Seattle City Council Finance & Housing Committee 4/6/22

Good morning, everyone.

Welcome to the Finance and Housing Committee meeting of the Seattle City Council.

It is 930 a.m.

on April 6, 2022. My name is Teresa Mosqueda.

I'm the chair of the Finance and Housing Committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Herbold?

Here.

Councilmember Peterson?

Here.

Councilmember Nelson?

Present.

Council Member Lewis.

Present.

Madam Chair.

Present.

Madam Chair, that is five present, none absent, or excused.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk, and welcome, everyone, to the Finance and Housing Committee meeting.

We do have a full agenda and a number of guests today.

It's wonderful to see you on the line.

We will commence with public comment, and then we'll have the Housing Levy Oversight Committee appointments.

This includes five new appointments and six reappointments.

We'll then have the Sugary Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board appointments.

This includes two new appointments and two reappointments.

We then have a panel presentation on cannabis business and licensing equity.

We'll be hearing from both business owners and folks from the Liquor Control Board and really appreciate the wealth of knowledge that's been pouring in from our committee meetings across the country.

We'll end by talking about budget.

We'll have a vote and discussion, possible vote and discussion on the capital projects watch list and three proposed amendments.

And then we'll have a discussion and possible vote on the payments of claims resolution and updated template.

This is a continuation of an item that we had in our previous meeting as well.

If there's no objection, today's agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, our agenda is adopted.

Wonderful, thanks all.

We do have a few folks signed up for public comment.

I see four people signed up for public comment, so we're going to get right into that.

Thank you very much for signing up for public comment this morning.

The public comment committee, excuse me, the public comment period will be hosted in the following manner.

Folks who've signed up will have two minutes to provide public comments.

You're going to hear a chime at the end of your two-minute allotment.

That chime gives you the indication that you have about 10 seconds to wrap up your comments, and we do hope that you'll take the time to wrap it up so that nothing gets cut off.

If you'd like to send us the remainder of your comments, you can send those to council at Seattle.gov.

Again, once you hear your name, please note that you will hear a prompt that says you have been unmuted.

However, that is also your indication to hit star six on your own line to unmute your phone.

At this point, we are going to go ahead and dive into public comment.

Again, you'll hear your name.

Please make sure you hit star six to unmute yourself.

The first two speakers are Claude Burfess and Kristen Wells.

Welcome.

Good to see your name, Mr. Burfess.

Welcome to the Finance and Housing Committee.

The floor is yours.

My name is Claude Burfess and I'm the first Vice President of Seattle King County NAACP.

The NAACP supports policies that lift up black and brown communities.

The policies and council will be considering was informed by a large stakeholder process, which we were a part of.

It was really important that we got the policy right and the elements are all things other cities have done to advance equity.

Black and brown communities were harmed by the war on drugs.

Here in Seattle, black people were arrested at rates much higher than white people for possession of marijuana, while the city has taken steps to remove misdemeanors from records.

People today are still dealing with the consequences of these decisions.

That's why we are here urging you to take urgent action.

to address the systemic problems in the cannabis industry by passing legislation to ensure more equity in the system.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

And again, great to hear your voice.

Thanks for dialing in today.

The next person is Kristen Wells, followed by Zion Gray-El.

Good morning, Kristen.

Kristen, if you want to hit star six one more time, it looks like you're still muted on my line.

Star six.

Okay.

I'm going to keep my eye on Kristen's tile here.

Hi, Kristen.

Please go ahead.

Can you hear me?

I can.

Thanks so much.

Thank you, Councilwoman Mosqueda and members of Seattle City Council.

My name is Kristen Wells, and I work as a blood tender at Ponder in Seattle.

I support the cannabis equity policy as well.

I've been working in the cannabis industry for almost two years.

As a bud tender, I match customers' cannabis needs and wants with the products we have, whether that be flower, plant, edibles, or medical.

I also describe the different strains and feelings you get from those different cannabis strains and types.

I decided to join the industry because in the middle of the pandemic, I was laid off from my job like many others.

I also found that I have a chronic pain disease and so, I really dove into the medical side of cannabis for my own personal use and I'm really passionate about sharing what I've learned with other people because I think it's a really powerful plant.

I saw this as an opportunity to pursue the passion of mine as well as get on the inside of the cannabis industry because there's a lot of equity work that needs to be done.

I believe that the training that this cannabis equity policy offers will be really helpful to open the gateway for workers especially to different avenues and fields within the industry.

It gives them the opportunity to see what they would be good at and just develop a ladder for workers to move up within the industry chain.

For example, I had the opportunity to take a medical marijuana course to be a certified consultant, but it cost about $400 and was paid for by my current employer.

It's really not accessible because it's so expensive and you have to renew it every year to be considered certified by the state.

Training will open up a lot more growth within the industry as well as upward mobility as you will have opportunities to move up within your job.

Overall, it will help with the development of the workforce within the industry.

I think it's really important Please pass the cannabis equity policy.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

The next speaker is Zion Gray-El, and after that is James Adams and David Hines.

Both James and David are listed as not present right now, so we will look to see if you dial in before concluding public comment.

Go ahead and dial in if you are still waiting up there to provide public comment, James and David.

Good morning, Zion.

Thank you for dialing in this morning.

The floor is yours.

Good morning to you as well.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Thank you.

All right.

Excellent.

My name is Zion Grayhill and I work as a bud tender at Have a Heart Belt Town in Seattle, the downtown location.

And I support the cannabis equity policy vigorously.

I have been working in the cannabis industry for about five years now.

As a bud tender, my daily responsibilities consist of very high volume of cash handling and customer service, also answering inquiries even to visitors who aren't customers regarding cannabis.

In addition, I de-escalate situations between staff and customers at times.

Now, I joined the industry because I had an interest in growing and Washington has approved our accepting atmosphere for that.

Cannabis was decriminalized, and the minimum wage was $7 more than where I'm from, which is Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

When I came to work in Washington, I tried to work elsewhere and got positions, but these jobs kept being yanked from underneath me for about a five-year-old felony that I had on my record.

It was very awkward how it happened.

It happened multiple times, too.

But the cannabis industry openly accepted me.

I've had my allegiance to them ever since.

I know from personal experience that vacation and expungement is a vital component of equity.

The cannabis equity policy is a game changer.

It's important to have equity funds to help undo the effects of war on drugs within the communities of color.

One component that has put me at ease is the fact that a Cannabis Equity Commission is developed.

and who it consists of.

This commission makes me more comfortable than the LCD to be honest.

They will allocate funds in an equitable way and they are from the communities or closely associated with the communities that have been wronged.

This policy dedicates avenues to people of color and opens doors within an inequitable and inaccessible industry.

Before hearing about cannabis equity policy, I never entertained the thought of being a cannabis retail owner.

At the same time, just because we are in the playgrounds does not mean they're going to play with us.

It's time that Seattle rights the wrongs of the war on drugs and protects cannabis workers.

I urge the city council to pass the cannabis equity policy.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you very much for dialing in today and for your presentation.

We do have James, Adam, and David Hines still listed as not present.

So going once, going twice, OK, three times.

We are going to go ahead and close our public comment for today.

Just making sure I didn't miss anyone.

Okay, wonderful.

We're going to go ahead and conclude our public comment today, and we're going to move right on into items of business since we do have a packed agenda.

Again, thank you, colleagues, for being here with us, and I want to welcome as well.

I see Councilmember Morales has joined us to listen in on the presentation, so welcome, Councilmember Morales.

Thanks for being here with us today.

and look forward to getting into this first presentation.

Madam Clerk, we're gonna go ahead and read the first 11 items of business into the record related to the housing levy appointments.

If you could do that at this time, that'd be wonderful.

Agenda items number one through 11, appointments and reappointments to the Housing Levy Oversight Committee for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you very much.

Wonderful to have so many folks with us here today.

Thank you for joining us for the appointments to the Housing Levy Oversight Committee.

Again, we have about six new appointments and we have five re-appointments.

Excuse me, let me say that again.

6 re-appointments and 5 new appointments.

And as our practice is, folks who are coming for re-appointment don't necessarily need to come to committee.

And those who are coming for new appointments, if they're scheduled permits, we recognize this is in the middle of the day.

It's not timely for some, but for those who are able to make it, we want to make sure to I have a chance to introduce ourselves and hear from you as well as you introduce yourself and what you're interested in doing.

So we do have some of the new appointments with us.

In order to get us started, I'd like to turn it over to Stephanie Velasco from the Office of Housing, who is going to walk us through the reappointments and the new appointments here.

And then we'll have a chance to hear directly from some of the folks who've joined us today as possible appointees to the Housing Levy Oversight Board.

Welcome, Stephanie.

Thanks for being here with us.

And you can kick us off.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda, and the rest of the council members on the Finance and Housing Committee.

My name is Stephanie Velasco, and I'm the Communications and External Relations Manager for the Office of Housing.

And I have the pleasure today of sharing with you just a little bit about the Housing Levy Oversight Committee, and then introducing you to our committee's newest appointees.

So as you know, the Office of Housing supports the production and preservation of affordable housing and homeownership opportunities throughout Seattle.

And we do this because we know that one, affordable housing is a proven solution to homelessness.

Two, affordable housing is an effective tool for preventing displacement of low-income households and people of color.

And three, affordable housing is a critical cornerstone for equitable community-focused development.

So in order for us to do this work, we need, we rely on funding from the Seattle Housing Levy.

And over the past 40 years, Seattle voters have repeatedly voiced their support for affordable housing through five levies and one bond measure, with the most recent housing levy being passed in 2016. And so the Housing Levy Oversight Committee provides valuable feedback on the ongoing administration of levy programs and they review our annual reports to make sure we are keeping on track to meet our goals.

So it is an important job and I know that our committee members are absolutely up to that task and so with that I'd like to introduce first our new appointees and give them an opportunity to tell you about themselves.

So first we have Joel C. Ng who's a partner with Edge Developers and I'll just actually go through everyone's name first and then we can go back and have them introduce themselves if that works.

So we have Joel Ng from a partner with Edge Developers.

Damian James, who's the Director of Facilities and Transportation at the Northwest School.

Denise Rodriguez, the Executive Director of the Washington Home Ownership Resources Center.

Dan Wise, Deputy Director of Catholic Community Services in King County.

And finally Patience Malabo, who's not able to join us this morning, who is the Executive Director of the Housing Development Consortium of Seattle, King County.

