Seattle City Council Briefing 3/28/22

This is a Seattle Council briefing.

It will now come to order.

The time is 2.01.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Strauss?

Present.

Council Member Herbold?

Here.

Council Member Morales?

Here.

Council Member Mosqueda?

Present.

Council Member Nelson?

Present.

Council Member Peterson?

Present.

Council President Morris.

Here.

Seven present.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I'm going to move to the approval of the minutes.

If there is no objection, the minutes of March 21st will be adopted.

Hearing or seeing no objection, the minutes are indeed adopted.

Going down the agenda to the President's Report, before I go there, let me just note that Council Member Sawant and Council Member Lewis are excused today.

In the president's report on today's agenda, we have no proclamations and we have no presentations.

We will hear reports from obviously each council member.

Tomorrow on the consent agenda, there will be 12 appointments.

11 of them will be coming out of council member Morales' committee, and one of them will be coming out of council member Nelson's committee.

We will vote on all 12. at once in the consent vote unless any council member requests that an item be pulled from the consent agenda.

So there's 12 appointments and 11 of them are Council Member Morales'.

Council Member Morales', you can let us know if you want to pull any of those individually out so you can speak to them separately.

So that's the process that we are now doing with the consent agenda.

Moving on to the part of the agenda where we talk about signing of letters and proclamations.

There are no letters or proclamations coming forward today for signature.

Let's move to council actions, a preview.

This week, it starts with Council Member Strauss.

And after Strauss, there's Council Member Herbal, Council Member Morales, Mosqueda, Nelson, Peterson, and then myself.

Council Member Strauss, you wanna kick us off?

Thank you, Council President.

Council President, colleagues, great to see you all.

Happy Monday to you.

In District 6, we're having a town hall this Thursday at 5.30 p.m.

District 6 residents, please RSVP and submit your questions on my website.

More information in just a second.

We also reopened our district office two weeks ago, and we've already begun meeting with other tenants, including the Ballard Historical Society.

We are going to be following public health protocol and guidelines in determining how the office is used, and we're very excited to be back to have a presence in Ballard in line with the mayor's reopening of having city employees return to office.

Last week on Tuesday I attended the North Seattle Industrial Association meeting, and also on Tuesday.

had my regular meeting with Police Chief Diaz.

On Wednesday morning, my staff and I attended the Green Lake Chamber of Commerce meeting, as well as my staff were able to meet with Ballard FC founders Chris Kamer and Sam Zazette on their work to expand and establish their use of the field at Interbay as their home stadium for Ballard FC.

And last week and this week, I continue to hold my weekly operations meetings coordinating with community leaders, governmental entities, and non-governmental entities to make meaningful interventions to address homelessness in specific places in District 6. If you want to meet with me for status updates or more information or have something you think I need to know, please do sign up for office hours.

This coming week, as I said, on March or on Thursday, March 31st, I'll be hosting a town hall meeting.

So please RSVP on my website.

In past town halls, we've had presentations from subject matter experts.

And then I've taken about a topic, whether it's homelessness, mental health, any of these types of the budget has been a topic of the past.

This time, I'm not having any presentations.

I'm just going to be answering your questions.

So submit your questions on my website and I'll answer them.

This is going to be scheduled during my regularly scheduled office hours, so we'll resume office hours next week.

On Friday I'll be meeting with residents of Sunrise Manor, a Seattle Housing Authority building in Ballard, to hear their concerns about construction noise.

And I'll be meeting with the Seattle Neighborhood Greenways regarding the Seattle Transportation Plan.

In the Land Use Committee, There are three items from the Land Use Committee on today's full council agenda.

Council Bill 120207, sponsored by Council Member Peterson and myself, which will require registration for tree service providers.

We have Council Bill 120265, which would extend bringing business home bill for an additional six months while permanent regulations are finalized.

And finally, Resolution 32048, which ratifies the countywide planning policies.

There is one item from the Land Use Committee on today's introduction and referral calendar, and that is Council Bill 120287, which modifies rooftop features that are allowed on certain buildings.

For your information, the April 13th meeting of the Land Use Committee will be canceled, so our next meeting will be Wednesday, April 27th at 2 p.m.

Thank you, Council President, colleagues.

That is my report.

Council President, colleagues, do you have any questions on my report?

I'm seeing none.

With that, I will pass it to Council Member Herbold.

Welcome.

Thank you so much, Council Member Strauss.

So item coming up this week for the full council meeting, we do have Council Bill 120280. which the Public Safety and Human Services Committee voted out of committee last Tuesday.

The legislation itself includes about $3 million in Urban Area Security Initiative grants, referred to as the WASI grants.

You may recall that the Seattle Police Department manages receipt of the grants.

though the funds themselves go to many different local law enforcement jurisdictions.

As the staff memo notes, project funding decisions are made through a collaborative process involving multiple public safety emergency response agencies located throughout Snohomish, King, and Pierce County.

The committee, in addition to recommending passage unanimously, they also adopted an amendment noting that any equipment purchased with these funds by the Seattle Police Department is subject to SMC 1418, otherwise known as the city's surveillance technology law.

