really lost on people is just how bad gas is.

In fact, when you look at the most recent science, it's not 24 times more damaging than carbon dioxide, it's actually 87 times more damaging.

if you're looking at the most recent science, and you add that with the leakage rate, it is as bad as coal.

People need to get that.

Gas is bad.

It's very fundamental.

We're not there.

We have to get it.

The second perspective is, what do all the long-range plans say, whether it's Governor Inslee, Obama, the U.N.?

Gas is going away.

But what we see is expansion.

The very first order of business is to stop digging the hole deeper, stop making the climate problem worse.

What you're proposing is a very modest step.

If we can't do this, we really have to question our commitment to climate protection.

And if you can do it, it will be of national significance.

Godspeed.

Thank you, Doug.

Alicia is going to be followed by Dale Bright, Monty Anderson, and then Leanne Geyer.

Good afternoon.

My name is Alicia Ruiz, here representing the Master Builders Association of King and Sonomish County.

The Master Builders share your concern with our planet's growing climate crisis, but do not support the proposal to continue with natural gas connections to buildings, to new buildings.

Our jobs revolve around building homes in a city that allows residents short commutes to work in other locations, often by foot, bike, or public transit.

These carless trips greatly outweigh any reduction on greenhouse gas emission savings for moving gas from homes.

Seattle builders are known for their consistent efforts to build local homes as energy efficient as possible, with many working with entities like Built Green to certify their environmentally conscious efforts.

Moving forward, it is our hope that City Council will consider more of an incentive-based approach to discontinue the use of natural gas rather than a prohibitory one.

This year has been a hard year for home builders with the addition of MHA fees and fire restrictions.

Our members are doing their best to roll with the punches, but if the city continues to add to the cost of building, how are we ever going to make homes more affordable?

And our formal position letter is forthcoming.

Thanks.

Hi Dale.

I'm Dale Bright, Labor's level 242. I'm here to talk about the proposed LNG ban.

We see this as being bad not only for our members that work in Seattle, but our members that live in Seattle.

Not only does it drive up the cost of heating and maintaining their homes and pricing them even out of a market that's even tighter, but it will cost some of them our jobs.

We ask you to look at this.

And you know, don't take a quick reaction.

Do something that's long term and sustainable, not a knee jerk.

legislation that is going to cause more hardship.

Thank you.

Thanks, Dale.

Monty?

Good afternoon.

My name is Monty Anderson.

I'm with Seattle Building Trades.

I just want to be clear here that Seattle Building Trades are not opposed to, obviously, to environmental issues, and we are always on the front of new green technology.

We're always out working with whether carbon dioxide scrubbers at refineries or different ways for us to manage surface water.

We're there with you.

The technology needs to catch up so we can be there.

The idea of banning something puts a lot of unnecessary pressure on the people who rely on that gas, the people who install the gas, the companies who employ the people for the gas.

The impacts are really large.

I want to be clear that we're all in on energy efficiency and things that make this place healthier, this city and this county.

But banning something, in my experience, has always been a recipe for a lot of rash decisions.

So I'm hoping that before this goes any farther, you take account jobs and the companies impacted and the suppliers and weigh it against what our end goal is.

Thank you very much.

Leanne, and Leanne, you're going to be followed by David Haynes, then Kirsten Smith, and Vic Robertson.

Good afternoon.

My name is Leanne Geyer.

I'm with UA Local 32 Plumbers and Pipe Fitters, representing over 500 members that are working in the Seattle area in the gas industry.

We have 3,800 members in our local alone.

I am speaking today in opposition of the ordinance in regard to prohibiting natural gas.

We are concerned about the impact it will have on our over 500 members and their families who are working in the natural gas industry in the Seattle area.

While we understand what the city is trying to accomplish and agree some action should be taken, we have serious concerns on whether this is responsible action to take at this time.

For those of us engaged and aware of the amount of natural gas that is being used in this city, we have serious concerns on how this can be accomplished.

without a comprehensive study to address the feasibility and impacts of this ordinance.

It is for this reason that I am requesting that council engage in a comprehensive study to ensure the feasibility of the electrical grid to handle the capacity of prohibiting future natural gas connections and future impacts it will have on residents and employers in the Seattle area.

We believe moving forward on this ordinance without conducting such study would be irresponsible for the citizens of Seattle.

We are very concerned about the environment and did successful work this last past legislative session in Olympia where labor was at the table with all the stakeholders and helped pass 100% clean energy bill.

We were engaged in the conversation from the beginning and worked through all the concerns of the stakeholders.

Our members and contractors are continuously training and installing more efficient means of equipment, reducing our carbon footprint.

Our contractors as well take this seriously, purchasing and installing high-efficiency equipment.

We have moved the needle in building cleaner and more efficient buildings.

In summary, it is a very important issue, which we are requesting the impact study of all the effects of this ordinance and look forward to working with the council once this study is completed.

Thank you for your time.

Thanks, Leigh Ann.

David?

Hi, my name is David Haynes.

The City Council needs to make a law that if you have gas in your kitchen, that you can take a zero off the rent until they convert it to electric.

It's causing mental, physical health, and Seattle residents are evidence of that.

Now, there are plenty of high wires with transfer stations in local neighborhoods waiting to be tapped for more 21st century infill developments with first world enhancements such as electric stove, the only way to go unless you got some sort of solar transferring hot plate.

The thing is, in order for the Green New Deal to work, we have to congestion price the coal train owned by Warren Buffett that passed through earlier this morning, the toxic waterfront with overloaded and uncovered coal cars.

Every time a dirty energy train and coal car passes under Dravis Street Bridge, Tax them.

If Seattle is ever going to save itself from treasonous gentrification by China shipping, playing the city against others for a free deal that steals property taxes, we need a federal injunction on the Port Authority selling us out.

Seattleites have to stop lying to themselves and come to grips with the fact that Obama Democrats legalized dirty energy exports that he signed into law before leaving office.

And Clinton's State Department, who went around after they bailed out Wall Street and moral financial tools, began her all-the-above energy promotion, starting with claims fracking was an advancement the world would benefit from.

These two senior Democratic establishment leaders backstabbed all the climate activists in any semblance of efforts to curb greenhouse gas after bogus conservatives cranked it up, regurgitating the 20th century's dirty energy proliferation of barrels per day.

I just want to say that the workers who work over gas need a three and a half day work week, seven day pay and take it from the non-working shareholders every three months coming out of Wall Street.

Thanks, David.

Kirsten?

Good afternoon.

My name is Kirsten Smith.

I'm here representing AIA Seattle, the architects of the city.

And I want to endorse both the Green New Deal and Healthy Homes, Healthy Buildings.

On the Green New Deal, we know it's passed council with a long list of items.

We really encourage council in the city to prioritize those according to what actually reduces carbon emissions the most.

And particularly with the advisory board that's on your docket today, we'd love to see people on that committee who know how to do that and have the expertise to do that.

And on healthy homes, healthy buildings, as you know, we're not on target to meet our emission reductions, either at the city level or the state level or the country level.

We have to decide, is this a priority or not?

And I'm not lecturing you.

This is how we're thinking at AIA Seattle.

If it is, we have to find ways to make that happen, and this is one.

We need to decarbonize buildings.

Doing so both lowers greenhouse gas emissions and increases our air quality.

All electric buildings can be built.

Architects are working on them right now.

They exist right now, as you know, and we support the legislation.

Thank you.

Thank you, Kirsten.

Vic?

Good afternoon, Councilmember.

Welcome to be here.

I'm Vic Roberson, the vice president of the Arc, the Associated Recreation Council.

What I'd like to do is I've come to represent Bill Keller, our Executive Director, Jonathan Hartung, our President.

I want to thank Jesus McGuire and his folks and staff.

AHRQ has been a vital partner with parks for 45 years plus.

We are involved in community building, community center work.

So what we want to let you know is we support the sale of commercial property, in particular, as it will provide a community benefit to the citizens of the city.

The community centers are the heart of our neighborhoods, a safety net for many folks, a gathering place, if you will.

Community centers provide child care, space for being with neighbors, prioritize health, wellness, and to get resources.

In light of the city's rapid growth, we're thrilled to have this opportunity to provide this additional community benefit to citizens of Seattle.

Thank you for your support.

Thanks for coming out, Mike.

Appreciate it.

Mark Cummings is next.

And Mark, you're going to be followed by Gordon Padelford, then Rick Browning, and Mike McQuaid.

Thank you.

Mark Cummings with Life Science Washington.

We're a non-profit trade association representing more than 500 members, including medical research institutes, life science companies, and their partners who are working to develop next generation therapies and medical innovations right here in Washington.

We're excited to see the Megabot Project proceed.

Lab space is absolutely critical to life science organizations and medical research institutes.

And right now we have a desperate shortage of lab space.

And so this project makes a big difference to addressing that.

I'd also like to point out that Alexandria, who's been selected to lead the project, is a really special company.

They're not just a real estate company.

They actually get involved in building that ecosystem and connecting those partners to each other, which has really helped make Seattle what it is today in the life sciences.

So the Megaloc project is really a huge opportunity to cement Seattle's place as a life science leader and also invest in much-needed affordable and workforce housing and other community benefits.

So we're excited to see this project move forward, urge you to support it.

Great.

Mark.

Gordon.

Good afternoon, Council.

My name is Gordon Padelford.

I work for Seattle Neighborhood Greenways.

I'm here to speak about the Mercer Mega Block.

First of all, I just want to say thank you for making sure the walk-bike path on the south side of the parcel was included in the final design.

It's going to be a really critical connection for Southlake Union and the city.

But secondly, I just want to offer a suggestion from my organization and from a number of other organizations of the Mass Coalition that have been thinking about this.

around potentially restricting some of the funding that's going to be coming off of the Mercer Mega Block sale.

Some of that we know is dedicated specifically for transportation, but that's a pretty big bucket that it's going to be dropped into and there's a lot of need.

So we would recommend really provisoring that to walk, bike, and transit improvements.

thinking about either restricting it generally or potentially even going down and restricting it at the project level.

Some projects that are really exciting to Seattle Neighborhood Greenways include the Beacon Ave Trail, Georgetown South Park Trail, they're gonna provide new healthy mobility for communities of color in Southeast Seattle.

The Thomas Street connection is gonna be a huge win for the whole center city and getting people to the arena and that's gonna need funding here shortly.

The Rapid Ride Program obviously also needs additional funding to complete their corridors in the time that was promised to the voters.

The Duwamish Tribe has been working really hard on getting a crosswalk to their longhouse, and that seems like an important connection to make, connecting the longhouse to the park and to the trail on the other side.

