Seattle Park District Board Meeting 11/20/23

It is 10.31 a.m.

and the November 20th, 2023 meeting of the Seattle Park District Board will come to order.

I am Andrew Lewis, President of the Board.

Will the Clerk please call the roll?

Board Member Herbold.

Board Member Juarez.

Board Member Morales.

Here.

Board Member Mosqueda.

Board Member Nelson.

Board Member Peterson.

Present.

Board Member Sawat.

Present.

Board Member Strauss.

Board Member Strauss.

Present.

And Board President Lewis.

Present.

Five present.

And for the record, Board Member Juarez is excused from today's meeting.

Moving on to approval of the agenda, if there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Approval of the minutes.

If there's no objection to the minutes of the October 16th, 2023 Seattle Park District meeting, those minutes will be approved.

Hearing no objection, those minutes are so approved.

And will the clerk please affix my signature to those minutes?

Public comment.

At this time, we will open the hybrid public comment period.

How many folks are signed up today, Madam Clerk?

I think it's been a year.

Okay.

Well, sir, you are recognized for two minutes.

And do please state your name and the agenda item to which you are addressing.

Just take a minute.

Yeah, of course, of course.

Thank you, that's perfect.

Okay, go ahead.

Sir, you may address the board.

If you want to speak, you may speak.

And you have two minutes.

Just make sure you introduce yourself, talk into the mic.

Yes, sir.

Second thing I want to say is happy holidays to everybody.

and all the city council and the mayor and the governor and everybody else.

The only thing I want to bring up right now is minimum wage.

And my comment and my point of minimum wage is to help this situation, this economic situation, is we need to raise minimum raise up.

And we need to be a leader.

A leader is a person and people that do low, bold things to set a situation so everybody can follow to help make things better in the bigger picture.

So I, in my opinion, I think we should double the minimum wage.

That's the only point I came up with.

So happy holidays, everybody.

Be careful and enjoy life.

Thank you.

And that was our only speaker.

Thank you.

And we will close the public comment period at this time.

Items of business.

Will the clerk please read item one into the record?

Agenda item one, the Seattle Park District proposed 2024 budget.

Madam Clerk, just one moment.

Board Member Nelson, do you have a question or a comment?

I'm sorry.

I just apologize.

I want to apologize for not saying present.

My volume is off.

So, present.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Let the record reflect that Board Member Nelson has joined the meeting.

Actually, just looking now to see Board Member Herbold, are you now in the meeting?

And Board Member Mosqueda?

Yeah.

So, let the record also reflect Board Member Mosqueda and Board Member Herbold have arrived at the meeting.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please read item one into the record?

Agenda item one, Seattle Park District proposed 2024 budget for a briefing and discussion.

We have joining us from the Parks Department, Michelle Finnegan and AP Diaz, and from our own central staff, Tracy Ratliff for this agenda item.

So I will hand it over to Superintendent Diaz to get us started.

And I believe there's a presentation which has been uploaded.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Well, thank you, President Lewis.

Thank you, Vice President Mosqueda.

And I just want to take a moment of personal privilege here to thank and acknowledge all of the council members who have worked so hard with us, our department, throughout the past several years to get to a point to have a thriving park levy system in place for the City of Seattle.

It's a testament to your leadership and your priorities and your governance.

So we'd like to thank you and for the opportunity that we have had to work together in this past year.

With that, we'd like to walk you through our 2024 proposed Park District budget and legislation.

On Tuesday, September 26, after Mayor Harrell released his proposed 23-24 mid-biennial budget adjustments, which included how the City plans to utilize the Seattle Park District resources to invest in creating safe, healthy, and thriving communities in 2024. On October 16th, prior to your public hearing on the budget, the Department of Parks and Recreation provided an overview of how the proposed 2024 budget aligns to the Seattle Park District's six-year plan, which we're now in cycle two, which you all adopted around this time last year.

And we will be pointing out a couple of technical changes in our presentation today.