The Safety and Human Services Committee will not be meeting this week and So I have no committee updates to provide, but I do want to just share a couple of department specific updates from the Human Services Department.

We know that the Human Services Department is seeking applications from organizations and farmers.

interested in food equity for its Seattle preschool program serving low-income children and families.

This is the farm-to-table request for proposals.

It will invest about $840,000 in healthy, local, sustainable, culturally relevant food and education in approximately 50 Seattle preschool programs located across the city who serve about 2,000 children ages three to five.

The RFP investment has two components, nutrition education and farm to family food bags for Seattle Public Schools children, families and staff.

The RFP focuses on food source from Washington State farmers and from farms owned and operated by black, indigenous and people of color families who are farmers and business owners, immigrants and refugees and women.

There's information session coming up for the RFP on Friday.

and applications are due May 3rd.

For more information, you can go to Seattle.gov forward slash human services and click on the funding opportunities button.

As it relates to public safety updates, I think we have all seen here on council, but for the viewing public, we've been talking a lot about our interest in receiving a report from the executive that we requested the council requested during the budget process.

And this is a report on citywide hiring incentives.

Many of us raised this issue during the 2022 budget discussions.

The report does note that a number of positions across departments that are critical to city business needs are in fact challenging to fill.

And these positions are not limited to police officers and 911 dispatchers.

This is what we suspected when we requested the report.

This response also notes that there are challenges with existing challenges with the city's classification titles and up notes the need to update the city's 30 year old classification and compensation system.

and that that would help attract employees, though it would be a large project that would take significant time.

Regarding hiring incentives generally, the report identifies both benefits and drawbacks, and as it relates specifically to SPD and the Community Safety and Communication Center, it states that SPD did not experience an increase in hiring since implementing a hiring incentive.

a hiring incentive into their process in October 2021. And then they note that the CSCC did see an increase in candidates entering the hiring process since the implementation of an incentive over the same period of time.

So they acknowledged that they didn't have very much time to analyze the incentive period, but they did note that they could definitely see an uptake during the period of time for CSCC, and they found that the fact that there didn't appear to be much of an uptake for SPD, that that was an inconclusive finding as it relates specifically to whether or not SPD has seen benefits from incentives.

And they note, again, that it's incredibly difficult to conclude because incentives have been offered and removed several times.

As a reminder, in 2019, the council enacted a SPD hiring incentive program.

that I think went for about a year.

And there's some limited data available about that as well.

I think generally that particular study on the 2019 incentive program showed that about 20% of applicants, not necessarily people who are hired, but 20% of applicants point to the bonus program as playing into their decision to apply to become a police officer.

So since receiving this on Friday, I've submitted a number of questions and will definitely appreciate getting into more detail with council members once I dig more into the report and get some answers to these questions.

And I'm sure there'll be plenty more to say about this in the coming weeks.

Moving on to updates, as far as this week, I will be attending the Housing Development Consortium event this week.

I will also be chairing the meeting of the Police Pension Board on Tuesday.

Also, there will be a public event, a virtual public hearing from Sound Transit focused on the West Seattle portion, and the focus will be on the DEIS.

This is going to be on the 30th on Wednesday.

There's information on how to participate and comment on the Sound Transit draft EIS page, and you can also find it at my blog at herbal.seattle.gov.

And Thursday, I'll be attending an event of the Big Brothers, Big Sisters of Puget Sound.

And on Wednesday, as far as regional committees, I will be attending as an alternate to the Regional Policy Committee.

Just a quick recap of my office hours last week.

I held office hours on Friday afternoon last week.

meeting with constituents from all over District 1 on topics ranging from crime, home zone projects, garbage pickup projects, the pay up minimum compensation policy, and the future of the Alki-Keap moving street.

And that's all I have for my remarks today.

Do any of my colleagues have questions or comments?

Council Member Nelson.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

You mentioned the report, so I wanted to follow up on that.

As my colleagues know, I did send an email out with some comments and some context for some of the inconclusive findings of the two-page memo, which has been delayed twice.

So anyway, per the report, discussion about whether about hiring incentives for SPD and their success, they do note that it had been in effect for a very short time, about two months at the end of last year.

And so I mentioned in my email the most salient point was that I do not believe that hiring numbers are a good indication of whether or not that program was a success because the SPD hiring process is at minimum six months long and basic law enforcemen It's actually, as I said, by my logic, impossible for anybody to have been hired as a result of that hiring incentive process, because we haven't come to six months yet.

Also, perhaps a better measure of the success of a program is level of interest.

And in the public safety meeting last week, we did hear from Chief Diaz, who mentioned that there was a sharp, that there was an increase in interest, that when the program was implemented, there were more, let me read the quote, let's see.

There were more, yes, in January, we actually had our highest sign up in testing since 2020. And there are several rounds of tests in the hiring process.

And then in March, We dropped drastically down to just six people signing up for testing, and that was when the program had ended.

So I sent this email simply to say that I think that hiring is not a good indicator of the success of the program.

And thank you very much for noting the inconclusive nature of that report.

Thank you.