And last but not least, we obviously have a huge need for pedestrian infrastructure around the city.

26% of our city still lacks basic walking amenities, and something like $5 million would allow us to build a sidewalk all the way along Greenwood Avenue, which is a transit corridor, is a safe right to school corridor, is a major arterial, and right now, kids and parents and everyone in the community really doesn't have a safe place to walk.

So there's some great projects, and we hope you'll consider restricting this funding.

Thanks.

Thanks, Gordon.

Rick?

And Rick, again, you'll be followed by Mike McQuaid and then Megan Murphy.

Council members, good afternoon.

I'm Rick Browning, local architect and chair of the Uptown Alliance Transportation Committee.

Thanks for your ongoing work on the Mega Block deal.

My neighborhood has suggested to you by letter addressed to Councilmember Bagshaw and CC, other members on the committee, several ideas for use of some of the mega block funds that would benefit the area and the city at large.

But as Transportation Chair, I'm here to talk just about my passion, the Thomas Street Greenway.

This could be a really transformative project for Southlake Union and Uptown.

It would connect a dynamic business district, one of the most dynamic in the country, Southlake Union, with a national historic landmark site, the Seattle Center, and, of course, Uptown.

So, in addition to that, Green New Deal, it would be a zero-carbon facility in terms of its support for bikes and pedestrians, which is sorely needed in this district.

So the adopted 2013 plan for Thomas Street, I think it's reasonable to say it has not been implemented to meet all of its objectives yet, and some of the most critical ones are still waiting.

So my neighborhood asks you to consider earmarking part of the proceeds from the Mega Block sale to complete this critical project.

So you're not up on the dais, but thanks for your work when you're up there, and thanks for your work at the table as well.

Thanks, Rick.

Mike?

Good afternoon.

I'm Mike McQuaid.

I'm the transportation chair of the South Lake Union Community Council.

I was also the community's appointed representative to work very closely with the city in supporting the vacation of Broad Street, which paved the way for this development and this real benefit for the entire city to come to fruition.

The South Lake Union Community Council is enthusiastic about this development.

I think it strikes an important balance for the city's need for housing, supporting advancement of the health sciences sector, and public benefits.

We've also come to know, both personally and on a professional level, Alexandria is a committed partner, and their vision is very much aligned with our vision as a community in South Lake Union and the principles in the UDF, the urban design framework formalized about a decade ago.

And for me as a fourth generation Seattleite, this is a good fit for our community.

We do have some questions and they're mobility related.

First of all, With the anticipated Sound Transit 3 SLU light rail station and the mobility hub located on the other side of Mercer Street, the ability for pedestrians to cross Mercer to this campus and particularly the recreation center benefits that are proposed as part of this is important, and we need to pay attention to that.

Secondly, Southlake Union has some questions regarding transit, freight, and existing vehicular safety and movements, both accessing the megablock property as well as moving through the area.

So that's something that we need to pay attention to.

And finally, the Dexter Corridor runs adjacent to the property, and the Dexter Corridor is one of the untouched corridors in terms of planning north-south through South Lake Union.

We should pay attention to this, both in terms of a corridor study and a streetscape study, so that we can understand better the impacts of mobility through the area.

So by and large, this is a good thing.

We look forward to working together with the city and the developer in shaping this and answering the important mobility questions through South Lake Union.

Thanks for your work on this.

Thanks, Mike.

Megan.

Megan's the last person who signed up.

If there's anyone else in the audience who'd like to provide public comment, please queue up behind Megan.

OK, I'm reading this book, Capital City, and the reason why I'm becoming so vigilant or more proactive with social justice issues is because I lost custody of my son for a diagnosis I don't have.

made me so hurt and I just had to really dig deep into the process of the state because I grew up around a household of social activists who were well known in the town and the state as social activists.

My grandma's writings are at the University of Iowa.

They collected all her editorials.

And so now I house clean and I organize homes.

And so fracked gas just drives me crazy because we're trading.

In capital city, city planners trade with capitalists, and then they build neighborhoods.

And I think anything fracked that is causing global warming to this extent should not even be considered tradable goods anymore.

And coal, I think, because we have been planning cities since time began.

I mean, America started on Native American trails.

and then where slaves used to live became sections of cities, and then the Irish, the poor Germans, and all of these became prime Manhattan properties.

So what I'm saying is now that we know all this, anything, now we have the tools, anything that's coal or gas that causes climate change should not even be considered worth money.

And I know real estate has more worth now than gold, three times more than gold ever had.

And I think it needs, people need to be in the formula.

So all the workers at the hospital and the Starbucks can live downtown because they work downtown.

And then the rich people can, you know, park their cars somewhere else and come visit downtown and shop.

So thank you.

Thank you.

I'm not seeing anyone else who's queued up.

I'll go ahead and close public comment.

And we will move into the first agenda item.

I'll invite presenters forward and then Yes, do you want me to read it or do you want me to ask you to read it?

Kelly, would you read the short version of agenda item number one into the record?

Council Bill 119609 an ordinance relating to the certain city-owned properties located in South Lake Union neighborhood and declaring them as surplus to the city's needs.

Thank you.

Why don't we start with a round of introductions?

Lish Whitson, Council Central Staff.

Stephen Shane, CBO.

Van Noble, City Budget Director.

Welcome, everyone.

Thank you all for being here.

Lish, did you want to make any opening comments?

Just very briefly, this is legislation that would authorize the executive to sign a memorandum of understanding with Alexandria Real Estate to sell up almost three acres of city-owned property in South Lake Union.

It would further authorize the executive to negotiate final sale terms and lease agreement for a 30,000 square foot community center on the site.

And it provides for a number of public benefits including community center which would be provided rent free for up to 40 years.

175 units of affordable housing, a protected bike lane along Mercer Street.

and a large public open space along the 8th Avenue right of way.

And $5 million for homeless services.

So we have had this, this has been a topic of discussion at the council, well, frankly, since probably I joined the council nearly 10 years ago.

We knew that this site was originally with the Mercer plan.

It was surplusing.

It was part of the transaction that was going to help pay for Mercer.

The value of the site is certainly exceed what was expected back at that time.

And I really appreciate the work folks did through this process to get the most value possible for the city, both in terms of some of the amenities that Lish mentioned, and then also as far as the check that will be written to the city to help us with both transportation and other general fund needs with the intent that a lot of that's going to go towards affordable housing.

We've talked about this a lot, so I don't have a lot of questions, but I want to give my colleague Council Member Sawant an opportunity if you want to speak to anything or ask any questions.

And then I have an amendment that I'd like to propose to the legislation.

Do you want to speak to it at all beforehand or should we jump in on the amendment?

Okay, great.

So we're looking at Amendment 1. Hopefully folks have copies of this.

It makes a couple of cleanups and renumberings.

The two items that are substantive in here would be that it would add a sentence at the end of Section 6, which relates to the authority we're granting the city to negotiate the final transaction documents for the actual sale.

And the sentence it adds, it says, in drafting the lease, SPR, which is the abbreviation for Seattle Parks and Recreation Department, shall work with Alexandria to include child care as a permitted use within the recreation center.

This is something that's been one of the series of benefits folks have been hoping to get out of this.

I want to be clear what the vision is at the moment is that that within the community center that the parks is planning to lease and build out and operate of that 30,000 square feet that there would be space within that and the feasibility to run a daycare center.

There's obviously some work that needs to be done on the city's end to figure out how we'll do that, what's feasible, what the configuration looks like.

But the intent here is to just make sure that we're in agreement with the purchaser of the property that this is where we want to go and they're comfortable with that direction assuming other things work out.

The second substantive change that this amendment would do is it adds a section 7 and inserts it before the previous section 7 which says Seattle Parks and Recreation shall include space in the recreation center for a licensed child care facility providing all providing all day care with a goal of providing space for at least three classes of children through 29 months of age.

Consideration should be given to designing any such space to accommodate non-child care activities in the evenings or weekends.

So the first really directs, Stephen, your team that will be, I assume, negotiating those final transaction documents.

And my understanding is that you've had some conversations with Alexandria and are comfortable with this language?

Yes.

And then the second piece is really more internal to the city, the council directing the parks department saying, hey, we wanna make sure you're doing the work on your end as this is being developed so that when we end up with a facility, it's a facility that, assuming it's feasible, which we believe it should be, that they'll be ready to accommodate a childcare center.

Any comments on that?

Council Member Swann, do you have anything you'd like to say to that?

I just had some overarching remarks.

Okay.

Should I go ahead and move the amendment now?

Great.

So I'll go ahead and move amendment number one as described.

Second.

All those in favor of the amendment signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

None opposed.

So the council bill before us, council bill 119609 has been amended to incorporate the language and a few technical cleanups that I didn't mention there.

So now we have a bill as amended before us, and so I think now would be time to make some comments or ask any questions.

Thank you, Council Member O'Brien.

A few points.

One is, one, it's absolutely important, whatever sort of social facilities we have included in the language, as you mentioned, the community center, the relation mentioned that, and all day care, providing space for at least three classes of children to 29 months of age.

I mean, all of these are very important.

But I also wanted to acknowledge some of the points that have come up throughout this discussion.

And I know this discussion has preceded certainly me and maybe even your time in the council.

But I wanted to acknowledge some important points that have been brought up by community activists.

And also we heard this in public comment today that the best, I mean, I think it's important to acknowledge that the best way in which the city of Seattle could deliver its obligations to fulfill the needs of working people in the city would be to prioritize the building of publicly owned affordable housing on public land.

And, you know, obviously including all the wraparound services like childcare and clinics and so on.

rather than do what we're doing here, which still we want to do the right thing, but I want to acknowledge that the first, obviously the most preferable option, and this is something we should be moving towards in the future, regardless of what we're doing here, which is that cities should be using the land it owns to prioritize the construction of affordable housing through public sector unionized jobs.

So this also goes into the question of expanding public sector jobs.

And both jobs and housing sort of go hand in hand.

And I just wanted to acknowledge that a lot of activists have said this and they're right about this.

And that we should not, as a city council, we should keep that at the forefront because that is where we want to go.

There is other public land that is owned by the city.

But what I'm driving at also is that the land is one aspect of it.

Then the other aspect is the construction of the homes, affordable homes.

And for that, the city needs revenues.

And that's why the question of progressive taxation and taxing big business and the rich cannot be ducked.

So at the end of the day, the point that was made by the person in the public comment, and that has been made in the past, really, whether consciously or not, goes into the question of of public revenues and progressive taxation.