And then we also have six reappointments, and I'll just share their names quickly, and we can get back around to introducing you to the new appointees.

So we have Beth Borum, Development Director at Beacon Development Group.

Valerie Fisher, who's a 25-year employee at Seattle Public Schools.

Aaron Christensen Ishizaki, a partner at Mifun, an architecture firm.

Anne T. Malone, who's the Senior Vice President and Business Development Officer for Affordable Housing at U.S.

Bank, Colin Morgancross, the Director of Real Estate Development with Mercy Housing Northwest, and Pradeepta Upadhyay, the Executive Director at Interim Community Development Association.

So that rounds out our list of reappointments, and we can circle back now to Joel, who's our first new appointee.

Good morning, all.

Appreciate the opportunity to serve the city.

I'm a Seattle native, born and raised in South Seattle.

I have a school product.

And our company, Edge Developers, myself and two partners are all similar backgrounds, all South Seattle, born and bred in our families with generational.

So we formed our company really to build affordable housing.

have experience of over 25 years in affordable housing.

And we also do community, many community projects as well, food banks, community centers, and so forth.

So we're really excited about, or I'm excited, certainly, and our company is excited to be able to have a participation in this year, certainly with the renewal on the horizon are right before us here.

So I appreciate the opportunity and any questions, happy to answer.

So thank you.

Thank you so much.

I'm really excited to hear more from you and the other panels.

Colleagues, let's go ahead and hold our questions for the new appointees until after everyone gets a chance to speak here this morning.

Thank you so much.

Let's move on.

Is it Damian next?

Great.

Good morning, everyone.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, council members, for this opportunity to introduce myself and be part of the House of Levy.

Can everyone hear me?

First time trying a new microphone, so I'm excited about that.

Yes, I've lived in Seattle for approximately 21 years.

basically have gone through some of the challenges of low income housing and being on that portion of the total to where I had to navigate.

certain elements to find housing for my family and what not.

And I've seen this progress and I've also worked for Catholic Community Services for a number of years.

I've been a partner and an advocate for the impoverished community and challenges that were faced in that community.

And I'm at a better place in life because of my commitments to that.

And I'd like to be in a position to help champion stewardship and change and help out with that.

I'm sorry, I'm a little nervous, but I mean well, and I just want to help, so.

Amazing.

Thank you very much.

And impressive 11 years of work at Catholic Community Services as well.

So thank you for sharing your personal story and for the work that you brought to this.

Yes.

Thank you.

I appreciate the opportunity.

Thank you.

Thanks, Damian.

Next, we have Denise.

Hi.

Thank you so much.

So yes, I'm Denise Rodriguez.

I'm executive director at Washington Homeownership Resource Center.

We are a statewide nonprofit that provides information and referral for people around all things homeownership.

So most often that involves distressed homeowners who are seeking foreclosure prevention assistance and also low to moderate income homebuyers who are looking for ways to achieve their dream of homeownership.

It also includes repair assistance and other types of things that can support people in being successful.

I have been really passionate about housing stability as a really essential tool to family and personal stability ever since my first launch into asset building as a fellow with central staff working to launch the Bank on Seattle King County initiative.

Since then, working more broadly in financial empowerment, I have really come to know that housing stability is at the core of financial empowerment work.

And so my efforts have focused more and more on that area of housing.

And so, you know, really excited to be able to ensure that the resources that are part of the levy are supporting the goals and hoping to bring, you know, a lens of homeownership and how homeownership programs are working, and then also increasing equity and access to homeownership is an important thing that I hope to bring to the work.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Yes, absolutely critical.

I just was asked in a community forum last night about what are we doing for new time homeowners?

So now folks will know more about that because of your presentation.

All right, and Dan.

Yeah, so the opposite of home ownership.

My name is Dan Wise.

I'm Deputy Director at Catholic Community Services.

For over two decades, I've worked with folks that are experiencing homelessness in our community.

And through that work, I've really seen that there's nothing more transformative in a person's life than being able to have a home and sustain that home.

And so I'm really excited.

had the opportunity of developing housing using the Seattle Housing Levy funds and the ability to open a building and welcome folks into their new home is just amazing.

And I'm really excited to work with my former colleague, Damian, and the other members of the committee on this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And a founding board member of Aurora Commons, is that right?

Very impressive.

Yes.

Well, thank you all.

Stephanie, I'll turn it back over to you for any concluding comments before I see if there's questions from the committee.

Sure.

Just wanted to note again, Patience wasn't able to join us, but she is our fifth new appointee.

And I think you're all very familiar with Patience's work, but she is newly the Executive Director of the Housing Development Consortium, and I'm sure you'll see her again very soon.

Yeah, the last thing I just wanted to say here, and I think Joel alluded to this, with the end of the seven-year term for the 2016 housing levy coming to a close next year, the Housing Levy Oversight Committee is going to be asked to share their diverse knowledge, expertise, and experience as we plan for renewal of the Housing Levy in 2023. So it's a really important time to have such great people on this committee.

So thank you.

Very well said, and the timing is so critical for us to both be planning for 2023 sharing with the communit levy has been able to ac also talking about what m be done.

Do any of you ha some of the things that y in anticipation of the co having with folks next ye about the things that you would really like to highlight as either well done or things that you'd like to continue to see growth in as we think about what that next iteration of the housing levy looks like.

Anything that really excites you at this moment in time and joining the Housing Levy Oversight Board.

I guess I can comment.

You know, as a developer, the one thing that is very obvious to those in the field is the Office of Housing, the City of Seattle, is the leader, is the leader in providing affordable funds, not just through the levy, but through MHA and other things.

And the city, through, as Stephanie said, has continually supported this.

And so I think our jobs on being stewards of this is as critical as ever with rising constructing costs with limited land prices.

So I think as much as we enjoy the support, I think we need to continue to really be good stewards and ensure that the trust of the public is remains so that the The levy continues to shine.

Well, I don't think there's been any real big controversies that I've seen, whether it's the levy or anything with city supporting.

Never enough money, but I think there's a lot of opportunities, and I'll just stop there.

Yeah, I think the thing that excites me particularly is that the Office of Housing has been an incredible steward of this resource, but they've also been really innovative.

And I think we've seen with ARPA funds and rapid acquisition, just how innovative and how nimble the department is at piecing funding together for these complex projects.

And so I'm really excited about with the renewal, what opportunities are afforded.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you for those answers.

And I saw Damian, you had your mic off mute too.

I'll just note seven parcels have been taken off of the private market in the last year alone.

That's 400 units by using city funds, state funds, and the American Rescue Plan Act dollars that you mentioned.

And so, you know, I think part of our goals over the next few months, over the next year is to really elevate some of those stories so that these great examples can be shared.

Damian, please go ahead.

Yes, I'm excited for a number of reasons, but I'll just share one.

I sat in on our city of Seattle building performance and standards open house yesterday and how this connects to the housing levy with equity within the BIPOC community and other various levels as far as home ownership.

Me personally, I've gone through low-income housing, and I've been forced to move outside of Seattle and those things.

So I understand the complexity of this and how it ties into sustainability.

And just so having that opportunity to be a steward and part of that is very exciting to me. coming from a facility standpoint as well.

So thinking about the future and reducing carbon footprints and being carbon neutral and such, as well as creating affordable housing within that.

So it's a tandem approach.

So I'm just fortunate to be here to talk about it.

Great.

And Denise, did you have something?

I was just going to add, I think one of the things that I'd be most excited to see in future levy would be a continued focus on preventing displacement.

And I think that was something that we achieved in the last levy, including some funding available to help struggling homeowners be able to stay in their homes.

The data that we were looking at to support the last levy was really telling about which communities were facing forces of displacement and how that was impacting certain homeowners.

And I feel like that is a lens that I want to bring even more to make sure that we are continuing to support health around the entire housing ecosystem.

I think that's one way that I try to look at things is homeowners who lose their homes become renters, which increases pressure in the rental market.

So, you know, there's a whole ecosystem that happens and the entire ecosystem of housing in our area is in distress.

So, having a resource like the levy to be able to do the work that's needed that works for us in our communities based on our needs here is really, really powerful.

So, I'm excited to, you know, see what we do with the next round.

Love that.

The both and approach.

Both prevent displacement and create additional housing throughout the city.

Councilmember Herbold, Vice Chair, please go ahead.

Thanks.

This line of conversation that we're having right now around levee renewal and what we want to see more of perhaps in the renewal in the area of preservation and rapid acquisition.

I am hoping that we could spend some time or the oversight committee could spend some time also thinking about how the next levy and some of the policies that the council has worked with OH to put in place, how they can work together.

A couple of examples, the Community Preference Program for development of housing, in areas that have seen a lot of gentrification.

The Community Preference Program allows the property manager to rent up to people who represent the characteristics of folks who traditionally lived in the community and have been pushed out.

Similarly, the City Council has done some work and is hoping to do some more work under the leadership of Councilmember Mosqueda, Chair Mosqueda, on the Notice of Intent to Sell Ordinance, sort of Seattle's version of Notice of First Refusal.

And so that's a mechanism where tenants can come forward and say, we know our building is vulnerable to redevelopment and we would like the city to to acquire it.

And so I think we're going to be making some changes to that ordinance this year.

But again, to the extent that we can think about how our funding objectives align with some of the policy that we've put in place, I think that is a really good way to ensure that policy is able to leverage funds and vice versa.

Just wanted to throw that out there.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Vice Chair.

Please go ahead, Joel.

If I could just address that really quickly, is one project, and I think this is an area that I'd like to see the city get behind further, is those families that are in areas that have owned property for generations and are looking to sell because they're getting older, One project, a couple of projects we're looking at, and I've done one through OH, is to provide the family the ability to repurchase the property.

So there's going to be affordable housing, over 100 units of affordable housing.

They're going to remain on the ground floor as a commercial tenant.

And in 85 years, they're going to have the opportunity to repurchase the property at a discounted rate.

And so what that does, it maintains, it provides kind of an end, and hopefully you provide more affordable housing, but then give the opportunity first right of refusal for the family that's owned it for generations to repurchase it with their heirs down the future.

Well, thank you all so very much.

And I appreciate the initial list of possible policy areas to look into.

We'll take one more question and then we're going to go ahead and call the vote.

Council Member Peterson, please go ahead.

Thank you.

I wanted to echo what Councilor Herbold was saying about being mindful of the existing policies, policy goals that we have in terms of preventing displacement and preserving existing low-income housing.

