Seattle City Council Economic Development, Technology, and City Light Committee 8/10/22

Good morning, everyone.

The August 10th, 2022 meeting of the Economic Development Technology and City Light Committee will come to order.

It is 931. I'm Sarah Nelson, chair of committee, and Stephen Ellis is our new permanent committee clerk.

Council Member Strauss is excused.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council President Bland?

Here.

Council Member Szilagyi?

Present.

Council Member Herbold.

Chair Nelson.

Present.

Three present.

Excellent, I love quorum.

All right, there are four items on today's agenda, a briefing and discussion on draft ordinance establishing the Seattle Film Commission, an intergovernmental briefing and discussion on strategies to support Seattle's film industry, a discussion and possible vote on Seattle City Lights 2022 integrated resource plan, and a briefing and discussion on Seattle City Lights 2022, 2023, and 2024 rate ordinance.

So now we will go on to approving the agenda.

If there are no objections, the agenda is approved.

All right.

So I recognize Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

So before public comment, I want to recognize the people who've come to in response to the letter I signed on to regarding the Lower Snake River Dams draft report requested by Senator Murray and Governor Inslee.

However, public comment for this committee is restricted to items on the agenda, and this issue is not.

I have to be consistent in the application of this policy for all committee meetings, so if you're here to talk about that, I ask that you refrain from comment today.

And I do have a staff member in the room that can take your name and email, and I would like to hear from you directly in a Zoom meeting very soon.

So thank you very much for that opportunity.

I want you to know that I've read the letter sent by a coalition of 12 environmental organizations, and I take your words to heart.

Personally, I've always believed that salmon protection and restoration should be prioritized, and as the new chair of City Light, I signed on in good faith that the utility shares that commitment.

I'm looking forward to seeing the Murray-Inslee plan, which I expect to be out later this month, and I'll make every effort to be supportive of that plan once I've seen it.

I appreciate the leadership that the Senator and Governor have shown to try to strike the right balance between honoring treaty rights, salmon recovery, and strengthening the power system.

With that, we'll now move into public comments on items on the agenda.

And let's roll the video, please.

to share your screen.

Hello, Seattle.

We are the Emerald City, the city of flowers and the city of goodwill, built on indigenous land, the traditional territory of the Coast Salish peoples.

The Seattle City Council welcomes remote public comment and is eager to hear from residents of our city.

If you would like to be a speaker and provide a verbal public comment, you may register two hours prior to the meeting via the Seattle City Council website.

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Once speakers have completed providing public comment, Please disconnect from the public comment line and join us by following the meeting via Seattle Channel Broadcast or through the listening line option listed on the agenda.

The Council reserves the right to eliminate public comment if the system is being abused, or if the process impedes the Council's ability to conduct its business on behalf of residents of the City.

Any offensive language that is disruptive to these proceedings or that is not focused on an appropriate topic as specified in Council rules may lead to the speaker being muted by the presiding officer.

Our hope is to provide an opportunity for productive discussions that will assist our orderly consideration of issues before the Council.

The public comment period is now open.

and we will begin with the first speaker on the list.

Please remember to press star six after you hear the prompt of, you have been unmuted.

Thank you, Seattle.

Okay, before continuing, I see- Point of order.

Point of order question.

Sure.

Totally understand that every committee chair has the authority to use the rules of the city council to limit public comment to items that are on the agenda.

My recollection is when Seattle City Light CEO Debra Smith presented the plan, she actually addressed this issue.

So it does seem like there's...

In her presentation, she addressed the issue of the plan and how it relates to the statewide efforts on dam breaching.

So given that it seems like there's a track record of there being somewhat of a link between the issues, and we've had that conversation in this committee, it seems like I appreciate that.

Council Rule 11.C.3 says public comment must be directed to matters within the purview of the committee.

And we have discretion on how we define the breadth of those comments.

This, yeah, a lot is related to our integrated resource plan because it is all about the, customers' energy needs and the resources that are at Seattle City Light's disposal to meet them.

However, the particular issue that I believe is at hand is a little bit removed from that.

So I thank you very much.

Okay, let's see, on the public comment sheet, we've got two speakers.

So we'll start with the remote speakers, and then we will go to in-person.

Everyone will have two minutes to speak.

And we'll start with Andrew Kenefick.

Please go ahead.

Andrew, star six.

Yes, can you hear me, Chairman Nelson?

Yes.

Oh, hi, thank you very much.

My name is Andrew Kenefick, Seattle area resident for 45 years, rate payer for 34 years.

I did come to speak about the Lower Snake River Dam issue.

And I also had noted the council rules that allowed for consideration of public comment that is within the purview of the committee.

But in light of Chairman Nelson's comments, unless someone tells me otherwise, I will honor her request not to comment on the Inslee-Murray report or more specifically on the letter that Seattle City Light sent in response to the Inslee-Murray report.

However, if you want me to speak to this in light of the other council members comment about this being within the feeling it is within the purview of the committee, I will I will continue, but if, if, if that's not appropriate for this council meeting, I will defer my comments until later time.

I really appreciate your, your understanding.

And I prefer that we move on to the next speaker, but My email is sarah.nelsonatseattle.gov.

And so your email is not on this list.

So if you would like to speak with me personally, then we will contact you.

So I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, our next speaker is Myron Partman.

Please go ahead.

Star six.

Hello, hello.

Good morning.

I'm assuming you guys can hear me?

Yes.

Okay, excellent.

Well, my name is Myron Partman.

I'm here to talk about the Seattle Film Commission.

And I want to thank you, Member Nelson and Mr. McTire for this presentation and the opportunity for me to comment today.

I'm Equity Committee co-chair at Washington Filmworks and co-chair for the Seattle Film Task Force.

I'm a local 48 member, born and raised in Seattle, been in the film industry for about 30 years.

And I just want to say on behalf of the task force, thank you for bringing up this legislation.

It's really been about 30 years in the making.

And since 2019, there's been a diverse group of Seattle filmmakers and stakeholders who have volunteered hours of their time to create a roadmap for this commission.

So I just want to say thank you so much.

Seattle is the biggest city in Washington.

And if you tell people where you're from, if you say you're from Washington, the next question is where?

Seattle.

So when people come to Washington to produce films here, they're likely to look at Seattle first.

So Seattle being aligned with Washington and King County, in their efforts to support this cornerstone of the Korean economy is really, really, really important.

It's an important piece of the puzzle.

So thank you so much.

And that's all I have to say.

Thank you very much.

And there's no one else signed up on our remotely, so may I please have the list of folks that wanna speak in person?

And for the viewing public, I want to acknowledge that there are about 12 people, some have left in the room that are interested in the issue that we've already touched on.

Okay, our first in-person speaker is James Keblis.

Hello.

Is the mic on the table?

Mic on.

Hello, my name is James Keblis.

I'm the general manager of a film studio here in Seattle called All Is Well.

We employ nine full-time people.

We have a handful of freelancers.

We pay living wages.

We have healthcare benefits.

We're diverse.

I'm telling you all this because I want to say thank you and appreciate the council members who are putting forward the film commission legislation to make that happen.

We're in Seattle, we want to stay in Seattle, we want to grow in Seattle, and this effort is absolutely going to help us.

Not only will it help our company do what we do, it'll help the effort to grow the creative economy in general.

I know a lot of talk has been had about the creative economy, I think it's very positive and good.

And investing in film is one of the absolute best economic development bets you can make to make that happen.

Film employs the most amount of people at the highest wages, it's got a union infrastructure that you'll hear about, and it's doesn't need a college education to get in.

You get in, you can have transferable skills that you can take with you for the rest of your life.

It's an absolutely fantastic way to go.

And I think this is a very good economic development step for the Economic Development Committee.

Thank you very much for your support of this legislation.

Thank you, James.

Next up is Melissa Purcell.

difficult for me to look up and my reading glasses, so forgive me, I'm just going to read.

Thank you, Chairwoman Nelson and Councilmembers.

My name is Melissa Purcell.

I'm a business agent for IATSC Local 488. We represent the crew members that work in the film, commercial, and corporate content industry.

Myself, our local, and many stakeholders of our industry are thrilled and supportive of what Councilmember and OED Director McIntyre are presenting today.

Many of us and others before us have worked for years on these efforts, including a film music coalition, as well as the Seattle Film Task Force to get us to this moment.

I am proud of the work the task force did throughout 2020, developing a list of priorities that would help increase family wage jobs and attract and streamline how film work is done in Seattle.

While at the same time, we spent real time discussing and identifying what access, diversity and inclusion needs to be for our industry.

As the city throws its support behind the film industry, I thank you all and ask for your continued support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we've got Dana Scherholtz.

And after that, we've got Nancy Hirsch.

Hi, I'm Dana Scherholtz.

I'm a teacher, a mother, and I I want to address, I want to speak to the integrated resource plan.

When I teach about energy and resource management to students, I often include the approaches that indigenous cultures all over the world and specifically in the Pacific Northwest have taken in resource management.

