Finance, Native Communities, and Tribal Governments Committee 5/1/2024

and will the clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Kettle?

Here.

Council President Nelson?

Present.

Vice Chair Rivera?

Chair Strauss?

Present.

Three present.

And two excused.

And two excused.

Council Member Rivera is excused until she arrives.

I want to thank everyone for meeting with us this beautiful Monday morning at 9.30 a.m.

This is a special meeting of the Finance, Native Communities, and Tribal Governments Committee because of Juneteenth, this Wednesday, where the city has the day off.

Hopefully, Association of Washington Cities figures that out for next year, as I will also be at their conference this week.

We have three items on the agenda today, and I'll note Vice Chair Rivera is now present.

The items on the agenda today are a briefing, discussion, and possible vote on Human Services Aging and Disability Services office lease in Renton.

We have a briefing and discussion on the Office of Finance Interim Director Jamie Carnell's appointment and confirmation.

We'll be voting on that at a different meeting.

And then we have a briefing, discussion, and possible vote on five reappointments to the Indigenous Advisory Council.

Before we begin, if there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is now adopted.

We will now open the hybrid public comment period.

Clerk, how many speakers do we have signed up in person?

Four speakers.

Wonderful.

Each speaker will be given two minutes To speak, we will start with the in-person speakers.

I don't see anyone remotely present.

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

Public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

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

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left on their time, and speakers' microphones will be muted if they do not in their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call on the next speaker.

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

We have, I believe, Christina Pearson.

I'm sorry, I'm not very, Mr. or Mrs. Pearson.

Gabrielle De Los Angeles, Maggie Cooper, and Jake Thonis.

First, Mr. or Mrs. Pearson.

I'm sorry.

Good to see you.

Is this on?

Okay, hi everybody.

I'm Christina Pearson.

I am the executive director at the Duwamish Longhouse and Cultural Center.

I'm here to talk about the IAC just really briefly.

The Duwamish Tribe should be invited to sit on the Indigenous Advisory Council.

The Duwamish are historically significant to Seattle and Duwamish Tribal Services has operated just south of here since 1983. The Duwamish Longhouse capital campaign began in the 90s, and the Longhouse has been open and operating for member and community benefit for 15 years in District 1. We will celebrate 16 years this January, which coincides with the treaty signing anniversary of 1855. I don't think that any of the folks here today need a history lesson.

I brought my son here today to watch me tell you fine folks that in the words of elected chairwoman Cecile Hanson, we are still here and we will remain here and respectfully deserve representation on the IAC that is formally affiliated with the present day Duwamish tribe and its nonprofit arms.

Thank you.

Thank you, Christina.

Always nice to see you.

Gabriel de Los Angeles, welcome.

Either one works, yeah.

Not that short.

Okay.

Sorry, Christina.

Council Member Strauss, it's good to see you again.

I was formerly the communications manager for Chief Seattle Club, and it was very awesome for you to be there for Raven Village in the ways that you showed up.

A lot of your work.

I'm very glad that you're head of this committee.

Again, my name is Gabriel De Los Angeles.

I am son of Chief Andy De Los Angeles of the Snoqualmie Nation.

I am also a board member for Duwamish Tribal Services, the nonprofit arm and representation of Duwamish Tribe.

Something that's lacking in here is an invitation.

There needs to be an invitation to the Duwamish, not only because of the fact that the city is named after somebody named Chief Seattle, but because The historical representation comes with a cultural context that cannot be replicated by any other tribe or community or entity in this space.

You absolutely need to make sure that you are invitational, invitational, not an open door, not just saying that we should all apply into the same process, that you are inviting.

the people of the Duwamish into this space to do this work.

I'm also a PhD in learning science and human development.

I study the way that people learn and transmit knowledge across cultures, across generations.

And like I said, this helps me understand the fact that you can't replicate the knowledge base that needs to be represented in these proceedings.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Always great to see you as well.

And Maggie is up next, followed by Jake.

Morning, Maggie.

Hello, everybody.

Good morning.

My name is Maggie Cooper, and I'm our wellness director at Duwamish Tribal Services.

And I'm here to ask for an opportunity for Duwamish Tribe to have a seat at the table.

Not only do we represent Duwamish folks, but we have our nonprofit arm.

So it gives us a seat, and we would like a say.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Last and not least, Jake.

And I still don't see that we have anyone online, so Jake will be our last speaker for the morning.

Good morning, Jake.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Jake Danis.

I live in District 2 on Beacon Hill, and I work at the Duwamish Longhouse as a project manager in District 1. I'm here to echo the comments of my colleagues to make a seat at the table for the Duwamish to be able to be part of the Indigenous Advisory Council.

Excuse me.

The Duwamish Longhouse has existed for 15 years in the city of Seattle, and this was the first longhouse built after the last longhouse was burned down in 1983 by settlers.

The mission of the Duwamish Tribal Services is to promote the cultural, social, political, and economic survival of Seattle's First People, the Duwamish Tribe, to revitalize and preserve Duwamish culture and to share Duwamish history and culture with all people.

Duwamish Tribal Services is the only organization doing this and it's beyond time for the city of Seattle to make a space at the table for them.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And this morning I will make an exception and do one last call for any additional public speakers.

Does your son want to speak?

Okay, just wanted to double check.

Suggestion from another council member.

With that, seeing as we have no additional speakers present, we will move on to the next agenda item.

Thank you for your public testimony today.

We are gonna move right into our first item on the agenda today, which is a briefing discussion on HSD Aging and Disability Services lease as an informational, this is not, we will be voting on this today.

Clerk, will you please read the short title into the record?

Item one, CB120792, HSD Aging and Disability Services, briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you.

And as part of our select budget series where we have done a deep review and examination of our budgeting practices over the last 10 and more specifically five years, it has made a different way that we've operated this committee this year, which means the last time that we had a Finance Native Communities Tribal Governments Committee was May 1st.