As the proposed budget has not changed since that time, we will simply provide a short refresher on the information we provided to you all at the October meeting, allow any opportunity for questions, and to prepare you for your vote on the 2024 budget and related legislation, which is coming soon to the Chamber.

And excuse me, and so at this time to do the overview, we do have Deputy Superintendent Michelle Finnegan who oversees our policy and legislative budget branch so with that I would love to turn it over to Michelle.

Thank you, Superintendent Diaz and Jacob can you go to the next slide.

Thank you.

As AP mentioned, we'll cover a quick overview of the proposed park district budget, and then I think Tracy is going to walk you through all the legislation.

So with that, next slide.

Thank you.

So this is just a quick recap of SPR's proposed budget for 2024. We wanted to highlight where the MPD sits in our budget, as most of our lines of business do have multiple funding sources.

So you'll see here that our 2024 proposed budget, including both operating and capital, is a little over $320 million across all funds, with the general fund and the MPD providing almost equal amounts and making up nearly 75% of our total budget.

Moving to the blue pie on the right, that's our operating budget, which is about $228 million for next year.

About 30% of that is supported by the park district with the general fund right alongside.

And then our park fund, which is where we generally put our earned revenues and grants and such at 18%.

And then the green pie shows you the proposed CIP with the MPD a little over half for next year.

And then I just want to highlight, and I'll show this on the next slide too, this doesn't perfectly match the MPD lens of the budget because that also includes funding that's allocated for the Seattle Center, who is now managing the waterfront operations.

So Jacob, on the next slide, could you go to that?

Thank you so as I said, here is the mpd only view of the 2024 budget, this is unchanged from the version that you saw in October.

it's aligned with the budget that you all passed in.

The six year plan you all passed last year as well with for technical changes which we also walk through and.

October, so I won't go into those unless you want me to, except for to just reference the item related to the waterfront, as you will see this in your legislative package here shortly, in which we are proposing to reallocate some unspent funds that were previously dedicated to the waterfront so that the Seattle Center can perform the duties that they have been asked to carry out next year.

So that is is one thing that you'll see momentarily.

And so unless you have any questions on these other technical changes or anything else, we could pass this over to Tracy to walk you through the legislative package.

Are there any initial questions from Michelle's presentation?

Seeing none, I will just mention to Michelle, I appreciate the department responding to some of the inquiries from board members at the October 16th meeting and distributing those responses to the entire board.

Address some of the questions that were raised about some of these line items previously.

So thank you so much for responding quickly and in detail to those requests.

Board member Sawant.

Thank you, Chair Lewis.

I first of all, I apologize for not being on camera due to continuing to be under the weather.

Superintendent Diaz, I have an important question, not directly related to what has just been presented, but it's, as I said, very important.

Over the weekend, my office has been contacted by hundreds of constituents concerned about the Seattle Parks and Recreation proposal to build a playground at Danny Blaine Park, which is Seattle's historically LGBTQ nude beach.

Since Friday, over 2,000 people have signed a petition opposing this.

I wanted to read one excerpt from one of the emails that we are receiving from hundreds of constituents because they make an indisputable case.

And as I said, these are excerpts from the email.

Queer and trans people are foundational to the history and culture of Seattle.

Denny Blaine Park is an area that is frequently utilized as a nude beach by the queer community here in Seattle and is not the right area for a children's play area to be built.

We urge parks and recreation to consider parks nearby, such as Lakeview Park, 850 feet from Denny Blaine, Verretta Park, 500 feet from Denny Blaine, William Gross Park, 0.8 mile, and Alvin Larkins Park, 0.7 miles from Denny Plain.

Nude beaches are a place for queer and trans people to feel confident in their bodies and be themselves in a world that frequently represses their identities.

There are not many nude beaches in Seattle, but there are plenty of green spaces that could fit a children's play area.

This move by Seattle Parks and Recreation is nothing short of gentrification.

and a continuation of the more and more frequent instances of the sanitization of queer spaces.

