Seattle City Council Land Use Committee 7/2/2025

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All right, the July 2nd, 2025 Land and Use Committee will come to order.

It is 2.03 PM.

I'm Mark Solomon, chair of the Land and Use Committee.

Will the committee clerk please call the roll?

Vice Chair Strauss.

Present.

Council Member Rink.

Present.

Chair Solomon.

Present.

Chair, there are three members present.

Thank you very much.

Let it be noted for the record that Council Member Moore and Council Member Rivera are excused.

If there are no objections, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Again, thank you everyone for coming to this Wednesday afternoon meeting to discuss land use.

As always, thank you to our city clerks and our central staff for helping us prepare for this meeting.

We'll now open the public comment, hybrid public comment period.

Now public comment should relate to items on today's agenda and within the purview of this committee.

Clerk, how many speakers do we have signed up today?

Currently, we have six in-person speakers, and there are currently three remote speakers signed up.

Okay.

So six in-person, three remote?

Correct.

All right.

Let's give every speaker two minutes.

We'll start with the in-person speakers first.

And could you please read the public comment instructions?

The public comment period will be moderated in the following manner.

The public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

Speakers will be called in the order in which they are registered.

In-person speakers will be called first, after which we will move to remote speakers until the public comment period has ended.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of their time.

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not end their comments within a lot of time.

This will allow us to call on the next speaker.

The public comment period is now open, and we begin with the first speakers on the list.

David Haynes.

All right, thank you.

David Ains.

One second, one second.

All right.

Get your timer going there.

Okay.

And now.

Hi, David Ains.

We need a 21st century first world quality housing build out.

Y'all need to take legislation to take the restrictions off the developers so that they would be incentivized to put the first three levels as affordable with a higher than six story level.

Instead, we have...

what seems to be Black Lives Matter and George Floyd protesters hiding behind this racist Tammy Morales mental health problem policy of roots to roofs where it's basically another racist tainted policy and priority for skin color like reverse racisms, I guess, because y'all are basing everything from a UW racist woke professor's priority policy of calling out restrictive housing in the past, so now you're gonna take crappy housing from unqualified nonprofits that are politically connected to the reelection apparatus of the progressive Democrat party, and you're gonna give them for the next 35 years a whole bunch of money, and they're gonna build a bunch of warehouse echo slum real estate, and then they're gonna act like some sort of slumlord, acting like they're like another social housing issue through a pilot program.

If y'all could like get rid of your blinders of hatred and like scorn lived experiences that wanna button push like racist voting blocks, you all could like, incentivize the developers, take the restrictions off the comprehensive plan, and purge all of your racist, tainted skin color priorities that look the other way on the merit base of a developer who's qualified to build a 21st century, first world quality home.

instead of allowing some politically connected re-election apparatus of non-profits that finance the activist and organizing community to hide behind a non-profit that lists themselves as a developer that's not qualified, that has to hire somebody else who's also somewhat suspect in not being qualified, that has to hire somebody else.

You all are cheating the people and wasting tax dollars with your racist woke button pushing for voting blocks.

Thank you.

All right, next up we'll have Sandy Shetler.

Hi, okay, hi.

Yeah, so hard to follow that.

So I'm Sandy Shetler, commenting on Roots to Roofs, which unfortunately does not appear to allow space for a single tree.

Having a lower income is correlated with negative health metrics that peer-reviewed studies show improve with access to large shade trees.

Street trees aren't sufficient to provide future residents the benefits of reduced asthma, reduced heart attacks and strokes, better mental health, higher infant birth weight, and even better brain development for children.

All of these benefits are correlated with living near trees.

Even Medellin Colombia is incorporating green space with new developments.

People shouldn't have to choose between affordable housing and their health.

Wealthy people have trees and will always have them.

I also ask why this bill is separate from the comprehensive plan, since housing abundance and affordability are being addressed on a larger scale in the comp plan and zoning bills.

Please amend this plan to include trees for everyone or take it up after the comp plan and zoning bills have passed when we will have a clear roadmap for future growth and future trees for everyone.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Ruth Williams followed by Jesse Simpson.