And another item is making sure that during this homelessness crisis that we are prioritizing people experiencing homelessness and making the housing first um, goal and policy, which is proven to work well, uh, to help those experiencing homelessness to have the Office of Housing and the Regional Homelessness Authority working together and our Human Services Department collaborating even more than they already do, especially during the crisis of homelessness.

And thank you for your your willingness to serve.

I've got my I'm a big supporter of the housing levy and really appreciate what you're going to be doing.

Thank you.

Wonderful, thank you.

Thank you all.

And again, I wanna lift up as well, as was noted by Stephanie, patients from ALABA, also new appointee, has been in front of our committee many a times, and is the newly appointed executive director of the Housing Development Consortium, among many other noteworthy experiences and skills in the application packet that you all received.

Along with the application packet was the information for the reappointments of Valerie Fisher, Aaron Christian Ishasaki, Anne Malone, Colin Morgan-Cross, and Pradeepta Udupaya.

OK, wonderful.

And Stephanie, do you have anything else you'd like to add?

No, that's it.

Thank you.

We're very excited to move forward with these new appointees.

Okay, wonderful.

Well, we are very excited and I think we could probably chat housing all day, but I will let you all go and want to say thank you.

Before we let you go, let's go ahead and vote.

I move the committee recommends confirmation of the appointments one through 11 in the board packet in front of us for the Housing Levy Oversight Committee.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Vice Chair.

Are there any additional comments or questions?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll of the recommendation for the appointments in items one through 11?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Madam Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor.

Thank you very much.

It is unanimous.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation that the appointments and reappointments be confirmed, and that recommendation will be sent to the Seattle City Council full committee meeting on April 12th for a final vote.

You are not required to participate in that meeting.

We will make sure to send your offices, your teams the final vote tally, but I anticipate it will be overwhelming support for the incredible partnership that we are entering into with your work on the Housing Levy Oversight Committee.

So thank you again for your interest in serving.

and congratulations on this initial process.

Appreciate it.

Thank you all.

Okay, Madam Clerk, let's go ahead and move on to items 12 through 15 on the agenda.

Agenda items number 12 through 15, appointments to the Sweden Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

OK, wonderful.

So thank you very much.

We have with us Bridget Eagle Eagle.

You'll have to correct me, Bridget, on your last name from the Office of Sustainability and the Environment.

I really appreciate you being here with us today to walk us through the appointments and reappointments to the Sugary Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board.

Very excited to have some folks here with us today and look forward to hearing more from you.

So, Bridget, I'll turn it right over to you.

Great, thank you, good morning and thanks Madam Chair and the entire committee today for the time.

The last name's Igo, lots of vowels in there, it's very confusing.

So today we have two appointments and two reappointments for members of the Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board.

This board was established to advise the mayor and city council on the food access and prenatal to three programs and services that are funded by revenue from the Sweetened Beverage Tax.

So we have two of the appointees with us today and two who are not.

So what I thought I would do is just first introduce all of them.

And for one of our appointments, I have a personal statement since she could not make it.

And then I can turn it over for discussion and for Barbara and Jen, who it looks like are on the call, to be able to say more about their interests.

All right, so first we have Bilan Aden.

She's a mayoral appointment as a community representative, position four on the CAB.

Ms. Aden is the associate director of the African Community Housing and Development, an organization that supports the African diaspora, immigrant, and refugee communities to attain health and housing stability, economic development, high quality education, and referrals to legal services.

Bilan is not able to make it today.

I am allowed to share that she just had her first baby yesterday and we're thrilled for her, but I do have a personal statement.

Miss Aiden writes, members of the African diaspora immigrant refugee community throughout Seattle struggle to obtain affordable, healthy, culturally relevant food.

I'm passionate about increasing access for my community via food access programs, farmers markets, and culturally and linguistically relevant outreach.

As a member of the CAB, I hope to increase awareness of the specific needs of my community and advise on appropriate strategies for addressing community food access and early childhood development needs.

Next, it's my privilege to introduce Barbara Rockey.

She's a mayoral appointment as a public health representative.

This is position nine on the CAB.

And I'll just give a brief introduction because I do see that Barbara is with us today.

Barbara is a senior education specialist at Treehouse.

She's been actively involved in improving access to nutritious foods at Seattle Public Schools and for foster children.

She has experience in key public health competencies like program planning, communication skills, community engagement, and systems thinking.

She's incredibly community-centered and passionate about addressing inequities in education, public health, housing, food, employment, and mental health.

Then we have Jen Moss, formerly Jen Hay and listed as Jen Hay in her appointment paperwork.

She is a mayoral reappointment to the CAB and is a public health representative in position eight.

She's also a co-chair of the CAB with Tanika Thompson.

Jen's with us today, so again, I'll keep it very brief.

She's a registered dietitian dedicated to reducing health inequities through nutrition education and support of policies and practices that promote healthy lifestyles and health equity.

She works with WSU King County Extension and the statewide SNAP-Ed program and is deeply involved as well with the Healthy King County Coalition.

And then finally, we have Dan Torres, mayoral reappointment as education and early learning representative, and this is position number 11. Dan has focused his career on systems work to support families and promote equity.

He works with the Bezos Family Foundation to cultivate partnerships for the VROOM program.

This is a science-based tool for families and caregivers that promotes child development.

And before that, he was executive director of the Washington State Essentials for Childhood Initiative.

So that is everyone.

And I, should we turn it over to Barbara to say more, or maybe to you, Madam Chair, to lead us through the next part.

No, that sounds great.

It's great to see you again, Bridget, and thank you for walking us through all of these incredible nominees and reappointments.

It's wonderful to hear from the office and all that you do and to have these new partners to be with us for the Sugary Sweetened Beverage Advisory Board, Community Advisory Board, or just the CAB, right?

And yeah, Barbara, why don't we turn it over to you first?

If there's anything you'd like to share about your background and your interest in the CAB, we'd love to hear more.

Thank you so much for the committee, as well as the council for having me.

And thank you, Bridget, for also those wonderful kind words that you shared.

I take this work very seriously, and I feel like it's an honor to be serving in this capacity.

My approach in terms of looking at this work is through a public health lens.

And I've worked in with youth and foster care and with my organization for now about almost nine years and also worked in education with the completion about nine years of that as well.

So I think that I've been able to look at cross systems impacts and knowing where food disparities fall within that.

And also knowing that families need access to nutritional resources such as food and substances that are important to the nutrition and as well as the development of children.

So I'm excited to know that Department of Early Learning is a part of our work as well.

And so knowing that working with my partnerships with the community and living in the community, I live in the Rainier Beach area.

So I'm completely immersed from my professional career as well as my personal day to day life.

and knowing the impact of food disparities and injustices, and also knowing the cross system impacts.

And so if we're looking at this work and serving on the committee, allow me to bring my skills of community, but also professional skills, as well as my passion for this work to advocate as well as to work on behalf of my community, really holds great value to me.

And I'm just really excited to know that I'm going to be serving and working with such a a broad scope of talented individuals who are also equally passionate about this work and come with a depth and a broad range of experiences, which I think is what we definitely need in our community.

And also the fact that we have someone such as Elaine, who is also front and center in the community, who's also serving on the committee.

So I'm excited to move forward in this work and look forward to all the things that come, but also the learning.

as well to be in serving in this capacity.

That's incredible.

We're very excited for you to bring your expertise to the CAB and thank you for being here with us.

Jen, would you like to share some of your experience as well and what drives you to seek reappointment and anything else you'd like to share with the committee?

Sure, so I have been very lucky to be involved in the sugar sweetened beverage tax and then the Community Advisory Board from the very beginning in its inception when we worked with the Healthy King County Coalition and then a lot of the community based organizations at the front and center being got green, which Taneika Thompson is deeply involved with.

And it's been a pleasure to watch how the framing of this tax has to shifted to a place of increasing food access and increasing access to services for folks in the prenatal to young child arena.

I have been on the CAB since 2017, I think, 17, 18. And it has been an absolute pleasure to watch as the CAB has evolved in many, many ways.

And we're finally at a full full board almost, and it is a very diverse board with a lot of incredible talent, expertise, and perspectives that I am very excited to be helping co-chair and also helping to build up new leaders in the CAB and move that place of feeling connected to the work broader in what we do.

One of the big things I would say that has come out of the last few years on the CAB, especially as we worked through the health crisis of the pandemic, was that our two camps on the CAB that we had maybe experienced at some point around food access and early learning have really come together and we've seen the synergy between those two priorities and we found common goals and common objectives and worked really closely to to get those out into back out to the community and to see how the different programs that we recommend funding for really raise up both of those goals.

So I'm thrilled to be part of the CAB.

It's one of the favorite things that I do in the work that I do.

And just a background there I also work for the SNAP-Ed program.

I've worked for the SNAP-Ed program for 14 years which is nutrition education in communities where people are experiencing low income, and we work in a variety of places and across systems, policies, as well as direct nutrition education.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Bridget, is there anything else you'd like to add before we open it up for comments or questions from the committee?

I don't think so.

I guess just to say that the community advisory board is working on their annual budget recommendations and those will be transmitted to the mayor probably in June, early June, in the hopes of being able to have meaningful input on the proposed budget recommendations.

So the full council will also receive a copy of those initial budget recommendations.

Excellent.

Well, thank you very much.

Colleagues, I'll open it up to any additional comments or questions from you, but I'll just build off of what Bridget just said.

Myself and Frida Cuevas, who's actually the clerk for our committee as well, she also is our lead on health policy issues.

I know she's been working closely with the CAB over the last five years.

We greatly appreciate the recommendations for the budget priorities that we have.

make sure that the cab revenue or the revenue that's being generated from the sugary sweetened beverage tax really aligns with what the cab had envisioned and also with what voters had committed to.

And especially during these times where we see so much stress and trauma in the community, recognizing the way that the funding from the sugary sweetened beverage tax actually can help not only alleviate physical health, but also help improve mental health is an incredible opportunity for us to think about how we emerge from this pandemic in a healthier, more holistic way.

So I'm really thankful for the work that you've done and that we've been such a groundbreaking policy, not only in terms of how it's been passed, but how it's been implemented in our city.

folks have you know called from around the country with interest in how we've done this and so you all have been the engine that's made it possible.

Is there anything that's of interest to you maybe in in this time in the I shouldn't even say in the wake because we're still in the midst of pandemic in the midst of the pandemic and looking at who's been disproportionately impacted notably folks of color and especially women of color by the economic consequences of COVID.