That was the last time we had this item before us.

We're now nearing the end of June.

And so colleagues, you might remember that presentation where council president was doing quick math on the back of her napkin right here in council chambers.

And so back of the envelope, right?

And so we had this a couple months ago.

This is a timely item where we need to vote on this today if we are going to be able to have HSD move into their new lease space at the conclusion of their current lease.

So as a reminder, we had this on May 1st.

This allows the council to be adequately briefed on this underlying business need, this lease.

And we are joined by central staff, Jen Labreck.

our analyst and central staff.

So following Jen's introduction, we have Human Services Department Director Tanya Kim, Aging and Disability Services Director Mary Mitchell, her esteemed colleague Lena Thibault, and Finance and Administrative Services, Real Estate and Planning Services Division Director Karen Gruen.

So I'll pass it over to Jen, and we'll just tick down the line, and I'll turn it over to all of you.

Hi, good morning.

This will be mostly HSD's presentation today.

I will open it by saying that HSD is here today to present this legislation for a lease for their aging and disability services program.

As we talked about last time, it is not unusual for a council to hear about a lease and vote on it.

It is a little unusual that this lease is in South King County, but HSD provided their rationale for why that is and some background on the Aging and Disability Services program last time.

And I will really turn it over to them now to walk us through a reminder of the lease and next steps.

Okay, and for the record, I am Tanya Kim, Director of the Human Services Department.

Mary Mitchell, Director of Aging and Disability Services.

And Karen Gruen, I'm with FAS, the Director of Real Estate and Planning Services.

So we've got five minutes, and Chair Strauss did a beautiful job with the context, and so we're gonna move into some reminders as to why.

Uh-oh.

Apologies for the technical difficulties.

We'll go ahead and move through the presentation while we adjust clicking the mouse.

Mary?

Okay, so the most pressing need is that our current lease ends on August 31st of 2024. Just as a reminder, we have two locations and we will be maintaining our location on the 51st floor of the Seattle Municipal Tower and the Renton office serves as a location for our clients down to the South County border in our training hub.

The new location will provide increased access for clients that use public transportation, increased safety.

We will be on the seventh floor.

We will still have free parking as well for clients and team members.

A trauma informed space for case managers that are working with clients that are approaching the end of life.

And the new space will also accommodate any increase of in-office requirements.

The funding source is Title 19 grant funds and not general funds.

Next slide.

And we partnered with FAS to do a search for a new space.

And Triton Towers has met all of our requirements that I just mentioned on the first slide.

We are reducing down our footprint by about 65% of our current footprint.

And we have a tenent agreement in place with the landlords.

And I will pass it off.

And for the budget slide, so you probably noticed the estimated savings are now at 535. The original estimates were based on a year lease.

And so that has been adjusted to start September 1st.

I mentioned we're using grant funds which are restricted and not general funds.

the smaller footprint of 6,800 square feet.

And then there are one-time costs for move and IT needs estimated at 386,000.

And then looking at the first, the terms, the lease terms, First month rent, you can see the comparisons there, right?

So we're gonna go down a little bit in rent and then for the annual 491 at Triton Towers versus 588,000 at our current location and then the one-time moving costs.

And just to underscore, the one-time moving costs as well as the rent over the 10-year period are all grant funds, all restricted funds.

Thank you.

I'll just note, as Council President noted in the last slide, that rent does increase every year.

It's typical, common with any and all leases, I believe.

And then, Director Kim, you stole my thunder there, which is to say this funding can't be used to help us close our structural budget gap, which is general fund, because these are federal grant funds that HSD is administering a federal program for South King County, which is why we need a South King County location in addition to, as Mary Mitchell said, the location on the 51st floor of Seattle Municipal Tower.

So we do have a location here downtown, and we need this auxiliary site as well.

And those funds are, it's a Medicaid program that we administer.

And so while HSD is at the table, because it is for our department and for our case managers, this is being put forward by FAS.

And so Karen will close us out.

And just a reminder for the committee, we are here because under the Seattle Municipal Code office space of over five years in term and over 5,000 square feet in size, we seek council authorization for the FAS director to be able to sign that lease.

The lease that we're talking about at Triton Tower is a 10-year initial term.

There are two options to renew each at five years.

The square footage is on the screen, 12,410 square feet.

And then the next slide as we close it out is just showing the committee again where we are on the timeline.

We're in June and talking to the committee today, hoping for council authorization later this month so that we can move HSD.

The move date is September 1st.

That coincides as the next day after the lease expires, the current lease of the Times Square building.

So we're making good progress and thank you for your time today.

Thank you, colleagues.

As this has been before us twice, this is the second time coming before us and we are on a timeline to make sure that we approve this lease.

I've had multiple meetings with this team because I had a lot of questions up front and colleagues, I'll use this as the example where We do have some leases downtown for Seattle departments that are not within the Seattle Municipal Tower.

It is my desire to make sure that they fill in within Seattle Municipal Tower.

And while that will give us cost savings in the long run, it's a cost increase in the short run.

As you can see in these slides, there is the moving cost, right?

And so if you were downtown, I would...

have a different set of questions for you.

But that's why I've had so many meetings with this group because I've had a lot of questions and they've done a really great job answering them.

So I'm not gonna ask any more questions today, but I do wanna check colleagues.

Do you all have questions for the team?

No questions.

I'm seeing none.

Director Kim, Karen, Mary, you've done an amazing job and I can see Lena's fingerprints all over this program, so.

Job well done.

Seeing as we have no additional comments, I move to recommend passage of Council Bill 120792. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to recommend passage of Council Bill 120792.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Kettle?

Aye.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Vice Chair Rivera?

Aye.

Chair Strauss?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation that the council bill 120792 pass will be sent to the June 25th city council meeting.

Council president might work.

Great.

We'll see you all June 25th.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Up next, and please feel free to come on up to the committee table, the second item on the agenda today is a briefing discussion on Finance Interim Director Jamie Carnell's appointment and nomination.