Hi there, my name is Ruth Williams and I apologize for not quite being over my cold.

I live in District 5 and I'm representing only myself, no community group, and I have a few comments on Council Bill 12-10-11, which is the Roots to Roofs.

Builders don't want to build much these days with our uncertain economy and high interest rates.

This circumstance provides an opening for the city to purchase and bank properties for future low income and small business projects.

Best not to waste this opportunity.

As you move through the amendment process on this bill, please be sure to include space for trees that support healthy communities and natural ecosystems that minimize flooding and preserve wildlife, including salmon.

Riparian ecosystems also support the native water table, which in turn helps keep our mature trees healthy.

Extensive pavement and impacted buffer zones promote flooding and expensive property damage.

A clear example of this is the persistent flooding of Little Brook Creek in the underserved Lake City.

It has been left for volunteers to apply for grants to map the flood prone areas for FEMA and the city may have to buy out impacted property owners.

We have all been paying our bills long enough to know that the cheapest way to accomplishment is to work carefully each step of the way.

Ignoring complications and cutting corners invariably sooner or later leads to expensive repairs and remediation.

Let's do this right with prudent planning and conservation included.

Thank you.

All right, next up is Jesse Simpson followed by Parker Dawson.

Hey, good afternoon, council members.

I'm Jesse Simpson from the Housing Development Consortium.

HTC is a member-based organization serving the nonprofit affordable housing developers, as well as other organizations like architects, general contractors, and more working to build the affordable housing our city desperately needs.

I'm here today to speak in strong support of the Roots to Roofs pilot program, which creates a density bonus for affordable housing and community-based development.

Affordable housing is one of our community's most pressing needs.

It serves people across the income spectrum, working people unable to afford the price of market rate rent in this very expensive city.

But it faces myriad barriers.

It's expensive to construct, and the operating funding needed to ensure that it's affordable and maintained over time is often difficult to secure.

But one of those key barriers doesn't cost the city any money to address, and that's the zoning.

I applaud the council member, Rink, for bringing forward this sensible and, I believe, common sense policy program, which will help our members deliver more affordable housing.

It will directly benefit some projects in the pipeline, enabling them to build an extra story and max out the potential of development sites that are under consideration.

I also wanna note that while the comprehensive plan is under consideration right now, the actual zoning for up zones through this plan in terms of the multi-family zones has been delayed to next year.

And so this pilot program can fill an important stop gap and I urge you to support it.

Thank you all.

Next up will be Parker Dawson followed by Steve Rustello.

Hey, council members.

My name is Parker Dawson with the Master Builders Association.

And to compliment my colleague, Jesse Simpson, we are a member-driven association comprised of market rate developers building additional housing that we desperately need.

Also here in strong support of the Roots to Roofs bill today.

I want to applaud the stakeholdering that was done by Council Member Rink.

Although this bill is not, and the program would not be geared primarily toward market rate builders, I felt very honored to be part of that stakeholdering group to make sure that this was incredibly well researched, that we were utilizing every development opportunity to As Jesse said, use the free tools in our tool belt, the free resources that we have, aka zoning, aka development standards, to really push opportunities to elevate community-driven associations and organizations to get the housing that they do need in the places that need them.

So thank you very much again, Council Member Rink.

I do hope that you all will see this through smoothly, and I'm very excited over the next 10 years, although hopefully sooner, to see those 35 projects go up.

Thank you.

All right, up next is Steve Rubstello.

Eventually, I think the comp plan should come to this committee, and they might even have more than a cattle call or two for people.

I live in beautiful upper Fremont.

Well, we'd like to keep it beautiful.

We were the only district in the last major up zone that didn't have the district representative help clean it up a bit.

Now that's not the current representative for that district.

The other one became so well known in the district, and not just with the fishermen, that he decided not to run.

But beautiful Upper Fremont has always been highly zoned, dense.

Fremont has taken far more density over a longer period of time than most neighborhoods, certainly in the north end of the city.

And I think that it needs to have some of the older buildings help to be saved, because what we're seeing is when you raise the zoning, being a highest and best use state, say you have eight units on a property, and you zone it so now we can put 40 units on it.