Are there any things that you're really thinking about putting as a priority topic for you and the CAB deliberations to help respond to the crisis that COVID has made worse?

I can actually speak.

I think one of the things that we are really thinking about this work, certainly from an education lens and what we do know is that families and certainly specifically students, as we look at our schools and the funding, that is deemed to be cut.

And so during the pandemic, there were extra resources that were available to families as well as students within schools.

So school lunch programs were actually a little bit more robust.

And so as the funding looks to be scaled back over the coming months and into the next school year, there is great concern to what that's going to look like.

And also we're heading into the summer.

And so what we do know that having access to quality food as well as nutritional foods becomes a concern for many families.

So I'm hoping that as the CAB, we can look at this lens as well to our work and how we can actually kind of grow that area and how we're looking at schools and how we're funding the programs and how it's going to be able to offer a greater sense of resources that families can look to and specifically when we're talking about schools.

So that was what I'd like to kind of think about as we're looking at this work too in the coming year and also with the budgets.

I love that answer.

Thank you for bringing that up and the focus on kiddos and what they've been through and their health.

both physical and mental.

So look forward to working with you more and really excited about what you are bringing to the cab.

Great to have you back, Jen.

Appreciate your interest in this.

Colleagues, I'll just summarize again.

We have appointments 12 through 15, appointments of Bill and Adam, appointment of Barbara Rocky, reappointment of Jen Moss, and reappointment of Dan And those are the four appointments and reappointments in front of us.

I would like to make a motion that the committee recommends confirmation of items 12 through 15. Is there a second?

Thank you very much, Vice Chair.

Is there any additional comments or questions?

Hearing none, lots of excitement.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the confirmation of items 1 through 15?

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Madam Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor, none opposed.

Wonderful.

It is unanimous.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation that the appointments and reappointments be confirmed.

This will be sent to the Seattle City Council April 12th meeting for a final vote.

Again, you don't have to be present to win, but we will make sure to sing your praises and the entire council will also have your complete application packet to review your credentials as well.

Thank you again, Bridget, and thanks to the team in your office for all that you do as well.

Please extend our appreciation to the full cab.

the next time you chat.

Welcome.

Almost I should not be too premature, but I think it's going to be a unanimous vote as well on the 12th.

So we'll make sure to send you the final vote tallies.

And thank you again for your interest in serving and reserving on the cab.

Wonderful.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for all the support.

Of course.

Thank you very much.

Good to see you, Bridget.

Bye-bye, everyone.

You too.

Bye-bye.

Okay, let's move on.

We have item number 16 on our agenda here.

Madam Clerk, could you please read item number 16 into the record?

Item number 16, Cannabis Business and Licensing Equity for briefing and discussion.

Okay, folks, I'm really excited about the panels that we have in front of us today.

We're actually going to break item number 16 into two panels that will give us a chance to ask questions midway through and then at the end of the panel presentation.

Thanks so much to Aretha Basu from my office who's been working with the folks who are on the line here today to ensure that we had a robust discussion.

We're excited about these panels.

I think that they're able to help us continue our conversation about what cannabis equity funds and equity licensing processes look like.

Again, we're looking to have conversations from folks who are in other jurisdictions across the country who have licensing that is really done through an equity lens and also We're excited to hear from our very own Liquor Control Board team.

We're going to have two presenters talking about what our state currently does.

We are going to hear directly from small business owners who were able to enter the cannabis industry through the equity programs that they have in their jurisdictions.

This includes from the Academy of Cannabis Science that trains the workers to be able to sell products and businesses and from the state's licensing experts who help our business owners be able to open their shops in our region.

So again, thanks to the Liquor Control Board staff and the Liquor Control Board member who's with us here today.

We also have on our agenda as part of the first panel, Javier Humboldt Root, excuse me, Javier Hernandez Humboldt Root, Trey Wickling from Academy of Cannabis, and we did have with us, intending to present Norbert Pickett from Cannabalist in D.C.

Unfortunately, Norbert let us know this morning that they are not going to be able to join us due to a last minute scheduling conflict.

So we appreciate their interest from Cannabalist in D.C.

But we are very excited to have Javier Hernandez and Tri Wickling here with us today from Humble Root and again Academy of Science.

of Cannabis Science.

With that, I will let them introduce themselves and tell us more about their organizations, and then we'll take some questions from our committee members.

And then we're going to go into the Liquor Control Board Cannabis Board members, who will be Ollie Garrett, a member of the Liquor Control Board Cannabis Board, and Becky Smith, the Director of Licensing and Regulation.

And we'll take some questions at that second panel as well.

But that, I thought, might be a good way to break up the discussion.

OK, wonderful.

So good morning, Javier and Trey.

I would like to turn it over to you, Javier.

Go ahead, Trey.

I see both of you.

I will turn it over to you.

You all can decide who goes first.

Javier, go ahead.

Go ahead.

My name is Javier.

I guess I'll go first, right?

Okay, sounds good.

I'm the founder and CEO of Humble Root, which is a cannabis delivery company based in Sacramento.

We are a social equity company and we're about seven years in operation now.

Welcome.

Hi, my name is Trey Rickling.

I'm the founder and director of Academy of Cannabis Science.

We were founded in 2015. We're a Washington-based company.

We were the first company approved by the Department of Health to train medical cannabis consultants.

We do that in partnership with Seattle Central College, who's been a very brave academic partner and one of the first.

And I'm here today in support of equity efforts as an advocate for transformative influence of education.

Although we're not taking a particular position on any particular proposal at this point, we're certainly one to champion the efforts of equity.

And as Mr. Burfik noted at the top of the meeting this morning, the war on cannabis has had a tremendous negative effect, not just on individuals, but entire communities.

And we want to be part of that effort.

Additionally, we're partnered with Highline College, with UNLV, with South Seattle College, which everyone should know is taking the very bold step of seeking to have the largest education and professional training footprint in the state.

They're currently developing about 10 different courses in cannabis, as well as two certificate programs.

And they continue to roll that out over the year, which aligns with their values as an institution related to social justice and equity.

We have also been partnered with Last Prisoner Project and their Prisons to Prosperity program to train constituents released from prison to work successfully in professional jobs in cannabis.

We're partnered with Green Legacy.

It's a local organization founded by one of our former students to help people support and empower underrepresented cannabis entrepreneurs and founders.

And we're in conversations with Think Big, an equity organization founded by C.J.

Wallace, the son of the late Chris Wallace, popularly known as Notorious B.I.G. But we're happy to be here today, and thank you for the invite, and we'd like to contribute anything we can to the conversation.

Wonderful, thank you so much.

Javier, perhaps I'll start with you.

Some of the questions that we're interested in from your perspective, if you could share a little bit more about Humble Root, how the CORE program supported you to be a business owner, and what are some of the challenges?

that you have experienced had you not had the CORE program.

And if you want to do a quick reminder for us about what CORE stands for and what it is, we've been having these conversations over the last three months, two months, and would love to hear more about how the experience has informed your practice and what you, from a business owner perspective, see as either the pros or what could be done as we think about a similar equity approach in Seattle.

Yeah, of course.

So yeah, Humble Root is a non-storefront dispensary, which just means that we're delivery only.

We were a legacy brand, so we were founded in 2015 in the medical market, pre-licensing.

The core program is the social equity program in Sacramento, which helps people of color, people that grew up in the impoverished areas in Sacramento, as well as impacted areas in Sacramento, get licensing.

One of the main things that the core program did help us with is get priority licensing.

I think that's one of the most crucial things is getting to the market before the big money comes in.

Once they're in, it's much harder to take that market share.

They did also provide a workshop for licensing, as well as some cash grants to our businesses.

These cash grants were used for things like security upgrades and equipment upgrades to help us stay competitive.

The challenges that we would have had without CORE program is probably the long and costly licensing process.

Non-equity applicants without priority licensing usually take about six months or so or upwards of construction and kind of getting ready to roll.

With the social equity program, we were able to cut that time in about half.

As I said earlier, kind of time is the most important thing here, not only because you don't stop paying rent and for all these other overhead things that keep going, but because access to the market early is kind of imperative to get into people's minds.

And, you know, if you're not into the market early, you're going to spend a lot of money trying to fight for that market share later.

So to me, I think the ability to get to the market early, as well as, you know, a little less costly, you know, they gave us free licensing as well too, has been really helpful for us.

And then I'll ask you one more question and I'll go over to Trey and then I'll ask a few questions there and then we'll open it up to the committee for additional questions before we go to the labor control board.

Javier, can you talk a little bit about some of the issues that you've experienced around racial equity that may have served as a barrier to getting more folks of color, more business owners of color to be able to enter the cannabis industry And what opportunities have you found there to be through the core program that has promoted community of color business owners?

And what would you like to see in terms of additional training, maybe for either business owners or for staff?

Yeah.

So I think one of the main things that we struggled with, maybe pre-licensing too, was finding a property that would be properly zoned for cannabis.

We don't come from money or any, you know, big connections like that.

I'm a first generation Hispanic here.

So I didn't have a lot of connections.

Finding property owners to allow you to go into those buildings were difficult.

You know, in the past, I think it was more of an issue where you couldn't have a building that was financed by any bank because of, you know, the feds would come in and try to compensate that.

Once we were able to get a property, I mean, finding the property is difficult, not only because it's difficult to find something for money, but also the zoning on these properties have been really hard.

A lot of them have already been taken up.

Once we do find a property, you know, usually we get a much higher lease rate than a non-cannabis business.

And then on top of that, those properties usually require a lot of build out, which is quite expensive.

And these things are all, you know, as a social equity company, we're probably not going to buy a building.

So we're investing into someone else's building, you know, upwards of six figures typically on the build out, which can be pretty expensive.

The land use, you know, entitlements that we also get stays with the land.

It's not even something that we as a social equity applicant own.

So one of those, the barrier that I see is land.

Even once we get it, we don't own it, and we're doing, you know, we're upgrading the properties for someone that already owns a property and is already wealthy.

Some opportunities that I would like to see for my staff training, as I said, we're a brand that's about seven years in, so we've developed a pretty good training program ourself, but something that would help other social equity companies, I think, would be basic cannabis knowledge, as well as medical cannabis knowledge.

A lot of people that want to join the industry have very surface-level knowledge on it, and that's not, you know, ideal.