And I know that those practices are based on a philosophy of seven generations.

How will our decisions that we make about resource management impact generations, our grandchildren's grandchildren's grandchildren.

And so the integrated resource plan is just looking at 20 years, I realize.

We're a little more short-sighted, but still, that's something.

And I don't think we can address an integrated resource management plan without considering the need to modernize infrastructure that's archaic.

And some of that archaic infrastructure is on the Lower Snake River, the dams there.

So I think that we need bold action.

The integrated resource plan should consider strongly that breaching those dams will enable us to modernize and to really create a plan that provides reliable, affordable power with energy that is not negatively, as negatively impacting all of the stakeholders, the human, the tribal, the non-tribal, the more than human stakeholders as well.

That I think that I want us to be asking, will our grandchildren not only have reliable energy, but will they have orcas that they live side by side in the Pacific Northwest, this iconic species.

And those orcas need salmon, and those salmon need a free-flowing snake.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Nancy Hirsch.

Good morning, Chair Nelson, members of the committee.

My name is Nancy Hirsch.

I'm executive director of the Northwest Energy Coalition.

We're a nonprofit alliance of more than 100 environmental, civic, consumer, clean energy businesses and utilities in the Northwest.

Seattle City Light and the Office of Sustainability and the Environment are both organizational members.

We support both the City Light rate ordinance and the integrated resource plan.

Utility rates and rate design affect not just how much electricity we use, but when we use it and how the cost burden is shared among customers.

The proposed fixed basic charge for all customers is within the appropriate range for a monthly charge.

However, it is important to note that an assessment of utility fixed costs does not equal what the monthly basic service charge should be.

There are many fixed costs that should not be included in the basic service charge.

Managing customer load is key to helping address reliability and peak usage in the summer and winter.

The proposed optional time of day rates are an important complement to other utility programs to manage customer usage.

And as you're aware, the IRP reflects a significant acquisition plan and one that echoes the city's commitment to energy efficiency and customer resources, as well as building out the next generation of new renewable energy resources.

As investments in energy efficiency increase, there should be a proportional increase in delivering low-income residential and multifamily weatherization programs.

And we're very pleased to see the focus on managing customer load using demand response.

However, these programs need to be accelerated as they should go hand in hand with electrification.

In the next IRP, we want to see new wind and solar projects paired with storage resources.

There are no investments in storage proposed in this proposal.

We appreciate working with City Light staff and continue to be deeply engaged in implementation and adaptive management as technologies evolve, creating new opportunities.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

That was our last speaker.

And so we will move on to item one.

Will the clerk please read item one into the record?

Agenda item one, establishment of the Seattle Film Commission briefing and discussion.

All right.

Seattle's got a reputation as a creative city.

And Seattle's also been on the cutting edge of filmmaking.

However, our creatives are being priced out of town, and we're no longer on the cutting edge.

It's bad enough to see Vancouver in movies and films that are supposed to be about Seattle, and it's even worse to see our creatives in small businesses moving to other cities with more film opportunities, like Portland, for example, or Nashville, or Atlanta.

So if we want to grow our creative economy, focusing on film is the best bet we can make.

Because film is the most commercially viable art form in which artists can make a living making their art in the most diverse and greatest number of creative disciplines.

And I want to pause here.

So we've got an infographic up there to make this point.

It is really hard to read, but it shows almost 200 creative jobs that are activated on a single film production.

And these are typically living wage, union jobs, and many don't need a college degree.

So focusing on film starts with the establishment of a film commission.

Why?

Because a commission of industry professionals will engage with their networks of other film professionals to help the city prioritize industry needs.

Commissioners will advise the city in the development of initiatives that strengthen our regional film economy and attract out-of-state productions that generate living wage jobs and pour money into communities and also showcase Seattle to the rest of the world.

And then finally, they'll collaborate with regional stakeholders and partners to foster alignment with King County and Washington State on policies and initiatives related to the regional film economy.

So obviously this is not my idea.

Film industry stakeholders have been advocating for a film commission for years, spanning many mayoral administrations.

And the Seattle Music Commission was started in 2010. So just let me give you a bit of recent history.

In 2019, the music and film communities came together and formed the Seattle Film and Music Coalition to grow music and film production.

In 2020, they mobilized the Office of Film and Music to create a film task force, whose primary goal was the establishment of a film commission.

And council members Sawant, Morales, and Herbold were prime backers, and I thank you for that.

The task force produced a report with a long list of action items for the city and a film commission was at the top, but they were never able to advance their agenda.

Meanwhile, my campaign focused on economic recovery.

I listened to film stakeholders and committed to a film commission if I got elected.

And once in office, I staked out film as a central component of my work plan and had my first meeting with film stakeholders on January 28th.

And since then, our office, and thank you, Jeremy, has been working with them and OED to bring forward this ordinance today.

And it's a draft ordinance, and we will be discussing the following introduced legislation at our next meeting on September 14th, more on that later.

So with that, I'll stop talking and let Brian Goodnight of Council Central staff present the specifics of the legislation.

Go ahead, Brian.

Thank you, Chair Nelson.

Good morning, Council members.

Brian Goodnight, Council Central staff.

I will bring up the presentation right now.

Right off the top this morning, I'd like just want to let everyone know that I'm pinch hitting for my colleague Yolanda Ho today.

Yolanda is the central staffer that's been working on the bill that the committee is discussing.

But with that, I will do my best and get started to try to accurately summarize the work that's happened thus far.

So first off, the things that I'll walk through today are just some background, some brief background notes, a summary of the draft legislation, and then we'll finish with next steps.

So beginning in 2019, as the city began to reevaluate the role of the Office of Film and Music, or OFM, which was located within the Office of Economic Development, It convened film industry stakeholders to provide recommendations for how the city could best support and grow the local film industry and community.

One of the recommendations was for the city to create a film commission to provide strategic advice to the mayor, city council, and city departments on initiatives related to the film industry.

As part of the 2020 budget process, the executive proposed to repurpose OFM resources to advance OED's new creative industry strategy.

Additionally, Council Member Herbold sponsored, and the Council adopted, Statement of Legislative Intent OED-10A2 that requested OED to provide recommendations regarding the creation of a film commission.

The following year, in November of 2020, OED submitted a response that provided initial guidance for the purpose and membership of the proposed commission, but ultimately the process didn't move forward.

And then as Chair Nelson said, in early 2022, she began engaging film industry stakeholders and has since advanced the creation of the Film Commission.

So moving on to the draft legislation, the draft is attached to the agenda and was developed in collaboration with OED and film industry representatives.

So the legislation would establish a new Seattle Film Commission staffed by OED The commission's charge would be to advise and make recommendations to the city on the development of policies and programs that enhance the economic development of Seattle's film industry.

This includes promoting the sustainable growth of family wage jobs for workers who have been historically underrepresented in the industry.

The goals of the commission are to address disparities in the film industry caused by systemic racism, to position Seattle as a leader in driving equity, inclusion, and economic prosperity, and to serve as a conduit between the city and the film industry and community to equitably grow the film industry as part of the city's economic development priorities in the creative economy.

The commission will have 11 members, five appointed by the mayor, five appointed by the council, with the 11th position appointed by the commission once the other 10 positions have been filled.

All of the appointments are to be confirmed by the council.

And as you can see on this slide, the makeup of the commission positions is designed to represent a diverse cross-section of film industry and community viewpoints, and this list shows the stakeholder groups that must be represented.

And I'll pause just for a moment on this slide so you can look through the list, but I will not bore you by reading it.

The draft legislation also assigns the following purposes to the commission, to engage with industry professionals to inform the development of city efforts, to advise the City in the development of efforts to support the film industry, such as strategies for equity and inclusion, education and training, and business attraction incentives, and to collaborate with regional stakeholders to ensure that Seattle's film priorities are in alignment with those of King County and Washington State.

And finally, in terms of process, the draft legislation requires the Commission to meet at least monthly and to meet annually with the Seattle Music Commission, The commission must also elect a chair and vice chair annually and adopt bylaws for its own procedures.

The terms of the commission members are set at three years each with a maximum of two consecutive terms.

And lastly, the draft legislation authorizes OED to provide compensation to members if serving on the commission presents a financial hardship.

In terms of next steps, OED staff and Chair Nelson's office will continue to engage with stakeholders on the draft legislation.

And as Chair Nelson said, the plan is to introduce the bill on September 13th and for the committee to discuss and to possibly vote on it on September 14th.

And if that occurs, the full city council would be able to consider the bill on September 20th.

And with that, if there are any questions, I'll do my best to answer them if I can.

And if I can't, then I will take them down for Yolanda to provide responses once she returns to the office.

Hold, please.

Thank you very much, Brian.

I appreciate that.

Just a second.

I see your hand, Council Member.

I am simply pulling up my script.

So before I get to your question, I want to thank OED director Mark McIntyre for helping in this effort, obviously, and Chris Swenson of OED, who's been Seattle's lead on all things film for about a million years.