Well, you don't pay the tax on the building, but the ground, the price goes way up.

So those eight or 12 units that were there before suddenly become unmarketable.

And Seattle's done a very good job of pushing the middle class, lower middle class, and working class out of the city.

I'd like to save Upper Fremont, and I will be talking to Mr. Strauss.

Thank you.

All right, moving into our virtual public commenters, we will start with June Blue Spruce.

June, give me one moment to unmute you.

All right, June, you may talk when ready.

Hello, my name is June Bruce Bruce.

I live in District 2. I applaud the intentions of the Roots to Roots bill.

And I know that some community organizations in my district could benefit from it.

But I have concerns about its impact.

I have years of experience in public health and health care research.

I know how pilot projects work.

A pilot project that is a building is different.

Whether the pilot is successful or not, the building remains in place.

This project would have a permanent effect on up to 35 Seattle neighborhoods, allowing taller buildings to take up more of the lot with no protection or requirement for trees or green space.

When we think about reducing the economic cost of housing, we have to figure in the health costs to residents of the housing we're building, as well as the public health costs to the city as a whole.

If we build housing that has cheaper rent or purchase price, but worsens chronic health problems like asthma, heart disease, or hypertension, increases deaths during heat events, and increases the number of low birth weight babies, are we really improving the lives of working and poor people?

Research provides clear evidence that neighborhoods with tree canopy have lower risks of all these conditions compared to neighborhoods that lack tree canopies.

Why is roots-to-roof separate from the proposed One Seattle Plan zoning changes, which will be voted on within months?

What mechanisms would be in place to ensure that most of its projects would be located outside Districts 2 and 3, which have already borne the brunt of significant up zones and displacement?

District 2 also has among the lowest tree canopy in Seattle.

How would the pilot be evaluated, and how would that evaluation separate out the impact of the pilot from that of huge zoning changes being considered at the exact same time?

How is this legislation consistent with the environmental justice principles of the HEAL Act?

If you don't have good answers to these questions, I respectfully request that you focus on the zoning legislation before you and vote this plan down for now.

Thank you.

All right.

Next up will be Richard Ellison.

After that, after Richard will be Lewis Martin.

Hello.

My name is Richard Ellison.

I live in District 4, which is an area that has a lot of big trees.

We are seeing the news of the global climate change right now in the record temperatures in Europe.

Seattle may seem cool today, but we know that the heat crisis will hit Seattle again.

This draft of CB 12, 10, 11, and the Roots to Roots does not support tree retention or planting requirements.

It makes no mention of the importance of maximizing the retention of existing trees during development.

It makes no mention of the need to replace trees removed during development.

Low-income housing should not be treeless without enough open space for families.

Trees are critical for reducing the heat island effects, reducing stormwater runoff and air pollution, its habitat for native birds, and it's important for environmental equity and justice.

Build taller, not wider, to save trees and make open space.

Allow for increased height on buildings if trees are retained.

Give incentives for added open space and new planting to big trees.

Where are the kids supposed to play?

There's no open space for big trees in this proposal.

There's no open space for kids.

Where are the roots?

We talk about roots to housing.

Where are the tree roots?

Where's the green space?

Schedule comprehensive plans to say that one of four core values was environmental stewardship.

Where is the environmental stewardship?

Where did that gold go?

Where's the beef?

A pilot housing project should be to show how affordable housing and big trees and open space can work together for people.

Note that existing trees are the real survivors.

Newly planted trees have a low long-term survival rate.

Those big trees that are there, they have survived so far.

Let's protect them.

The loss of this precious resource during the climate emergency is poor planning.

Please require that the qualifying development also include at least 35% of the units as affordable for lower income households.

Thank you.

Our final speaker today will be Louis Martin.

Good afternoon, council members.

My name is Louis Martin.

I'm a legacy black resident of the central district and director of a longstanding early learning center in Seattle.

I'm here to urge you not to pass the Roots to Roots legislation.

This policy, formerly known as Connected Communities, rebrands developer incentives as racial equity, but in practice, it threatens the very communities it claims to support.