Thanks, Council Member Nelson, for saying so.

I was just about to say, I thought I said.

So I appreciate you recognizing that I did quote from the report that it determines that it is inconclusive based on the data for the short period of time.

And I did refer to as well, and I'm happy to share it with folks.

It is also, I would say, pretty inconclusive because they were supposed to report out on a much a longer time frame.

But we do have a I think it's about a six month report.

And that's what I referred from the 2019 bonus program that I referred to earlier, where they identify that about 20% of applicants mentioned that the reason why they applied is because of the incentives or that the incentives had played a large part in the reason why they applied.

And I will, that was a sort of a partial snapshot of a larger report that was due in 2020 that the department never completed for us.

So I'll be happy to share, send that around as well.

Any other questions, comments?

All right.

Seeing none, I will pass it on to Council Member Morales.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Let's see, I'm going to start with the appointments that Council President mentioned.

I do have 11 appointments for my committee on tomorrow's council agenda.

And thank you, Council President, for placing them on the consent agenda.

I had thought they might be going on the committee reports because I ended up having to cancel my committee for lack of quorum on Friday.

So again, my apologies to those 11 appointees who were waiting to be heard and to the two interim directors, Director Mohammed from Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs and Interim Director Allie Barnes from the Office of Arts and Culture who were prepared to present and could not.

My committee happens to be where we engage most closely with neighbors, particularly those who are interested in serving the city on a board or a commission.

They volunteer hours of their time to conduct research, provide us recommendations, provide their expertise and their lived experience to us, council, as we deliberate on policy.

decisions.

Their appointments are an important part of conducting the people's business, which is what we all signed up to do, whether it's high profile policy work or the more routine work that really kind of keeps the gears of government moving, we have an obligation to show up and do the work.

And so I appreciate Council Member Nelson for being there.

I know there was a couple of excused absences, but it's really important that we make sure that our committees are able to meet.

So I just wanna let my colleagues know that my staff will be hoping to brainstorm with the LAs at the meeting this week about how to provide better notice when folks aren't going to be around.

And I'm hopeful we can resolve this so that committee work can proceed as scheduled.

I do have a lot of appointments in my committee.

Some of them are a couple years old.

And so I would like to move through them.

And we do have lots of legislation coming through as well.

So it's important that we actually be able to hold these meetings and be able to vote.

My committee report tomorrow will have two reappointments to the Arts Commission, three appointments to the Community Involvement Commission, and then there will be three people who will be appointed to serve out the remainder of a term that they should have started two years ago.

As it happens, there's only two months left on this term.

And then that will be followed immediately by reappointment of those three people to a full second term.

So if it seems a little confusing when we get there tomorrow, I'm happy to walk through it again, but that's what's happening.

They're being appointed for the end of an existing term and then immediately reappointed for the next term.

The next meeting of the committee is April 22nd at 9.30.

We'll hear from interim directors, Mohammed and Ali Barnes, who were not able to present their work plans.

And then we have additional items, which I'm happy to discuss next week.

Last week, I met with constituents during office hours.

I heard from several parents of young children who are concerned about why so few playgrounds are fenced or offer secure space, particularly for parents of toddlers.

There's a lot of challenges, I guess, with parents who are having to chase after multiple kids and there's a fear of them running into a parking lot or worse running into a street.

So we're reaching out to the parks department to learn more about how those decisions are made about what kind of protections to put in place.

I also met with friends of the market and Pike Place Market historical commissioners who wanted to discuss commission appointments, but also are interested in understanding better the administrative review decisions that we made when COVID first hit and are interested in understanding better what the plans are moving forward.

My staff was present at an encampment removal in CID on Friday.

I saw a disturbing video that appeared to indicate that there were no interpreters present in the Chinatown International District.

And in particular, there were a few elders who speak Vietnamese, do not speak English.

and were unaware of exactly what was happening.

So I'll be following up to understand why there were no Vietnamese interpreters present.

And just want to state again, this is a practice that I feel is incredibly inhumane.

And I feel like this could have been avoided if we had invested more appropriately in just care.

hoping that we will continue those conversations with the Regional Homelessness Authority and make sure that we're actually investing in things that solve people's problems instead of creating new ones for them.

My staff met with Seattle Subway to hear about their vision for the West Seattle Ballard light rail extension that will all be running through District 2. And so I also met with SDOT last week to discuss the draft EIS.

I'm especially interested in what's proposed for the Chinatown International District.

There will be some hard trade-offs to be made between the options.

There's a couple of 4th Avenue and a couple of 5th Avenue options that are being proposed.

Both are going to have impacts, hard impacts on the community.

We're talking about years of construction, potential businesses being displaced.

And the challenge is that again, in part because of the language challenges, there's not clarity about what mitigation strategies are being offered in any of the options being presented.

And so there is a real interest on behalf of community and on behalf of SDOT to make sure that Sound Transit is providing clarity about what they're willing to commit to in terms of mitigation strategies, not what they might do or what some possibilities are, but what can the community expect are the mitigation strategies that will be put in place.