And it is in contradiction to some of the things that we are hearing a lot that, well, the city has a lot of money and it just needs to put its fiscal house in order.

That is not true.

Actually, we don't have the resources that we need to address the needs of our city.

And we're not going to be able to do it ever.

I mean, it's an imaginary scenario.

It's never going to happen without having access to progressive revenues.

And so I feel like while I fully agree with this and I will be voting yes on this, I also wanted to highlight that We have a long way to go in addressing the affordable housing crisis.

Thank you, Council Member.

I appreciate those comments and agree with that.

I feel like we're in a certain reality today, which is that I would love to be able to hang on to this parcel and build 1,000 units of affordable housing there.

If we were to hang on to it, we would have to do some things to it.

One is environmental remediation, which Someone needs to do to that property and in this transaction someone else the purchaser Alexandria is going to be doing that and so we would need the money to to do the remediation and then of course we would have to Certainly subsidize significantly the building of affordable housing as we do and I agree with what I believe you said is it's entirely possible to live in a world where we actually a city like Seattle, have the revenue to hang on to that land and do that.

But our current fiscal reality is much more constrained.

And what I believe, which is why I support this and I'm excited for the work that folks have done, again, within those constraints we have to find what I think is a really outstanding deal for the people of Seattle, both in terms of the benefits we get and in terms of the the funding we'll receive that will allow us to To in addition to do some some hopefully some great transportation projects also made some significant incremental investments in additional affordable housing beyond what the developers going to do I'll say just let's correct me if I'm wrong here, but the transaction today that the ordinance were I believe we'll pass out a committee in a moment authorizes the sale of it and at that point Once it passes through the full council, the executive under the terms that have been discussed and are part of this ordinance will have authority to proceed.

It won't come back to council at that point.

What we do with the revenue from that is something that the mayor has spoken to, which I appreciate, but the actual specifics around that are not part of this ordinance.

I expect we will see more detail on that when we see a budget in a couple weeks.

I can guarantee that you will.

We will evaluate how well the mayor did relative to our standards and we'll work on that.

So I know there's a lot of folks in the public including some of the public comments today talking about where they would like to see that revenue dedicated and I think those are very appropriate questions.

It's it's not embedded in this ordinance but in a matter of weeks we will be digging deep into that collectively as a community.

I also, Stephen, I want to say thank you personally and the team that you've been working with, because these are complex deals.

And I think in the past, we'll let history judge how this plays out.

But my sense is the city is typically not a real estate expert.

That's not our core business.

There are people within the city, of course, who do a lot of management work that's for real estate.

But big transactions like this are complex.

And getting a good deal that really leverages all the opportunities possible.

It's not an easy task and I'm really grateful to have your expertise working for the city of Seattle, working for the people of Seattle, and from everything I can tell in reviewing the documents, I'm really proud of what the city has achieved and I want to give you a lot of credit for bringing that to us.

So thank you.

If I could, I very much appreciate Stephen's work as well, and to express this.

But I also wanted to thank Lish, because this is an opportunity for us to work together as staff from the executive and from the council through the process of drafting RFP and bringing in the proposals and reviewing them.

And I think that that transparency of including him has been an assistance for you all, and it certainly has been for us, and also just the value of his expertise and his input.

So it's been a good collaboration, and I just wanted to recognize that as well.

I appreciate that.

Lish, you are always amazing to work with, and I think one of the things that's been really valuable to me and helps me get to the place where we are now at a pretty complex piece of legislation and transaction, but that I'm comfortable with, is that I've known all along what's been going on in the discussions because of your work, Lish, in advocating for folks on the council and the values we have in that process, and also the transparency that the executive had with Lish on the council.

So thank you all for doing that.

I don't think there's any reason to talk any further about this here, unless you have any questions or comments.

So I'll go ahead and move Council Bill 119609 as amended.

All in favor, signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

So this is going to the full council.

We're here on a Friday afternoon, so it will not be next Monday.

It'll be the following week, which I believe is the 16th.

Great.

Okay.

Thank you so much.

All right.

Kelly, would you like to read in agenda item number two?

Council Bill 119604, an ordinance relating to the Green New Deal for Seattle, establishing the Green New Deal Oversight Board, providing compensation for those who incur financial hardship by their participation on the board, requesting that the Office of Sustainability and Environment create an interdepartmental team to advance the Green New Deal for Seattle.

amending section 3.14.970 of the Seattle Municipal Code and adding a new section 3.14.979 to the Seattle Municipal Code.

Great.

Yolanda, will you introduce yourself?

Yes, Yolanda Ho, Council of Social Staff.

Welcome.

Thank you so much for being here.

If it's okay, I'll say a few opening remarks and then maybe ask Yolanda if you don't mind walking through the the kind of structure of the ordinance that's before us.

For the public's benefit, about a month ago the City Council passed a resolution committing the City to a Green New Deal for Seattle.

That follows on some work at the national level that's happened over the past year to really elevate the national level, both the climate and economic crisis that our country faces, especially for folks that have most impacted by the environmental injustice of climate change and other aspects, and also who are most frequently left behind in the economic opportunities that are created in our economy.

The reality at the federal level right now is that there's not brought enough support to move Green New Deal legislation to the federal level.

And so community members who've been working on that came to City Hall back in June and asked the City Council and the Mayor to adopt a Green New Deal for Seattle.

The resolution we passed was exciting last week.

It was a resolution, so it really laid out kind of goals and expectations that we're working on.

One of those is to create a Green New Deal oversight board as a new board or commission for the city of Seattle to help steward the work that is laid out in that Green New Deal resolution.

And this ordinance is the action we would take to set up that oversight board.

So with that, Yolanda, do you mind just kind of walking through the memo?

Sure, yeah, so I will provide as introduced what is proposed for the board and then we will walk through some amendments to that.

There are some late breaking amendments as well, so we will walk through this together.

Excellent, thank you.

So Council Bill 119604 would establish a Green New Deal Oversight Board staffed and administered by the Office of Sustainability and Environment.

This board would advise and support city efforts to implement the Green New Deal for Seattle.

Key aspects of the proposed board include 16 members comprised of eight community representatives directly impacted by racial, economic, and environmental injustices, including one tribal member and two individuals between the ages of 16 and 25 at the time of their appointment, three representatives of environmental justice organizations, two representatives of labor unions, and three representatives with experience in greenhouse gas production and climate resiliency strategies relevant to cities.

such as public health, infrastructure, sea level rise, extreme weather events, et cetera.

The terms would be for three years with a limit of two consecutive terms, and members for whom persisting on the board presents a financial hardship would be eligible for compensation at a rate of $50 per hour.

The proposed legislation also requests that the Office of Sustainability and Environment form an interdepartmental team, an IDT, to implement the Green New Deal for Seattle and to support development of individual climate plans for all city departments.

The IDT would include representatives from a wide variety of departments, including the Department of Parks and Recreation, Department of Transportation, Office of Planning and Community Development, Office of Housing, Seattle Public Utilities, Seattle City Light, Office of Economic Development, Seattle Department of Human Resources, Office of Emergency Management, Department of Neighborhoods, Mayor's Office, City Council, and Council Central staff, and others as needed, reflecting the broadness of the Green New Deal for Seattle.

Each department's climate plan should include targets and metrics to monitor the city's efforts to achieve decarbonization by 2030. The Office of Sustainability and Environment would report on these plans to the council by July 1, 2020, and provide progress reports annually beginning in 2021. The IDT is also expected to meet quarterly with the board on the development of these plans as well as policies, programs, and projects related to the Green New Deal for Seattle.

So that is the bill as introduced.

So we have some proposed amendments which I had attached a substitute version to the memo, but there's a new substitute version, so I brought that for our reference.

Great.

Thank you, Yolanda.

And so I will walk through the amendments that were made to kind of clarify and change a little bit of the structure in response to stakeholder feedback.

So...

Maybe I'll jump in just briefly here.

I'm going to let you walk through all this, Yolanda, because it's very well organized, and I would certainly not be capable of that.

I just want to highlight that in the intervening weeks since we first had a discussion of this back in August, we've got feedback from the mayor's office, from the Office of Sustainability and Environment, and then also from a series of stakeholders who will be at the table in a moment talking about the next piece of legislation, but representing various community groups that have been working on the green new deal, that kind of coalition, I'll say, is led by Got Green and 350 Seattle.

So I don't necessarily, I'm not able to signal which change come from which of those, but we've tried to incorporate the feedback from everyone and believe we have, with maybe a few minor exceptions, pretty good consensus that these amendments kind of meet the needs of where we want to go.

Yes, thank you.

That is accurate.

So one of the first changes was that instead of just providing staff support for the Green New Deal Oversight Board, the director's duty would include staff support for all boards and commissions and committees associated with the Office of Sustainability and Environment, just acknowledging that they have other boards and commissions under there that they support.

And then we also, so that was the, sorry, there's a long table.

So we also clarified the board will be an advisory body to the mayor and city council and took the opportunity to clarify some of the duties of the board, being that the board would provide proposals for the design of new policies, programs, and projects, and for modifications to existing policies, programs, and projects to the mayor, city council, and city departments that advance the Green New Deal for Seattle.

Before the mayor submits to the council any changes to city policies, related to the Green New Deal for Seattle requiring council approval by ordinance, the mayor will notify the board in a timely manner.

So I am now melding our, there was a couple of amendments that in the, what I just handed to you, I've highlighted in yellow.

It's a little tricky because I had to delete things.

So I will note that because I couldn't highlight those in yellow.

So in a timely manner, that's the request that will be the requirement.

And the policy areas include but are not limited to the following public health, climate change, and climate preparedness, environment, energy, workforce development, including green jobs, housing, and transportation.

They will also support the planning and implementation of individual city departmental annual climate action plans and specific actions, policy programs, and practices to make Seattle Climate Pollution Free by 2030, so aligning the language in the Green New Deal resolution in regards to climate pollution goals.

They will also provide recommendations on city budget priorities and coordinate efforts with the Environmental Justice Committee, Equitable Development Initiative, Advisory Board, Transportation Equity Work Group, and other city boards and commissions as needed, leveraging the expertise on the many boards we have currently.

And they would also review a quarterly report or as kind of determined by their work plan, the outcomes and indicators for the previous year related to policy programs and projects related to the Green New Deal for Seattle.

Another duty added underneath this list was that the board would provide an annual work plan and submit that to the council and the mayor.

So there's an understanding of where, what their, plan is for the year, and they would update that annually.

And let's see, so we are also removing the requirement for confirmation by the majority vote of the council to allow for confirmation by majority of council members present.