This pilot allows buildings close to property lines eliminated space for large state free, increasing heat exposure and worsening environmental health in neighborhoods already overburdened with air and noise pollution.

It exempts developers from parking and design review, shutting out community voices, and prioritizing profit over people.

This legislation benefits organizations that want to become landlords, not legacy residents, not displaced black families, and not working class homeowners.

It includes no path to home ownership, no tree protection, and no meaningful racial or environmental analysis.

To the members of the Lone Use Committee, this is your opportunity to take a different path.

Real equity means more than good intentions.

I'm sorry when my little one is upset.

It means asking hard questions about who benefits, who pays supplies, and who gets left out.

This legislation should be fully evaluated through the comprehensive plan process where thorough analysis and community safeguards are in place.

Please vote no in its current form.

Thank you for your time.

Chair, that is the end of our list.

Thank you very much.

There are no additional registered speakers, so we will now close the public comment period and move on to the items of our agenda.

So clerk, will you please read items one and two into the record?

Agenda items one and two, appointments 3216 and 3217, the reappointments of Diana Quintar Solaris and Caleb Tewalde as members of the Seattle Planning Commission for term to April 15th, 2028 for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you very much.

I see a presenter has joined us at the table, so if you'll please

Thank you, Chair Solomon, and good afternoon, council members.

My name is Vanessa Murdock.

I'm the executive director of the Seattle Planning Commission.

The Seattle Planning Commission is an advisory volunteer body appointed by this body, the city council, and the mayor, and approved, subject to full approval of the full city council.

The planning commissioners offer advice to you all, city council members, the mayor, and city departments, staff on issues related to land use, housing, transportation, and livability.

Thank you for inviting me here today to speak on behalf of two commissioners who are eligible for reappointment, Caleb Tuwolde and Diana Quintanar-Solares.

Caleb is Associate Director of Leadership Development at Rainier Scholars.

He is currently the co-chair of our Land, East and Transportation Committee, and he came to us first as a Get Engaged member, which is a program run between the mayor's office and the YMCA to promote youth participation in boards and commissions across Seattle.

Diana is a senior vice president at WSP, focusing on urban innovation and mobility.

She is a sustainable transportation planner, as well as has expertise in public space and urban development.

Prior to coming to Seattle, she worked in Mexico City.

Most recently, as in the authority of public space, which is Mexico City's urban development, open space and mobility department.

Happy to answer any questions on these two reappointments.

I'll just add that planning commissioners are appointed to a three-year term and are eligible for reappointment to a second three-year term.

Thank you very much.

Committee members, do you have any questions or comments for our presenter?

None?

Sure.

I'll jump in, Chair, if that's all right.

I remember appointing— Vice Chair Strauss.

Thank you, Chair.

I remember appointing both of these individuals when I was Land Use Chair.

I'm glad to see they're back.

Thank them for their volunteer service.

Excellent.

Thank you.

All right.

If there are no further comments or questions, I move that the committee recommend confirmation of appointments 3216 and 3217. Second.

All right.

It has been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointments.

Are there any further comments?

Clerk, can you please call the roll?

Vice Chair Strauss?

Yes.

Council Member Rank?

Yes.

Chair Solomon?

Yes.

Chair, there are three votes in favor and none opposed.

Very good.

The motion carries in the committee recommendation that the council confirm the appointments will be sent to the July 8th, 2025 city council meeting.

Thank you very much.

Thank you all.

All right.

Thank you.

All right.

Please clerk, could you read item three into the agenda?

Agenda item number three, Council Bill 121009, an ordinance related to land use and zoning, meaning sections 23.22.024, 0.064, 0.066, 0.070, 0.072, 0.074, and 0.78, of the Seattle Municipal Code and repealing Subchapter 4 of chapter 23.22, consisting of sections 23.22.082, .084, .086, and .088 of the Seattle Municipal Code to build, to update subdivision procedures for briefing and discussion.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

And I see our presenter to have joined us at the table.

Please introduce yourselves for the record.

HB Harper, analyst.

Liz Schwitzen, Council Central Staff.

Great.

And they are here to provide an overview of the bill and answer any questions that may arise today.