We do not have other spaces to go to, but there are other spaces for a children's play area to be built to meet the stated need.

The community will be mobilizing to stand against this plan that will erase one of the few genuine queer spaces left in Seattle.

So that's excerpt from an email that we have got from many constituents.

I just wanted to say from the standpoint of our office, I think this point that this is really a move towards gentrification is the most central point here, because at the end of the day, wealthy people, even when they are queer and trans, they have access to lots of spaces.

Ultimately, it is working class and poor, low-income community members who lack the freedom for this kind of space and this kind of public area.

That's why it has been historically important.

And so I think that's the central reason why this is extremely problematic.

This proposal is extremely problematic.

And I wanted to read comments from, as I said, 2,000 people have signed a petition.

There's many, there's countless comments on the petition.

I'll just read two from the petition.

One of them is, even 40 years ago, Denny Blaine was a haven for young lesbians recently arriving in Seattle.

that it has continued to be a safe and accepting space for the queer community is remarkable.

This tiny and rare nude beach should be protected from any encroachment.

And another comment says, really, one queer beach in Seattle and you want to effectively get rid of it?

I'm a parent, by the way.

So these are two comments, and I think these two comments also encapsulate the other point that I wanted to make is that this, again, you know, it's unfortunate.

It's really unfortunate, but it's not surprising to my office that, again, this type of move it smacks of this divide and conquer where you are, you know, you're saying, oh, well, we need children's parks.

Well, who could argue with that?

Of course, you know, I absolutely as a community member and socialist myself, I always advocate for more spaces for especially for working class and poor children, children of immigrant families, children of families that are struggling, including children that are facing homelessness and with families that are facing homelessness.

But the idea of fitting one safe space for our working class and poor queer people with the need for children's spaces.

That's just, you know, it's just not okay.

And I just don't understand how this proposal even happened.

I mean, I just, as I said, I find it difficult that it is honestly about a playground rather than as the letter that I just quoted said, it's a gentrification and a continuation of the more and more frequent instances of sanitization of queer spaces.

So I would appreciate a response from you and I might have some follow up points.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member.

Well, the proposal is under consideration.

We are evaluating it.

With the community we're glad to hear that community word is getting out because part of our goals for any proposed project is to have community engagement.

So I just want to reiterate that we are at the initial stages of this proposed playground, which is in a gap area where there is a need.

Uh, for playgrounds, but ultimately, um, we want to be able to evaluate all of the public comments, the points that you mentioned out.

We will certainly review.

Um, it is not our intention to.

Make this a polarizing issue or to at all.

discriminate against any group.

That's not the Parks Department.

The parks is always the beacon of community inclusion and places where the public can come to use public land for all uses.

So access to the water, access to open space, access to play, recreation.

And so again, this is a project to build a playground in a gap area.

But we certainly understand that there are many viewpoints and opinions being circulated about the project.

So again, we're in the infancy stages and we're also happy to give you and your staff some more briefings if you would like at a time perhaps away from the budget meeting.

Board Member Sawant, did you have a follow-up?

Your hand is still raised.

Yeah.

Thank you, Chair Lewis.

lower my hand, but I raised my hand just to quickly follow up if you don't mind.

Yes, of course.

Thank you.

So I appreciate the response and yes, I definitely would appreciate the updates or any other interaction from the departments with my office.

So please feel free to contact Ted Verdone from my office about this.

Just one thing I'll mention here is I mean, actually two points I just want to mention just for the record quickly.

One is, I mean, you're saying that everything, all of this is that initial proposal at an infancy stage.

I'm just a little bit concerned because we're hearing from repeatedly from community members that there is a concrete plan and even a timeline for construction and that Seattle's LGBTQ community and and their supporters you know need to organize post haste to address it so I if when you do contact my office please give us details about where the plan actually is so that we can reconcile what you're saying with what we're hearing that would be much appreciated and then secondly uh I totally agree with you that that it's the responsibility of the Parks Department and all the departments of the city to take all the points of view into consideration.