And let's see, let me make sure I'm getting everything here.

The initial terms would be changed to be staggered by two groups instead of three.

Initially we had three different groups and one group had kind of a shorter term which would have been maybe a little over a year perhaps.

So the request was that there would be, no one would serve shorter than two years, just kind of recognizing that the work is substantial to get this started in a year would not be sufficient.

Also clarified in regards to, Sorry, this is a lot.

So now on to the membership.

We have now added an additional member.

So previously there were 16 appointed members.

There is now 17. And that additional individual would be appointed by the board.

by a majority vote of the board, and that we wanted to, there was some interest in clarifying what it meant for members of communities directly impacted by racial, economic, environmental injustices, so that these members must be part of a community-based organization or community group that represents a community that is disproportionately burdened by pollution and environmental hazards, and based on socioeconomic and population health risk factors, is particularly vulnerable to an increased pollution burden and carry out the majority of their work using a community-based approach in the Seattle area.

And we changed, so previously there was one member who was a representative of a tribe, increased that number to two, and specified that the representatives should be from tribes whose treaty rights are connected to the lands and waterways of Seattle, or whose usual and accustomed places are in Seattle.

And the rest of that is still the same.

And then the additional member added to the board, the 17th member, would be a representative of an organization involved in workforce training, acknowledging the importance of the kind of economic transition needed with the Green New Deal and the worker training.

And I think that, yeah, so the other change was just coordinating with Environmental Justice Committee and other relevant boards and commissions was moved to another section, again.

removed the requirement for a majority of the board to allow just the majority of those board members present to elect a chairperson and vice chair people.

And we added the Seattle Department of Construction Inspections, because we don't want to leave them, out of the IDT.

They have an important role as well in terms of building energy and permitting.

And the IDT wanted to specify that the climate plans should be really action oriented.

I think this was a.

There's been a number of plans written about reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, but the feeling was that each city department should generate an annual plan and have really, you know, things that can be implemented immediately to begin, you know, the process of eliminating greenhouse gas emissions.

climate pollutants and that, you know, it seems that people know what needs to be done.

It's just a matter of actually doing it.

So, I believe I covered everything.

Oh, yeah, so I believe in the other version that's attached to the memo, we had retained 16 members and had not added the additional member who's the specialist in workforce training, and then reduced a number with the environmental justice organizations, but we restored the three members of the representatives of environmental justice organizations, and it just added an additional member.

I think I got it all.

Thank you for all of that, Yolanda.

I really am grateful for your work over the past month on all this.

You've been handling a lot, so thanks for that.

The last piece on the memo talks about next steps and that this will require additional resources.

I don't know if you want to speak to that briefly.

Yeah, so I think as we are aware, there are, in some departments more than others, there are people who do have some specialty in climate preparedness and greenhouse gas emissions and things like that.

But we know that in other cases, there may not be those resources currently on staff.

And so, especially in particular with the IDT and these annual climate action plans, we're just acknowledging the fact that we know there's some disparities in the departments.

And so in order to participate fully and meaningfully, departments may need to add staff who actually have this expertise to contribute.

And also that OSC may also need additional, this is a pretty significant lift, I think, of engaging with all the departments to kind of collaboratively take action.

So that's just acknowledging that.

And I'll state my intent here.

I mean, the work to be done here is significant.

And as you mentioned eloquently, we generally know what the work is.

We just need to do it.

ensuring that our city departments have the resources to actually execute that work is critically important, starting with OSCE to have a staff person to work with this board of volunteers.

So I will be working aggressively during the budget process, which will begin in a couple weeks, to ensure that we have the appropriate funding so that the Green New Deal, we can actually achieve some of the goals that we've laid out in there in a relatively quick manner.

I would add that we also, because of the compensation aspect, would also need to provide appropriations for board members who may suffer hardship and may need to be compensated.

Yeah, that's great.

I appreciate that too.

Thank you.

So Council Member Sawant, what I'd propose to do first would be to actually move to amend the legislation by substituting.

So I'll move to amend Council Bill 119604 for substitution to replace version D1D with D2D, which is the version that Yolanda handed out to us.

It's for those watching on TV that's slightly different from just a couple of places that you highlighted when you talked through it than the one that's posted online, but we will make sure that this is up and posted.

Great.

All those in favor of the substitution signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

So we have the amended version before us.

I don't have any further comments, but do you have any comments you want to make on this?

Just to say that it is important that this oversight board is being established, and I appreciate Yolanda not only going through the details as you did, but also pointing out that the the underlying mission is not just to talk about the things that we all know are real, but actually doing it.

I appreciated you saying that as a member of the central staff.

And just wanted to quickly thank Council Member O'Brien, God Green, 350 Seattle, everybody in all the work that has been done by activists on the Green New Deal.

And just, and one or two things that I wanted to add And one I wanted to mention in this context, but I think it'll come up much more in the next item and also on the, you know, upcoming things that we will be doing this year and in the following years around the Green New Deal, which is I think at every step we have to highlight the question of the workers in the fossil fuel sector, and that we cannot effectively have any kind of Green New Deal or establish a sustainable society without tying it to the question of people's lives as a whole, and that we don't want a division between those of us who are, you know, more prominently highlighting the sustainability aspect and those of us who are more prominently highlighting the question of jobs because there can't be a division.

We can have jobs and sustainability or neither.

We have to go in lockstep.

And so I just wanted to appreciate the leaders from the labor movement who came and from the trades who have come here today and also have engaged in this topic.

on an ongoing basis, but I feel like that there has to be much more engagement on those issues that we can bring those together.

And I wanted to just also reiterate something that Yolanda mentioned, that there are two members from the labor unions that will be on this, at this table.

So I think that's important that we bring that, bring much more unity than we have in the past and that we all share sort of a collective responsibility for that.

I appreciate that, and I have some similar comments.

We'll probably get into that when we get to the next agenda item, but it's absolutely critical.

I mean, at the core of, at least for me, the principles of the Green New Deal is the transition we make has to be a just transition.

And this means that the burden of transitioning can't fall on the backs of the folks who, one, haven't been responsible for creating the injustices that are happening, two, that historically have always borne the bunts of transition.

And three, that have the least resources to absorb those transitions.

Well, the folks that have the most resources often move on to the next thing without consequence.

And if I might just add, I think the other reason why we should be sort of bringing all of that together is also because I think the workers and the unions themselves in the fossil fuel sector are in the best position to put pressure on the oil billionaires and others who are the real power brokers to make a shift away from the harmful sources of energy to renewable energy sources.

And the other thing I wanted to mention in the context of thanking God Green and other activists also is just to remind everybody who's watching this, we have the Youth Climate Walkout that is going to happen on September 20th.

And they're going to march to City Hall.

We're very excited about it, and I'm sure a lot of other people are going to be joining them Thank you Great.

Well, I'll go ahead and at that point then and go ahead and move Council Bill 119604 as amended All in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

So this will go to the full council again a week from Monday, so the 16th.

I want to just signal that the goal is to get this board, this oversight board set up before the end of the year.

And so that's going to require almost immediate action.

I'm not exactly sure exactly which People will be part of that, but certainly some folks on council and hopefully some folks in OSC along with community members to figure out how to get the word out and get an application process for folks that want to serve on the board.

So folks listening, if you're interested, let me know and we'll make sure there's an open and transparent process and try and spread the word as widely as possible.

Thanks, Yolanda, for your help on that.

Kelly, do you mind reading agenda item number three?

And I'll invite presenters forward.

We'll be having a briefing on the Healthy Homes, Healthy Buildings draft legislation.

So as folks come forward.

I just want to give a little bit of an overview of where we are on this.

Again, we have draft legislation posted with the agenda, but this is not official legislation that's been introduced.

A version of this is scheduled to be introduced on the referral calendar on Monday, and we'll have another discussion and committee next Tuesday, I believe.

And again, no plan to vote on it next Tuesday.

Probably the week after would be the earliest we would consider a vote on that.

So why don't we start with a quick round of introductions.

Steve, you can go first.

I'm Steve Gilb with Emerald Cities Collaborative.

I'm Brittany Bushbole.

I'm with the Sierra Club.

Nancy Huizar with Got Green.

Debolina Banerjee with Puget Sound Sage.

Great.

Thank you all for being here.

I'm going to give an overview of what this legislation does and talk a little bit about, just briefly from my perspective, why this is important to me.

But I'm mostly interested in hearing from community members that are here today.

to hear from you relative to your organization or aspects of this legislation, why you're working on that.

As far as what the legislation does, the draft legislation before us is eight pages, but I would point people to, let's see, I think it's page, seven of it, where there's, at the very top of page seven, it's one sentence that's fairly straightforward.

It says, effective July 1st, 2020, natural gas piping systems are prohibited from being installed in new buildings.

And so the steps to do that will require a few more technical things to happen and the rest of the legislation talks about some of the history of Seattle's work on climate and also the steps that need to happen and directs the department.

who's currently working on updates to the building codes in anticipation of building code changes from July 1st to next year at the same time as this to come up with the actual pieces of changes to the building code that'll need to be required to execute this new law that would go into effect assuming this were to pass the City Council.

I want to just speak to natural gas in residential homes for a second because it's something that I have in my home.

About 25 years ago, my wife and I bought a house in Seattle.

We still live in that house.

When we bought the house, there was not natural gas in the house.

One of the first things we did when we moved in was we took out an oil furnace and put a natural gas furnace in and added a whole bunch of other natural gas appliances over those first few years.

I considered myself, like I do today, back then an environmentalist.

And at the time, 25 years ago, converting to natural gas seemed like the green thing to do.

And the reality we face today is what I know from the science, what I've learned from the change in the industry, both the gas industry and changes in the electric industry, is a lot has changed in the last 25 years.

And what's become more and more apparent every day to me is that natural gas is no longer the green alternative.

One of the things that shifted is at the time, 25 years ago, the electricity in Seattle by Seattle City Light included coal in their electric system.

About 15 years ago, that shifted.

So in the last 15 years, electricity in the city of Seattle has been 100% carbon neutral.

Another shift that we've seen is a significant increase in fracking.

Today, almost two-thirds of the gas we get in the city of Seattle is fracked gas.

And we're well aware of the impacts that fracking has on the communities where the fracking is done.

the devastation to water quality, air quality, and the people that live in those communities.

And it's a point of guilt that my cheap gas that I get in my home to cook with and to heat my house and heat my water is at the expense of people in communities often thousands of miles away who are bearing the brunt of that decision and it doesn't feel just or fair in any stretch of the imagination.