So I'm hopeful that that can be made clear to Sam Transit because community members can't really make a choice at this point about what the preferred alternative is without some clarity on the mitigation strategies.

My staff also met with Lehigh to discuss the south end village that will soon be opening in Rainier Beach or near the Rainier Beach link station.

The houses are already up.

I think they're already putting up the kitchen tent as well.

And my understanding is that there's some unanticipated delays.

to opening the village and that Lehigh is looking for advocacy and funding on their behalf.

Colleagues, you know that I've been meeting with folks in the Mount Baker area for almost two years now.

And part of what we're hearing from them and part of what we committed to them was that we would be able to help some of the folks living in the Chistie encampment move in to this Lehigh village when it was completed.

And we can't do that until they get the funding they need to actually work on operations.

These challenges are sort of cascading if we can't make sure that the implementation of these strategies is working.

And then finally, with regard to last week, my staff met with a community group looking to purchase a multifamily apartment building in District 2 to take it off the speculative market and move it into community control.

And I'll have a little more information about that in future briefings.

Quickly for this week, this morning I met with, sorry, I keep thinking I've turned that off, but I haven't.

This morning I met with the Beersheba Sister City Association to talk about upgrades to Beersheba Park and possible community collaborations to celebrate the sister city relationship.

My staff and I will meet with Transportation Choices later to hear their feedback on the West Seattle Ballard project, again, with a focus on the CID.

We have our regular little Saigon meeting to talk with business owners, mutual aid, and residents, and service providers.

And then colleagues, this week I'll be launching a series of D2 town hall discussions.

We're calling it Seattle Within Reach.

This is really gonna center around what makes a vibrant, connected neighborhood.

And we'll be bringing in experts throughout the year or through the series to talk about what that might mean.

So this Thursday, we kick off the series.

We'll be hearing from members of the Seattle Planning Commission, from the American Institute of Architects and Puget Sound SAGE.

to talk about simple steps we can take to make Seattle neighborhoods more inclusive, more connected, and more human scale.

Following on that, we'll host a second panel discussion on the topic of community development, sort of building on the 15-minute cities, 15-minute neighborhood ideas and social housing.

And we'll be hearing from cities that are actively doing this work to learn about their approaches and how they might work in Seattle.

So that week we will be joined by members of the delegation from our French sister city Nantes.

If you don't know, they are coming here to visit Seattle.

I think there's like 50 people coming.

It's going to be a lot.

But for our panel, we will have Deputy Mayor Pierre Manuel Marais.

Melody Loderick, along with representatives from El Centro de la Raza and some cities that we are talking to from Local Progress.

So that second discussion is going to be April 14th at 9.30.

And as I said, we've got several discussions that are in the works.

As we put some meat on the bones of those conversations, I will be happy to share those.

But you can also find more information on my council website and we'll be posting information on our social media and newsletter.

And then finally, this Saturday is the Khmer New Year Village Festival hosted by the Khmer community in Seattle King County.

My former aide, Darzel Touch, is now the organizational strategist for the organization.

So hooray, congratulations Darzel for getting this kicked off.

They'll be showcasing performances by the Kwai Amarak Performing Arts Group, which is a youth-led traditional music and dance program.

And the event is from noon to four this Saturday at the Rainier Arts Center.

So I encourage all of you to come out and enjoy the show.

That is all I have.

this morning or this afternoon.

And do any of my colleagues have questions?

I just want to say one thing, Council Member Morales.

I'm really sorry that you were unable and I understand that we spoke about the quorum issue.

So I just want to remind my colleagues that As soon as you know, you cannot make a council meeting, let the council member know.

It's really important, as you all know.

So now that we're down to what a quorum is of three, we don't have alternates anymore.

It's even more critical to give people a heads up that you can't be there or you're going to be late because Council Member Ellis did have teed up all of these people to speak.

And unfortunately, she was unable to move forward.

So that's why it's on tomorrow's calendar, everybody.

So thank you, Councilor Morales, for working with our office.

And again, I just want to just reiterate and emphasize what you said, that a lot of those folks on these commissions and boards are volunteers and they're professionals, and they have lived experience, and they give up their time to do the work and show up.

And the least we can do is show up and be there and listen.

So thank you, Councilor Morales.

Thank you.

So I will hand it over now to council member Mosqueda.

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, the Finance and Housing Committee has its meeting on April 6th at 9.30 a.m.

We are still finalizing our agenda.

Included on the agenda will be the housing levy oversight appointments, which include five new appointments and six reappointments.

The Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board, which has two appointments and two reappointments.

A vote on the capital projects watch list.

Thank you to our colleagues for your engagement in the conversation about The possible capital projects watch list over the last month and for submitting some possible additions and being cautious about the limited work Capacity that the departments have to add more but we will be adding a few more based on your suggested amendments again That will be on April 6 at 9 30 a.m We're also in conversations currently with some of the folks who are operating with the equity fund already in place related to cannabis equity funds and other jurisdictions.

And we'll be having a small panel of possible business owners who are operating within structures that have allowed for greater equity to be distributed throughout not just the industry, but the jurisdictions that they're working in.

So looking forward to pulling that panel together and having your participation there.