But I would also say that if we are to actually establish inclusion, as you were saying, which I completely agree, we have to, inclusion of our community members has to be the guiding principle.

But I don't think we can say it's inclusion if any proposal that's being made is specifically excluding the needs of one of our historically and at present, one of our most marginalized community sections of our community, which is the trans community.

So I think that's something that we would keep in mind and we would like to follow up with you on this.

Thank you, Chair Lewis.

Thank you, Board Member Swann.

With no additional questions, we can, sorry, Board Member Mosqueda.

Board Member Skata, you are muted.

Thank you so much.

I just wanted to make sure to add for the record that there's, I think, broad interest in this.

I support what council members want added.

I don't want it to be seen as just one council member, especially the reporting from KUOW, I think, points to the fact that this would be basically creating division amongst community members where there currently is none.

and given the other play areas that exist for kiddos and wanting to see those enhanced and expanded.

Of course, we need space for kids, but we don't have to put that in opposition or in juxtaposition to an area that's historically been notably used for marginalized communities.

And I just wanted to make sure to underscore the broader support for that and look forward to hearing more as well.

So if you could please copy our office on that and I appreciate that Council Member Swann raised it here today.

Thank you, Board Member Mosqueda.

We can now proceed with the presentation.

Board members, for the record, Tracy Ratz of Council Central staff will now walk through the legislation that will enact most of what is in front of you in terms of the budget for 2024. So moving to item number two, resolution 59, this would relate to the 2023 park district budget and carry forward the $700,000 of funding that would in fact be allocated to the Seattle Center to conduct maintenance at the waterfronted park.

Court President, were you going to move these individually for vote?

No, I am sorry.

I'm just yes.

I'm just looking at the list in front of me.

Yes.

So I will move.

My apologies.

Yeah, I'm just I'm just looking at I'm getting distracted looking at the presentation and looking at my script.

So will the clerk please Let's see.

Yes, I move that we adopt resolution 59. Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, it is moved and seconded.

I'll read it into the record.

Yeah, and will the clerk please read it into the record?

Agenda item two, resolution 59, a resolution relating to the 2023 Seattle Park District budget carrying forward non-capital appropriation from the 2022 Seattle Park District budget.

And it's for briefing discussion and possible vote.

And you've made a motion.

It's been seconded.

Yeah.

Will the clerk please call the roll board member her bolt.

I have a question.

Oh, sorry.

There is a question from board member Nelson.

You're recognized.

Thank you, Tracy.

It's I thought that you said in your introductory remarks something about the waterfront, but this is for the whole parks district spending plan.

Um, the carry forward from last year to next year or this year to next year.

Correct.

It's actually allocating funds that were in 2022 for the waterfront maintenance that were not needed.

And then with the transition that has now happened with Seattle Center taking over the maintenance responsibilities, what we are doing is we're authorizing the funding to be carried forward in 2023 to be spent by the Seattle Center.

So there will be a transfer of these funds to the Seattle Center because they now are carrying on the maintenance of the waterfront park.

So it is the park district funding of $700,000 only that Resolution 59 is dealing with that's in front of you right now.

Okay, I didn't catch in the title or in the budget summary level graph that it was just for Waterfront Park.

Thank you very much.

You're welcome.

Are there any further questions or comments on Resolution 59?

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Resolution 59?

Board Member Herbold?

Yes.

Board Member Juarez is out.

Board Member Morales.

Yes.

Thank you.

Board Member Mosqueda.

Aye.

Board Member Nelson.

Aye.

Board Member Peterson.

Aye.

Board Member Sawat.

Yes.

Board Member Strauss.

Yes.

And Board President Lewis?

Yes.

One more time.

Board Member Herbold?

Okay.

Seven in favor, none opposed.

Yes.

Sorry.

My apologies.

Yes.

Thank you.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries, and the Seattle Park District Board adopts Resolution 59. Will the clerk please affix my signature to the resolution on my behalf?

Item three, will the clerk please read item three into the record.