The other thing is that science has told us that, one, the climate impacts of natural gas, as we heard in testimony today, and there's been a number of other reports, is actually, while it seemed like a much better fossil fuel than coal or oil, it's starting to appear like natural gas actually is just as damaging to the climate as coal and oil are.

And it was maybe never an actually greener alternative, it just seemed that way at the time.

And the last thing I'll just mention is that Yesterday I heard from the Physicians for Social Responsibility talking about the health impacts of breathing the exhaust from cooking with natural gas in my house and recognizing the fact and coming to terms with the fact that I have raised two boys about 20 years old now their entire lives breathing the exhaust of the natural gas in my home and as I'm hearing the list of toxins and poisons that are in that exhaust Oftentimes making the air quality in my house apparently illegal for outdoor air quality is really hard for me to believe that I expose my family to that.

And I want to find a way so I can stop doing that, and I don't want any other families to be exposed to that going forward.

Those are some of the reasons why this is important to me, but really bigger than all that for personal, it's that the community members that are here at the table and the coalition that folks have put together, led by Got Green and 350 Seattle, representing some amazing communities across the city, but often the communities that are subject to all sorts of environmental justice have said, this is a priority for us and we need to get moving on this right away.

So with that, I will stop my talking.

And I don't know if you all have worked out an order, but I will let you figure out how you would like to speak to this.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you, Councilmember.

So God Green and SAGE definitely support this ordinance, and we're excited that you are helping us lead in this way.

Debolina will talk kind of a broader scope, and then I'll come and chat in about some anecdotes about how natural gas affects our communities.

Thanks, Nancy.

Thanks, Council Member Bryan.

So, God Green and SAGE, we fundamentally do not support natural gas because we know what impacts it actually brings on the communities.

On a very broader scale, the very process of natural gas extraction includes contamination at every level.

contamination and emissions, both.

Its transport via pipelines includes risks of leakage and explosion and further contamination.

Most of these impacts are borne disproportionately by communities of color, indigenous communities on their lands and communities and workers who are already burdened by other environmental injustices.

So it is extractive from start to finish, honestly.

Apart from that, even on a smaller scale, if we talk about it in residential scales, indoor air quality is also affected adversely by natural gas burners, especially when there is no ventilation like in winters.

You know, pollutants like nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, these are released in the indoor air, and these have severe impacts on health, including respiratory diseases and asthma.

Nancy is going to talk more about some of those impacts.

At the same time, while we currently know that it is a cheaper solution, we still know that this is not a viable solution for our future.

However, while it is important to eliminate natural gas from our system, it is also important that we ensure that we are not burdening the same people even further who are at the front lines.

So education, planning, support during this transition is very important, especially thinking about, you know, workers in these communities, some of them who are actually employed in natural gas, you know, employment jobs.

They are the first and foremost to also face those impacts, although they know, you know, that's the only employment opportunities they have.

So thinking about all these things is important in our opinion.

So I've shared before that I thought that asthma was a normal thing that people have, and that it's not preventable, it's just part of life, because my mom, my brother, and my best friend, and so many other people that I grew up with have asthma.

And so when we talk about natural gas and we've seen studies that show that there's a link between asthma and natural gas, it doesn't make sense to continue with this pattern.

It doesn't make sense to continue to build new buildings that will be affordable or that will be accessible for our communities that will still harm them.

So moving away from this and being able to address these health issues will be really important especially if we're talking about this as the Green New Deal.

And then another thing we've seen that gas leaks are a big deal not necessarily in our city or in our state but we've seen that one happen recently in Greenwood and everybody is always talking about the big one when the big earthquake is going to happen and You know, at God Green we talk about climate resilience a lot.

And so if we continue to have these kind of piping infrastructure that could be harmed in times where we would experience an earthquake and don't really have any ways for our communities to be able to protect themselves from this, then this could exacerbate the impacts that they would already be facing in that kind of situation.

And lastly, I brought this ordinance up with my committee last week.

So God Green Structures, we have committees that we work with, and we meet twice a month.

And we talk about what are our priorities for this month, this week, things like that.

And so when I brought this up to them, They were like, oh, natural gas is harmful.

And then I asked, do any of you all have natural gas in your homes?

And all of them had natural gas stoves.

And one of them didn't have a fan in their kitchen.

And so this is something, too, that we've seen that our communities are heavily impacted by this, but they don't understand the health impacts and what that could mean.

And so to continue in this way without And having the education for our folks to be able to understand how this would affect them would be another injustice that they would be facing.

And I will pass it on to Brittany to talk about how this is more than just what I've said and what Deblyn has talked about and how this really addresses the climate issues that we're trying to tackle.

Thank you, Nancy.

The Sierra Club is also happy to support this proposal.

nationwide actually are looking at similar proposals as cities all over the country come around to the reality of what natural gas is doing to our urban climates and the fact that we have to address it now.

I do want to first mention that we don't see this as the be-all end-all of city climate policy.

Healthy homes, healthy buildings should come parallel to and work in conjunction with a host of other climate health efforts, many of which are also inside the envelope of the Green New Deal, but some outside as well.

With that said, we do feel this is a critical piece of our fossil fuel elimination efforts.

At this point, there is no doubt that fossil fuels are driving our climate crisis, that we must reduce emissions and fast.

Building emissions account for about one-third of Seattle's greenhouse gas emissions, and natural gas accounts for about two-thirds of those emissions.

And a 2017 Building Energy Target Report notes that for Seattle to meet its original goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050, not only must electricity be carbon neutral, but we must convert the majority of building gas and oil to electricity.

So when we look at those numbers and at our new goal of 2030, it becomes clear to us that it is not only illogical, but frankly unconscionable to keep constructing new fossil fuel infrastructure for our buildings.

When you're in a hole, you don't keep digging.

And when the planet is burning, you don't keep lighting fires.

Declaring we will no longer make a place for new fossil fuels is the least that we can do.

Before you jump in, Steve, let me just let Matt introduce himself.

Just a quick name and rank for the record.

My name is Matt Rimley, and I'm a resident of South Seattle, Beacon Hill.

Thank you.

Sorry for being late.

No problem.

So Emerald Cities works at the intersection of equity and environment, and we want to be certain that as we move forward on our environmental policies and reducing greenhouse gases, we're doing it in a just way, and we're concerned with equity.

So the two areas I want to speak about are clean energy jobs and opportunities.

We think that as we transition jobs from fossil fuel jobs to clean energy jobs, like building automation and controls, advanced ventilation systems, heat pump installation, building shelf specialists, and so on, that we can create opportunities for folks who have been left out of these careers in the past, folks from communities of color and low-income folks, immigrants, women, and veterans.

So there will be a transition.

We will need to make sure it's a just transition, but this also creates tremendous opportunities and new opportunities for good paying careers for folks who have been excluded.

The other thing, Emerald City's been working a lot with affordable housing.

And the affordable housing community continually exceeds building code in their standards and has tremendous concern for their residents and the health and well-being of their residents.

So many affordable housing buildings are already electric.

The housing development consortium has a team working to pilot to reduce the cost of all electric buildings to make sure that we can do this at a low cost and deliver all buildings this way.

So we're already moving down this path.

Emerald Seas also works to do retrofits on existing buildings and we are replacing gas equipment that was installed five, more advanced electric equipment.

And we don't want to get into this bind again.

We don't want to dig the hole deeper and put in infrastructure that we need to replace to make our city climate pollution free by 2030. So I will leave it there.

Matt, we've heard from everyone else here.

I know you just got here, but I'd love to see if you want to share a few comments.

Thank you.

Up on the stem, there you go.

Turn it off, I'm pulling it over.

Well, thank you for the opportunity to share some words in regards to the Healthy Homes, Healthy Buildings efforts.

And at first, I actually would like to thank the council members for all your years of work on issues of protecting the environment, protecting our communities, and thank your staff for all the good work that you have laid out on multiple issues.

What I'd like to address specifically around this issue, and thank you for putting it forward, is I see it really as one of the first steps in putting teeth to the Green New Deal resolution that the council passed just a couple, a few weeks ago.

Making bold resolutions and statements is one thing, but what's important is taking the next step and putting teeth and kind of meat to the resolution.

As has probably been stated, so I apologize if I'm repeating some earlier talking points, but we know that 25% of Seattle's greenhouse gas emissions come from so-called natural gas.

What we also know though is that natural gas is a myth as a clean fuel.

We know that it releases methane and a lot of times when there's conversations around the climate crisis we only hear about reductions in carbon and not all the various greenhouse gases that contribute to changing climate.

It's one reason I really supported the Green New Deal, because it talked about eliminating all greenhouse gases.

But we know that methane is 84 times more potent.

than carbon dioxide and 30 times more potent as a heat trapping gas.

Seattle's natural gas comes primarily from British Columbia, Alberta, the Rocky Mountain region, and the San Juan region of the southwest.

And Sightline did a study just last year, 2017, and they estimate that well over half, if not more, of that natural gas comes from fracked gas sites.

So in British Columbia and Alberta, there are currently over 200,000 fracked gas wells.

One of the things we know that fracking does is it needs fresh water in the process to extract the natural gas.

On average, it takes 2 to 8 million gallons of fresh water for just one fracked gas well.

Fracking, oil companies do not need to disclose what chemicals they're using in the mixture they utilize for fracking, thanks in part to the 2005 so-called Halliburton loophole, which exempted disclosure, allowed companies exemption from disclosing the various toxic material they're using in their fracking process.

And of course, coming from former Vice President Dick Cheney and his connections to Halliburton.

So we don't exactly know what's going in the ground.

We know that fracking wastewater, up to 85% of it remains underwater, and this is near and around communities' drinking sources.

The remaining is brought into open pits, which are often not cleaned up and left exposed.

Recently, just last year, the B.C.

Oil and Gas Commission released a report studying the impacts of fracking that is had in British Columbia.

And what they have found up there, excuse me, it's actually a 2016 study, that 90% of the earthquakes that they're experiencing in British Columbia currently are directly tied to fracking, and this is coming from the Oil and Gas Commission.

They released a statement believing that continued fracking is a threat upon some of their infrastructure such as dams.

Energy development itself, if we want to take a step back, because it's much more than just the fracking, it's more than just turning on the lights, and it's more than just the climate crisis, because the reality is that energy development, historically and contemporarily, has been built on the desecration and destruction of tribes and First Nations lands and communities.

This dates back even to the damming of the Missouri River and the Mississippi River to bring electricity to various cities that impacted, actually, Standing Rock and quite other areas.