He helped write this legislation along with Melissa Purcell of IATSE, Kate Becker with King County, and Amy Lillard of Washington Filmworks.

And with that, I will turn to Council Member Herbold for questions or comments.

Thank you so much.

And my sincere thanks, Council Member Nelson, for bringing this forward.

In the previous administration, the difficulty in establishing a film commission was very much linked to the mission of the new administration as implemented by the Office of Economic Development to really look at the creative industries as sort of under a single umbrella, rather than recognizing that some of our creative industries merit a specific focus.

And so I have two questions sort of related to how things have pivoted since the prior administration to the current administration.

One, I didn't see anything in the In the presentation, though, I'm sure it's covered in the draft bill.

I just haven't found it yet.

What are the appointing authorities and of the appointing authorities, how many commissioners are appointed by each?

It's five and five and one.

So five by the mayor, five by the council, one by the commission as a whole, and all confirmed by council, and the positions and terms are in the legislation.

That's great.

I interpret by seeing that the mayor has authority to appoint five, that that's a pretty good signifier that we have buy-in with this administration.

We have buy-in with this administration.

Yes, absolutely.

Congratulations.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

They're right along here and with Director McIntyre, yes.

Is that it?

That's my question.

Okay.

Thank you very much for that historical background.

And I think that there's a lot of energy behind seeing new things coming forward.

Are there any other questions from my colleagues?

All right.

This is just the beginning.

I just want to thank everyone for your work on this today and just leave you with some important points.

This is about equity and it's about economic growth and workforce development.

It's about creating jobs and opportunities to build wealth and livelihoods.

It's about art and innovation and commercial success and tourism and pride of place.

We've got all the assets here in Seattle.

We really do.

And so not only do we have the talent and the passion for film, we've got CIFF and other amazing nonprofits.

We've got a rich cultural history and ethnic diversity.

and very, very strong partners and partnerships with labor.

And we've got stunning physical beauty.

And and so we've got all that.

And it's government's job to say yes, it really is.

It's government's job to say yes and put some intention behind getting Seattle's edge back as as the best city in the country for filmmaking.

And so that's what the Film Commission is about.

That's what we're that's the road we're on right now.

And I'm excited.

that we're taking our first steps.

So thank you very much, everyone.

All right, reminder, September 14th is our next discussion and hopefully a vote at a committee with a vote in full council, I believe on the 20th.

I could have my dates wrong, the following Tuesday.

All right, with that, will the clerk please read item two into the record?

Agenda item two, intergovernmental briefing on film industry strategies, briefing and discussion.

Okay, the presenters can come up to the table as I say a couple words.

Okay, so while the momentum on film in the city of Seattle has slowed a bit, King County is charging ahead.

And in Olympia, in Olympia, Washington Filmworks was a driving force behind getting the legislature to allocate $12 million annually to film incentives statewide.

And that's up from 3 million.

So we've got to align our efforts with what's going on at the county and state.

And so Director McIntyre will present the city's strategies on film, and Ms. Becker will, with the office of the King County Executive, will talk about exciting new developments that will boost film in the region and in Seattle, mostly thanks to her.

Much thanks to her.

And Julie Damon of Washington Filmworks will talk about the new incentives and what Seattle can do to best position ourselves to help people in the regional film economy and in Seattle get their hands on that.

So after that, I will ask for questions.

But for right now, take it away.

Director McIntyre.

Thanks Council Member.

My name is Mark McIntyre.

I'm the Director of the Office of Economic Development.

Thanks for having us here.

I'm gonna work through a few slides to kind of set background, although Council Member Nelson and Herbold have done a nice job of kind of setting the context.

So I'll be brief and then hand it over to Kate and Julie to take it from there.

So next slide, please.

We're just going to give kind of an overview of current film support, talk about some of these new economic opportunities which is which is really kind of one of the driving forces behind establishing the Film Commission as well as OEDs.

work with our partners to kind of lean in on film right now, because there's a clear economic development opportunity here, continue discussing government alignment opportunities and why that's so important, and then close with an overview of some of the near and long-term priorities for OED on the film industry.

Next slide, please.

So just to recap of OED, our mission is to build an inclusive economy where everyone can participate in and benefit from our regional prosperity.

And so we define this inclusive economy as a combination of individual wealth, business wealth, and community wealth.

And our role is to really drive growth in those three areas through strategies investments that open doors, remove barriers, especially for communities that have been systemically occluded from such opportunities.

So what does that really mean?

That means listening to and collaborating with our businesses and workers, partnering with our regional workforce and economic development systems and making sure there's alignment there.

finding multiplier opportunities that are gonna leverage public, private and philanthropic dollars for maximum impact and prioritizing innovative approaches to wealth building opportunities for all residents.

So that's, again, just kind of an encapsulation of what OED is generally.

Then more specifically, next slide, please.

Around the creative economy, in the 2019 study that OED and Arts and Culture Office put together, the definition was jobs and businesses that use creative skills and produce creative results across all industries.

And this was brought up a little earlier in the Film Commission introduction, but that's really broad, which is really exciting that it's a broad definition.

So it includes 61 different occupations.

And just as an example, we've got camera operators for TV, video, and film, PR communications professionals, an actor, a musician, a web design freelancer, an audio engineer, social media content creators.

So it's broad.

And yet to be really effective, we also need to pick and choose where we find economic development opportunities that can have that maximum impact.

And that's why we're talking about film today.

That's why we're establishing this commission.

And as an example, as Council Member Nelson mentioned, the state and the county are already moving forward with different assets.

So the Washington State's increased the film incentive, King County has the new Harbor Island Studios, which we'll talk about later.

So these are all new opportunities that we can take advantage of to grow our creative economy as a whole and the film sector in particular.

And then I'd also just mention that, we have a really long standing relationship with the County and the States.

So this isn't like it's something brand new.

What we're really trying to do is just foster more alignment, have closer collaboration, and really figure out how we can leverage our actions and our dollars in a more effective way.

And this is kind of like a, It's one of those key moments in time where if we don't, if we don't take advantage right now we don't really lean our shoulder into it, we're going to miss out because this is a national and international competition for these film productions, and the opportunity is right now and so we've really got to seize it grasp it work with our partners work with the businesses and workers to really figure out how we take advantage of it.

With that, I'm really excited to turn it over to my two co-presenters, Julie Damon, who's the Director of Operations and Finance for Washington Filmworks, who's gonna go next, and then we'll hear from Kate Becker, who's the Director of King County, is it King County Creative Economy?

Creative Economy and Recovery.

Thank you.

So first, Julie, take it away.

Hello, thank you, Council Member Nelson.

Can you guys hear me?

I'm on Zoom.

Yes, hello.

Excellent.

Thank you for this time.

Thank you, committee members and Director McIntyre.

I am Julie Damon.

I'm the Director of Operations and Finance with Washington Filmworks, which is the actually we can go to the next slide.

It'll be our lovely introduction slide.

There we go.

We are the legislatively commissioned nonprofit that manages the motion picture competitiveness program.

So that is what is formally our incentive program.

We also provide the functions of the state film office.

So we're the first point of contact for all types of film projects of all types and sizes.

We provide resources and information to help facilitate film, but really, The incentive is the best tool we have to attract and win those larger projects that mean real economic development for the state.

Next slide please.

So the mission at Washington Filmworks is to build a sustainable and competitive film industry in Washington state.

And we know that key to that is going to be a film ecosystem.

So we're thrilled with this new legislation that we are able to invest in that talent pipeline through career-connected learning, workforce development, and business development.

So that means that we have the cast, crew, and support systems with the skills and capacities needed to, so they have the skills and capacities needed to meet that new level of filmmaking that the incentive will bring.

Next slide, please.

So what does this new incentive look like?

Well, for the past 15 years, as you mentioned, it looked a lot like $3.5 million.

It is actually now increased to $15 million, not 12. So we're thrilled about that.

The governor signed that into law in April.

And in this legislation, there was also an allowance for a 10% enhancement and 20% goal to encourage filming in rural communities and help tell the stories of those from historically underrepresented groups.

I think part of it that is often overlooked is the fact that it also extended our sunset date to 2030 which with the increased cap of course means more money for longer to help bring in those projects.

Next slide please.

So another program that is new to this legislation is for small budget productions and this program is near and dear to my heart because it is about Investing in the next generation.

It's finding our next Lynn Shelton's and our next Megan Griffiths, it's about helping emerging filmmakers make that first motion picture, that first feature film, or leveling up.

So we can allocate up to $3 million annually for small budget productions, which is defined as budgets with less than a million dollars that are creatively driven by Washington residents.

That means keeping the talent pool local and incentivizing these filmmakers to stay in Washington state.

And the cool part is we get to be first money in.

And what does that mean?

Well, in the standard program, when projects apply for funding assistance, they have to be fully funded and ready to go.

In this program, they don't.

So we can help support these projects as they're developing and make sure that they're the best that they can possibly be.

Next slide, please.

Workforce development, it's been mentioned a lot today and we are very excited about this new provision.