Agenda item three, resolution 61, a resolution authorizing an amendment to the interlocal agreement between the City of Seattle and the Seattle Park District.

Thank you so much.

Sorry, sorry.

Board Member Herbal, did you have a question?

That was me, board president.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Tracy, you sounded like board member Herbold for a moment here in chambers.

So Tracy, I will hand it over to you for a brief overview of resolution 61.

And this is the resolution that would allow for this one time change to calculating the general fund appropriation for the parks department set at 3% for 2024, but returning to the formula based on CPI for our future use for all future years.

Yes, thank you, Tracy.

And we spent an extensive amount of time at our October meeting discussing this item and appreciate the follow-up from the department, clarifying questions from board members and from central staff.

Are there any comments or questions on the resolution before we call the roll?

Board member Sawant.

Board Member Swann.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Thank you.

Since this is about the parks district budget as a whole, I just wanted to make a few comments quickly.

That is all right.

Sorry, this is not the budget board.

I'll hold my comments.

I'm sorry I got it wrong.

Okay.

Not a problem at all.

Are there any comments or questions on Resolution 61?

Okay.

With that, will the Clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Resolution 61?

Board Member Herbold?

Yes.

Board Member Morales?

Yes.

Board Member Moschetta?

Aye.

Board Member Nelson?

Aye.

Board Member Peterson?

Aye.

Board Member Sawant?

Yes.

Board Member Strauss?

Yes.

Board President Lewis?

Yes.

Madam Clerk, I don't know if we moved and seconded the resolution.

Do you recall?

I do not recall.

I don't think we did.

I think I got thrown off by Tracy starting her remarks right after you read into the record.

So we do need to move.

Sorry, we need to do that resolution again.

I move Resolution 61. Is there a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Resolution 61?

Board Member Herbold?

Yes.

Board Member Morales?

Yes.

Board Member Moschetta.

Aye.

Board Member Nelson.

Aye.

Board Member Peterson.

Aye.

Board Member Sawant.

Yes.

Board Member Strauss.

Yes.

Board President Lewis.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The resolution passes.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the resolution on my behalf?

Item four, will the clerk please read item four into the record?

Agenda item four, resolution 62, a resolution adopting the 2024 Seattle Park District budget for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk and Board Member Swant.

I believe this would be the appropriate place for your remarks after we move the resolution.

I move resolution 62. Is there a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded, the resolution is in front of the board.

Are there any comments or remarks or questions regarding resolution 62?

Board member Swann.

Thank you, Chair Lewis.

As I mentioned this morning, I am voting no on the budget as a whole because it falls far short of the needs of Seattle's working people.

We heard from parks workers about the services they are unable to provide because of the massive understaffing and the underfunded positions.

As I said this morning, I'll reserve my comments for the budget as a whole for when we vote on it at the full City Council meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Are there any other questions or comments or remarks on the resolution?

Seeing none, will Council, I'm sorry, Board Member Nelson, please.

So in the lineup of these items, I suppose this is the best place to ask this, but this follows on Resolution 59, which I understand had a $700,000 carryover of unspent money.

And I thought that was pretty good because this is a pretty big budget.

And so that's a very small amount that was not spent according to the spending plan.

So are there but then we heard that that was for a very specific body of work.

I'm looking at this resolution, the attachment A, and I'm not seeing if there are underspends in other categories or budget control levels.

Is that, how are we doing on getting all the money out the door is my basic point.

Tracy, do you want to field that question?

If I recollect correctly, we have heard from the Parks Department, and I think this actually was covered at the October 16th meeting, the expectation is that there will be underspend in 2023 going into 2024. but that was calculated to be the source of funds.

And I think it's in the ballpark of around $3 million that is going to be used to do the purchase of vehicles that are required to actually implement the activities of the park district.

And Michelle or AP, please correct me if I'm wrong about the figure or what the use of the plan funds were for, but I believe that is what the intent is.