Typically, what you want to have is someone that has knowledge on cannabis, and it's imperative because that's what you're going to use to build rapport with your customers and kind of solidify that relationship with them.

And that's something that doesn't really exist too much here in California.

I think Oakland has a course, but in Sacramento, we haven't had anything yet.

Excellent, thank you.

I'm gonna go ahead and turn it over to Trey.

Thanks again for being here with us.

uh, the Academy Academy of Cannabis Science.

Um, and I'll just notice what you mentioned, not taking a position.

That's, that's totally great.

We're still in sort of information gathering mode.

Uh, no legislation has been drafted yet.

And so looking forward to hearing more from you about what existing training programs are out there for the advances of cannabis industry in Washington state and a little bit more about what the Academy does.

Um, and, uh, any additional information you'd like to share from your perspective of how you are adding, um, opportunities for folks to enter into this industry, and especially through an equity lens.

Thank you very much.

And I failed to mention, I'm a patient first.

And so that was also a strong contributing factor for our passion for what we do.

And I was able to witness and be part of the medical cannabis program that pre-existed 502 and know that the culture and rules and laws changed around all of that.

But as you might be aware, there's no required training for any buttender working in the state of Washington to work in a retail space.

Other states have a baseline requirement.

Now there is, I will say, when the Patient Protection Act came on, it created the cannabis consultant position, or medical marijuana consultant position, and it's a 20-hour program that is, exists as the highest level of recognized authority in retail space, not only in our state, but I don't know of another program in the country that has a program that's as comprehensive as Washington State.

So I want to recognize our state for, I think, going over and above in attempting to fill that gap and make sure that when patients come into a store, that they're greeted by somebody who understands, like Javier talked about the importance of medical cannabis different qualifying conditions and how cannabis may benefit without, of course, you know, veering into acting as a healthcare professional, which they are not.

So that does exist, but it exists as an opt-in part of the program.

So stores do not have to participate in the medical program.

They opt into that and then they have employees that are trained.

So if a store chooses to not opt into the medical program, It's up to them whether they train anyone or not.

I went into a store last week and asked, who's in charge of your training?

And they kind of looked at me dumbfounded.

They're like, well, what do you mean?

I said, well, who trains your staff?

And they had no answer at all.

And so that's sort of, although that might be an exception or a minority of licensees, it does exist.

And when we're talking about handling a controlled substance, I think we owe it to the public.

to make sure that they know what they're handling, what they're recommending to patients, making sure, or I mean, to adult users, and doing everything they can, especially for first time, or first time and a long time users, to make sure that their experiences are safe and their dosing protocols are within bounds of reason.

So we think education is critical.

All of our content, since early days, has focused on the social injustice of cannabis and i think likewise that's important for everybody in the industry to understand what's going on the ongoing crime is that over forty thousand people are in jail today some serving life sentences for what other people make in life savings and so you know that's the ongoing injustice and and i know you all are aware of that and that's why you're tackling this issue we think it's important that everybody working in the space understands the context of the space we're working in.

So that, one for empathy, two for understanding, and ultimately for, you know, the cannabis industry, or the community of cannabis should be the most diverse community you can belong to, right?

People of all ages, all persuasions, all backgrounds, and And the industry itself, people working in the shops, people owning businesses, I think should reflect that diversity.

So, sorry, that was long-winded, but.

That's excellent.

And it dovetails very nicely with some of the comments that we heard earlier from other jurisdictions, but also from workers on the front line, especially folks who are interested in having access to training programs and also maybe small business training support themselves.

So I do see a question from our committee members.

So I think at this point, why don't we flush out some more of the answers that you can provide for us, both Javier and Trey, in response to the committee questions, if that sounds okay.

And of course, if there's other items that you haven't shared, just as an overview of the work that you do, we'd love to hear more of that as well, if you want to integrate that into your answers, or we'll come back to you before wrapping up this panel.

Council Member Nelson, would you like to ask a question?

Sorry about that.

Thank you very much.

This question is for Trey.

I did not know about this training program, and you said that businesses have to opt in.

When they opt in, do they have to pay for the training, or is it free?

I guess that's what my first question would be.

Yes, ma'am.

They opt in, and they pay.

Employers typically will pay for their employees to go through it.

but some employees or even some prospect employees who just, we talk to a lot of people who are professionals in other fields who want to be part of the cannabis industry, either in part or in full, and so we train a lot of people to take their transferable skills and apply them to cannabis, but we give them the language, the history, the context, understanding of the industry they're going into so they can do that effectively, but it is absolutely opt-in program.

Okay, and just ballpark, what is, how much does it cost?

Or is it based on the amount of time someone or the amount of hours of training?

Sure.

No, we have a collection of classes.

That particular class is, is between 20 and $25 per credit hour.

So it's $399.

We offer a discount for, um, you know, when, when people enroll a whole staff or a number of people, but our, um, our costs for delivery, we've intentionally kept low.

So, all of our courses between $20 to $25 per credit hour.

Additionally, it's all online.

So that's been the nice thing for us, is being able to welcome people, whether you're in SWIM or Walla Walla, or right here in Seattle.

And we've had, and this is an aside, but we've been pleased to, we really were focused on the Washington audience, and we've been pleased to attract people from Guam, from South Africa, from Romania, from Delhi, India recently.

And so the need and the hunger is out there.

Like Javier mentioned, it's so necessary for people to understand the industry they're working in and the substance that they're handling.

And we've been excited to see passion from all over.

Thank you.

Thanks, Council Member Nelson.

And I'm wondering if maybe the public commenter from this morning had the opportunity to go through one of your trainings.

They mentioned the opportunity to have done that and then also noted the cost that their employer had picked up, which is great.

I'm wondering, Javier, from your perspective as a business owner, if this is something that's available and of interest, what are some things that you'd like to see You know, obviously you're in a different jurisdiction, but if you had a magic wand, what would you like to see as a business owner to help make it more possible or even affordable for folks to be able to go through training programs like this?

Um, so, uh, the city of Sacramento has put on something similar, like the workshop training classes for people that wanted to join the cannabis industry on the workforce level.

Um, this was, you know, all social equity applicants as well, too.

Um, but it provided some basic cannabis knowledge and, um, you know, some business, uh, like sales training and stuff like that.

It wasn't too, um, intensive.

I don't believe they have a built out curriculum, uh, kind of what kind of science has over here, but it's much more, um, early, I would say.

And Trey, did you have any other thoughts and response to that as well?

No, I would just say that although I'm representing the Academy today, it's proud to say that we're made up of physicians and lawyers, naturopaths, nurses, veterinarians.

And so we're a firm believer in high of intelligence.

So I'm never trying to be the smartest person in the room.

I'm always learning.

And like we remind students, this is like getting into a job in tech.

None of us are going to be able to lay down on our laurels of what we know.

We need to keep employees constantly up to date because our information is changing all the time.

And so as a new study that comes out about the effectiveness of a certain route of administration for a qualified condition comes out, it's important that people know, as well as studies that might come out to talk about particular harm and how we can avoid those.

Excellent.

Yes, Council Member Nelson, please go ahead.

Yeah, sorry, one more last question.

For Javier, I might have missed it in your presentation, but how is CORE paid for?

I think that we had a presenter from Sacramento in a previous meeting, but I don't know if there was a 5% tax or something, I can't remember.

So what is the funding source for your program?

So the state has given grants to individual cities and counties.

And then those cities and counties create their own social equity programs and kind of administer the money how they see fit.

OK.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

One last question and then we look forward to hearing from the liquor control board representatives and staff about how they're working to encourage equity through their licensing and training approach as well.

If I could ask Javier and Trey, as we're thinking about equity in the context of Seattle and recognizing we were like, I think the first state to move forward with legalization.

What I'm hearing throughout the last two years is while we were the first state on legalization, we're a little bit behind in terms of where other jurisdictions are in terms of how we've added equity into the application of public policy.

if at least at the local level.

So not impugning our LCB fans, but at the local level, as we think about how we could now fold back in equity approach in dollars, support, you mentioned, you know, property, acquiring property, the zoning changes, the ability to work and have access to capital, Javier, some of the things.

If there was one thing where you're like, hey, as you're building this, this has been the most helpful thing for us to see, any indication of what that might be as we think about pulling together public policy?

Well, like you guys said, you guys were first to implement the recreational market.

So it might be a little backwards, but to me, it was really the access to the market, the priority licensing.

I can't say enough how much I wouldn't be here today if I didn't have that priority licensing.

As big companies come in, such as Eaze, they really eat up the market share and it's really hard to take that back.

Giving us the opportunity to get in there first was really imperative.

Like I said, it's the only reason why I'm here.

We wouldn't be able to compete if we came in late.

One thing that some cities are starting to look at is reducing the city tax.

This is probably one of the biggest challenges that we do face.

In California, we're taxed effectively over 50%, which makes it impossible to have a successful business.

The way that breaks down is we have a 28% state excise tax, a 4% city tax, a 1% neighborhood tax.

8.5% sales tax, a 21% federal tax, which is also subject to 280E.

And most of those taxes are taken off gross, which means that they don't care how we spend our money, including the city tax.

So some cities around here, I know San Francisco recently implemented a two-year moratorium on the city tax, which is they had an 8% tax on the city.

That's going to be very beneficial.

What Sacramento, I believe, is discussing is doing something for the social equity applicants and put a moratorium on that city tax to help them be a little bit more competitive.

That's one thing I could see being beneficial.

As a social equity company, you don't have the same scale of economy as a large business will.

So that tax moratorium is gonna be extremely helpful to keep us competitive pricing-wise with the bigger players.

and then I'll go to Council Member Herbold.

Yes, I think someone mentioned earlier testifying about expungement.

I think anything that we can do to help lower the barriers to expungement, understanding that sometimes those processes involve lawyers and fees and processes that can be complicated.

So for anybody who's not a lawyer, so anything we can do to lower the bar there because people's criminal history certainly follow them.

I think it's important to look at our underage community because if we continue to view cannabis as a criminal activity and involve them in juvenile justice system rather than fines and other deterrence efforts, I think we can do them a disservice and don't want to put anybody in the prison pipeline that doesn't belong there.

Access to capital is huge, of course, because you can It's one thing to have a license.

It's another thing to be able to carry the license and be able to own what you have.

And I do want to hold up the Muckleshoot tribe as a great example.

I think our tribal model here in the state is pretty exceptional.