Council Member Rink, as a sponsor of this legislation, you are recognized to speak to it.

Thank you so much, Chair.

If it's all right, I'd love if Central Staff could provide the briefing first before I provide my comments.

Indeed.

Thank you.

Central Staff.

Despite the long title, I don't have any slides today as it's a relatively minor piece of legislation.

Council Bill 121009 amends Title 23 of the Seattle Municipal Code to delegate decision-making authority on final plats to the city departments that currently review subdivision applications, therefore removing final action by city council as a requirement.

As you may be aware, Chapter 5817 of the RCW regulates subdivision of land, which occurs in two phases, preliminary and final.

So during preliminary subdivision proposal and application and review, we've got a lot of different departments who review those applications.

Decision-making happens depending on the type of subdivision either by the Seattle Department of Construction and Inspections or by the hearing examiner.

And at that point, a number of requirements are placed on the preliminary plat approval such that the final plat cannot occur until those requirements are met.

So final plats with more than 10 lots do come back to the city council.

You may recall we had one relatively recently.

But before they come here, it's already been confirmed by department directors that those requirements from the preliminary stage have been met.

And typically, a length of time has elapsed and infrastructure has actually already been created.

So plat utilities and potentially buildings are built.

So council's purview at that point is, as you may imagine or recall, quite limited.

Given that the council has on average more than two of these per year that come to you, delegating this role to department directors would improve the efficiency of permitting and without really sacrificing much in the way of real value since the council approval is essentially ministerial.

So with that, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you very much.

So that's Barbara Rank.

Thank you, chair.

And thank you for that overview on this colleagues.

This legislation is related to streamlining our subdivision processes.

The state legislature has given us the authority to delegate final approval for subdivisions to the Department of Transportation after the hearing examiner has issued a decision.

And while council, as was stated, votes to codify these decisions, we have no real choice in the matter, but rather to approve it.

This process takes months from drafting legislation to committee hearings to a final vote for it to go into effect.

So this bill is a simple yet straightforward effort to promote good governance and shave off months, unnecessary months on housing project timelines.

And with that, open up for any questions you all have.

Thank you very much.

Any questions or comments regarding this bill?

Councilmember Strauss.

Thank you, Chair.

I can remember when Lish brought this to me when I was the land use chair a number of years ago because it's a straightforward piece of action.

We didn't unfortunately just run into the crunch with budget.

And then after budget, I switched roles in being the budget chair.

So we had talked to the last land use chair.

I thought it was going to be passed under their tenure.

And so I'm glad to see it back before us today.

It's very straightforward.

If we had jurisdiction to alter or amend these decisions, then we should not pass this bill.

We do not have those abilities, and therefore, this just takes work off of our desk that we don't have any jurisdiction over, put plainly.

And I will ask central staff, did I represent the facts correctly or is there anything that you'd like to change there?

Thank you.

Thank you.

As has been mentioned, seems straightforward.

It seems common sense.

Let's not get in our own way.

So with that, if there's no further comments, I want to thank you for presenting.

We look forward to actually moving on this piece of legislation and making it happen.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Clerk, will you please read item four into the agenda?

Agenda item number four, council bill 121011, an ordinance related to land use and zoning, establishing the routes to roofs bonus pilot program, and adding new sections 23.40.090 through 0.097 to the Seattle Municipal Code for briefing and discussion.

Great, thank you.

I see our presenter has joined us at the table.

Please introduce yourself for the record.

And council member Rink, would you like our presenter to proceed before Got it.

So please, sir.

All right.

Ketel Freeman, council central staff.

Let me make things smaller here so I can see what I'm doing.

That's not it.

All right.

Okay.

Um, so this is an initial briefing on council bill one, two, zero, uh, 1-2-1-0-1-1, which is a roots-to-roof pilot program.

I'll talk a little bit about the purpose of the program, briefly go through what the bill would do, talk about who could qualify for the program, briefly describe kind of at a high level the development capacity increases that would be available through the program, and then I'll walk through some next steps here for the committee.