Lakota tribes, the coal that's taken out of the Navajo reservation to power Los Angeles, Phoenix, and the other cities is coming out of the Navajo community.

And this fracking that's taken place is happening on First Nations lands.

So this light that we're sitting under is coming to us from the exploitation of First Nations communities.

And in particular, in BC and Alberta, the Treaty 8 First Nations are not seeing any of the economic benefits.

They're not seeing any of the jobs, but they are certainly experiencing the poor health outcomes due to the fracking, the loss of their drinking water.

And many of those communities are also subsistence livers, and so they're seeing a loss of their fish as well as other wildlife.

So that a full circle, when we're talking about the climate crisis, that First Nations tribal communities are facing it, the bearing, the brunt from the beginning.

to the end.

Just last year, the Canadian government, another issue that's directly tied to these fracking sites is the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women, as what you find is in these areas.

where mass exploitation is taking place, man camps are soon to follow.

A Cree community from British Columbia documented an increase of over 400% sexual violence against indigenous women in these communities, in and around these fracking sites.

So I bring some of that information here that when we're thinking about even a policy about ending natural gas hookups in Seattle, it has very broad and deep implications beyond where we get our light source.

So thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing the council move forward on this effort.

Thank you.

Thank you, Matt.

Really thank all of you for all your ongoing work and engagement in this and your kind of thoughtful leadership on, you know, pushing the council and the city to address a crisis that's been in the works for decades.

And unfortunately, it's clear that despite some decent efforts, we're not nearly doing as much as we need to to truly address the crisis.

I want to take a minute and just acknowledge some of the comments we heard in public comment today.

Heard from at least three labor leaders representing workers that work in industries around this that could be impacted or almost certainly would be impacted by this in one way or another.

And I know that core to the principle of the Green New Deal is the transitions we make are not on the backs of those workers.

And I want to just acknowledge that we have work to do in the coming weeks, both around this policy, which I see as a relatively modest first step, but certainly in subsequent policies if we're going to transition off of You know, a majority of the homes in Seattle are heated with natural gas today.

And if we're going to transition all those off, there's going to be impacts, both positive and negative to workers.

But we really need to make sure we understand what those, what a transition looks like so that we don't end up down the same path of having the folks who bear the brunt of that transition be the folks on the front line, the workers in this case.

We also heard from a woman testifying.

She was actually testifying about oil heat, which is another piece of legislation we're working on.

We're not discussing that today, but it highlighted that some folks are in a situation where they rely on a fossil fuel for heating their home.

And if we're going to eliminate all fossil fuels in our city in the next 10 years, you know, everyone will need to make that transition.

We need to be working with folks that are living, whether they're homeowners or renters, to ensure that they continue to have reliable, safe, affordable heating and other implements for living in their house.

And we have to make sure we have the resources in place and structures in place so that transition is fair and just as we move forward.

We also heard testimony from a representative from the building community talking about their concerns about what this means.

Obviously, going forward, if legislation such as this passes, we will need builders to continue to build homes that are 100% electric.

We need to make sure we're working with the builders to make sure we can do this.

I believe that one, there's a lot of evidence.

In fact, I'm looking at a data piece of single family residences and the heat source they've used as construction over the last eight or nine years.

Back in 2010, less than 20% of the homes in Seattle were heated by electricity.

Over 80% were heated by gas, the new construction.

But in 2018, that had shifted radically where less than a third, or about a third of the homes constructed just last year were heated with natural gas.

Two-thirds are heated with electricity.

We are seeing this transition already happening in the marketplace.

Obviously, there's a whole variety of buildings, and I'm just speaking to single-family homes, but the transition is happening, and we're going to have to watch how that happens, and we want to work with the builders, too, to ensure that it's possible.

I'll just note that at a media event yesterday to help explain some of this legislation, we did have someone from the building community talk about the fact that they've built only all-electric homes since 2012, And that they're doing quite well, and the consumers want those homes too.

And so this is a place where figure out how we help that market shift in a way.

And again, we're just talking about this legislation as simply talking about new construction.

And I recognize that that will have impacts, obviously, on a variety of folks.

And we still have a lot of work to do with all the existing buildings that currently rely on natural gas that we're going to have to figure out how to transition off that.

Dr. Eswan, I don't know if you want to ask any questions or make any comments to people that are here today.

I do.

First of all, thank you all for all the remarks you made and also all the work that has gone on, not only on this one legislation, but in general.

I thought, Matt, you made some really important points about how especially the First Nations have been impacted throughout North America.

And I think the statistics from British Columbia are extremely powerful.

And just as a side note, I wonder if you could send some of those sources over to my staff and me so we can look at that as well.

And I... I also thought it was very important, I mean, in addition to the science that we know now about natural gas, and I think that is a big shift we are having to make, which is it used to be known as the safer thing, but we know now from science that that's not true.

But in addition to all of the scientific reasons and climate-related reasons to move away from natural gas, I think it is extremely crucial that we and the indigenous activist community has done this consistently.

We need to join them in doing that consistently, which is highlight that environmental, economic, and social aspects go hand in hand.

And the crisis of sexual violence that our First Nations communities have faced because of the establishment of the man camps, which inevitably happen once some region is opened up to fracking, that it goes hand in hand with the sustainability issue.

And that is, I mean, that is an unbelievable crisis that is being faced.

And that is why it's important that there has been tremendous activism around the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.

And I really wanted to give a shout out to Roxanne White and others in Seattle who have been at the leadership of that.

I also wanted to take this opportunity to thank all the activists for, although, I mean, Matt said this is not the first thing we've done.

We've had a lot happen before this in the recent years.

Our No Dakota Access Pipeline Resolution, our resolution against the LNG plant, PSE's LNG plant in Tacoma, which is very important, and our ordinance for the city to divest from Wells Fargo.

All of this has been important, and I, you know, just wanted to say my staff and I have really been honored to work with you all on all of those different policy aspects.

And then the other thing I wanted to add was, and I think Steve made a very important point, which is that this is an opportunity also actually to expand the public sector for jobs and That's a big, that's a big component of this.

And I was, we're just discussing this legislation.

Obviously, we're not, we're not voting on this.

I do, I would like for my office to work with yours, Council Member O'Brien and with community activists, of course, to maybe add in some language on putting it in writing what we both have articulated and the community has articulated today on the question of jobs being tied to the question of sustainability.

And I think that's important to add in and be very consistently adding in at every step of the way.

And then two points specifically.

One is that jobs in general, but I think the voice of the Plumbers and Pipefitters Union was also important.

And the transition of jobs away from non-profit organizations the energy sources that we are trying to move away from, that transition would imply retraining as well.

And I think that we have to have some explicit language around that so that the language we use today, even if that may not be a concrete component of what material shifts are happening today, It should be a guideline for the future.

So in other words, just to give you an example, Steve, you mentioned the question of retrofitting.

That's extremely important.

This legislation talks about new buildings, but we also have to concretely talk about clean energy retrofitting of existing buildings.

that would, if we're talking about just transition in actuality and not just as an abstract notion, then that would imply in some shape or form, I'm not an expert, I'm not a trades person, but it would imply some sort of retraining questions and that would have That would again tie into the question of how are we going to fund that retraining?

Obviously, we're not going to put this burden on the workers themselves.

It has to be publicly funded.

In other words, expanding public sector retraining and jobs and apprenticeship programs with priority hire, all of that.

And all of that has to, of course, tie in with progressive revenues.

So that has to be part of the discussion.

And the last point I'll make is I also appreciated Matt talking about how The First Nations communities have been the most adversely impacted by all of this, but they have not seen any of the jobs.

They have not seen any of the training opportunities.

And so I think we have to have a special focus on that as well in some way.

And concretely, let's talk about the language later.

Community members, do you have any other comments you want to make?

I just wanted to thank Matt for giving all the information and detail.

So we were through another network, the 100% network, we actually met someone from the indigenous environmental network and they vehemently opposed to natural gas.

One of them was actually based out of Oklahoma, and she says that, you know, her entire community actually has no other option apart from, you know, being employed in this sector.

And again, that's the reason why I made the point that, you know, there needs to be other options at the same time have the, you know, support, enough support to cushion them from this, you know, adverse effects of transition as well.

I just wanted to also comment on the woman who gave public testimony about oil in her home and, you know, by putting gas in people's homes tomorrow or next month or next year, we're doing them a disservice because we know we're going to need to remove it eventually.

So rather than burden them in the future.

With doing that, we can set public policy, which puts us in the right direction.

Some data in Washington State, I don't know if Seattle is specific, but we added 350,000 new residential gas customers in Washington State since year 2000. How many?

350,000.

And greenhouse gas emissions in buildings were the fastest growing sector of our greenhouse gas emissions in the state.

We're digging the hole deeper and faster, and that's what this resolution is really about.

It's about stopping that.

One more acknowledgement I want to make of who this impacts.

Puget Sound Energy is the major gas company here in Seattle.

Obviously, no new hookups will have an impact on them.

I had a chance to have a conversation with a representative from Puget Sound Energy.

They're in the room today, but didn't testify today.

But I had a conversation earlier today, which I want to just acknowledge and appreciate.

what I heard, and I don't want to put words in mouth, but a willingness to sit at the table and talk through a process.

I want to be clear, I don't think this legislation on the timeline we're on is consistent with what they see, but the fact that there's an openness to a collaborative process, which was, I think, demonstrated by, I think, some great work that happened at the state legislature last year, is appreciated.

And so, you know, how we continue on this and move forward, continue to have those discussions, want to figure out how to have as many people at a table having conversations about both this piece of legislation and also what will ultimately be a series of pieces of legislation going forward that we'll need to do if we're going to meet that goal of eliminating all fossil fuels and all climate pollution in our city by the year 2030. Great.

I think we'll wrap up this conversation at this point.

Thank you all for being here today and thanks for all your ongoing work and your future work too.

So thanks.

Kelly, would you like to read the next agenda item in?

Yes, we have Council Bill 119610, an ordinance vacating a portion of Armory Way as condemned by Ordinance 67125, lying between Western Avenue and Elliott Avenue, and vacated Pine Street and Virginia Street, adjacent to the PC1 North site within the Pike Place Market Historical District, on the petition of the Pike Place Market Preservation and Development Authority.

Clerk, file 31376.

Welcome.

We start with a quick round of introductions.

Beverly, you can go first.

Beverly Barnett, Seattle Department of Transportation.

Mary Baccarolla, Executive Director of the Pike Place Market PDA.

Welcome both of you.

I believe we have a little presentation.