So last year in 2021, we piloted a program called the Media Mentorship Program, which was aimed at making statewide sets more diverse and equitable.

We were able to partner with local film organizations to identify individuals from underrepresented communities who wanted to participate in a PA program.

We matched them with union mentors and eventually they were hired on to incentive sets.

It was an amazing success, but it was incredibly small.

So we're thrilled that in this legislation, we were given the authority to expand that program.

And not only that, we are mandated to put real dollars behind it.

$500,000 each year over the next two years and $750,000 every year until the program sunsets to make sure that we are doing workforce development trainings and job placement focused on those individuals from underrepresented communities.

Next slide, please.

So what is possible?

I've outlined what the increased $15 million and what some of these new programs are.

Numbers are kind of my jam.

So I did some projections.

This is really just meant to give you an idea of the shift in scope.

This is nothing that I'm going to say is definitely going to happen, but it's a possibility.

So under the old program, with $3.5 million, we were able to commit funds to probably three to four feature films.

With the $15 million, we're looking at an increase to possibly 10 projects, and not just feature films.

We might be able to attract three episodic series.

Those are those longer-term projects that have multiple episodes, hopefully multiple seasons, where crew members can grow their craft and learn and move up.

We'll still be able to support those four feature films, and then we'll also be able to invest in those three small budget productions, which is really about investing in the next generation.

Next slide, please.

So it's all very exciting.

And we are absolutely thrilled that we get to do all of this fun stuff, but we can't do it alone.

We are going to need the partnership of all of our statewide partners.

And the city of Seattle is the largest, most recognizable production center in the state.

It was already mentioned.

When people think of Washington, they think of Seattle first.

So we are so excited that we've had this great relationship with the city in the past, whether that has been working on the Commercialize Seattle campaign, taking trips to LA for marketing purposes, touring around prospective filmmakers.

And so we are really looking forward to growing our longstanding relationship.

And I'm outlined here some pathways for the city to continue to demonstrate their commitment to economic development through the motion picture work.

First and foremost is a strong leadership that understands film and can partner with us on the strategies and policies and programs as they unroll.

Secondarily, having a well-staffed and resourced film office so that can not only continue to meet the current needs, but also as the incentive brings more projects, meet that increased demand as well.

The film industry is notoriously fast paced and seemingly last minute.

So making sure that there is a streamlined permitting process so that there is someone who understands the language of film and can translate that into city speak to make sure that permits get processed in a timely fashion is going to be exceedingly important.

And finally, having partnership on this workforce development to better serve the individuals from historically underrepresented groups is going to be important because building a film industry that is reflective of not only, you know, reflective of our community is not only good economic development, but it allows those individuals to tell stories about our communities and share those stories nationally and internationally, and build on this reputation that the City of Seattle and Washington State has for authenticity and creativity.

Thank you very much.

I will stick around for questions at the end, but I believe I'm going to hand it back to Director McIntyre right now.

Thanks Julie, great presentation and really appreciate the clarity of what the film incentive can do in terms of projects that it brings to the state and hopefully to Seattle, as well as the support that you're looking for from the city and how that aligns.

With that, I'm very pleased to turn it over to Kate Becker to talk about from the county perspective.

Thank you so much, Director McIntyre, and I'm delighted to be back at this table in Council Chambers.

It's been a while.

First, before we get started, can we switch to the next slide, please?

I really want to thank the leadership here.

Thank you, Council Member Nelson, for stepping up to this plate and championing this.

It's really an incredibly transformational moment that we are in.

and council member herbald for your support over the years as you advocated for this for so many years to try to move film in the positive direction that we seem to be moving in now so this is this is tremendous thank you very very much um i had the honor of serving as the director of the office of film and music here from 2014 to 2019 and then moved to the county to work with Executive Constantine, who has been a longtime champion of film and really wanted to see us expand this work at the regional level.

So that's what we've been working on since then.

In 2019, September, the executive issued an executive order prioritizing film throughout King County.

expediting the film permitting process, reducing film permitting fees and prioritizing King County real estate and property for film production.

We established an executive film advisory board that consists of 15 people, including.

Melissa Purcell who is here with us today and they advise us regularly on the King County Film Initiative and on one of our biggest investments which is Harbor Island Studios.

We did invest three million dollars in activating a 117,000 square foot warehouse down on Harbor Island in the city of Seattle.

And we have had two big pilot projects in there since we opened the pilot project doors and put several hundred people back to work during the pandemic with Three Busy Devils season two and Love is Blind season four.

We are now making some further renovations in order to get to a formal grand opening moment.

I also want to mention that Seattle and King County have worked together on a film ecosystem study that we did in 2019 and 2020. And so that, while we have not released it yet because the pandemic hit and it altered the state of the film industry radically, we have most of the work done and just need a baseline refresh to get that ecosystem study out the door.

Next slide, please.

So I did mention this already, King County film permitting, we have really eased the process and made it much easier for film professionals to get permits quickly and affordably in King County.

We heard from location scouts and managers that this was an ongoing issue.

So it was something we addressed right away.

Next slide, please.

Thank you.

As we move forward in this transformational time, what we really want from OED and the City of Seattle is continued collaboration.

We've long had strong partnerships and hope to continue that, of course.

Update the film ecosystem study for the region and continued access to a city-owned parking lot near Harbor Island Studios, which is actually very key to the success of big productions working in that facility.

Next slide, please.

Oh, well, before we close, I just want to say that this is an incredibly exciting moment.

I want to thank all the advocates and activists and political leaders who have stepped forward to make this happen.

There is so much opportunity at hand now to really grow a competitive and equitable film industry here in this region.

And King County, the executive, the team, and I, we all stand at the ready to partner with the city as we move forward on this work.

So I sure look forward to it.

Thanks.

First of all, I love the energy.

I know you've been doing this for a long time.

And so I can imagine this is this is a big moment.

This is really exciting.

So we shouldn't lose sight of that just because we're in kind of a formal setting.

This is a very exciting moment.

Can you go back one slide?

Because I want to talk a little bit more tactically about what it means.

You've heard from the state, you've heard from the county about how meaningful the partnership was with the city.

I want to talk just a little bit about what that actually means in practice.

Both Kate and Julie talked about permitting.

I'm somebody who believes that permitting can always be improved, no matter what the industry, no matter what the permit.

So we're certainly gonna work on that over with our film team and work with the other departments.

Certainly as we're thinking about bringing on more productions, different types of film productions, we wanna make sure that permitting is as easy and straightforward as possible.

Second, we want to continue to align with the state and county on film priorities, whether that means policy or programming, we've got to just kind of stay lockstep.

I think having this film commission, the county has their body and making sure that we're working very closely together, both in terms of who are the people being represented, the different voices being represented, but also trying to synthesize down to a really actionable set of priorities so that we can make progress and not just generate laundry lists, I think is gonna be a key thing about that alignment.

And then we want to launch a film Seattle brand.

As both Kate and Julie mentioned, when you think of Washington State film, Seattle is kind of the top of the list in terms of the iconic brand for where to film.

We have some of the certainly the iconic landscape, we've got mountains, water, all sorts of interesting film locations.

within a half hour to an hour away.

So we really want to make sure that as film productions are looking for where they want to shoot, it's really easy to find us and it makes them want to come be here.

And so we're going to launch this film Seattle brand that's gonna include work with our business districts around the neighborhoods, connecting with the state stories from underserved communities that Julie mentioned that mandate, and just trying to be as creative and thoughtful as possible at how we bring in and attract film productions to Seattle.

And then finally, it's establishing this film commission and making sure that OED and our staff do an excellent job of staffing it.

And again, trying to, do those few things that we're tasking them to do, which is advise us on the policy and programs, engage with the industry and their various stakeholders to figure out what are those economic development opportunities that we can really take advantage of.

We certainly have some in front of us right now, so we're gonna, we've got kind of our work plan I think is pretty well stated kind of out of the gate, but over time, figuring out what those other priorities are and synthesizing them and making sure that they're in lockstep with the state and the county are gonna be really important.

So we've got plenty of work ahead of us, but I think it's pretty clear what we need to do to take advantage of the opportunity.

And we're really, really excited to go get to work.

With that, now you can get to the last slide for questions.

Excellent.

I just have to say I am, I feel really lucky to be stepping in at a time when the stars seem to be aligning.

And I'm just pretty much convening here.

So thank you very much for everything you all are doing.

Julie, I am, numbers are not my jam.

Okay, so I just want some clarity here.

Are we talking about 15 million total?

So it is new money on top of 3.5.

Can you just please clarify?

Sure, so it's 11.5 more on top of the 3.5 totaling $15 million annually that we can commit.

Got it.

I had the total right, but the part's wrong.

Okay, Council Member Herbold.

Thank you so much.

I'm hearkening back to a study that the Office of Economic Development, Office of Film and Music, and the Office of Arts and Culture did in 2019, the Creative Economy report recognizing, of course, the leadership of the former director, Kate Becker, here with us today.