And we will be having a possible update on the payment of claims resolution and template.

We had a briefing from central staff, interim director Panucci and Tom Meisel presented a presentation on how we can update our payment of claims process.

This is something that we take on as part of our weekly deliberations at city council and wanting to make sure that the payment of claims resolution I think it's been since the 90s since we updated that document.

So looking forward to integrating some of the suggestions from both central staff, but also the city's budget office.

I want to thank CBO for their participation with us as well.

For full council, there are no items from the finance and housing committee on this week's full council agenda tomorrow.

And just a quick report out.

I will be attending, um, Let's see, I will be participating in a presentation at Ethan's soul with the Marshall Marshall fellows panel that will pull together.

A group of folks looking at the impact and the importance of democracy vouchers in our region.

I'll also be meeting with folks from Cascade Bicycle Club in D5.

I'm going to check out the new bridge, Council President.

Yeah, yeah.

So we'll be up there tomorrow.

And I want to flag for folks that there is an ongoing conversation that the Seattle City employees retirement systems board of administration is engaged in through the investment committee about possible updates to our environmental and social justice policies that guide investment strategies of the city.

Those investment committee meetings are open and I, as the.

I will be making a special effort to participate in those over the next two to three months as the ESG policies are reviewed and possibly updated.

This follows a year's worth of conversations that I led in the CSRS board meetings.

by bringing in folks from Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City, in addition to advisors like FFI advisors who are looking at the ways in which various jurisdictions wearing the financial fiduciary duty hat have engaged in strategies to update their environmental and social justice policies for investments, specifically investments for pension funds.

So look forward to following up the year's worth of discussion that we had in our service board meetings last year to see if there's updates that will be incorporated into our ESG policy throughout this year.

In addition to that.

Folks, I want to flag for you that you should have received information from the mayor's office.

Mayor Harrell sent down their nomination for the permanent appointment to the director of the intergovernmental relations position and are putting forward for our consideration the confirmation of Gail Tarleton.

Former representative Tarleton has been acting as an interim director since January of this year.

As you all know from the presentations we've received on a weekly basis during session, And thanks in large part to the Mayor Harold's administration for their robust engagement with us.

They have followed the required confirmation process and packet that is in your email.

If you haven't yet received that, please do look for that email that came down on Thursday last week.

Finally, from the Department of Finance and Administrative Services, they want to do a quick report out on all that they have been working on.

FAS, the Logistics and Emergency Management Team, has distributed over 265,000 masks.

They are continuing to help provide additional assistance across our city in terms of getting back to work and making sure our facilities are ready.

FAS's warehouses, the facility operation and real estate services department is planning and searching for a new consolidated warehouse location.

FAS has contacted a Seattle fire department and police department, alerting them that FAS may vacate the current warehouse, providing them with time to assess their space needs and complete the space use request form or the SURF process.

Finally, from FAS, the Capital Development Department at FAS is continuing to monitor the fence construction area at the 4th Avenue entrance at City Hall.

The concrete strike is having an impact on the process there and FAS is going to continue to verify that the site condition with the contractor is on par every week.

A project at Haler Lake in solution related to electric vehicle charges is also impacted.

And I'm going to be following up with our friends from Seattle Department of Transportation about the concerning reports that we continued to receive throughout the last few months about ghost trucks or non-union trucks delivering concrete and flatbed vehicles and not having both A, the appropriate equipment, but also using non-union members to deliver those.

So we'll be having more conversation about that.

And Madam President, if I may, I do have a one-sentence update from our colleague, Council Member Lewis, that I'd like to provide.

Okay.

Sure, go ahead.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Lewis's update is that their office is planning to have a public briefing and discussion with the county and affected community partners on the proposed transfer of City Hall Park to the county during the Public Assets and Homelessness Committee meeting, and that will occur next week on Wednesday, April 6th as well.

That concludes my report and Council Member Lewis's report.

Yes, please go ahead, Council President.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda.

It may be a bit premature, but I know we've had some offline discussions in your committee meeting on April 6th for your panel for the cannabis stuff.

You and I have been talking kind of offline, like, you know, our concern about, I know the House has passed it a few times, the Safe Banking Act and, you know, kind of how that works with, because cannabis is still scheduled to, which means federal banks can't, anyone federally insured can't do these kinds of loans.

for particular communities can have equity and gain capital to go open up a cannabis business, the inequities in the cannabis business.

So I want to ask you, when you do your panel, is it strictly, you said you were gonna have some small businesses, some small, I wasn't sure if what, one of my staff will be attending, but I want to know, should we be prepared for anything more than what we're gonna hear from some of these banking issues, or is it just gonna be the small business piece?

You know, we were looking to do some outreach to some of the small businesses who've been operating within a similar equity framework that we've been hearing about as that's potentially needed from our Department of Finance and Administrative Services.

For example, Office of Economic Development has done some work over the last few years as well.

So I wanted to hear from some of the businesses who are working within a similar framework on how that's worked.

But you know what, you are bringing up a very timely issue.

I know that there was an op-ed by one of our state legislative members as well over the weekend about the need for reform related to the banking industry.