So, Devli, I don't know if you want to start by giving us a little overview of what we're considering here.

Yeah, today, well, in fact, today, this item and the next item are final vacation ordinances.

And we usually do a little reminder so people kind of get why we're doing something so abbreviated.

So the city council has established a two-step approval process for vacation.

So we will come forward with a recommendation.

And the city council holds a public hearing.

And if the city council chooses to grant the vacation, they will always outline conditions that the developer should meet.

And then the developer goes out, builds the project, meets all of the conditions, does everything.

And then some period of time, we come back and go over how the project was implemented and how the public benefit features were accomplished, because that's usually one of the greatest elements that the City Council wants to see.

So this is the very last piece for this project for the Pike Place Market.

As we'll see with this, this was one of those odd little strips of right-of-way that's very, very steeply sloped, and I think When the market first began looking at their work there, it wasn't even anticipated that this was right of way.

So it was only when all the title work and everything was going on that everyone recognized that the vacation needed to be one of the many steps.

And it is outlined in the legislation some of the history of the City Council's work in supporting the market and some of the prior pieces of legislation to get the project underway.

But this, I think, was strongly supported by the Council at the point that we were here in 2014 for the public hearing and the council has expressed a lot of support for the development activity and it's been really fun to have a project in this location and be able to go down and watch it come online.

But I think, you know, probably we just really want to let Mary go through the PowerPoint presentation.

We did it pretty briefly since we know you're all very familiar with the spot.

But it just, it gives Mary and the market a chance to share the work they did based on your earlier support.

Take it away, Mary.

Great.

Thank you.

Actually, thank you, Beverly.

You actually just took all my first notes, so I don't have to go through it.

I'm really happy you did that.

Exactly.

The team didn't realize that they needed a little bit more land in the development site and extended, so this is where we are today.

So let me tell you a little bit about And I hope you all have visited the Market Front because it was the first step in the Waterfront Project and it's very exciting.

And we love it and the community loves it.

There's a number of things that the Market Front does for our community.

not only the Pike Place Market, but the Seattle community.

So formerly, this is the site here, and it was formerly the Municipal Market Building, and that burned down in 1974, and since then, until the Market Front, it was service parking lot for 40 years until the Market Front project.

This is the area.

It was a steep slope.

It wasn't used for any sort of transportation purposes.

No evidence that the strip of land was ever improved for transportation purposes, but it was still designated as the Armory Way.

So here's the aerial photo with the Armory Way vacation indicated in a red outline.

We probably think it might have been a back drive to the Armory at the time, way back when.

So we're going through the different phases of the market front, but I'd like to give you just a little bit of what the market front is right now.

It was completed in June 2017. It's 30,000 square feet of public space.

We have a producer's hall on the lower level that includes four retail spaces.

The public plaza has room for 47 new day stalls for artists and farmers.

The architect was Miller Hall, and it was built by Sellen.

$74 million expansion for the market.

There's a new residential building, Western Avenue Senior Housing.

We call it the Wash Building.

40 units rented to low income, 55 years or older, with income 50% and 30% below area median income.

And it includes, on the first floor, seven work-live-artist spaces on the lower level.

So in the summer, whenever they want, They can come out, they're artists from our community, and that can be another way that people can come and explore the market.

There's also a new neighborhood center called the Market Commons.

It's run by our Market Foundation.

It's a resource center for connection and engages the community that works and lives at the market.

Actually, we get a lot of people coming there from outside our community also.

We help them with services, preparing their taxes, where they need to go for certain services.

We also have movie nights, potlucks, et cetera, for our community.

And you'll find out about the three new public art installations and also the breezeway for the connection.

So what you're looking at right now is on the left side, the west side looking south and the east side looking south.

The east side is Western Avenue.

The west side overlooks what used to be the viaduct.

You can see the covered canopy looking south, and then also at the bottom, the covered canopy and the seat area looking east.

That was actually one of the best places to watch the viaduct coming down.

We have a public parking garage that was part of it, because the waterfront construction and the new waterfront coming in was going to take away some parking spaces, so we built 300 parking spots in this parking garage that's part of the market front, and it was built in partnership with WSDOT and the city.

Here we go to one of our public art mosaic tile walls.

This is just so beautiful.

A longtime market artist, her name is Claire Dona, she did this in mosaic.

And it represents the flowers, the fruits and vegetables, and the seafood that we are known for.

And also on the bigger fish on the seafood are our donors that donated to the market front build out of a $10,000 donation or more.

And all of the donation that was raised, the $6 million, was by our Marketfront Foundation as their part of the Marketfront.

Another beautiful piece of art, which is the Western Avenue Tapestry.

I haven't been part of the executive director of the market very long, but I think this was one of the coolest projects that they did.

John Fleming was the community artist.

And what he did is he did these big strips of cloth.

And then we had our community coming together, and they actually, he gave them like a theme of, again, vegetables, flowers, fish, and our community came together over three to four days to paint these, and then he put them together on Western Avenue as a piece of artwork.

And what are they, is that metal?

It's actually, it was originally cloth that they could paint, and now it's coming down.

It's actually, I believe, wood.

Yeah.

And it's supposed to represent our flowers, our vegetables, our seafood, everything the market represents.

It's just so beautiful if you've walked down on Western Avenue to see it.

And then this is our third, but Billy the pig has been part of the Pike Place market.

Billy is a sibling to Rachel the pig.

Rachel's the one underneath the clock sign.

What Billy and Rachel do is we've moved Billy there and the foundation gave it to the PDA.

They are actually piggy banks and all the money that is raised goes to social services for the Pike Place market.

And then if you see the hoof prints that are installed, that was also a fundraiser for the foundation and also for the market front.

This is our Market Commons, and this is run by the Pike Place Market Foundation.

And again, that is when I told you we have...

it's open 40 hours a week.

We have classes, we have get-togethers for our market community, we help them with their social services, we have a social worker that helps with our social services and our housing that goes there and helps.

And it's a resource center, and it's also a gathering place for, again, potlucks, movies, playing bridge, whatever they would like to do.

But our market foundation oversees that.

And it's a really welcoming community place for our community.

Here you see on this map the public benefit improvements.

You can see the artwork that's there.

You can also see the public access pass, and that was there so you could tie together the park, Western Avenue, and the new waterfront.

to down to the waterfront through the Pike Place Market.

So you can see the public access there.

We also had a partnership with the Chief Seattle Club, and they are also on the market front on the pavilion.

And all of the wares, it's mostly jewelry at the moment that they make, they come out and they sell it along with our art community.

And these are the public access areas for the market front.

One goes out to western access.

One goes to the park.

One goes into the market itself.

Again, up there is western.

And at the bottom is the anticipated future connection to the waterfront.

And actually, the future connection per the development agreement is actually going to move a little south.

We're working right now with the Office of the Waterfront where exactly that's going to happen, but it's going to move to the south.

It's not exactly right there.

And I just want to thank everyone.

I want to thank you for the beginning of the process.

I want to thank SDOT and Beverly, everyone that had anything to do with the Marketfront.

It is truly, truly a gift to the place market has received from all of you.

And our city gets to use it.

Like I said, we've had night markets there, best place to do the Viaduct.

We had Blue Thunder out there today.

Everybody wants to come out on the Marketfront.

And it's the best view in Seattle.

Thank you, Mary.

Beverly, I rely on you a lot for our eyes and brains and ears on the ground on these things.

You help us ensure on the front end that the public benefit package is commensurate with the vacation that we're providing.

And then you also help us at this point to ensure that, you know, substantially what was discussed at the front is actually delivered and want to confirm that you feel that this is?

Yes, they've completed everything as outlined in the council conditions and we have property use and development agreement that addresses maintenance and public access and things throughout the life of the improvement.

So it's ready to go.

That's great.

And Mary, not so specific about this project, but I'm curious, since the traffic on the viaduct stopped and you didn't have that noise out on the deck, and then of course that was short-lived until the jackhammers came in, although it's really fascinating to watch people tear down a freeway, and then I believe that's almost moved on from that phase, but I'm curious how your summer was up there with the construction and no vehicles but other things going on.

Actually, we've been very, very busy down there.

So many people come into our town every year.

And we've been very busy.

And like I said, even though our Alaskan Way entrance to our garage had to be shut for a month, People found their way around to Western if they needed to park.

People come into the market and go down.

WSDOT and SDOT made it very easy for people to walk through the market down to the waterfront, even through all the construction.

And people did take advantage that it was a great place to sit and watch the viaduct come down.

And I have to add this.

I know we're busy, but our artists actually went and got rebar and concrete, and some made jewelry out of it.

Some made things for your yard out of it.

The market really does take opportunities and run with them.

It's an amazing incubator for creativity.

It is.

And it has been forever.

Great.

Well, thanks so much on that.

Council Member Sawant, any questions on this?

I'm comfortable with the legislation moving forward.

So I will go ahead and let me make sure I'm on the right one.

Move Council Bill 119610. All in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Unopposed, great.

Thanks for your work on this.

It'll be the full council week from next Monday, the 16th.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Great.

Beverly, stick around.

And Kelly, do you mind reading in agenda number five?

Not at all.

Council Bill 119561, an ordinance vacating the alley in Block 1 with sedition on the petition of 2026 Madison Corner LLC and LMC 2026 Madison Holdings LLC, clerk file 306083.

Great.

Why don't we do quick introductions again, just for the record.

Beverly.

Beverly Barnett, Seattle Department of Transportation.

And Brad Reisinger with Lenar Multifamily Communities.

Great.

Welcome, Brad.

Good to see you again, Beverly.

Give us the rundown on this guy.

So this is also a final vacation ordinance.

So the project was approved some years ago.

I think one thing that's a little bit unusual about this is that the property was sold a couple of times.

So this project came back to city council for an extension.

So when you look, the legislation you see some of the transition and the city council granted extensions to allow the purchaser to complete the project consistent with what they approved originally but this is a bit longer than what we usually see but this is also ready to go and has completed everything and we do have in the the powerpoint it's it's kind of easier to When we start the PowerPoint, if you see the location, this is then just the description.

So I think we can just jump in.

You want to jump in, Brad?

Great.

Well, thank you.

Thanks, Beverly.

We're really excited about this.

Thanks for taking the time to meet with us.

This is for our community now named 2020 MADD.

It's been a very successful community.

Residents really love it.

We have one of the highest retentions in our entire portfolio.

Over 60% of the residents choose to renew their leases here.