Clerk, will you please read the short title into the record?

Appointment 02897, appointment of Jamie Carnell as Finance Director of the Office of City Finance.

Thank you, we are joined by Interim Office of City Finance Director, Interim Director, Jamie Carnell.

Mayor Harrell's Deputy Chief of Staff, Dan Nolte, is also here at the table in a supporting role.

Director Carnell, I've had an opportunity to work with colleagues.

What you might not see is that I also chair a number of committees outside of city council, and my role is the finance chair.

So the CSRS committee, we sit on a number of different committees together.

It's been an absolute pleasure to get to work with you.

So I get to see you every week, whereas my colleagues might not get to.

So I'm excited to get to introduce you to them.

I'm going to pass it over to you and Mr. Nolte to do some opening remarks.

And then I've got some questions for you as well.

Colleagues, the full packet of confirmation questions and answers are attached to Legistar.

Chair Strouse and council members, it's my pleasure to be here today to introduce Mayor Harrell's nominee for city finance director, Jamie Carnell.

While our city budget office works with policy makers to decide how to dedicate the city's money, it's our office of city finance that actually administers it.

The office serves as our central accounting system, manages our cash pool, and stewards our city finances while ensuring we adhere to state and local laws and also best practices.

It's imperative we have a tested and trusted leader running the central department, and we clearly have that in Jamie.

She's been part of the city finance team for the last 30 years, homegrown from within the department, starting as an administrative specialist back in 1994. She rose through the ranks as financial reporting lead, senior IT project manager, senior tax policy advisor, director of business systems, deputy finance director, and as interim finance director for these last two years.

Through experience in IT and financial operations, she has hands-on comprehensive understanding of the department systems and work processes, knows how the pieces fit together, and she can spot when something isn't working right.

One of her staff shared with me how often she spots issues before they ever have the chance of becoming problems.

Jamie also routinely demonstrates herself to be someone who's oriented toward action.

After the council unanimously approved the coalition for city unions contract last April, we learned city employees would receive the retroactive back pay in October.

When the mayor heard about this, he called Jamie and to ask whether the payment could be accelerated sooner.

Within 24 hours of that conversation, she rose to the occasion and coordinated between the departments to accelerate those retroactive payments three months sooner to July 12th, all while respecting the bandwidth of her fellow departments.

That outcome is a testament to her solution-oriented thinking and strong project management background.

Further, Seattle maintains the highest possible bond rating thanks to sound fiscal decisions, risk minimization, and thorough money management skills of Jamie and her team.

Those high bond ratings mean we can borrow at the lowest possible rates so we can maximize delivery of services to the people of Seattle, which is the very definition of good governance.

That's for you, Council Member Kettle.

So, one dollar.

Council Members, Mayor Harrell makes this nomination with complete confidence.

Jamie Carnell is a true public servant, brings integrity, transparency, and strategic acumen to her work.

I trust that after talking with her and reviewing her record, you'll agree she's the right choice to lead our Office of City Finance.

And with that, let me turn things over to Jamie.

Well, thank you.

You took most of my speaking points.

It's fine.

Thank you.

I really appreciate it.

And I appreciate the confidence that the mayor's office has in me and for you assisting me through this transition.

So thank you very much.

And thank you all for the opportunity.

Thank you.

I am truly honored to be here this morning and I want to thank the mayor's office again for their confidence and support.

I am an experienced public sector executive with 30 years of experience, all of which has been in finance here at the city.

I'm a solid people manager successfully maintaining a highly productive and a cohesive culture at this office of city finance.

And I bring a unique ability to understand the needs of business and identify the most efficient process and appropriate solutions to solve the city's needs.

I look forward to our discussion this morning.

Thank you.

And colleagues, this is a good opportunity to ask questions.

Director Carnell will be back before us on July 17th.

Director Carnell, we've had many discussions.

I'm gonna ask you a couple questions off of your appointment Hackett, and then a few others.

But what I've been struck by, also happy wedding anniversary.

Oh, thank you.

Yeah.

You picked a good day.

You picked a good day.

You know, you've been here and worked here for 30 years.

You started as an admin spec one.

And over the course of these three decades, you've risen through the department.

And it gives you a special and unique perspective perspective where, much like myself, working as staff from getting my foot in the door as a session aide, then legislative assistant, and then policy advisor, it gives us a different perspective of the department and the work that we do.

Are there any reflections that you can share over the course of your 30 years that has prepared you for today in particular?

Yeah, absolutely.

I think that the city of Seattle is an excellent place to start and end a career.

It has so many opportunities and areas where, you know, from, as you said, starting out as admin spec one, back in the day when we had desktops for people to use and really took that opportunity at that point to help people learn how to use their desktops, which led to my working in finance technology.

It's really been all about opportunities.

And I think it gives me that unique ability to understand when a problem comes up, truly where to go to solve it and how to solve it because I have been here and worked through the ranks.

And I also am truly cognizant when we talk about retro payments of the people who work here at the city of Seattle and really trying to make sure that what I do for the city is at the best interest of all city employees, for somebody who's just starting out or someone like myself who has a long tenured career here.

I really want to put the city employees at the forefront of things that we do at the Office of City Finance, whether it's making sure that we have the highest bond ratings, to make sure that we have good governance, and then we put processes and procedures in place that help city employees and elected officials such as yourselves.

I think the example that Mr. Nolte provided about, and within the city government, we We're worried that we couldn't get those payments out before October because that's how the system was set up.

And layperson speak, you are our comptroller.

You know where the money is and you know how to make that work, but that doesn't mean, if somebody's not dedicated in the way that you just described, we would not have been successful getting that retro payout.

So I wanna take a moment to thank you.

I know in our discussions between your time as a deputy director to interim director, Were there any areas of expertise that you felt that you needed to grow in to assume that role?

And if so, what were they and how did you close that gap?