Let me see what we can do in terms of the timing on our committee meeting next week.

And if we can't work it into that panel, I'd love to talk a little bit more about making sure that that broader conversation about the federal changes that are also needed in the banking industry is continued to be highlighted.

But at this point, our panel is really focused on just hearing from a few of the more small business owners, but they might be able to comment on that.

And I know Council Member Herbold has done some work on that in the past.

So the reason why I wasn't trying to put you on the spot, I know that that's a lot for you to try to pull together for your April 6th meeting.

But I know you and I've talked a lot offline about this whole banking issue and access to equity and banking and all those issues, and been following the federal law for what, three or four years now.

So if our office can work with you, and maybe we can pull in OIR and our lobbyist in DC, Leslie, to see what's going on, because I understand that the Fair Banking Act has passed the House, I think, three times, but gets held up in the Senate.

And so I just want to keep pushing that, because I think there's some alternatives there.

So be happy to work with you on that.

If you do a second or third committee hearing about the cannabis issue, would love to partner and be collaborative with you and your staff.

So thank you.

Councilmember Herbold, I know you've done some work in this arena.

Please chime in.

Vice Chair.

Okay, this is, um, uh, went back and forth about whether or not I was going to mention it.

Um, but then, uh, Council President Juarez, um, confirmed that I probably should use this opportunity to let folks know, um, that, uh, uh, Councilmember, um, Council President Juarez accurately reflects what the status is, the current status is, of the Safe Banking Act.

I have been in touch with both our, Sarah Aulette at OIR, around this issue and how we could be most impactful.

Have also been in touch with cannabis advocacy groups who have been in touch, I think, with many of us, the Craft Cannabis Coalition, and we're just sort of trying to figure out whether or not a council letter asking for the mayor's support is the best way to go.

Um, really, um, you know, we have the strong support the House, our entire Washington State House delegation voted in favor of it.

There's no reason to believe that anybody in the Seattle Senate delegation would not be supportive of it.

In fact, I think I think it's It might be Senator Cantwell is in a leadership position.

So we're just trying to figure out how we can most be impactful on this really important issue.

This bill has come up a number of times over the past several years, and it's really time now to get it over the finish line.

So I look forward to finding out more and sharing with the rest of you what we can learn.

Thanks.

Thanks so much.

Looking forward to that conversation.

All right, I'm handing it off to Council Member Nelson.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda.

Hello, everyone.

There are two items from the Economic Development, Technology and City Light Committee.

on tomorrow's agenda.

One is the appointment of Michelle Mitchell-Brannan to the low-income representative position for the Seattle City Light Review Panel, and that is appointment number 02122. That was unanimous coming out of my committee.

And then there's also Council Bill 120273, effectuating a rate change for the Seattle Tourism Improvement Area, also unanimous.

Last week, I attended the Regional Leadership Conference, and well, before I get to that, let me just start with Monday.

I attended the North Seattle Industrial Association's monthly meeting with Council Member Strauss, and we heard from OED Interim Director, Mark McIntyre, and John Persak, who is the liaison for the maritime industrial sector.

and talk mostly about, as you could imagine, the industrial lands DEIS, freight mobility, and public safety and homelessness issues in the area.

And then from Wednesday to Friday, I attended the regional leadership conference and this is an annual gathering of regional elected officials and business and nonprofit leaders.

And this year's theme was regional reset and Mayor Harrell.

King County Executive Constantine and Governor Inslee all gave keynote addresses.

And as I say that, I recognize that it's a little executive heavy, but anyway.

And then the topics were organized under broad policy issue categories like transportation and arts and culture, homelessness, current initiatives on homelessness, et cetera.

But as you might expect, the most interesting part to me was on economic recovery.

and with the specific focus on equitable economic recovery this year.

And the panel that was most striking that people ended up talking about the whole time was one focused on small business and the and the pandemic impacts, but also the uneven nature of our recovery.

And it featured Joe Fougere, who's the founder and president of Tudabella, also Margie Haywood of the Work and Play Lounge and Freelance Hoyle, who owns the Rebecca Onassis Boutique.

And I have to say, Margie Haywood told a room that had a lot of bankers in it that she's been in business for several years now and has been unable to secure a loan, that she was almost approved and then wasn't at the last minute when she showed up as a black woman to have one of the in-stage meetings.

And then Freelance told us how her black-owned business has been struggling to get in a commercial lease And she's been operating out of her home and has had to monetize social media to get through the pandemic.

And so these were powerful examples of the problem of access to capital for BIPOC business owners.

So again, a focus of mine and one of the sidebar conversations that I had was with Joe Sky Tucker, who is the president of Business Impacts Northwest, which is a CBFI.

And it just launched a new program, which I thought was really interesting, called Endeavor Northwest.

It's an accelerator program that's focused on driving investment to the BIPOC business community.

and provide technical support and also help generate and steer people toward supplier and procurement opportunities, which of course got me thinking that the city of Seattle could be a partner here because we have a vendor list and we buy a lot of goods and services.