That report noted that Seattle's creative economy is strong with about 75,000 creative jobs here in Seattle and above average growth compared to other economic sectors.

That's one of the reasons why I've been such an advocate with Director Markham coming in and making sure that the creative sector is identified as a sector that is a prime sector for the city to invest in.

The report In addition, noted that a median hourly wage for creative occupations was almost $31 an hour and creative industries contributed to 18% of our gross regional product.

Compare that to 4% in other jurisdictions across the country.

But the report showed that there were disparities along race and gender lines, specifically computer related occupations have the highest earning arts, design, entertainment and media occupations had the lowest earnings.

And of course, this speaks to the need to invest in skills.

competency-based education, workforce development programs to prepare young people and understand the barriers to entry.

And I really appreciate that the new Film Commission has right in its charter, the fact that it's going to be centering its efforts on addressing racial disparities within the local film industry.

I further appreciate hearing how the film incentive bill makes a modest investment in addressing these goals and that Filmworks has identified the city as a partner in addressing these goals.

But I'm wondering if you, Director Markham, can speak to a little bit more about what your vision is about how we can partner to address some of these really important goals.

before you start um you mentioned this report um was that ever presented to council uh because that's a lot of good information i can send you the link it was okay so it wasn't it was okay at a public meeting yeah okay thank you i appreciate the question because i think that really is the heart of what we're trying to do with economic development um as i've mentioned with the new focus of oed is really on how do we

breakdown barriers and open doors for people who haven't been included in our economy or have been included only at the lower rungs.

So as we, as I think all three of us talked about, workforce is going to be a huge component of that.

We're lucky here in this region where we've been generating lots of high paying jobs over the years.

Unfortunately, we've been importing a lot of talent, rather than strengthening our workforce development pathways to get people get local people into those jobs.

And a big part of that is our regional workforce development system has been fragmented over decades.

And so we really need to make sure just like we're doing alignment on this specific film project on all sorts of different industries, we need to have stronger regional alignment, because it is a team sport.

and Seattle trying to do it alone and build its own programs just ain't gonna work.

We've got to figure out how are we partnering with other cities, with the Regional Workforce Development Council to have a real systematic approach and then try as best we can to bring in the state and federal dollars to help make those programs go.

That's really how we're gonna build a holistic system that both gives people access to those opportunities, but also trains them for those opportunities.

We're hearing from a variety of different creative sectors, not just film, that they're really looking for new talent.

And so again, there's a clear opportunity there.

It's really about how do we get organized to take advantage of it.

Second is more on the business side.

So we need to do a better job within the creative industry.

So film, nightlife, music, and special events.

How are we helping businesses owned by women, by people of color, How are we helping them grow as businesses?

What kind of technical assistance are we giving them?

How are we helping them connect to access to capital?

There are a variety of things that we can do as a dot connector to make sure those businesses are growing and thriving.

Hopefully, so they're then creating more jobs that link into our workforce development system.

So it's really kind of, I see it as a both and strategy of supporting the workers that exist within those four creative industries, but across a much broader construct of creative skilled jobs, and then also supporting those businesses within those creative, those specific creative industries to strengthen and grow, particularly for women and people of color.

Does that help answer your question?

It does, but I look forward to learning more as I think that first component, which is really about partnerships.

I'm just excited to learn what's going to come out of those conversations.

We will be back.

We've got a lot cooking on workforce.

I think it's going to be pretty exciting.

Chris Swenson, you've got such a wealth of historic knowledge.

I see you on screen and I would like to know if you have anything to add or say following some of these questions or just off the top of your head.

Thank you, Council Member Nelson, hopefully you can hear me.

I basically just want to echo a lot of the comments that have been shared here by the state, the county, and city leadership.

It is really a great moment in time that is finally the stars feel like they're aligning to continue to develop this work.

I want to just give a big shout out to the Film Task Force, which is the group of industry stakeholders who spent the pandemic year really developing a set of recommendations that the city could follow.

And so all of their work really is coming together with the establishment of the Film Commission.

Really excited and looking forward into the future of the city support of the film industry and really excited for our continued integration and growth with our partners at the county and the state level.

and thank you Council Member Nelson for helping drive and lead all of this.

Thank you very much.

Well, I don't see any other hands, but I also, I want to acknowledge that Director McIntyre came on board, I believe your first day was February 28th, and you had a lot to do.

And really, you have put your focus on the new OED and the right priorities that you've presented to this, to this committee and along comes this council member who's got an agenda on film.

So you have really, really seen the opportunity and stepped up and I really appreciate your leadership.

Thank you very much.

All right, with that, we'll move on to item three.

Thank you all very much.

Stay tuned for the 14th on film commission.

And will the clerk please read item three into the record?

agenda item three, a resolution relating to the city light department, acknowledging and approving the 2022 integrated resource plan as conforming with the public policy objectives of the city of Seattle and the requirements of the state of Washington and approving the integrated resource plan for the biennium September, 2022 through August, 2024 discussion and possible vote.

Thank you very much.

Um, so Before beginning, I...

Before beginning this item, I just want to say that in the background a little bit, I've been communicating with Council President Juarez, and regarding the folks that came here to give comment and to listen to that discussion, I'll be working with Council President Juarez, my other colleagues, and Seattle City Light to talk about the possibility of another meeting or something like that to really to give this the time.

So with that, I just want to say that, back to this item, Seattle City Lights 2022 Integrated Resource Plan is a long-term strategy to meet anticipated energy, customer energy needs over the next 20 years.

As mandated in the revised codes of Washington, chapter 19.280, utilities within the state of Washington must develop an integrated resource plan that presents the mix of generation and demand side resources that utility plans to use to meet their customers' electricity needs in the short and long term.

Seattle City Light is required to file a full IRP every four years with the progress report due every two years in the interim.

All right, so that's what this is about here.

And we had a long presentation last meeting and we learned that this plan is generally similar to past IRPs, but with some important new additions, particularly an increased attention to electrification and addressing climate change.

It outlines steps City Light will take to maintain greenhouse gas neutrality, maintain equitable access to clean and affordable energy, and make progress toward being greenhouse gas free by 2045. It also outlines a 10-year clean energy plan that lets City Light meet its goals around reliability, affordability, and environmental responsiveness, while also complying with regulatory requirements in ensuring service equity.

The new portfolio of energy resources includes more wind and solar energy serving customer load, as well as new customer participation in demand response and energy efficiency.

It paves the way for transportation and building electrification efforts that will shift our communities away from fossil fuels.

Going forward, the plan commits City Light to further study energy efficiency, distributed resources, storage, and customer solar potential under climate change and electrification loads, and commits City Light to continue to develop relevant social equity metrics and include them while making future analyses and decisions.

Finally, it incorporates additional climate change scenarios in future IRP analyses to help create a more thorough understanding of climate change-induced resource need.

So not every aspect of this IRP is required by state law, and I commend your staff for stepping up and really, you know, it was on you to include this, seeing the future.

the future is now.

So I really appreciate your work on this to further engage in these issues and your forward-thinkingness to address the challenges that climate change is, that we're facing with climate change.

going forward.

So we have Deborah Smith, General Manager and CEO, Saul Villareal and Paul Nisly with Seattle City Light at the table.

And we have Eric McConaghy of Central Staff joining remotely.

They're here to answer questions.

They're not making a formal presentation today.

So I now open it up for questions.

All right, seeing no questions, I thank you very much for coming, for all of the work that you've done.

Just mention one more time that the timeline that this has to get done at full council, please.

September 1st.

Okay, so that is, so we are working under a deadline.

Correct, and that's around filing with Commerce.

Yep, okay.

So, Now I move that the committee recommends passage of resolution 32061. Is there a second?

Second.

All right.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend passage of the resolution.

Are there any further comments?

I have a question, Chair Nelson.

Just a moment.

Yes, Council Member Sawant.

Thank you.

I have a question about the plans for a new utility scale resources.

I understand that the integrated resource plan includes customer resources like energy efficiency, demand response technology and rooftop solar panels.

But this question is specifically about the plan for new utility scale resources.

So the city light plan to build and own our own new solar and wind generators contract with other public utilities for the power or contract with private for profit power companies.

For the last century, people in Seattle have benefited from inexpensive and climate neutral electricity precisely because we have a public utility that owns and operates its own hydroelectric resources.

And because it is a public utility, regular working class people can organize to make demands when there are issues such as rates, the utility discount program, which my office, when it was heading the Energy Committee, some years ago made a major headway in increasing enrollment.

And also, because it's a public utility, it also makes a difference for the public to have a say in the population of the Skagit River Salmon.

There is no guarantee of successful struggles, but with private utilities, there is no space for democratic oversight at all as there is with public utilities.

Part of the parts of the country that have relied on private energy companies have seen extreme price gouging, fatal brownouts and blackouts, as we've seen in Texas, precisely because the private energy market is primarily interested in making profits, not providing power, and it will go to just absolutely ruthless lengths to do to do that.