Sure.

So there are a couple of areas.

One was debt.

That is a new area to me.

That was really something that the previous city finance director, working with our excellent debt team, it's truly a city finance director role.

And so as a deputy director, I had other responsibilities.

And so one of the things that I did was take advantage of the Government Finance Officers Association training that they do for debt.

And it's a week-long immersive experience in learning about debt.

I also truly rely on our great debt team and our partners that we have that run our debt program, as well as the utilities.

It does truly take a village to get our debt program to where it is.

And I wanted to be able to ensure that I understood what was...

what the process was and how we did that.

And I'm grateful for Government Finance Officers Association for having these types of trainings for finance directors such as myself.

Thank you.

That's excellent.

Not everyone takes that moment of self-reflection to understand their gaps and their growth.

I've got one more question that's not on your confirmation Council President, last question is about our biennium report.

It's very text heavy.

Is there anything that we can do about that to make it more real?

Because for somebody who's in the finance world, I'm sure it is the cat's meow.

But for everyone else, it's a little hard to digest.

Any ways we can improve that?

Yeah, I think.

there are definitely always ways to improve reporting and financial information.

And it's something that myself as a city finance director really want to make sure that the data that we're providing to you as well as to constituents is in a format that makes more sense.

So that is a very data rich, built on a lot of other reports that are publicly available.

And so really our goal right now is looking at that report and making it into more of a story, telling the story of the city finances through data visualization tools, better charts that really truly aren't, that give you what you need to know versus very long lines of a lot of data.

So it's important to me and it's something that I think we absolutely can do because we have a great financial system that allows us to have standardized data sets across the city and then taking that information and truly translating it in a way and showing it in a visual way that gives more information and really helps you understand as a city council the state of our city finances.

Thank you.

Council President, I see that your hand has gone down.

Do you still want to...

Yeah, I was just taking away that annoying hand signal.

So thank you very much for being here today.

I have not had a chance to dig too deeply into your responses, so I look forward to you coming back.

I might have some more trenchant questions, but you just mentioned something that I want to make sure that I and other people understand.

When you say debt, that is...

the debt it's not we're not talking about the operating deficit and because people and the cbo deals with the the city budget office is responsible for figuring out how we're going to spend the money we have and tracking how much we don't have you're talking about our ongoing debt service and and uh our bond rating etc so in in all of those financial principles and in policy uh decisions so when you were talking about that training that people were able to take, who all makes decisions about our debt?

and how we're going to, is it across departments or can you just talk a little bit about the decision tree that goes in there?

It's a completely collaborative process with the city budget office, as well as we have a debt committee, which the council central staff also participates in.

So it is not a singular decision maker.

It is a team of people across the city collaborating, including our utilities, because they also sell bonds.

So it's really, truly goes from Office of City Finance to CBO and our partners in the council and the utilities.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

Good question.

I'll expand on that, which is the Debt Management Committee is another one of the committees that I chair, where we do it in coordination with the executive's department or executive's office.

And so when we had the museum debt bill before us a couple meetings ago, that was a product of Director Cardinal's work and that formal committee of the Debt Management Committee.

Councilmember Kettle, over to you.

Thank you, Chair Strauss.

Thank you, Ms. Cardinal and Mr. Nolte for showing up.

It is noted that Mr. Nolte has to add a dollar to the jar for his reference to good governance.

Thank you.

which I really appreciate and leads up to my question.

But as everyone here knows, I like turning every committee into a public safety committee.

So briefly, I will say that in our strategic framework on public safety to attack the challenges that we face there, pillar six is engaging with the county and the state.

You know, your point about the bond rating and so forth and the good governance is, you know, State Treasurer Mike Pelliciotti, I've spoken to him many times, and note what we've done on the state level in that regard.

I can't speak to the county, but is your work primarily insular to Seattle or do you have a lot of coordination work with the county and the state, and can you elaborate on what you do with the county and the state, if so?

Yeah, so the Office of City Finance, there's a couple areas that we truly do collaborate more with the state than with the county.

So one of them is in local jurisdiction of our business and occupation tax.

So we work with the Association of Washington Cities and as well as with the Department of Revenue when we have tax policies that are coming up.

So things that we work around.

with the local business and occupation tax that is a mirror, somewhat of a mirror to the Department of Revenue's business and occupation tax.

And so we have a series of, excuse me, my mind is, we have an agreement within the cities, the 30 plus cities administer the, the business and occupation tax that mirrors what the Department of Revenue does.

So we have a close working relationship with the Department of Revenue.

We also have a very close working relationship with 10 cities in the Puget Sound area through our municipal license and tax agency, which runs File Local.

File Local is a one-stop shop for applying for your business license and paying for your taxes.

And that's a complete collaboration with the 10 cities that participate.

We don't have a direct touch point necessarily with the county.

We've worked on a few things with them, but I would say our relationships are really more broadly across the 30 plus cities who do the business and occupation tax as well as the state.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Wonderful.

Council Member Rivera.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you both for being here.

I just want to say I very much appreciate, as part of the process, we all have an opportunity to meet with interim director Carnell and very much appreciated having that conversation with you.

And it's clear to me that, you know, you do lead with good governance and the accountability piece and at the same time making sure that we're centering the work that we do at the city and of course, the employees hardworking at the city as well.

So it was clear to me that you take a really a broad brush approach and make sure that you're looking at all the pieces, which is really something that is important and critical to this role.

And I got that from our conversation.

So I very much appreciated having the opportunity to engage in that way and learn more about you and your approach to the work.

So thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Vice Chair.

And I'm going to ask a couple questions out of the committee packet now because our next Finance Native Communities and Tribal Governments Committee is...

Very full.

It is so full that we might be pushing material into September at this point.

And so I just highlight for you that we have a month between now and Director Carnell's final visit to our committee for that final vote.