And so working with this organization and perhaps other entities to figure out how we can support more local and BIPOC-owned businesses to be on that list for when we're making our procurement decisions.

I also met with Dave McFadden, who leads economic development at the port, and he told me about a plan for a Seattle and port partnership for equitable community development in the Duwamish Valley that got sidetracked during the pandemic and with some leadership changes And I would like to look about exploring reviving.

They recently, the port recently leased a community hub in the Duwamish Valley, which is a space that could provide a venue for a lot of these partnership initiatives.

So more on that later.

So I spent a lot of time talking about RLC just because I learned a lot.

And it is definitely a good opportunity to meet with colleagues and learn about your issue topic experience, I mean, interests.

So I encourage people to attend if they can next year or following years.

So while I was gone, my chief of staff, Jeremy, attended the quarterly Visit Seattle board meeting, which is one of my external committee assignments.

So he went in my stead.

And the meeting was the last for the chair, Tom Norwalk, who is leaving.

And I just want to say that I wish him a happy retirement.

He's done a tremendous job at the agency.

So thank you very much for your service, Tom.

Visit Seattle and Seattle Bank just announced at this board meeting, announced a partnership to bring tourism revenue to Seattle's small businesses and diverse communities.

A first collaboration between the organizations, which is called the Community Partnership Program, will provide support to 20 locally owned businesses, including restaurants, cafes, and shops within Seattle's vibrant International District and Central District neighborhoods.

All right.

perhaps not the highlight of my week, but a big one.

Last, on Saturday night, I attended the UNCF's gala to raise money for scholarships and support other programs of historically black colleges.

And it was definitely one of the, well, I should say, I was gonna say funnest, but it was also very successful.

Over $1.6 million was raised, but also they had a band and a DJ, and the evening ended with a packed dance floor.

definitely I'll be sure to return again there in coming years.

And this week I will go on a ride along in the West Precinct on Tuesday.

I'll attend the launch of the King County Metro battery electric bus charging station or base on Wednesday and attend Visit Seattle's Outlook 2022 on Thursday.

And that's sort of like DSA's state of downtown event.

So I'll learn much more about the state of our tourism industry at that event.

And that's all I've got.

Thanks.

Any questions?

All right, seeing none, I will pass it to Council Member Peterson.

Thank you, Council Member Nelson.

Good afternoon, colleagues.

On tomorrow afternoon's full City Council agenda, there are no items related to our Committee on Transportation and Seattle Public Utilities.

Our next Committee on Transportation and Seattle Public Utilities will be Tuesday, April 5 at 9.30 a.m.

As mentioned earlier on tomorrow afternoon's full City Council agenda, I'm co-sponsoring Council Bill 120207 with Councilmember Strauss.

The City Council's Land Use Committee unanimously recommended that we adopt this legislation.

tomorrow.

For those not on the Land Use Committee, this legislation will increase the accountability and transparency needed to protect Seattle's trees by requiring anyone seeking to cut down or heavily prune mature trees to register beforehand with the city government.

I want to thank all the supporters of the legislation who took time to call into the committee meeting and who are still sending emails of support for Council Bill 120207. In District 4 this past week, I met with the principal of View Ridge Elementary School and several parents concerned about pedestrian safety along the busy Northeast 70th Street.

That important east-west arterial connects the Bryant neighborhood to View Ridge and then on to Magnuson Park.

Our city's new traffic engineer also accompanied my staff and me to visit the low-income housing project Mercy Magnuson.

Several residents there are seeking a crosswalk so they are more safely connected to the city's community center.

The Magnus Park Community Center is undergoing a light rehab and expected to reopen this year and so we want the crosswalk ready for the expected increase in pedestrians seeking the recreational programs there.

That concludes my report.

Any questions before I turn it back over to Council President Juarez?

Oh, but thank you.

That was nice and quick and tidy.

Thank you, Council Member Peterson.

So let me wrap us up here.

Starting with the Native Governance, there are no items from the Governance and Native Communities and Tribal Governments Committee on tomorrow's council's agenda.

The next committee meeting will be Thursday, April 21st at 930. Saturday, I attended the 20-year anniversary of the Native Action Network, which has been, was put together by former Senator Claudia Kaufman.

And Irish Friday, and I attended the very first one when my daughters were 10 and 7, and now they're 30 and 27. I can't believe 20 years have gone by.

We've honored just about every tribal woman leader I can think of, and then some nationally and regionally.

And the Native Action Network is there to prepare and provide mentorship and leadership, but more importantly, antiship to our young Native women as they go into the world, when they're in college, after college, encourage them to go to law school, med school, get their MBAs, run for tribal council, run for city council.

So they've had a successful program.

I can't say enough about former Senator Claudia Hoffman and Iris Friday, mothers themselves, leaders themselves.

So it's a real example of mentoring and being there to make sure that you shepherd those young women and men behind you to leadership positions because it does matter and representation does matter.

As far as other issues in Native communities, the city received 29 completed applications for the Inaugural Indigenous Advisory Council.

Staff from the city's legislative and executive branches will be working in the coming weeks to select finalists to be interviewed.

Candidates selected for appointment will then be confirmed by city council to form the nine-member panel.