And we've seen that.

We've seen that happen.

This is the first IRP in years that has discussed adding substantially new power generation.

And I would be extremely concerned if the plan is to contract with private companies for that power, because it would mean that City Light was then starting to, you know, incrementally become dependent on the rapacious private energy markets.

And these conversations have happened from Council members many times in the over eight years that I've been on the city council and especially in the energy committee.

But this is the most concretely posed that I've seen this question of all that time.

And I know that it won't happen all at once, but it will be a step towards privatization that I would not support.

And just to be clear, I do not object to contracts with other publicly owned utilities, such as the contract with Bonneville, It is a public hydroelectric power plant that was built as part of the new deal.

And it's a good reminder that we need a real green new deal.

My objection would be to contract with private for-profit power companies.

So I would just appreciate some light shed on that.

Okay.

Sure.

I can, I can help with that council members want.

So the plan, and as we discussed last time, we do intend or expect to need to acquire new resource as soon as 2026. And certainly by 2027, that's largely driven by a new load through electrification.

So it's exciting, but also does put pressure on our resources.

And at this point, our plan would be to enter into a purchase power agreement, a long-term agreement, I don't think we have a specific, we haven't talked specifically about whether we would contract with for-profit entities or not, but likely they would be what's called a merchant plant.

So someone who is developing new renewable resources and is looking for purchase power agreements to help firm up what they'll do with the resource.

In response to your question, let me just add one more thing.

I'd love nothing more than to be the general manager that was part of Seattle acquiring its own new resource.

But the dilemma is that the way we have managed the utility for a very long time in order to deliver the lowest possible rates to our customer base as we've been growing, in terms of our service territory, number of connections, number of meters, et cetera, and you all know this better than I, but we've been doing that in no small part by leaning into long-term debt financing.

And we have set rates in the past often by looking at debt service coverage as the overriding metric to determine and whether how we move our strategic plan and our financial plan forward as a result of that we don't have a significant borrowing capacity available to us to purchase or enter into a purchase for our own resource or to develop our own resource and that is particularly true right now as we look ahead to the potential for some very expensive investment in our Skagit hydroelectric project.

So one of the things we're doing on the financial side right now is actually trying to move that debt service coverage up, which means borrowing less and rate funding more of our ongoing capital so that we create room.

And hopefully over time we're able to get to that point, Council Member, where we could look at purchasing our own resource.

We certainly would love to partner with other publics.

And in fact, we talk regularly with Snohomish, with Tacoma, and we think about whether there are opportunities to partner or come together.

And so that's certainly not off the table and is something that we will continue to talk about.

Do you have a follow-up question or shall I go to Council Member Herbold?

Council Member Herbold.

I don't have follow up questions.

I appreciate that information.

But yeah, I just wanted to let you know that I'll be abstaining on this for now.

Okay, thank you.

Council Member Herbold.

I'm not sure if I'm asking the same question as Council Member Sawant asked, or if I'm asking a different question.

I think it's a slightly different question.

It came up in public comment, which relates to the lack of storage investments in this plan for wind and solar.

Could you speak to that?

Yeah, nothing currently is in the mix.

It wasn't cost effective.

We did look at it.

to supplement the wind and solar, but at the current state, yeah, it was a big cost to City Light.

But we will definitely look at it in the next IRP as costs continue to come down and new technologies emerge.

And Council Member, I just came from a meeting for the Electric Power Research Institute, EPRI, which we've talked with you about before, and we've talked about the EPRI study, the electrification study.

They're the leading research arm in the country and internationally.

And I would just say that long duration energy storage, which is what we're talking about, is I mean, it is every meeting I go to, it's what we're talking about.

So I think it's very close.

Some folks are starting are doing pilot projects, particularly in California, where it was the fastest way to deal with a resource shortage, a resource inadequacy that was fueling rolling blackouts, et cetera.

So it's certainly something I want to see.

I also want to see in our next rendition, so the next update that we do in two years, I would like to see more demand response.

The notion of connected loads and the notion of hot water heaters that and et cetera.

So all of that is on the table and it's just not mature enough to fold into the current submitted IRP.

And this is a two year plan, is that right?

Excuse me?

This is what we're voting on today is a two year plan, is that correct?

Yes, we'll be back in two years.

And we expect that there will be a lot of shift and a lot of movement forward in some of these emerging technologies in the two year period.

Thank you.

Okay.

If there are no further questions, I think that we are ready to go for a vote.

The legislation has been moved and seconded.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that this resolution pass.

Council President Huiz.

Aye.

Council Member Sawant.

Abstain.

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Chair Nelson?

Aye.

Three in favor, one abstained.

All right, the motion carries and the committee recommendation that the resolution pass will be forwarded to the city council on August 15th for final consideration.

Thank you very, very much, everyone.

I appreciate you being here.

Okay, moving on to item four, our last item.

Will the clerk please read item four into the record?

Agenda item four, Seattle City Light 2023 to 2024 rate ordinance, briefing and discussion.

Okay, this ordinance implements the rate path in City Light's 2022-2026 strategic plan.

And council approved that on August 3rd.

And so before going into discussion, I'm gonna touch on some of the, issues that were raised during that process by saying that City Light has held customer bills steady by eliminating an approved rate increase in 2021 and reducing it in 2022. And at the same time, costs of generating and distributing electricity went up a lot in the past three years.

The price of steel, aluminum, and copper rose by 70 to 80 percent.

The proposed residential rate increase is 5.7 or about $4 a month.

That increase is less than overall inflation and is actually still not enough to cover the rising cost of providing electricity.

And many other utilities are raising rates by about double that just to maintain basic service levels.

And as a public utility, we already have noticeably low rates.

So to hold these rates down as much as possible, City Light is cutting spending in other areas.

And as mentioned already, for customers who are having trouble with their bills, whether they're business or residential, heavy or light users, we do have programs that are tailored to fit those needs.

So with that, I will turn it over to our team here.

Please introduce yourselves and I look forward to your presentation.

Great, thank you.

Well, again, my name is Debra Smith, and I'm the general manager and CEO of Seattle City Light, and I have my amazing team here with me, and we'll start with Kirstie Granger.

Good morning, Kirstie Granger, City Light Chief Financial Officer.

Good morning, Craig Smith, City Light Chief Customer Officer.

Christopher Feeney, Finance Director, City Light.

Good morning, Karsten Kraf, Manager of Financial Planning and Rates.

Before you continue, I should say that we are not voting on this today.

The vote will be on, hopefully, we'll have another discussion and possible vote on September 14th.

Go ahead, please.

Great, all right.

So can we go to the next slide, please?

All right, thank you.

So this is City Light's biannual rate ordinance, and this ordinance implements the rate increases for 2023 and 2024, that were authorized last month by City Council via City Light's strategic plan.

These rate increases are designed to produce the amount of revenue that City Light needs to deliver reliable, clean, and socially responsible electric service for the next biennium.

And the timing of this ordinance, so it comes after the strategic plan and implements the rates endorsed by the strategic plan, and then it will align with the budget of course, where the city council will turn their attention to later this year.

So that is the timing of this ordinance.

So the rate increases, which are 4.5% for 2023 and 2024 reflect the impacts of significantly higher inflation, as well as lower increases in 2021 and in 2022 that were a part of Seattle's COVID response.

In 2022, our rate increase was 2.1%, which was less than the increase.

improved by the previous plan.

This ordinance also implements some fairly significant policy changes and rate design that are many years in the making.

Some might remember the work that we did with the City Light Review Panel and City Council pre-pandemic on a rate study.

This ordinance implements some of the policy recommendations that came out of that work.

as well as implements the cost of service study, which takes actual costs and uses them to assign increases across our customer classes.

So next slide, please.

We're going to start talking about, start with rate design changes and talk through some of the policy changes that we're going to be proposing Um, and then we'll move into talking a little bit more about the increases and a little bit about, um, affordability impacts.

So, um, back in 2019, uh, City Light completed, uh, a rate policy study and, and this was in conjunction with our, uh, uh, Citizens City Light Review Panel.

And, um, it was in response to a request from City Council, um, in Resolution 31819, um, to, to complete this work.

The study identified rate design goals, which you can see summarized there, and then also identified some strategies for meeting these goals.

And so this ordinance features a few strategies that were identified in this 2019 report, which are incorporating a fixed base service charge, in all of our customer classes that's designed to recover a portion of customer service costs.

We're going to be introducing a time of day rate option for all customers, and also adjusting our legacy two block structure to facilitate this migration to this time of day rate option.

Next slide, please.

So the time of day rate option, this isn't coming until 2024, but in many ways, this is the biggest policy change that we're making and one that's the longest coming.

So this dates back to City Light's been working on rolling out advanced meters throughout our service territory.

And again, we completed the policy framework in 2019 that identified where we want to use the new advanced meter technology in our rates.

We've been working over the last several years, putting technology in place, connecting our meters to our billing system to make billing time of day possible.

And then here we are today with the rate ordinance setting rates for the next two years.