And so if you do have...

deep and entrenching questions, please meet with her between now and then because that public committee will be a good place to put things on the record, but we will need to be very focused with our time that day.

And so I'll just kind of jump in here.

And Director Cardinal, can you remind me, are you the first woman to hold this position?

I am the first woman to hold this position.

That is taking too long and we're excited for you to be in this role.

So as Interim Director of Office of City Finance in question one on your packet, you don't have to answer everything because we'd be here all day.

That's how good of a job that you do.

But since 2022, what accomplishes are you most proud of and what has surprised you about this role?

First off, thank you for just going back to the meetings.

I do appreciate having the time to spend with each of you before this, and absolutely am willing to meet with you as we have a full month before the second meeting.

You know, I think...

with 30 years there's not honestly much that surprises me because i have the breadth and have the experience i will say though i am always pleasantly surprised and i know this about my staff but i want to just take the moment to say i have an amazing office of city finance team who really have done a tremendous job during this transition in supporting me.

Some of them I've worked with for a lot of years, and so it's really, I am always pleasantly surprised when they rise again and again to the challenges that we have just in our day-to-day work, and just really, truly thankful for all of them.

So accomplishment-wise, we've talked about our bond program.

Really accomplishment-wise, again, going back to staffing, I'm really excited that we, at the same time I was transitioning into the interim director role, I brought on a new city treasurer.

We had a transition with treasury.

and I had spent several months being the treasurer so I had more gotten some hands-on experience with Treasury and Nuke and where I really truly wanted to take a very important function for the City of Seattle and so I brought on our new treasurer and she has a process driven background such as myself and so she really took a look at all the processes across the Treasury and really worked especially specifically on our automated clearinghouse.

So that's when you do electronic payment.

That's an automatic clearinghouse transaction and vendor identification and truly making sure that we were lowering our risk related to financial fraud through providing additional protection against unauthorized transactions.

It's really important.

that as we are sending citizens' money out the door for payments, that we're making sure that that payment is safe and secure.

And so she had done a really good job coming in and creating new processes around that.

And I'm really excited for the work that they've done there.

I also want to highlight that we have an excellent enterprise financial system that is used citywide.

It is one of my bigger accomplishments.

I really had a vision with the previous financial director of making sure that every single transaction that was entered into the system was aligned to our accounting principles and our financial policies.

We have a truly standardized city system that is used for all of our consistent financial data, which is leading to better reporting and creating better opportunities for process improvements with our annual financial report, our ACFR.

And that truly is a collaboration that we have with all of the city departments to make sure that that is done on time at every fiscal year end.

And I think because of the work that we did in 2016 through 18 to truly transform our financial system, it has given us a better opportunity with our data and with our processes.

And with that, we've been in true partnership with the budget office and creating fiscal monitoring tools for those departments.

And I'm very excited that we'll be rolling those reports out and our monitoring capabilities to the city council next year through the fiscal transparency ordinance that was passed last year.

Wonderful.

And I know that the list continues on on paper.

And so I'd say job well done, especially with that electronic transfer.

Moving on, question number two.

So that was the look back in your time as an interim director.

Looking ahead, what are your specific goals for the Office of City Finance over the next three years?

So I'll just touch on a few points that I think are really important.

We have about five main goals that we've been working through our mission and vision and to our five year strategic plan.

But I really want to highlight just a couple of things.

One is the workforce.

I'm acutely aware with the way that finance technology is ever changing and ever evolving.

that it really is changing the way that we work in accounting and treasury across the board because this technology is coming that will allow us to really hone our skills on more process improvement and letting systems do some of the work by giving us higher degrees and improving our financial reporting.

capabilities and proving how we output that data into our annual financial report.

So it's really important that we prepare the workforce for the future.

And the way that we've started doing that is we've reestablished performance management functions that align to our strategic goals.

And we're looking at training opportunities as well as something I'm acutely aware of with my 30 years is succession planning, and we need to do that.

So it's one of those really critical areas for me personally, that I wanna make sure that we are preparing our workforce for the future.

Process improvements that is across the board is what Office of City Finance is truly focused on.

And I think it's an important focus, especially as we come into, what I would say critical budget challenges, times where we have critical budget challenges always create opportunities to take a look at what you're doing and improve your processes.

So we've started that.

We really have about, you know, each division has about one to two specific process improvement goals that they're working on this year.

An example of that is the License and Tax Administration taking advantage of a federal tax administrator program around artificial intelligence.

So they have been in immersive training that's offered through that from the Federal Tax Administration to really learn about artificial intelligence and its impacts on tax.

that they are taking the information they have and now looking at their processes, starting to figure out ways to improve them, to prepare them for when we have the opportunity to really look at investments in systems that would help them in their tax administration.

Just reading my notes that I've highlighted here.

And I think we've talked, my second one is just always improving financial reporting.

So we've talked at length about that.

And you're leading there, I mean, with process improvements, making sure the workforce is ready for their next step and your strategic planning.

I know that you've done your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats analysis of your department.

And within there, what are the primary challenges facing the office and how do you see overcoming?

I mean, you touched on the broader strokes, But where are we right now with the challenges and how do we overcome them?

I think really truly the challenges are, you know, ensuring that we are prepared.

I do listen to, in talking to finance colleagues across the country, there's so much coming in the technology for finance and we, you know we as a municipality as many municipalities we are always slow we're slower to adopt but i don't i think that the strides that are being made are are going to at some point clash with the workforce and so it's really truly and it's about financial literacy it's about data literacy and making sure that our workforce is prepared for that and while it would be great to have the ability to invest in the systems that we have or the technology needs that we have, we know that we have budget challenges.

And so how are we preparing for a day, and there will be a day, when we are not in a budget challenge and we have the ability to really be ready for that future of finance that we're not ready for right now?

That's really helpful, and I was really focusing in on the challenges aspect because you're doing so many things well.

I'm sorry, can you repeat that?

I was focusing in on the challenges because you're doing so many things well.