So in terms of purpose, the proposed pilot program would be-the purpose of it would be to demonstrate the social benefits of equitable development, including community-serving uses and housing available through a spectrum of household incomes, setting on-site affordability standards and incentives for development of housing and equitable development uses.

And I'll return in a minute to what an equitable development use is through partnerships between public, private, and community-based organizations.

So how would that purpose be achieved?

It would be achieved by providing a development incentive and incentives for qualifying development to participate in the program.

Specifically, it would define equitable development uses.

Generally, there are sort of two flavors of equitable development use.

It could include an institutional use like childcare or something like that.

It could also include commercial uses like a commercial kitchen.

It would require that qualifying development provide affordable housing.

At least 25 percent of units is affordable for a period of up to 50 years.

Affordability would range between 40 percent for very small units and 80 percent for two-bedroom units.

It would have identified minimum qualifications for program eligibility.

You'd have to be a qualifying development and a qualifying development organization to participate in the program.

It would provide additional height, allowable floor area, exemptions and floor area calculations and flexibility for development standards.

for participating development.

It would exempt participating development from design review and parking minimums, and it would also direct SDCI and OPCD and the Office of Housing to promulgate a rule to help administer the program.

So there would be a deferred effective date for the bill, assuming it passes while that rule could be promulgated.

And it would expire in about 10 years or after 35 qualifying projects apply.

So who could qualify?

It would be nonprofit organizations.

It could also include public development authorities, such as the Social Housing Developer or Community Roots Housing, and also public housing authorities, like the Seattle Housing Authority.

So those could be qualifying developments that could partner with either for-profit or nonprofit developers to participate in the program.

what kind of extra development capacity would be available.

So there's a baseline level of additional development capacity that would be available, and then there would also be some bonuses beyond that baseline additional development capacity.

So what you have here is a table that compares the current height limits in FAR for different zones where participating projects could be developed, the height limit and FAR that would be available through the comp plan if it's implemented as proposed by the mayor, and then baseline height and density increases that could be available through the Roots to Roofs pilot program.

Generally speaking, development could build about an additional floor, sometimes more depending on the zone, and could build somewhat more than is proposed for comp plan implementation.

and go beyond that for additional incentives.

Those additional incentives would include development in areas with historical racially restrictive covenants, and the map shows, this is from the University of Washington's webpage, the Racial Restrictive Covenants Project shows where some parcels are with our historical racial restrictive covenants in the city.

Generally speaking, they're pretty much all over town.

In those areas, there'd be an additional development incentive It would range between about 0.2 and 1.2 FAR, depending on the zone.

And then beyond that, there would be an FAR exemption for development of equitable development uses in a project.

So if there is some institutional or commercial use in the project, a floor area in that project, up to one FAR in most cases, would be exempt from chargeable FAR.

So next steps, public hearing is scheduled for the end of the month on July 30th.

The committee could vote at that meeting or at a subsequent meeting in August.

That's all I've got for you.

All right, thank you very much.

Councilman Barink, as sponsor of the bill, you are recognized.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for that overview, Ketel.

Colleagues, this legislation came about after conversations with community stakeholders and a desire from them to see a revised version of this legislation after some disappointment about it failing to get over the finish line from last year after years of work.

And after that initial conversation, my office spent months redrafting and stakeholdering to ensure this legislation was meeting some of the outstanding concerns from where it was left off last year.

And we hosted multiple roundtables with stakeholders trying to ensure that all voices were heard to address the concerns.

And I believe we've made significant progress with what you see today.

Some of those stakeholders include known groups such as Urban League, Filipino Community of Seattle, Homestead Community Land Trust, Uplift Investment, Ethiopian Community of Seattle, Allied Eight, Habitat for Humanity, Housing Development Consortium, and more.

And we have, and we will continue to engage stakeholders that reach out to my office to voice their thoughts on this bill.

I know my team has taken a couple of those calls even just yesterday, making sure that we're hearing from folks.

We're doing whatever we can to work in good faith to make sure that we make changes to address concerns that we heard last year and now.

And while this bill is modeled after legislation council considered last year, we've worked to incorporate a number of changes.