I love the fact that not just an individual could get a license, but a community gets a license.

So everybody's lifted up.

Everybody can benefit rather than a few individuals.

The Muckleshoot Tribal College teamed up with Joint Rivers when they were about to have their first cannabis store on their land and they did a series.

We worked with them in partnership on a series of six weeks educational event and so once a week we would go and train people about what cannabis was, its history, possible benefit, so that the whole community could learn and then from those community gatherings and those events they effectively were able to choose staff because people started with a head start in their training.

And then the community also kind of had an opportunity to buy in, to express concerns, express fears.

So as a model, I haven't seen anything work as well and be such a fun, engaging and enlightening event as what they did.

And so I just wanted to give a shout out to the Muckleshoot tribe for really approaching this in a different way and leading first with education.

So thank you.

I love that.

Thank you very much.

Vice Chair Herbold, please go ahead.

So I just want to flag a couple of things.

I've mentioned in one of these presentations in the past, but I think it's appropriate, given some of the comments of the panelists, to bring it up again.

The excise tax on cannabis is very high in Washington state.

It's 37%.

I also want to flag that.

Council in the past has showed an interest in reducing the licensing fee that cannabis businesses pay.

FAS has recognized some improvements in the licensing fee that would result in greater equity.

In last year's pre-budget process had actually made a proposal to reduce the business license fee on cannabis business, did make a proposal to the mayor's office.

The mayor's office did not put forward to the council and The council didn't, we could have independently acted on it if we had some understanding of the details of the proposal, but that was not possible at that time.

So just want to flag that FAS does have a proposal for a reduced business license fee that we could take a look at, assuming that they get the support to share that with us from the executive.

Also, just a couple of real quick questions.

And if you covered this, I apologize for asking again.

Does it relate to the social equity licenses that are available in Seattle?

I think there are only 10 or i'm sorry two that are that can be issued in seattle and i understand that that uh that is set by the state but um can you talk a little bit about um the status of issuing those those those two licenses in seattle and then secondly um I would also love to understand about, I think this is for LCB also, what barriers exist currently in licensing for folks who have a criminal history on their background?

Well, I am also happy to use that as a good transition to our folks from LCB, unless Trey or Javier, you had any thoughts about that?

Okay, Council Member Herbold, I think that's a really great transition actually to this second panel and Council Member Reza.

My apologies.

You did a good job.

As the vice chair, you teed up some great questions.

Again, I want to thank Javier and Trey.

If you do have to leave, understandable.

Thank you very much for being here with us this morning.

And if you were able to stay, fantastic.

And there may be more questions for you later.

Today with us on the second part of the panel we have Ali Garrett with the Washington State Liquor Control and Cannabis Board member and Becky Smith, Director of Licensing and Regulation at the Washington Liquor and Cannabis Board.

Thank you both for being here with us today and I will just not add my questions because I think the ones that Council Member Herbold teed up are Perfect time, perfectly timed to roll over to your presentation.

So thank you for being with us.

And Becky, I see you off mute along with Ollie.

Thanks for being here with us today.

I'll let you take it away.

Well, thank you.

Thank you.

And I see we're running close to out of time, and I know we both have other meetings to jump on shortly.

But as I am Liquor Cannabis Board member and have been on the board since August of 2016, being the first state legalizing recreation cannabis, the Liquor Cannabis Board didn't know what they didn't know.

And one of the things that we didn't have in place was an equity program.

In February of 2020, the Liquor Cannabis board introduced House Bill 2870 called the Social Equity Task Force, Social Equity Bill, and that bill passed in February of 2020. As a result of that bill, a Social Equity Task Force was formed, and the first meeting was in late October of 2020. The LCB, in the meantime, did a virtual community meeting throughout the state.

We had three meetings to hear from the community and learn from the community their challenges of getting in, what they thought worked, what didn't work, and just to hear firsthand from the community how not having a social equity program impacted the mostly African-American community, but the minority community at large, and also to just hear the issues and concerns they had throughout the licensing process.

And that kicked off the first Social Equity Task Force meeting later in October of 2020. And from there, Becky is going to now show you and do a presentation on where we currently are and going.

Fantastic.

Thank you, Ollie.

And we do have extra time if you have another pressing meeting.

I apologize for that.

But we have plenty of time right now.

We'll go until 1130. And we have a few two other items if we have the chance to get to.

But I just wanted to make sure you didn't feel pressed for time if there was other things you wanted to share.

And welcome, Becky.

Thanks for being here with us.

And thanks, Ollie, for the overview.

Thank you as well.

And I was hoping I think I sent someone my slide show.

So if they could bring that up, that would be fantastic.

Thank you very much.

Farideh, are you able, Madam Clerk, are you able to tee that up for us?

Give me just a second.

Let me prepare for that.

And we do have the presentation as well linked on today's agenda for the viewing audience.

So if you'd like to start, you are welcome to hold it.

OK, let me just go ahead and start then.

And so I'm going to just kick it off with that you had some questions.

And so I will be addressing some of those questions It's a pretty short slideshow that I wanted just to explain that we currently are not accepting applications for producer, processor, retailer.

That you can buy a business, but you can't currently apply for a business.

That we are looking at, however, with the new social equity program.

And the purpose of that program is to increase the number of cannabis retail licenses held by a social equity applicant.

that part of that is being able to make sure that those applicants from disproportionately impacted areas and reducing the accumulated harm suffered by individual families in the local areas.

that were subject to severe impacts from the war on drugs.

And Ollie mentioned about the law, but the law does authorize Liquor and Cannabis Board to reissue retail licenses that have been forfeited, revoked, canceled, or not previously issued.

The LCB does not have the authority to increase that number of retail licenses for the program.

This must be done by the legislature.

That we currently have 40 licenses available.

And I believe that somebody said we had two in the city of Seattle.

But what I want you to know is that the agency has begun drafting rules to allow more flexibility for social equity applicants to find locations within the county instead of specific cities.

So we have the authority to move it from the city level to the county level, and that will bring on an extra eight licenses available in in King County.

So, for instance, those eight folks could, if there was room available in the City of Seattle, be located in the City of Seattle.

The task force also created to provide LCB with recommendations on how to implement the program and the recommendations that we received from the task force we received in January of this past year.

that rulemaking is currently underway.

We had our first listen and learn, which invited community members to have input on our rules and to understand what it is that we were moving forward with.

That we have, as I mentioned, accepted all of the task force recommendations with the exception of the scoring rubric.

The LCB has proposed a race neutral alternative to the scoring rubric.

that as many of you know, the Federal Equal Protection Clause prohibits the Liquor and Cannabis Board from using explicit racial preference in licensing.

And so our agency has also taken, as I mentioned, we accepted all of the other recommendations with that exception.

We also listened to feedback.

We heard from task force because we, you know, that my staff and myself attended all the task force meetings that we wanted to hear from the community as well about what we could be doing differently.

We held a couple of forums about two years ago.

And with that information, what we did was that we created a website.

So we have a website where folks can go to to look at information or look up information on the social equity program.

We also made changes in criminal history.

So we made changes to the rules and And I'm going to say, can you move that to the next slide, please?

So criminal history rules.

So the goal was to reduce unintentional barriers to enter into the legal cannabis market.

That although we, you know, that although we had allowed for folks that had criminal history into and to be able to apply for For a license, what we didn't do is that we we didn't explain.

We didn't explain all of the all of the background around applying for the criminal history, so folks might have unintentionally took themselves out of applying for a license in the very beginning.

That now with those changes, I would say that we've ease easing conviction allowances in time.

Considered we're removing all of the point system.

We remove the requirements for an individual to disclose past offenses.

Since we run a check anyways on the criminal history and we run fingerprints, it's easier for us to see what's in the background without having to do like a gotcha, you know, that I think that folks felt like I disclosed everything that I could remember.

But in cannabis, it's a bit different than liquor.

We go all the way back.

So juvenile, all of that history, they have to be able to remember and complete the document source for.

So we removed that requirement and we'll be able to check the criminal history ourselves.

We also wanted to make sure that we considered, we were transparent in how that process worked.

Because again, it really, the internal review that happens after somebody fills out their criminal history that that wasn't that folks didn't really know about that.

They didn't understand that they could write letters that they could explain why it was that you know that that how much they had changed or that they hadn't had any violations or any.

You know they hadn't been arrested in the last 10 years and so they you know that that instead of.

instead of just assuming folks knew that we wanted to make sure we were transparent.

So that's included in our role set as well.

And then just to note that the licensing division over the last eight years that we reviewed 16,500 criminal history records.

And out of those 43, only 43 were denied a license because of their criminal history.

And again, those rules went into effect in last October of 2021. Next slide, please.

I also wanted to show you our cannabis retail owned store by People of Color.

So this data represents self-identified race of a majority or equal interest owner who disclosed their race in August of 2021. We review this yearly, it's not something that Because we have to look at the criminal history, it's not a question, of course, that we ask on any of our forms other than the criminal history.

It is a voluntary.

You do not have to disclose your ethnicity on that form or your race.

It is self-identified.

Next slide.

And this is our producer processor.

Again, the data represents the self-identified race and majority or equal interest of those owners and producer processors.

And just so you're aware that we currently have that there's only two stores in the city of Seattle that have majority owner by people of color.

Next slide.

And in response to addressing comments made by the community at Social Equity and Canada's Task Force meeting, the agency did create a social equity page.

I mentioned that earlier.

It's an external website.

This houses various resources and opportunities for further engagement with the community that you can go on our website and look at the social equity program.

It'll give you an overview.

It also has licensing resources.

So what's a business structure?

What makes up a business structure?

Local requirements.

That was a big one as we licensed folks.

What we heard from our first initial and second initial licensing of both retailers and producer processors is that what was the local requirements?

And it's difficult to find on, you know, depending on your website at the city, sometimes it can be difficult for those licensees to be able to find or those applicants.

We also included local restrictions.

So LCB in the state has restrictions and buffers, but then the city can either, and city of Seattle has actually lowered their buffer zones to 500. but they also have buffer zones that don't allow business to be within a thousand feet of another business, right?

So as we lower some of our buffers, there's other changes that the city can make as far as requirements.

And so we'd have that on our website as well.

We also have the floor plan.

So what does a floor plan look like?

We wanna make sure that any information that we can provide a social equity applicant ahead of time, that they'll be able to start to prepare for the application process.

And then we have a place that you can ask questions.