Overall, the office is running very well, right?

Success does not happen by accident, and that's why I wanted to really focus in on those challenges.

I was struck by your comments over the last 30 years.

1994 was your first year here, and...

how we brought in desktop computers to the city.

Even, colleagues, this dais that was put in in 2003 was not originally outfitted for computers.

That's why this dais feels clunky.

And so your answer there and how we're going to that next realm of technology, I feel very comfortable with you at the helm.

I've got one last question off of your appointment packet, which you'll see a theme here of...

What have you done?

What are you going to do?

What are the challenges?

And how do you now question five, what methods do you use to monitor the office of finances performance?

So we talked about performance management.

We're using the equity engagement expectations, E3 program.

That is not something that the office of city finances used before we've done performance management, but I really wanted to use a system that was already in place that many other of my department director colleagues have used.

And so we were putting that into place.

We have that matches to our strategic planning process with our five initiatives.

And then we have the critical milestones and key performance indicators and are we producing our annual financial report in a timely manner?

Are we successfully completing the state audits that are required once you produce your annual financial report?

Are we maintaining our bond ratings?

And so it's a combination of all of that that really makes sure that we are monitoring our performance.

Wonderful.

Well, I look forward to having you back here at committee.

Colleagues, any other questions for Councilmember Kettle?

And please, we've got time today.

We don't have so much time next time, but Councilmember Kettle, over to you.

Thank you, Chair Strauss.

I really appreciate the answers to the questions, and it highlights the work on the finance in terms of bringing on the systems, gaining clarity.

And in a sense, gaining clarity also, in a way, provides independence because the numbers are the numbers.

And I think that's very important for us as a city to have that clarity from the legislature branch.

And this goes to the budget world too, having the independence of the forecasts and the revenue and all those pieces.

because it really helps us do our job and partner with the executive, particularly in a more difficult fiscal picture that we have now with our deficit challenges.

So moving forward on that is fantastic, and thank you for that.

And thank you also for your point about finance and data science questions moving forward, because that is going to be a challenge of which we don't necessarily know what's coming exactly.

And so being prepared is key.

And for me, being prepared means you have to be initially present.

You have to be present and then be mindful.

And being mindful is really being conscious about those challenges that we face and then preparing.

And then being prepared will allow us to face that future adversity, that future challenge that we may have, which is another reason, by the way, not in your lane, why I've been advocating for the emergency and stabilization funds to be part of the discussion, because we need to be ready for the next thing.

You know, the great recession, the pandemic, we have to be ready for the next thing.

So thank you for your comments on that in terms of moving forward, because I really appreciate, and it builds confidence, I believe.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Seeing as we have no other questions, colleagues, I will alert you now.

We will be having the required public hearing on July 17th.

And because we will be having the public hearing on the same day as the vote, I will need to suspend the rules that day.

So I give you that early warning now.

And that's a month away, on July 17th.

Seeing as we have no further questions, interim director, I don't get to call you interim director for much longer.

We're very happy to have you here.

Thank you so much for your service to our city of Seattle.

Council President Nelson with a question.

We do have, I think you said a month until our next meeting.

And I just saw these because of Father's Day and graduation weekend, I wasn't able to read your answers as I've already noted because they came out late last week.

Is there an opportunity to, would you like written questions, if we have specific questions directly emailed to you that you might be able to?

Absolutely.

Please feel free to reach out.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Wonderful.

With that, we look forward to having you back next month.

I hope you and your husband get to celebrate this evening.

Thank you for your service to our city.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate all of your time today.

Yeah.

See you soon.

Up next is our final agenda item.

It's technically one, two, three, four, five agenda items that we're gonna roll into one.

So if the clerk can read the short title of all five agenda items in and then at the end of this agenda item, we will vote on all five at the same time.

Clerk, will you please read the short title of these items three through seven into the record.

Briefing discussion and possible vote on the reappointments of Agenda Items 3 through 7, Appointments 2898 through 2902, Derek Belgrade, Jackie McCormick, Suzanne Salido, Jeremy Takala, and Councilmember Luther J. Mills to the Indigenous Advisory Council.

Thank you.

If we have a moment or if Ledge IT can triple check that we don't have anyone in the waiting room.

I was able to briefly drop in with the Indigenous Advisory Council meeting last week and got to chat with the current members who are also appointees now and also let them know that because it's a reappointment, they didn't necessarily need to attend.

It's Monday morning at 1030, but that we offered them that space.

So...

I will be passing it off.

So I'll just do a little bit of summary.

So colleagues, in 2021, under the leadership of former council president Deborah Juarez, the council voted to form this indigenous advisory council.

And so of all of the advisory committees, councils, this is our council.

most recent, and so the IAC was established to advise the mayor, city council, and city departments on policies of importance to tribes, urban Indians, and indigenous populations.

Today, we are joined by Indigenous Advisory Council liaison Francesca Murnon, And we have Lydia at the table today.

And so we're very excited to have you both here.

So we've got Francesca online and Lydia in person.

And before we get into the individual reappointments, could you, Francesca or Lydia, please reintroduce us to the Indigenous Advisory Council broadly, if you'd like to share any current updates on the work.

And then if you could remind me, I believe this is...

the first round of reappointments.

And so in the history of this council, we've appointed everyone for the first time, and now this is the first round of reappointments, which is different than all other councils or committees.

So with this, I'll turn it over to Francesca and to Lydia.

Welcome.

Thank you church house and thank you members of the committee for having us here today.

Nice to see you all again.

My name is Francesca Murnan.

I'm a member of the Shawnee Tribe and of the Cherokee Nation and I work in our Department of Neighborhoods.

I provide staff support to the city's Indigenous Advisory Council and the just minor correction is the second round.

Our first to ensure we had offset membership, the first round of folks only served a one year short term and so many they all opted, many opted to to reappoint.

So this will be our real first full reappointment of the IC and I'll hand this over to Lydia for introductions as well.