And that includes some of the concerns that were raised about clustering in areas where we've seen disproportionate growth and higher rates of displacement compared to the rest of the city.

We have adjusted height and far numbers to meet our ever-growing community needs.

We have also added a community preference policy meant to prioritize vulnerable populations who are at risk of higher displacement.

We have worked with stakeholders on collaborative language when it comes to the owner unit incentive, which we intend to bring forward in the form of an amendment as language is finalized to promote legacy homeowners' ability to retain equity in their homes.

What is clear is that Seattle is in an affordability crisis, and while much work is being done to promote community-led affordable housing, it's not enough.

And this legislation intends to promote housing affordability with an anti-displacement and racial equity lens.

And for too long, high-risk displacement areas have borne the brunt of new development, and this bill is meant to mitigate some of that harm.

By emphasizing the city-wide nature of this legislation with an emphasis on historically racially restricted covenant areas, rather than the south-end oriented community preference policy map as seen in the previous version of the legislation, we're spreading growth to areas that haven't seen their fair share of new community-led affordable housing.

On the more technical side of this bill, which comes in the form of a pilot program meant to incentivize community-led affordable housing production by providing height and FAR bonuses, the pilot would expire at the end of 2035, or once 35 qualified projects have applied, whichever comes first.

So this would be citywide with an additional bonus in areas with historically racially restrictive covenants.

And I'm very happy to have Chair Solomon as a co-sponsor on this.

I want to thank him and his office for collaborating with us on this to get this legislation to a place where I think everyone can be proud of.

And with that, Chair, as co-sponsor, I invite you to share any of your thoughts on this legislation.

I want to thank you again for your collaboration on this.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Council Member Rake.

For me, it comes down to this.

We need housing, period.

We need more housing at more income levels, and we should have the flexibility, or at least allow the flexibility, for developers to develop housing.

It doesn't matter if it's, you know, who the organization is.

If you can build housing, let's make it easier for those projects to come online, especially...

in those communities that have traditionally been excluded from being in certain neighborhoods.

So that's what it comes down to for me.

Let's get it done.

Vice Chair Strauss, my apologies.

Thank you.

Thank you to both of you for bringing this back.

I was disappointed.

I think it was a year ago or so when the bill was pushed forward without time for a little bit more discussion.

At that time, I think I saw a pathway forward, but we needed at least one more committee meeting about it.

And so that was a lost opportunity.

I just want to check in with Ketel.

When we were working on...

creating a pathway forward to the bill last year.

I had a number of amendments.

One was encompassed with a striker.

Were those concepts included in this bill?

Yeah, so the base for the legislation that was introduced, it's not just what came out of committee last year.

Councilmember Rank noted some other changes that were not necessarily considered by the committee.

But as a point of departure, the amended bill, as it came out of committee, informs the legislation that was introduced and is in front of the committee today.

So some of the changes that I think were incorporated in your striker and also that were passed by the committee included having income levels that reflect the affordability levels in the multifamily tax exemption program, for example.

So that is in the base bill.

That may be something the council will need to reconsider at some point in the future if the MFTU program changes, but that is an example of the kind of thing that came out of the committee process last year that is incorporated into the base.

Okay.

I'd love to just dig in a little bit deeper with you.

I know, Council Member Rink, we've discussed this in the past, and I believe that at least at broad strokes, what I was working on last year was incorporated, but I just want to double check.

But thank you for bringing this back forward.

Thank you.

A couple of quick questions and actually points of clarification for the record.

Commentary that we have heard today as well as what we have seen coming to us in email related to tree canopy, tree protection, there's no provisions for more trees.

Can you speak to that?

Sure.

So there are some exemptions in the bill.

For example, there's a parking exemption and there's a design review exemption.

There is not an exemption for development that conforms to the city's tree code.

So any development under the pilot program would be subject to the tree code regulations.

That includes replacement trees as well as opportunities to modify development standards to preserve existing Tier 1 and Tier 2 trees.

It is generally the case that when more development is allowed, it is somewhat more likely that existing trees will be removed as part of that development, but the replacement requirements that go along with the tree code would apply.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

And another point of clarification, again, the criticism being that why don't we just do this with the comp plan?