And as you all know, this is very historic.

I think we're the second city to do this.

In regards to Sound Transit, I know a lot of you have, there's a lot of issues regarding Sound Transit that we're trying to stay on top of, besides the DEIS and the alignment and the other issues that Council Member Morales had brought up.

On March 16th, Sound Transit announced it will receive $15.9 million in federal funding for bus rapid transit investments that will dramatically improve services to our region.

Funds will be used to construct new stations and secure new bus rapid transit vehicles and sound transit's stride system.

The stride system serves a 37-mile corridor between Linwood and Burien and a nine-mile corridor between Shoreline and Bothell.

These are investments that will offer riders a way through congestion with faster and more reliable service on the east, south, and north sides of Lake Washington.

The grant was secured with the support of the Biden administration and our congressional delegation, including Senator Patty Murray.

Sound Transit is seeking volunteers from the Pierce County, Snohomish County, North King County, and East King County, and South King County sub areas to join the Community Oversight Panel.

Again, that's the Community Oversight Panel.

The Community Oversight Panel currently has eight openings, one for Pierce County, two for Snohomish, two for North King, and one for East King County.

And two for South King County.

Sound Transit relies on the oversight and expertise of this dedicated and independent group of volunteers and encourages community members to apply.

The members serve three year terms.

So to submit an application, you can do so online at Sound Transit website or email a completed application to email the board at soundtransit.org.

Applications are considered on a rolling basis.

More specifically in D5, we have some good news with our Children's Home Society and the CEO, Dave Newell, a good friend of mine.

As you know, the Children's Home Society, their headquarters is in Lake City, and we work closely with them and have since before I was elected.

Anyway, we received, they received an $8 million gift from Mackenzie Scott, the philanthropist Mackenzie Scott.

Thank you Mackenzie Scott for giving us $8 million.

I really appreciate it.

We really appreciate it.

Children's Home Society is one of the state's leading children and family organizations and this contribution will help the Children's Home Society of Washington carry out its transformative work to shift government and phil can never say that word philanthropic resources to keep families together and combat the inequities from the pandemic that the pandemic compounded.

So basically we just say this.

We reached out to them.

We worked with a lot of groups and McKenzie Scott came back and worked with Dave Newell the CEO of Children's Home Society.

And the gift of $8 million is obviously going to be used statewide.

But it's just been incredible working with our on-the-ground social service folks.

and having these public-private partnerships and these institutions and these folks that reach out and give back to their community.

I cannot emphasize how important it is that businesses should be good civic neighbors.

And if that means writing a check, then I think that's what they should do.

But that's just me.

So I'll leave it at that.

So thank you, Mackenzie Scott.

Congratulations to Children's Home Society.

And thank you, David Newell, for working with our Seattle City Council.

There's a lot of issues, or we saw a lot on the news about the Little Red House.

That has been a piece of property that we advocated to buy for over a million dollars, like, I don't know, two or three years ago.

Long story short, in late February, and actually well before that, community members start reaching out to us about concerns about the Lake City flood plan park location.

It's referred to as the Little Red House.

It's a beautiful piece of property where Thornton Creek runs right through it.

So last week in response to evidence of folks living in the house and on the property and in the garage, Seattle City staff are on site to remove tents, clean up the trash, and offer shelter resources to those currently living at the site.

CL Parks facilities team installed a fence and boarded up the property to discourage future encampments in the area.

I went up there.

I've been there half a dozen times.

It's completely cleaned up and boarded up and the fence is up now.

There were five individuals living at that site.

All were offered shelter, three accepted referrals.

I want to have a big shout out to CL Parks.

Seattle Police Department, Seattle Public Utilities, and City Attorney's Office, and our staff, in particular, Dean Alsop, our District Director, for working many weeks collaboratively to resolve this emergent situation.

Again, nobody should live outside like that.

I think that's inhumane.

I'm glad that we were able to work with all of these different city families, city departments, To address this issue, it certainly was on our radar.

There were some other issues going on about alleged drug activity and some other investigations that we weren't at liberty to share at the time.

But as it was, it was all alleged there wasn't a, indeed, not a meth lab there.

But in any event, at the end of the day, it did get cleaned up.

And we hope to continue to work to keep Thornton Creek Watershed clean.

and also have our folks out there to provide services for those people that find themselves unsheltered on public property.

Let's see, upcoming this week.

So tomorrow I will be joining Mayor Harrell and other community members to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the monorail.

And I will be joining Council Member Herbold in attending the 14th annual celebration of affordable housing with the Housing Development Consortium.

Thank you Patience Malaba for inviting me.

I understand she's the new executive director.

Congratulations to you Patience.

I know we had some great discussions offline.

So I will be there with Council Member Herbold at the convention center.

And so I think that wraps it up for me.

Are there any questions before I adjourn us?

Okay, not seeing any.

President Peterson, you with us?

So colleagues, this concludes the items of business on today's agenda.

Our next regularly scheduled council briefing is scheduled for April 4th, but we will have our regular council meeting tomorrow at two.

We are adjourned, thank you.