And they talked about this at the October 16th meeting.

that's right tracy we will have some underspend on the operating side and we'll bring that back probably at your june meeting to have you um carry that forward when we have exact dollars it's only october right or november now we don't have the year-end figures yet thank you for that information um

that's great i don't remember the specifics of that october meeting however because we had one resolution mentioning 700 000 i just wanted to know um are there other categories and so um offline i'll understand better uh for future votes in in upcoming years why we single out one area where there's underspend and carry forward and not others but that's to be continued thank you

councilmember just to follow up on that it the carry forward that was talked about is anticipated for 2023 is exactly what michelle just said which is they don't know yet because we haven't gotten to the end of 2023 we will have that conversation in probably the june meeting when the park district needs to in fact probably authorize a carry forward and you will hear then specifically just like for the the resolution 59 how they are proposing to use that underspend but it's hard to do that now when we haven't gotten to year end to find out okay what is the total amount and then how much would be used for vehicles or if there's other resources that are underspent what they would be proposed to spend them for so um yeah

Got it.

And congratulations to the administrators of all of these funds for apparently doing a great job spending the property tax that's collected in a way that meets the objectives of our spending plan.

And that's ultimately what I'm thinking about.

When I was gearing up to vote for this last year, I was thinking, I hope that we're actually using all the money that we are collecting Because if not, then is there a possibility of changing the budget in the following year, the rate, etc.

So I'm very glad to know that things are running apparently very smoothly and I await future meetings.

Thanks.

Thank you.

And just to give a couple of remarks in closing in that same vein, I would just say I don't think that we've seen starker improvement in any city service than we've seen in Parks over the past two years, and that's due in no small part to the work that this team at Parks has been doing with the maintenance surge, with getting things back on track and really, really grateful for the leadership of our parks folks here and also Deputy Superintendent Williams, who is not on the panel today, but I know has been a very, very big part of these efforts of really turning parks around from some of the challenges that were endemic in our parks early in the pandemic.

So a lot of gratitude to the Parks Department for this hard work.

With that, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of the resolution?

Board Member Herbold?

Yes.

Board Member Morales?

Yes.

Board Member Mosqueda?

Aye.

Board Member Nelson?

Aye.

Board Member Peterson?

Aye.

Board Member Sawat?

Aye.

Yes.

Board Member Strauss.

Yes.

Board President Lewis.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries.

The Park Board adopts the resolution, and will the clerk please affix my signature to the resolution on my behalf?

Will the clerk please read item five into the record?

Agenda item five, resolution 63, a resolution authorizing the levy of regular property taxes by the Seattle Park District for collection in 2024 representing- Sorry, I'm sorry, Chair Lewis.

I meant to vote no.

Oh.

Duly noted.

Seven in favor.

Thank you.

One opposed for agenda item- That was agenda item four, resolution 62, correct?

Yes, Madam Clerk.

And Board Member Swant did make very clear remarks prior to the vote indicating a desire to vote no.

And Board Member Swant, the record does duly reflect your no vote on agenda item four.

Really appreciate that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Well, the clerk, sorry, Jodi, did you just read item five under the record?

I don't think I finished it.

Agenda item five, resolution 63, a resolution authorizing the levy of regular property taxes by the Seattle Park District for collection in 2024, representing an increase above the regular property taxes levied for collection in 2023 for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I move Resolution 63. Is there a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded.

Tracy, any remarks on Resolution 63?

Nope, this is just the required resolution that authorizes the increase that reflects the 3.4% increase over the amount collected in 2023 of 118 million, going up to 122 million in 2024.

Thank you, Tracy, for that reminder.

Are there any comments, questions, remarks from board members?

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on resolution 63?

Board Member Herbold.

Yes.

Board Member Morales.

Yes.

Board Member Mesquita.

Aye.

Board Member Nelson.

Aye.

Board Member Peterson.

Aye.

Board Member Sawant.

Yes.

Board Member Strauss.

Yes.

Board President Lewis.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The resolution passes.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the resolution?

Will the clerk please read agenda item six into the record?