And I don't know if you want to speak to that or if you would want to speak to that.

So the two bills that are currently referred to the Comprehensive Plan Committee, the Select Committee on the Comprehensive Plan, are the Comprehensive Plan Bill and also implementing regulations for the Comprehensive Plan Bill.

this bill doesn't rely on any proposed amendments to the comprehensive plan so it is a standalone pilot program that abends the land use code which is why it's in your committee okay cool i'll just build on to that point and i know we we heard from one of our public commenters today about this point just about timing and noting that we know timelines for affordable housing development can be particularly lengthy and looking at the timeline for the comp plan that has been delayed and looking at kind of the timeline we're looking at for future zoning decisions.

This offers an opportunity for us to still make progress on getting some of these projects started now without, and as Cato stated, without a requirement to change us to the comp plan.

So there's an opportunity ahead as we're working on the comp plan to reconcile and include potentially language related to this pilot in that process.

I welcome those discussions, but that's a bit of the rationale of what we were thinking towards bringing this forward now.

Great, thank you.

And again, my bottom line, we need more housing.

We need more housing now.

We need more housing at all income levels.

And let's not get in our own way to make that stuff happen.

So that's why I'm coming down on this.

So thank you for that.

Any other commentary questions for such stuff?

Vice Chair Strauss.

Thank you, Chair, just addressing the question that you just asked.

Even though the comp plan feels like it is immediately before us and upon us, we are many, many, many months, potentially even a year out before those regulations take effect.

Because if we look at how we've broken the comp plan out into two sections, we're doing the words and the policies as well as...

the blue lines of the centers and HB 1110 this year, we're not taking up that zoning regional centers or urban centers until next year.

And then there's also implementation time, and then there's the design time and the permitting time, et cetera.

And so what is attractive about this pilot program is that it is, let me double check, is it time limited?

I know it's project limited, up to 35 projects.

it is both project and time limited.

So it's 20, 35, 10 years or 35 projects, whichever is sooner.

And so the reason that that's attractive to me is like, I even look at the design review pilots that we've done over the last few years.

When I've talked to people who are trying to utilize those pilots, they only became aware of them a year into the pilot and then it takes time for permitting.

So by the time they fully understand how it impacts their ability to build, the pilot is almost done, right?

And so with an appropriate timeline and a number of projects as a ceiling, this provides a pretty narrow scope as far as pilots go that is also reasonable.

And if we wait to finish the comp plan, before engaging in this, we're actually selling ourselves short.

That's my humble opinion today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And again, a lot of what we're talking about in terms of bringing units online, this needs to happen sooner.

And if we're waiting for the comp plan to be the fix-all, we're going to be several years out.

And I know there's efforts in this body to streamline the permitting process, to bring units online faster.

I think that's a desire that's shared by the entire city government.

So if we can do this, if we can make this happen so that we get units online quicker, you know, within the next few months or the next year as opposed to the next five years, again, we need more housing now at all income levels.

So that's one of the reasons I'm happy to be a co-sponsor with you on this.

Let's bring these units online now.

So...

Any other further comment or questions for our presenter?

Any final comments from you as the sponsor?

Appreciate that, Chair.

I think you captured it really well with your remarks just there and really thankful that you're a co-sponsor with us on this.

Just as a refresher, we do have, as I mentioned in my opening remarks on this, we do have a small amendment as we were finalizing our stakeholdering process and working on the owner unit incentive language.

And we'll circulate that as soon as possible on this.

But really grateful for the time and committee today to brief this and talk through it and looking forward to our further work on it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I believe it is our intent at this, the July 30th committee to have a public hearing as well as maybe having some of our stakeholders present at the table at that public hearing, public comment period.

So good.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Well, we have reached the end of today's meeting agenda.

Our next meeting will be Wednesday, July 16th, 2025 at 2 PM.

Is there any further business to come before the committee before we adjourn?

Okay.

Hearing no further business to come before this committee, we are adjourned.

It is 2.50 p.m.

Thank you very much, everyone.

Enjoy your Wednesday, and I hope you have a happy and safe Fourth of July.