Yeah, hit the little green button.

Greetings.

My name is Lydia.

I'm Tongan and Samoan American with an indigenous title to the South Pacific.

And I currently work for the Department of Neighborhoods at the Civic Engagement Program Manager.

And we are pleased here to present five reappointments to the Indigenous Advisory Council.

Today, the Indigenous Advisory Council is comprised of nine members representing native communities in our region.

Our membership includes youth and elder representation, elected tribal members, and urban native leaders.

I'll go ahead and pass it on to Francesca.

Thank you.

And for a little bit of background, since we last came before the committee earlier this year, the advisory council has continued to meet monthly with departmental and community partners on a range of issues impacting Native communities.

In late May, the council met for their annual retreat, and they will be updating their three-year strategic plan and annual work plan that they will submit to this committee later this summer.

The Council and our collaborative work across the city with our tribal partners and Native partners was recently featured as one of three project highlights at the National Civic League's All-America City Awards competition in Denver, Colorado.

And thanks in large part to the collaborative spirit of our partners at the Office of Intergovernmental Relations, our IAC members, the Mayor's Office, and City Council, Seattle was recently named a 2024 All-America City.

So really grateful for all of the work that has been done in the work ahead of us.

And we're grateful to our five members and their willingness to continue to serve on the advisory council as we further define and shape this role to support native communities through local government.

So thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

And we'll be ready to share a brief bio of our five reappointed members whenever you're ready.

Thank you, Francesca.

Thank you, Lydia.

I always like to be, to learn more about what I don't, I don't necessarily always remember, but I think that that really strikes the point of in the first round of the appointments to this council, some were given that short one year term, which is unusual.

This is the full term reappointments.

And just what I'll say before you get into speaking about these appointments, is that when we start something new, it is important to give it a solid foundation.

And I think that's the overall conversation about this round of appointments is that these have been folks who have been here since the start.

It's important that we give them a little bit more runway to really set the foundation of what you're working on.

And I'm excited to have you back at Committee Francesca to talk about the strategic planning and the work you've done and where we're going.

I'll briefly say Derek Bellegarde is somebody that I work with often through the Chief Seattle Club.

He's somebody who has lived experience and a master's degree, which is a combination that is hard to come by.

And I have deep and great respect for Derek and his work.

We have Jackie McCormick, who if you haven't heard about Rise Above, You should, because the work that they do is just so incredible and meaningful.

Former Councilmember Suzanne Salto is a friend, and she's somebody that I've been on the opposite side of the table with and the same side of the table with, and I love her just the same.

She's a great person here.

And I believe it is Councilmember Takala, is that correct?

Yep.

That's correct.

Councilmember Jeremy Takala of the Yakima Nation, you can see his smile from a country mile away.

His smile is infectious and it is amazing.

And I just really respect Jeremy a lot.

And we have Councilmember Luther J. Mills, who colleagues came to our committee from Suquamish.

He was here...

I can't remember which date off the top of my head, but he's somebody who was here in chambers with us already.

And so with that, that's the brief overview off the top of my head.

Those aren't notes.

So if I got anything wrong, Francesca, please tell me I was wrong.

And I'll turn it back over to you and Lydia to give a brief overview of each of these reappointments.

Thank you, Chair Strauss.

In position seven, we're pleased to present the recommended reappointment of Derek Bellegarde.

Derek's an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes of Selects Indians of Oregon and also Chippewa Cree from Rocky Boy, Montana.

Derek has worked and served in the field of housing affordability and fought for the rights of those suffering from housing insecurity for many years.

Derek completed his undergraduate degree in public affairs, magna cum laude, and went on to obtain a master's in public administration, both through Seattle University.

And in position nine, we're pleased to present the recommended reappointment of Jackie McCormick.

Jackie grew up at the Nez Perce Reservation outside of Lewiston, Idaho.

She fell in love with basketball early on and earned a scholarship to play for Illinois State University, where she earned her degree in sociology.

In 2015, Jackie founded Rise Above, a nonprofit organization that gives Native youth the skills and resilience to overcome their circumstances and write their own futures as ceo of rise above jackie leads the organization in its mission to empower youth through a variety of sports modalities including sports education music financial literacy prevention skills and mentorship using prevention strategies that spark change in people's lives in position five we're pleased to represent to present the record member and former tribal council member.

She's had the opportunity to live and travel the world with her father, who served 20 years in the military.

She graduated from Lakes High School in the ever-increasing world ministries.

She has three sons and two daughters-in-laws and is blessed to have four grandchildren.

She volunteers her time on numerous boards, including the Snoqualmie Ridge YMCA, Encompass in Snoqualmie, the Elder Council for Chief Seattle Club, a seaboard member of the Snoqualmie Casino.

And during her time on council, she was part of many of the major accomplishments of her tribe, including acquiring Salish Lodge, purchasing eighth generation and a land purchase for the Snoqualmie ancestral lands movement.

She enjoys giving back in her free time to her tribal nation and to other local communities and tribes.

In position three, we're pleased to present the recommended reappointment of Jeremy Takala.

Councilmember Takala is of the Komatpa Band of the Rock Creek of the Yakama Nation located in the Columbia River, and he's a proud descendant of the Hopi.

He was nominated in 2020 to serve on the Tribal Council of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, and he chairs several committees, including the Fish and Wildlife and Law and Order Committees.

He also serves as Secretary of the Legislative Committee and is a member of the Health, Employment, and Welfare Committee.

Prior to his time in office, he worked for 12 years for the Yakima Klickitat Fisheries Project as a fisheries technician, and he is passionate about upholding his tribe's treaty rights with the federal government and protecting resources for those yet unborn.

And finally, in position two, we're pleased to present the recommended reappointment of Luther J. Mills.

Council Member Mills is a Suquamish tribal member and has served more than 25 years on tribal council.