Agenda item six, resolution 64, a resolution relating to the levy of property taxes, fixing the rates and or amounts of taxes to be levied and levying the same upon all taxable property, both real and personal in the Seattle Park District to finance the activities of the district for the year beginning January 1st, 2024 for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

I move resolution 64. Is there a second?

Second.

Moved and seconded.

Tracy, do you have any additional comments on resolution 64?

No, this is the one that authorizes the collection of $122 million that will equate to approximately 41 cents per thousand dollars of assessed value or about $345 a year for the median homeowner.

Thank you, Tracy.

Are there any comments, questions, remarks from board members?

Seeing none, will the Clerk please call the roll on the adoption of Resolution 64?

Board Member Herbold?

Yes.

Board Member Morales?

Yes.

Board Member Mosqueda?

Aye.

Board Member Nelson?

Aye.

Board Member Peterson?

Aye.

Board Member Sawant?

Yes.

Board Member Strauss?

Yes.

Board President Lewis?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, the motion carries and the Park District Board adopts resolution 64. Will the clerk please fix my signature to the resolution on my behalf.

Item seven, will the clerk please read item seven into the record.

Agenda item seven, resolution 65, a resolution setting the Seattle Park District Board meeting dates in 2024 for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

Tracy, any remarks on this item?

Did you want to move it and get a second or did you do that already?

Sure.

Let's make sure that we do that first.

I move resolution 65. Second.

Moved and seconded.

Tracy, do you have any remarks on resolution 65 before I open it up to board members?

Councilor, just to note that this does establish the park board meetings for 2024. And just a word about how we changed the timing of this last meeting.

Most of you will remember we used to hold this meeting after the budget committee meeting on the second day just before approval of the budget.

And it became clear to us that we actually could do it right after the budget committee finishes the work the day before.

So we moved the meeting to to coincide with that versus us all having to wait until after the full council adopted the budget because the work is essentially done and approved.

So that's the reason for that meeting getting moved and we will carry out that pattern I think going forward.

So I appreciate your help on that.

Thank you.

Are there any questions, remarks from board members?

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the resolution?

Board member Herbold.

Yes.

Board Member Morales.

Yes.

Board Member Mosqueda.

Aye.

Board Member Nelson.

Aye.

Board Member Peterson.

Aye.

Board Member Sawant.

Yes.

Board Member Strauss.

Yes.

Board President Lewis.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Well, thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

The resolution passes, and will you please affix my signature to the resolution?

Well, board members, this is the conclusion of our final Park District Board meeting for the year.

This is, you know, a great body of final legislation to tie off a lot of long-planned and long-organized investments.

As just a point of personal privilege, it has been a great honor to have the trust and confidence of my colleagues to serve as president of the Park Board during a really, really dynamic time in this institution.

for creating a new investment cycle, for working with stakeholders, community members, and respective board members on projects in their communities.

Really, really excited to have engaged in this body of work during the time that I have been here on the council dais, and really will reflect back on this as one of the greatest opportunities I've had to serve in public life.

So thank you so much to everybody here who has supported me in this work, who has worked to put together the six-year investment plan, to implement it, to our team at Parks that has done such a great job in diligently picking up the mantle of this really big mandate from the Park District Board, a funded mandate, a mandate about the types of open space and recreation opportunities that we as Seattleites want to aspire to, and a team that is coming together to deliver it and make sure it happens, really could not be more proud of that work.

I look here at AP Diaz, Christopher, who's not here, but was an instrumental part of putting this together last year with us, Michelle, and of course, Paula, who has worked so closely with us here at the Council.

I also want to thank my Chief of Staff, Jacob Thorpe, who has been the clerk to this process and really, really helped do a lot of the legwork of stitching together that investment plan last year.

And I really look forward next year to the Council continuing this work.

The next scheduled meeting will be June 24th of 2024. of the Park District Board.

And if there is anything for the good of the order, I'm happy to open that up now.

But seeing none, we are adjourned until June of 2024. Thank you so much.