Industry average is probably 50% less than that, more than the 40% range so I think that speaks well for the neighborhood has really embraced it the public plaza and the various public benefits that we're going to speak to slide So a little orientation, this property was bounded by East Denny Way to the north and the east, East Madison to the south, and then the existing alley to the west.

You can see the alley being vacated in red that split the site, and then the public benefit area shown in blue.

As Beverly mentioned, The original application was by a different developer.

They had actually proposed to develop the entire site.

We worked with the city to revise the master use permit, and instead of building a donut across the entire site, we have only developed a C-shaped building.

The public benefits are shown here.

We'll go through each one of these in the following slides, but basically it's public space, plaza, park, an art element, cafe seating, benches, inviting openings into the park, stone finishes.

The finishes we're talking about, those are essentially stone seating areas.

And then widening the sidewalk along East Madison.

The community summary, we have 157 homes, 2,500 square feet of retail, two tenants, both local, Brio is an interior designer from Capitol Hill, and then 30 Minute Hit is a women's boxing gym, local franchise.

32, we did choose to participate in the MFTE program, so we have 32 affordable homes, 0.65 ratio, and it was completed two years ago.

So the first slide here shows the primary area of the public benefit.

Large public plaza, entrances to it from both Denny Way as well as off of East Madison.

The vertical separation in the back behind the public benefit between the public areas from our private residence spaces, both vertical separation as well as landscape.

What you can't really see through here, and you saw it on the prior slide, the breezeway.

So there is connectivity for the residents to the west to connect to the public benefit area through the building.

It's a well-lit breezeway.

So there's three access points to that center section.

Next slide.

This show is really the heart of the plaza.

It's an art piece by a local artist named Troy Pillow.

It's an equalizer.

The whole theme of this building, 2020 MAD, it's really meant to celebrate the rich musical history of this intersection.

This is where Dino's was previously.

And the history of the entire Central District.

music scene.

So the equalizer is really a great piece of art.

It's backlit LED lighting, so it lights up at night and just brings a lot of attention to the park.

The next slide represents the cafe-style seating.

It looks a little dark up on the screen.

You can see it to the left, and that's the entryway coming in to the public plaza area.

This slide represents the entrance to the public plaza off of East Denny, and it shows two of the benches, one of them you can partially see behind that tree, as well as three of the stone finishes, blocks.

This was in a direct response to the design commission who asked for us, originally it was just a sidewalk going in, to open that up a little bit more and make it more inviting coming in off of East Denny.

Next slide shows more of those stone finish pieces integrated with the art, complement the art to allow for seating areas.

And finally, the large setbacks on both Denny, on East Denny, East Madison, which is shown here, as well as 50 feet of the alley to the west of the property.

This was particularly important.

We didn't know it when we were proposing it, but you now have a BRT station located adjacent to the building here.

So having a widened sidewalk will be really nice for the BRT program.

So that is our presentation showing you the various public benefits and how we conformed with the original agreement.

Do you have any questions?

Yeah.

Brad or Beverly, I'm not sure who's best to answer it, but the public benefit open space, the outline there, how will that be signed and how open is it?

Is it open certain hours of the day or?

No, it's open 24 hours and we do have signage up indicating that it is a public place.

And again, what we tried to do is we tried to use, we didn't use signage to delineate between the public and private, but rather we used landscaping and a kind of a vertical separation.

So you kind of go up into a different area and that indicates that that's the private zone.

And we also, in the property use and development agreement, we set maintenance standards and public access standards so that it can't be closed or the public excluded.

Usually we accommodate like a periodic, you know, tenant summer party or something.

But for the most part, the PUDA requires that the maintenance and design standards be maintained by the developer and that the public have access to the site without being excluded based on, you know, not having money to spend or some other criteria.

Great.

And then on the map that shows that public benefit as installed to the building, it also labels that lawn as a future development site.

So you mentioned that the original design was a much bigger building and you scaled it back, but is there, is the plan that at some point in the future develop on that site?

We will not be.

We actually do not own the corner.

So we worked with the, so I think 2004 is when the initial application came in.

Oh, is that long ago?

That long ago.

It got tied up in the recession.

It had been mopped for the donut.

Coming out of the recession, we looked at it.

There was a dry cleaner here, so there was PCE, and while the existing owners had remediated the PCE that was in the soil, it was still in the groundwater off-site, so we did not want to take liability for that.

So we purchased the northern and, I guess, the western and northern portions of the property that were deemed clean.

We built those, and we did not take title to the balance of the site.

Not certain what the current owner plans to do with that.

Got it.

I suspect nothing until they eventually get an NFA.

Great.

Did you guys do the landscaping there or is that there all?

That was, we negotiated with them.

So we had to negotiate with them to do the PUDA because public area impacts both of us.

Part of the negotiation with us, the sidebar negotiation, was to ensure that that area was not left in its prior condition.

Great.

That's the only question I have.

in 2004, 15 years from, any council members around back when this originally got going?

I think this was, Council Member Drago worked on some of the changes on this one.

Good to know.

What's the oldest one still outstanding, Beverly?

Terminal 5.

How many years?

30?

We discussed that the other day, right?

I don't know if it's quite that much, but it's in the two decade territory for sure.

Great.

Well, I appreciate the work on this.

Thanks for coming out today.

It's nice to, it looks like a great project.

I haven't actually set foot on it.

I guess it's in your district.

Oh, thank you.

But I'm prepared to go ahead and move council bill 119561. All in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

So that passes out committee.

It'll go to full council on the 16th.

Great.

Thank you.

Thanks for your work.

And we have one last lonely resolution at the end of the day.

Kelly, will you read this into the record and invite Amy and anyone else forward?

Yes.

Resolution 31899, Resolution Granting Conceptual Approval to Construct, Maintain, and Operate a Below-Grade Private Thermal Energy Exchange System Under and Across John Street, East of Bourne Avenue North and West of Fairview Avenue North, as proposed by ANI-DEU, John Street LLC.

Welcome.

Why don't we start with introductions?

Amy Gray with the Seattle Department of Transportation.

Yes, Scott Locke, Energy Conservation Engineer with UMC.

We're working with Ani on the project.

Great.

Thank you, Scott.

Thanks for multitasking there.

Amy, why don't you tell us a little bit about this?

All right, well, thank you for having us here on this long council meeting.

We're happy to be here.

So this resolution, if you adopt it, would provide conceptual approval to ANI, D-E-U, John Street, LLC, for a private thermal energy exchange system.

The system connects the buildings located at 1120 John Street and 1120 Denny Street.

And the purpose of this system is to capture waste heat and distribute this heat between the two buildings.

I'm going to turn it over to Scott so he can talk you through sort of the technical aspects of the system.

There's unfortunately a, oh it looks better on that screen.

So this is just a, it's really a very, very simple system.

The intent is to connect the two blocks with a thermal pipeline, water line beneath the street so that we can share waste heat between the two facilities.

Essentially we'll be utilizing a heating or thermal plant only at one of the sites, so we'll eliminate it at the other site.

That will reduce the amount of equipment that has to be manufactured in the process.

And then it's also going to allow us to have the primary heat source as heat pumps so that we can utilize any waste heat, store it when needed, and then utilize it between the two sites.

One reason this is a really good site for this is we've got two separate kind of disparate types of utilization between the two blocks.

We have one that's a residential site and one that's an office site.

So they have peak heating loads that occur at different times of the day.

So that allows us, if one system is in heating, to then utilize the waste heat at the other site.

So like I said, a very, very simple system.

But in general, that's how it would operate.

Is, what is the heating source for the?

The primary heat source is heat pumps, or our heat recovery chillers.

Electric?

Yes.

Electric, yes.

Sorry.

All the heat pumps I'm aware of are electric, but just curious.

It's apropos of the discussions earlier, too.

Yeah, so I told you to be prepared for that.

I should clarify, there will be backup.

gas boilers, but we're trying to utilize as much of the heat pumps as possible as the primary source.

And do you use, I don't know if this is your area of technical expertise or not, but is the backup gas boiler just for heat pumps below a certain temperature or is it more of like a peaking load as a backup in case the heat pump can't generate enough?

It's basically both.

If there's a situation where the load is too great or we don't have enough disparate load between the two facilities, then we would have to temper that with the gas boilers.

Got it.

And is there, I appreciate that there's an ability to shift where it's going.

Is there heat recovery that happens in any of the buildings?

I mean.

Yes.

Yes.

On the air side, separate from this system we're talking about, there is heat recovery.

Absolutely.

That's great.

All right.

Do you want to go to the next slide?

Councilmember O'Brien, I think you mentioned this earlier when we were introducing at the beginning of the committee meeting, but this is located in South Lake Union at the old Seattle Times site.

Sort of a historic little area that's no longer the newspaper location.

Just about the term permit process, this is the first step in the two steps that gets ultimately a permit for them if council adopts this resolution.

Estat will prepare a term permit ordinance that specifies the terms, conditions, fees, inspections, et cetera, that we're going to require for the long-term occupation of the right-of-way by this private use.

I anticipate that that ordinance will probably be first quarter 2020, so you won't be here.

I will not be here.

Maybe I'll be out there.

But that's a 10-year permit with two renewable 10-year terms.

And I just want to say that we're recommending approval.

And if you have any questions, we're happy to answer them.

Great.

And so that's the, according to that timeline, that'll be in advance.

I don't know what your construction schedule is, but that'll be well in advance of completion of the building, but probably about the time you're in the ground doing that work.

Yeah, they're anxious to get their permit.

Yeah, I imagine.

That's great.

I don't have any other questions.

I appreciate it.

I mean, I love, you know, we have worked for a number of years trying to establish a much broader district energy system at South Lake Union.

And despite some good efforts, we still hadn't figured out how to really bring it up to kind of utility scale district energy.

But it's great to see that projects are using the concept locally.

And, you know, who knows, maybe someday there'll be a way to tap into bigger network and share some of the resources that are being created.

So thanks for doing that.

And I always appreciate it.

I assume there's cost savings from this, but there's also energy savings, which I'm particularly excited about.

So that's great.

Council Member Swann, any questions on this?

Great.

I'll go ahead and move resolution 31899. All in favor, signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Great.

Thanks for your work on this.

Full council and then some other council members will take this up in six months.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Great, I don't think we have anything else.

Thank you so much for being here on a Friday afternoon.

Kelly, thanks for your work.

We're done well before 5 p.m., so I'm really proud that I had a meeting that barely went over two hours, so it may be the last one of my career, but I'll celebrate it at the moment, so thanks so much.

I wanted you to know I did have my calendar for this meeting.

Well done, I'm giving you some time back.

Thanks, Council Member.

With that, we're adjourned.