He's been employed in several capacities by the tribe's economic agency, Point Fort Madison Enterprises, and he has served in that role for more than 45 years, and he currently serves as their enterprise ambassador.

He has more than 25 years of experience in tribal government and has also been a commercial fisherman for over 50 years.

So he brings a wealth of knowledge in gathering and preserving Salish foods.

And I don't think anyone was able to make it today.

We had a few folks who were interested, but with other work and tribal council capacity, I don't think they were able to hop on the call.

But we thank you for allowing us to be here to provide these introductions.

Thank you, Francesca.

And all of these people are volunteers to the City of Seattle.

No one's getting reimbursed or compensated for their experience and expertise advising the City of Seattle.

And so completely understand that a Monday meeting is...

not doable for some folks.

And so I just, it was really nice to get to see you last week when I popped into the Indigenous Advisory Council meeting.

Colleagues, do you have any questions on the, or comments on these appointments before we bring them to a vote?

Chair?

Senator Kettle.

Thank you, Chair Strauss.

First, thank you both for being here today, you know, via online and in person.

I really appreciate it.

And I really appreciate this opportunity to you know, be part of the early days of the Indigenous Advisory Council.

And I just wanted to state, as I said before, from my District 7 perspective, really look forward to engaging with the Indigenous Advisory Council and inviting participation, like with our District 7 Neighborhood Council.

which we'll have our second meeting, first full meeting on Friday, which we've had representation already set up, but always can add to that.

Also looking for participation with our new portal park in Belltown to have that early integration, because one thing I picked up previously is that We need to engage the Indigenous Advisory Council early and not come to them after the fact for that kind of stamp of approval.

I think it's important to be there at the beginning.

And along those lines, I'm really happy that my staff is working with Parks, Daybreak Star, other organizations on the canoe carving center at South Lake Union Park.

And we're going to press on that, by the way.

And we will continue to press on that, my staff and all the stakeholders that are involved.

So I really appreciate that.

And...

And lastly, and Francesca knows this, but as I said earlier, I always take the opportunity to turn every committee meeting into a public safety committee meeting.

And of course, representation on the community police commission from the indigenous native community is fantastic and something that we want to continue to work with you in terms of identifying an individual to serve on that commission.

So council commission cross-pollinization, if you will.

Thank you, Chair.

And thank you very much again for being here.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Council President.

Again, thank you so much for being willing to serve the city.

And this is what I say often to commissions when we're reappointing.

And I emphasize that especially here because a lot of times there are policy issues that we know that we reach out to or engage or solicit or just say, tell us what to do from the commission in advance of actually taking any action.

There are a lot of other smaller conversations that happen with the members that I've that I find to be a great resource around substance use disorder and treatment and all these other things that we're all interested in.

So I just have to say that these are volunteers.

You're giving of your time and expertise, and your commitment goes far beyond your regular meetings, as, at least with me, you're fielding questions and in conversation behind the scenes as well.

So it is a big commitment, and I thank you very much.

Vice Chair.

Thank you, Chair.

I echo the sentiments of my colleagues, and I very much appreciate the ability to meet on an ongoing basis with the Indigenous Advisory Council.

Very much appreciate the willingness of our community members to serve on this commission and all the city commissions.

And I'll say in particular that what is really great about having volunteers on these commissions is they're the folks that are actually in community, working with community.

And so when they serve, they bring back the needs of community as we are doing the work.

And to Council Member Kittle's point, it's important to have those touch points on the front end, not the back end.

If we're going to be really true to the work, and to the seriousness of the relationships and the partnerships.

So I highly value that.

And I look forward to a meeting and working with some of, I've met some of these folks already and look forward to meeting other ones I haven't met with.

And in particular, I'll say that Derek Belgrade with the Chief Seattle Club I've gone down to visit and all the incredible work that goes there that is, you know, very welcoming to all indigenous community.

The work that is happening there on all levels from the permanent supportive housing to just a day center apart and feeding of folks is really amazing.

So I'm really happy to have folks on this commission who can help.

advise us as we are doing the work, what is needed in community.

So thank you for that.

And thank you to the members for their willingness to serve.

And thank you both for being the liaisons at the city who work with our community members.

Thank you.

And before I turn it right back over to Francesca and Lydia for any final comments, I'll raise my gratitude to former Council President Deborah Juarez.

Without her, none of this would have been possible.

We live in your legacy, Deborah.

And now, colleagues, you get to say back in my day when the first round of full reappointments to the IAC came before us, been here since the early days.

And so back to you, Francesca and Lydia.

Thank you, Chair Charleston, members of the committee.

Go ahead, Francesca.

I didn't have anything other to say than just thank you for having us.

Thanks for the opportunity to be here, and we look forward to continue to serve.

Lydia?

Wonderful.

Thank you.

Thank you both.

With that, no final comments before we go to a vote.

So hearing none, I move to recommend confirmations of appointments.

2898 through 2902. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of appointments 2898 through 2902. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Kettle?

Aye.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Vice Chair Rivera?

Aye.

Chair Strauss?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries, and the appointments, these reappointments, and the committee's recommendation of these reappointments to be confirmed will be sent to the full City Council for a final vote on Tuesday, June 25th.

You do not need to come to the committee, and you're always more than welcome to.

This motion carries.

Thank you, colleagues.

This does wrap up our June 17th special meeting, the Finance Native Communities and Tribal Governments Committee.

Our next meeting will be held on Wednesday, July 17th.

It will be a long committee, mostly because we will be taking up the mid-year supplemental budget bill.

for the first of two times.

It will be heard in our FNC committee and then voted on in the select committee.

So this is now our month notice about that.

It's gonna be a long committee and so just colleagues, I give you that forewarning.

I will be asking for you to reserve until at least noon on your calendars for that committee meeting.

We'll come back to that later.

So this does conclude the Monday, June 17th, 2024 Finance Native Communities and Tribal Governments Committee meeting.

Thank you for attending.

We are adjourned.