And in 2024, this new time of day rate option will become available for all of our residential and smaller business customers.

So that's where we're going.

And in presuming that this is approved in 2023, we'll be doing a lot of outreach work and preparation for this rollout in 2024. Next slide, please.

A little bit more on the time of day rate design.

So it's it's designed to have three periods, there would be this mid peak period, which would be 13 cents per kilowatt hour, that would be the standard.

And then the time of day is designed to discourage use or encourage customers to move away from use during the high the high peak period of 5 p.m.

to 9 p.m.

So you can see there that electricity is priced higher during that peak period.

And then conversely, in the early morning hours between midnight and 6 a.m., when the system has the most capacity, when energy is priced very low, we would offer a low $0.08 per kilowatt hour off-peak rate.

And so this time of day rate structure is designed to encourage more efficient use of our grid and offer customers who would like to opt in a new way to manage their electricity bills.

We did a little example here for an EV owner showing that if they were to choose to charge their vehicle in the evening during the most expensive period, that the price would be almost twice as much for them as it would be if they were to set their charger to charge between midnight and 6 a.m.

So they've had the opportunity to save by shifting the way they charge their vehicle if they choose to.

And so looking ahead, there's gonna be a lot of smart technology coming out.

And so this is really a right structure and a option that we want to offer customers looking out into the future.

And really in many ways we're building for technology that's not even here yet.

Yeah.

And just to note, I mean, because people sometimes wonder about the equity component of that.

I mean, you can buy even today over there with Alexa, you can buy smart plugs, smart switches that allow you to control your appliances remotely.

So, and they're inexpensive and you can buy them at Best Buy.

We absolutely believe in the industry is moving to where more and more the appliances that we purchase, the new appliances, will be smart appliances that give folks the opportunity.

But there are also workarounds that are relatively inexpensive and very accessible to people.

We're also introducing a rate specifically for commercial charging.

So this would be for companies that offer EV charging or maybe fleets.

And so this is based on a pilot program that we have now that's going very well.

So this would expand that commercial charging rate to be a permanent feature.

So moving on, another rate design change that we're making is introducing a basic service charge for all of our customers.

So this would be a fee that all customers would pay that covers a portion of the costs of customer service, meter reading, billing.

These would be all things that a customer would use, even if they didn't use any electricity.

And you can see there in the table at the top currently for residential customers that the fee is $6 per month and we would be proposing to increase that incrementally to seven and then $8 per month in 2024 for general service GS, which is. you know, commercial and industrial rates, there currently isn't a base service charge.

And so we would propose to introduce one for all of these customers.

And you can see that depending on the size, the customer ranges from $7 all the way up to, you know, a few thousand.

And, you know, just for context, high demand, I think we only have about 14 high demand customers.

So these would be very, very large customers, just to put that fee into context.

And, you know, the why behind this, it's a fair way to allocate this cost and it assigns this cost burden in a way that's both fair and progressive.

And this is really an industry best practice that we're seeing most utilities, we see that our neighbors have a fee like this on their bills.

And so, you know, we really feel like this is, we're moving in the right direction and towards industry best practice.

um one quick uh misconception we just wanted to clear up just in case that folks don't understand this you know just as a reminder you know city light is a you know we are a public utility the purpose of this fee is not to generate more revenue it's it's simply to change the way that we collect revenue from our customers and so um it doesn't result in in higher rates overall, it's just adding a different component.

So you can see there in the bar charts that the revenue collection is the same under the no customer charge or the basic service charge or with it overall.

So from the utilities perspective, the revenue doesn't change.

It's just changing how we collect it from our customers.

And actually, if you go back to one of the early, I'm not asking you to move, but going back to one of the earliest slides where we talked about the goals and objectives after the rate study.

So this is in direct response to rate stabilization, revenue stabilization.

So as we have increasingly stable revenue sources, it allows us to be more flexible and adaptive.

And this policy change in particular is one that we worked really closely with the review panel and with the Northwest Energy Coalition on this design.

And so we're really grateful to Nancy for coming today and expressing her support for this.

And we thank her for her partnership in the work that we did to get to this recommendation.

So the next slide is just a summary of these rate design changes.

So for residential customers, they're going to see this small increase in this per meter basic service charge.

And then the new time of day rate option coming in 2024. I should add to that, as I mentioned earlier, there's also some modifications we're making to our legacy two block residential rate structure to facilitate this transition to offering customers the option to do the standard or the time of day rate.

For business customers or the general service customers, we're introducing a new basic service charge for all customer classes.

The new time of day rate option is coming in 2024 for small and medium general service.

For the large and high demand, they already have a mandatory time of day rate and have for many years.

And then finally, the new opt-in commercial charging rate as well.

So that's a variation on the time of day rate for commercial charging.

There's this is also this is a big ordinance.

And so there are many other technical changes that are happening.

And we're working with Eric McConaghy on on all of those.

We're making some updates to the large solar program and a few other things.

So this is all wrapped into this 60 page ordinance.

So a little bit more on the rate increases, we can move forward a couple slides.

There we go.

So a little bit more on the 4.5%.

So what is driving up City Lights rates?

And the short answer is it's inflation.

We are seeing rising costs in raw materials.

The price of steel, aluminum, copper, which is of course a part of electric wire, has gone up 70 to 80% since 2020. Similarly, underground cable, conduit, poles, transformers, we're seeing rising costs in all of these materials that City Light uses to deliver electric service.

And as well, you can see here that the city's Office of Economic and Revenue Forecasts, this is the CPI forecast, and you can see how much it's changed just in one year.

In 2021, 2022, and 2023, we're seeing increases in the 5% range.

And I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, that since this forecast, the office has introduced a new update that's even higher.

And so just to emphasize that the rate increases that are in this ordinance reflect inflation that we are seeing today and that we have been seeing in 2021 as well.

And so in some ways we're catching up for price increases that are happening as we speak.

And if I could just add to this.

I mean I, since I got here almost four years ago.

One of my main focuses has been on changing the rate trajectory for city light who we had, you know, historically had rate actions that were in the five 6% per year range.

you know, double at least what we were experiencing from an inflationary perspective.

And it was clear to everyone that that was not a sustainable path.

And so we worked very hard to change that.

And we were really, I think, feeling pretty good about where we were headed and how quickly we were heading there when we submitted last year's strategic plan.

you know, when the folks first came out, you know, I said, look, we can't do this.

And they quickly said, you know, we can't balance the budget and provide the level of service that customers I think not that they need, but that they should expect from us without funding some of these inflationary pressures.

As it is, we are still struggling in many ways, particularly because of our vacancy rate right now, to provide the level of service that we want.

But we know that especially with new connections continuing to grow, and we're seeing them go up right now.

We are working hard, and in some cases, we are actually, in order to get customers connected, we are actually doing workarounds from a supply side that allow us to connect, but that ultimately will mean higher costs.

So there simply wasn't any way to absorb all of it, and we absorbed a lot of it.

So on the next slide, we'll talk a little bit about the rate increases.

Pause, could you pause a moment, please?

Council Member Herbold.

I appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

I did have a question about that slide.

Great.

I'm wondering, it's very clear that rate changes are being driven by inflation and that leads one to believe that that is not just affecting the ongoing operating costs, but also the capital projects.

that are within Seattle City Lights CIP.

And so I'm wondering, is there a way to sort of break out sort of the explanation for the increases so we can see how much is driven by capital projects versus ongoing operating costs?

And then secondly, and I feel like I've asked this question before and I apologize.

What is your capital project completion rate assumption?

We did a lot of work and we struggled to hear you council member.

What was the last on the first part of your question?

That's not a problem at all.

In fact, we used to have a slide that showed that our CIP was actually going down.

And so that's 1 of the tools that we've used in order to bring that service coverage up that I spoke to earlier.

and to maintain the rate strategy.

What was the second part of your question?

Your capital project completion rate assumption, that is a tool that we used in the deliberations around the Seattle public utility rates.

They had proposed a rate path that assumes all projects are completed 100% on time.

We looked historically to see what was actually the history and we applied that rate to the rate structure and we're able to bring down some of the rates.

Right, great question.

And I'll turn it over to Karsten who's our technical expert on this, but you're absolutely right that the number that you would see in our capital program coming in the budget is going to be very different than the number that we used in our rate setting assumption.

But I'll let Karsten talk a little bit about the technical details of that.

Yeah, quick answer is 90% completion rate.

And we also, you know, for many years have been making cash adjustments, right, to the CIP budget in terms of, you know, when that spinning is actually going to occur.

So, you know, we already have that taken into consideration.

Thank you.

And I do think I asked this question before, but.

And we are continuing to watch it just like we are continuing to watch and make reasonable assumptions around how long it takes us to get back to our typical staffing.

Typically we assume a 6% vacancy rate.

We're not assuming that we get there in this plan because we're currently at 17% vacancy rate.

I mean, we don't wanna artificially slow down projects in order to reduce rates, but we do wanna make assumptions that are based on sort of the historical practices and experiences of the department.