So if you have a question, a suggestion that we have, my staff monitors that and will respond within 24 hours of receiving a question.

We also have information there about our rules.

We keep other agency partners can also provide information on our website as well.

So that's the end of my slides.

But I do want to mention a couple of other things that, as I mentioned, we were just beginning our rule process.

And as far as how a social equity application will flow, that the idea is that we'll start, of course, with like we do with any type of other license.

It'll go through business and licensing services.

We'll open a window in the fall of this year.

We're hoping for September of 2022. to open that window application.

It'll be open for 30 days.

That LCB will receive those applications after that 30-day window closes.

That then will send those applications over to, and the application, when I say the application, it's a social equity application only.

And we'll send those over to a third-party contractor.

We're just getting ready to release an RFP for a third-party contractor that will then review and score those social equity applications.

Once they've been scored, they will receive all of the applications back again, that the highest scoring applications will be processed.

We know that with the small amount, 40 licenses is such a small amount, that we know that there's going to be quite a few folks that apply for those licenses.

So we'll have a double blind lottery Again, that will be able to determine then who's processed and in what order.

And then those folks will receive a preliminary letter of approval which will help them to be able to work with the cities.

It'll also help them work with Department of Commerce to look into what kind of funding they might be eligible for.

And then at that point, it'll also at the same time, we'll be processing those applications through the Liquor and Cannabis Board because all of those folks, even though you meet the requirement to be a social equity applicant, you still have to meet the state requirement of becoming licensed.

We have or just we just released a brand new position.

One of the task force recommendations was to hire a program manager to sort of be that ombudsman for an applicant to help them through the licensing process.

That position has just been posted.

And I will say that you do not have to live in Olympia to apply for that position.

So if you know of anybody, we've just begun accepting applications.

We are planning on, after the rules are accepted, we are planning on this summer to go in and do some education with the folks that have interest in applying for these social equity applications.

as well.

So I'm going to stop there and see if you have questions.

Thank you very much for the overview.

And Ollie, did you want to add anything else before I open it up to questions?

No.

Becky was thorough.

Okay, excellent.

Well, thank you again.

Thanks to the both of you.

I do want to double check with Councilmember Herbold.

The questions that you teed up, did you have any follow-up questions on those two?

Thank you so much.

I just want to confirm my understanding based on what I've heard about sort of the new flexibility as it relates to the geographic distribution of equity licenses.

So, After all is said and done, given that now the situation is that King County has eight, and that includes two that were originally targeted for Seattle, it is possible, particularly in our in our market, in our real estate market, and in our land use configuration, it is possible that Seattle will not end up with any after the process is all through and done.

And this is not a criticism.

This is just a reality related to some of the restrictions inherent in our zoning, as well as the high cost of real estate.

But I just want to confirm that that is a possible outcome.

You're absolutely correct.

That is a possible outcome.

Thank you.

I will also mention is that in our rules and a task force recommendation was that a applicant doesn't have to have a time limit.

So they could take a year, they could take two years in order to find a location.

Councilmember Herbold, any additional follow-up?

Okay, great.

Thank you for those answers.

And Ali, I see you off mute.

Did you have anything you wanted to add to that one?

Nope.

Okay, great.

Councilmember Nelson, please go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

So the proponent of this proposal.

Um, you have C.

W. Has begun talking to off our offices and they are proposing a tax on product that will generate 5 to $6 million a year.

There are 55 shops right now in Seattle, so that comes down to about 90 to 110. Uh, thousand dollars per shop.

And obviously the bigger ones would pay more and the smaller ones would pay less, but the smaller ones have less cushion to absorb that on top of already paying, as Council Member Herbold noted, 37% excise tax, highest in the nation, a $6,000 FAS licensing fee on top of 10.25% sales tax, etc.

So all told, it ends up being, I'm told by some members of the cannabis collective, that that's about 47 to 49% of revenue.

So, Ms. Garrett, I'm directing my question to you.

You have a better sense of, in your role at the LCCB, what kinds of barriers and costs marijuana shops face across the state, but you're also president of Tabor 100, and you're a small business owner yourself.

So I would just like to know what your opinion is of an additional tax on these small businesses.

Thank you very much.

And as Ollie is coming off of mute, I'll just also reiterate, this is, um, this is, you know, a proposal that we are considering at counseling partnership with the mayor's office.

As you heard, members of the NAACP have been part of a broad coalition over the last few years.

So I just want to make sure that I clarify for the record, there's a broad coalition of folks who are interested and there is no proposal on the table yet in terms of the council and the mayor's joint deliberations on policy.

So, as we do every year and every month, we get proposals from various stakeholders.

So I just wanna make sure that I was super clear with members of the public as well, that even in the last two months, we have clarified a number of times that there's a proposal that we are continuing to look at in partnership with the mayor.

There is not a draft law that has been suggested by Council Member Nelson.

So I just wanna make sure that that was clear.

And that again, we hearken to the public comment that was made from folks like NAACP today.

in support of the concepts that we're talking about.

All the apologies, I jumped in because I know you were looking for the mute button and wanted to fill the air, so I did so.

OK, so I'm going to answer the question not on behalf of the LCB capacity, but as president of Tabor 100 that does advocacy work for women in minority owned business and small business and being a small business owner myself.

anything that increased tax or cost to a small business.

And I would say in this industry, the majority, 100% of the businesses are considered small businesses.

So anything that increase tax on a small business propose a harm.

That in some cases, you know, in some of these business, the revenue, projection is very marginal anyway.

So that's my answer as a small business owner to your question.

Thank you, Ollie.

I really appreciate you being here and the work that you do on the LCB.

Are there any additional comments or questions?

Okay, I am really interested in following up.

Ollie, I might be reaching out for some additional time.

Would love to chat more with you.

And Becky would also love to know more about, well, let me just ask this question real quick.

If race is not being looked at in the application of the equity licensing.

Um, and that's the only, uh, it sounds like recommendation that wasn't taken is geographic location.

Looking at, for example, we're very interested in defining folks who've been disproportionately harmed by the war on drugs, especially noting the impact on folks who have lived in the central district and the impact that the war on drugs has had, especially for communities, for example, in the central district.

So we're looking at geographic definition.

And we look forward to hearing all either from you or Becky about whether or not geographic location is being looked at in lieu of the recommendation around race and ethnicity.

So actually, I was going to say Becky and you might because I don't think it's that many want to cover the requirements.

I think it's four or five requirements where we were zoning in on.

And one of the comments that we were hearing is, you know, with gentrification and things and moving out of the Central District, we had to be very conscious that when we did talk about what Becky's going to answer, that we were taking those things into consideration.

So there's actually nine areas that we're going to be looking at and scoring for in the scoring rubric.

And that's have you lived in disproportionately impacted areas or DIA area.

And we're actually working with the University of Washington to provide us with that information.

We'll have a map that shows that information.

How long have you lived in a DIA area?

So six months to five years, 10 points, five years to 10 years, 20 points, 10 years plus 40 points.

And then convicted of a drug offense.

And that's whoever it is that's going to be the majority owner convicted of a cannabis offense that.

If a family member was convicted of an offense and then convicted of an offense, again, family member, and then if you were convicted of a cannabis offense, what type of offense did you have?

What type of sentence did you receive?

As we looked at different different states, that that was one of the recommendations that they had and they used in their scoring.

And so, again, you know, that if you were a person of color, you tended to serve prison time versus receiving a fine, for instance.

So a fine gets five points, serve time in prison gets 40, will receive 40 points.

Did you or your family member have incarceration keep you from getting employment?

Did you lose your home or ability to purchase a home or rent a home as a result of your conviction?

Is your household income less than the average state income?

And then did you own a medical cannabis collective store between or garden between 1998 and 2016?

Or do you have any previous cannabis business experience that would make your business viable?

And then have you held or do you currently hold a state cannabis license?

Or are you a title certificate holder?

And then we do have three other questions that are initial questions that folks won't receive points for.

But we also are going to require an applicant, of course, to have to have a social equity plan.

So how are they going to be giving back to the community?

What is it that they're going to be doing to enhance the community that they're going to be licensed in?

And that is something that's required by law.

It's not something that that any of the other licensing licenses have been required to do, but it is something that was required by law.

I hope that's helpful.

That is very helpful, very helpful.

Great, well I appreciate that and it is also similar to some conversations we've been having and will continue to have with the Finance and Administrative Services Department, Office of Labor Standards, Office of Economic Development and the Mayor's Office directly and look forward to maybe comparing some notes with you all at the Labor Control Board about how those nine elements are similar to some of the things that we're thinking about and obviously I look forward to working with you in partnership as we continue to build in equity and equity lens, not just in Seattle but across the state.

Well, thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you, Ali.

Great to see both of you.

Appreciate it.

And colleagues will continue to have conversations with those departments and keep you updated about when there is a possible draft for consideration as this is culminating and pulling together great policy ideas from our state, local leaders within the state in terms of workers and business owners, as well as across the nation and looking at what other jurisdictions have done.

Thank you so much.

Let's move on to item number 17.

And item number 17, resolution 32047, a resolution establishing a watch list for a list of large, complex, discrete capital projects that will require enhanced quarterly monitoring reports for the 2022 calendar year for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Okay, thanks so much.

I'm going to give a heads up on item number 18. We did hear from central staff that if we didn't have time for item number 18, there's nothing urgent about that.

We will endeavor to put that on our agenda for the next committee meeting.

Um, and this is a great opportunity for us to take.

I'm seeing a thumbs up from an interim director.

Panichi.

Uh, this is a great opportunity, though, because we've already been briefed on item number 18 once.

Now you have the draft in front of you.

You're welcome to take a look at that and ask Tom Meisler Ali Panichi if you have any additional questions.

but we'll move item number 18 to our committee meeting next time.

At this point, we do have the legislation in front of us.

We have Brian Goodnight here with us to walk us through the bill, and we have three amendments that I am going to make sure that we get through before we wrap up close to 1130 here.

Thank you very much.

Brian, please go ahead.

Great.

Thank you, Council Member.

Good morning, Council Members.

Just for the record, Brian Goodnight, Council Center staff.

So this is the second committee discussion related to establishing a watch list of capital projects for 2022. As a brief reminder, the council established expectations for enhanced quarterly reporting in 2018. The process calls for the executive to propose a list of projects for inclusion on the annual watch list by January 15th of each year, and the council typically adopts the project list via resolution.

Some elements that might make a project a good candidate for being on the watch list are projects that have significant financial or programmatic impacts, The project is at risk of overspending its budget or missing schedule milestones, or its delivery is particularly important to the council.

At the committee's March 16th meeting, I walked through the 18 projects that the executive has proposed for inclusion on the 2022 list, which is the same as the 2021 list, with the exception of the proposed removal of the Seattle Department of Transportation's, or SDOT's, Northgate Bridge and Cycle Track project.

And the reason for the removal is that's because it's now open to pedestrian traffic.

So resolution 32047, which wasn't introduced in time for the prior meeting's discussion, but is before you today, does just include the 18 executive proposed projects at this time.

As Chair Mosqueda mentioned, there are three proposed amendments for the list that the Council Member has informed central staff of by the March 22nd deadline.

And Chair, I'm happy to walk through those amendments now, or if you'd rather handle them one at a time when they're moved for consideration, that could work too.

Let's go ahead and walk through those right now, and then we'll take some questions.

Great, thank you.

So the First Amendment is sponsored by Council Member Herbold and would add SDOT's SPU Drainage Partnership South Park project to the watch list.

The project totals approximately $10 million and is related to the Seattle Public Utilities South Park stormwater program that's proposed to continue on the watch list.

The SPU program is a suite of projects intended to reduce flooding in the South Park neighborhood The project addressed by the amendment allows SDOC to partner with SPU on installing needed drainage collection systems and repair deteriorated roads.

So that's amendment number one.

The second amendment is sponsored by Chair Mosqueda and would add the Finance and Administrative Services Human Capital Management System project to the watch list.

The project cost is estimated at approximately $61 million and is intended to replace the city's human resource information system, which does include the city's payroll and benefit system.

And then the final amendment, the third one, is authored by Council Member Morales and sponsored by Chair Mosqueda, and it would add SDOT's Route 7 Transit Plus Multimodal Corridor project to the watch list.

The project has an estimated cost of $8.5 million and is expected to be constructed in 2022. And the project would make improvements to sidewalks, crossings, signals, would install ADA-compliant curb ramps along the Route 7 bus line, which runs along Rainier Avenue.

And the project area is approximately South Finley Street in the south, up to South Dearborn Street in the north.

And that concludes my summary of the amendments.

And Chair, I could also bring them up on the screen if that's helpful to the council members.

Let's go ahead and put those up on the screen as we consider the amendments.

Colleagues, I would like to go ahead and move to have the resolution in front of us so that we can consider these amendments.

And then we'll walk through each of the amendments as outlined by Brian.

Good night.

I move the committee recommends passage of resolution 32047. Is there a second?

Second.

Wonderful.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

Council Member Herbold, you are the author and sponsor of the First Amendment.

Would you like to speak to your amendment?

Absolutely.

Thank you so much.

Let's see.

So Amendment 1 references the project that's already referenced in the resolution called the South Park Stormwater Program.

There's a related project in SDOT.

called the SPU Drainage Partnership, South Park.

So what this amendment does is it adds the related project to the 2022 watch list with the understanding that there are sort of two components of this project.

The SPU project will install a pump station to control flooding in South Park.

And the SDOT CIP, Capital Improvement Program, notes that, quote, alone, this project will not control flooding.

Many streets in the area are in poor condition, don't have a street drainage collection system.

And this funding allows SPU and SDOT to partner to install the needed collection systems and repair the deteriorated costs.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Would you like to move your amendment?

Yes, thank you.

I move amendment one to the resolution establishing a watch list.

Second.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

Are there any additional comments or questions on the amendment as described by Council Member Herbold?

Council Member Herbold, I am not seeing any comments or questions.

I am also supportive of this amendment and will be voting aye.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on amendment number one?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Aye.

Madam Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much.

The motion carries and amendment number one is adopted.

Thank you very much Council Member Herbold, not only for your amendment, but as we talked about in the last committee meeting for your sponsorship, your co-sponsorship of this with your leadership, we have the opportunity to really have these projects in front of us.

So thanks for all of your work on the underlying bill originally and for the work on this iteration in front of us.

All right, council members, I have amendment number two.

Excuse me.

I'd like to move the amendment first so that we can discuss it.

I move to amend resolution 32047 as presented on amendment number two.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

Apologies, I'm under the weather.

And right when I needed to speak, my voice is about to go.

I want to thank Lisa Kay from central staff for identifying this amendment.

This amendment adds $61 million in project house at FAS to replace the city's human resource information system, which includes the citywide payroll and benefits system to the watch list.

Based on the cost and scope of the project, central staff identified this option as a good candidate for inclusion.

A similar project at the county, it took 10 years longer and three times as much than originally envisioned.

And to ensure efficiency and transparency, I very much agree that this is a good addition to the watch list and would encourage your support of this.

And again, thanks central staff for flagging it for us.

So any additional comments or questions?

I hear none.

I also want to thank the mayor's office and CBO for their interest as well in being open to adding this to the list.

I think that that's a great partnership and look forward to continuing to watch this item.

Madam Clerk, could you please call for the, excuse me, call the roll on the adoption of amendment number two.

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Madam Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

Thank you, colleagues, and thanks again to Lisa Kaye.

Okay, we also have amendment number three in front of us, as noted by Brian Goodnight.

This is an amendment being brought to us from Councilmember Morales, and I am listed as the sponsor, given that Councilmember Morales is not a voting member of the committee, but we absolutely welcome her inclusion and suggestion here.

I'm happy to sponsor the amendment.

So I'm going to move the amendment in front of us, and Council Member Morales, I believe, is present, and will speak to it.

And if not, I'm happy to speak to it as well.

Colleagues, I move to amend resolution 32047 as presented in amendment number three.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

I am looking at our list here and I don't see Councilmember Morales.

I did see her before.

She may have had to jump off.

So I want to thank Councilmember Morales as the author of this amendment.

A few talking points from their office that I'd like to share.

This is a vital component of creating a more connected and well-resourced and equitable Seattle and ensuring that our community members in the south end have access to reliable, expedient public transit and getting to other parts of Seattle.

adding to the long-awaited rapid seven multimodal, adding the long-awaited rapid seven multimodal to the capital watch list will provide well-deserved attention by the council to complete the project.

Brian, is there anything else that you would add to the amendment description?

No, Council Member, I think you've said it.

Thank you.

Okay, thanks.

Colleagues, are there any additional comments or questions?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on adoption of amendment number three?

Councilmember Herbold?

Yes.

Councilmember Peterson?

Yes.

Councilmember Nelson?

Aye.

Councilmember Lewis?

Yes.

Madam Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor and none opposed.

Again, the motion carries.

It is unanimous.

Amendment number three is adopted.

We'll make sure to pass that along to Council Member Morales.

Thanks for your support for that.

Brian, thanks for all of your work on the legislation in front of us and colleagues for your detailed analysis of the watch list as it was presented and now amended.

Are there any additional comments on the amended resolution in front of us?

I have a question that I probably should have asked at a previous briefing.

In past years when the watch list has come before us, I have advocated and for many years it sounded like the budget office was amenable to doing this.

But it hadn't happened, and maybe something has changed this year, and I have forgotten to ask, but I have advocated that the Budget Office consider not just individual projects, capital projects, but also programmatic capital projects.

I'm wondering, is anything different this year?

So Council Member, there is one, so nothing's different this year than from 2021. In 2021, the CBO did work on a new format for programmatic projects.

There's only one of those projects that's in the watch list right now, and that's the City Light project related to pole replacements, the overhead equipment replacement project.

So that is a new format, but it's consistent with 2021.

Got it, okay.

So maybe, yeah, maybe I'm forgetting.

that that change was made then.

So really, really appreciate that.

Can you just real quickly speak to sort of one of the things that CBO was talking about, the difficulty of doing sort of a programmatic inclusion on the watch list.

the fact that there would be sort of a different – there would need to be sort of a different approach to tracking performance.

And can you say a couple sentences about how they address those concerns and how is the forum different?

I would have to take a look.

Sorry, I don't have that detail in front of me.

One of the fundamental differences is that there's no project baseline.

So as you know, I mean, right when we get to the 30% design phase, that's kind of what we track future progress against for discrete projects.

So a project that's ongoing, there are estimates about what you know, the program will spend over time.

So I think that's one of the main challenges is reporting the financial data.

So there is the report for the City Light one is a little bit less.

It's a few, you know, the graphs are different and things, but I could follow up and we could get more information.

That'd be great.

Thank you so much.

Really appreciate it.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

I am not seeing any additional hands for questions.

So I want to again thank the mayor's office, the Mayor Harrell's team has been working with us as we've been considering possible amendments here and thank as well Julie Dingley, the director of the city budget's office, for their interest in collaboration and transparency on the amendments in front of us.

I think add to that transparency and accountability.

I look forward to continuing to work with them and all of you as we now look at all of the items, including the amendments that were added today on the watch list.

Thanks for all of your work on this.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of Resolution 32047 as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Madam Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, colleagues.

The motion carries.

The committee recommendation that the resolution as amended pass will be sent to the April 12th Seattle City Council meeting for a final vote.

Look forward to your comments at the April 12th meeting.

As I mentioned, central staff was suggesting that if we didn't have time, it's OK to hold item number 18. So if there's no objection, resolution 32049, agenda item number 18, will be postponed and held till April 20th at our next committee meeting.

There's no objection.

The resolution is postponed, and we will consider that at our April 20th meeting.

Look forward to the next committee meeting with you all.

If you haven't yet heard me make the plug, please tune in on Friday for the revenue forecast.

The council's going to have its first opportunity to receive the recommended forecast.

It will be published and broadcast live on Seattle Channel.

And then, colleagues, you all will have the chance to ask any questions or hear the outcome of the Council's deliberation at our April 20th meeting.

We will have the Office of Economic Revenue Forecast presentation on what the Council deliberated.

We'll have the CBO, the City Budget Office Forecast presentation, which will comment on the other revenue streams and revenue forecasts that do not go through the Office of Economic Revenue Forecast, and we'll have an explanation of which ones do and which ones don't go through each of those offices.

We'll have the city budget's office report out on our quarterly ARPA spending, keeping an eye on those American Rescue Plan Act dollars and how not only have dollars been encumbered, but we'd like to know what the timeline is for those that have been encumbered as well.

And any other agenda items will be forthcoming.

So thanks again for all of your time today and generous time because we went a little over.

Have a great rest of your day and I'll see you on April 20th.

Bye-bye.