So I really appreciate that, thank you.

Absolutely, and those same assumptions are driving how the size and the timing of our bond sales as well, because on one hand, we wanna make sure that we have sufficient cash to support the capital work we're doing, But on the other hand, there's a cost to that cash and we don't want to have more than we really need.

Great question.

Thank you.

So rate increases by customer class.

Again, this is the result of a cost of service study, which takes actual costs and then uses it to allocate the costs across rate classes based on what we're seeing as far as where we're actually spending.

And typically we would do a cost of service study every two years.

However, you know, owing to the pandemic, that there was a break there.

So it's actually been four years since City Light has completed a full cost of service study.

So these increases that you see here reflect four years of evolution of spending.

Just to talk through a few of the changes here.

So, again, the average system wide for all customers is 4.5%.

For residential and small general service, the small business customers, this increase is a little bit higher.

And this is owing to when for lower users, a larger portion of their bill comes from fixed costs like customer service, as well as the delivery costs.

So that's the poles and the wires and the infrastructure it takes to deliver the electricity.

And what we're seeing is that more of our spending is going there to infrastructure maintenance than it is on the cost of the bulk power, like the generation or the purchasing of the electricity.

So that's why for the lower use customers, residential and small, the increases are a little bit higher.

And for the larger customers, who use more electricity and for whom more of their bills is coming from the cost of bulk power, the increases are a bit lower.

In the network, again, we're seeing and I should explain that the network is a small number of customers in the downtown core who are served on a premium network service, which means that it's redundant and very reliable.

Their rates are higher than for other customers overall, but their increases for the next two years are lower.

And this is partly again, because we're spending a little bit less than we have been historically on the network.

And then also I should say that this is normal to see a little bit of variation from average across the customer classes.

And the last time that we did one of these studies, the network rate increases came out higher.

So this is a little bit of correcting over time.

That makes sense.

So bottom line, you know, these increases, this is the way that the increases are getting allocated to the customer classes.

And these little variations are normal, and then we'll adjust them again in two years when we do the next cost of service.

And I wanna just throw out one thing just so as a reminder, and partially because Council Member Nelson, I know this is a new gig for you, et cetera, but Council, many years ago, we passed through Bonneville rates.

So in addition to having a rate stabilization account, which helps manage the fluctuations associated with secondary revenue, and I think we're all familiar with that, There's also an ordinance that requires or allows us to pass through adjustments or changes in Bonneville's rates from the assumption we make in these plans.

So the rates that you're looking at for both 2023 and 2024 make an assumption around what the power rates will be from Bonneville.

Bonneville does rate cases every two years and they have a funky federal, they do the federal year so it starts October 1. So we had a rate action from Bonneville last October 1 and we will have a rate action on October 1 of 2023. Very preliminarily, so I'm just throwing this out so that folks understand, depending on what Bonneville came through, you could see an increase or a decrease that we would net or add to the numbers that you see here.

Preliminarily, it looks like the 2024 numbers could see a net decrease.

So that would mean what customers might see is something less than what you're seeing up there for the 2024 case, that's correct.

In 2023, it would only be for three months, so it would have minimal impact.

But for 2024, it could certainly have an impact of up to a 1% reduction.

And that's based on what we're hearing today.

All right, so moving on to talk a little bit about impacts and affordability.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Yeah.

Excuse me.

Follow up question or.

Thank you.

Just a question on that last slide again.

Can we go back to it?

I'm sorry.

So I'll try to filibuster here while we get to visual.

The rate increases for 2023, as you mentioned, showed some disparity between the residential and small business customers from the medium and large customers.

And you explained that, why that was.

And I'm wondering, what happens in 2024 that that disparity shrinks so much?

The individual rate increases are much more aligned in 2024. And it sounded to me like the reason that you gave for the disparity in 2024, basically it costs more to provide the energy to those customers.

It seems like that would be still the case in 2024.

Great question.

Yeah, so the 2023 rates are capturing four years of evolving cost of service.

And so it's making that correction.

And then in 2024, it's sort of staying on that same course.

And so since these are changes from the previous year, you're seeing the correction in 2023, reflecting the four years of cost of service.

But then in 2024, it's the same.

Perfect, thank you.

Great, great question.

Okay, so a little bit about affordability.

So, looking at other major US cities looking at our other utility counterparts.

Just take a moment to note that we believe that Seattle leads the nation in affordable and progressive rate offerings.

We do, as a public utility, we offer competitive rates compared to other major U.S. cities.

And these rate design changes that we're making, we believe are moving us in a more progressive direction.

At the same time, our progressive rate design is complemented by affordability programs, one of which is Seattle's utility discount program, which we're very proud of.

not to say that we can always make it better, but so it offers a 60% discount to income qualified customers on top of our already competitive rates.

And this UDP is a community based program and it's funded by all of our customers through their rates.

So everyone contributes to the UDP through their rates.

And just as a note that because commercial and high demand customers, so those higher users have bigger bills than the smaller users, they actually comprise 60% of the funding for the utility discount program because they have higher usage and higher bills.

So this is a program that's funded by all of our customers and it's available to customers who need help on their bills.

And so you can see that Seattle's average rate is 11 cents per kilowatt hour.

And for UDP participants, it's 4.4 cents per kilowatt hour.

But that's not to say that there is an opportunity to do more and to improve.

And so we're looking at that and we're looking forward to bringing some more information on that next year.

But on the next slide, a little bit more at rate design and affordability.

So again, as I said, rate design is one tool in our toolbox for meeting affordability needs, and it's complemented by targeted programs.

And one of the reasons for this is because we know through our research that households in Seattle have a really diverse energy use profile.

And that we know that high income households can be high users, but they can also be very low users.

And conversely, just because a household is low income does not mean that they are necessarily low use.

a low income household could be a single person living in a very small apartment, but it could also be a multi-generational family renting a home with electric baseboard heat.

And so you can see in the histogram that we have here, when we analyze the population of non-UDP residential customers and UDP, the profiles actually look the same.

So we see that same diversity amongst the UDP and the non-UDP customers.

So what this means is that rate design is a tool for affordability, but it isn't the only one.

And so we have programs like the UDP, budget billing, energy efficiency programs to complement rate design.

And then we also know that as we move to 2024 and start offering customers options for how to manage their electric bills, new affordability tools that we recognize that communication, outreach, language access, these will be really important components to a successful rollout so that we can reach communities who might not hear about these programs so that we can ensure that our customers have the information that they need to make the choice that's right for them.

I think it's important to note that there's generally two reasons why folks will choose to opt into a time of day pricing program.

One is because they see the opportunity to reduce their usage or the time, reduce their bill by changing when they use the product.

Two is folks who have a very strong environmental ethic.

And so they are choosing a time of day rate so that they can, again, contribute to let me say this right, so that they can reduce the need to build new peaking plants to deal with those high-use areas.

And because we know that still, and likely for many years to come, the peaking resource in the Northwest tends to be natural gas.

And so if I use less or I change my consumption and use it during off-peak periods, I'm helping to reduce the amount of natural gas carbon that goes into the environment.

One of the things that we know from our research, and that which we commission on our own, and that which we participate with, that's syndicated research that reflects the industry, is that city-like customers are among the most environmentally conscious consumers in the country.

And they're very, very interested in getting more from us around ways to save energy and having more choice and more options.

So this package really helps us to advance the goals and interests of customers.

Before you move on, Chris, you said something that, when I first heard it, was sort of counterintuitive.

So high-use customers don't necessarily have large homes, which also could reflect income.

It's oftentimes older homes that are less efficient and so high use customers are often can be on the lower end of the income level and so I think that you said that that is one reason why the service charge is is important to to equal out.

It's very long standing and really tough nut to crack, which is that when you're dealing particularly with rental properties, the property owner doesn't necessarily have the incentive to invest his or her dollars into making the property more efficient.

And then often folks who have limited choices, either not great credit, whatever it might be, can wind up in those homes.

At the same time, folks who have affluence and access to wealth can afford to put roof-type solar on their homes, et cetera, which then decrease their consumption.

And by shifting over time some amount of cost into that fixed charge, it ensures that those customers who have access to those dollars and to those technologies are still paying their share of the fixed investment in the system.

Thanks.

Go ahead.

Okay, so this is our last slide.

Save the busiest one for last.

So this is a bill impacts example for residential customers.

You can see in the top here that this is the first block and second block structure that we've had for many years.

And we've been each year narrowing the difference between the first block and the end block to make that a little bit flatter.

So you can see there that the 13 cents is unchanged and that the increases in the first block And then in the basic service charge and so you can see the small increases to that fixed basic service charge from six to seven to $8 and just as a reminder for UDP customers, they would receive a 60% discount on all of these rates.

The impact of the rate design combined with the rate increase comes out to between three and $5 for customers, depending on their use profile.

So you can see there that, you know, as we discussed, depending on the heat source or the housing stock that a customer lives in, the insulation and whatnot, that their bill could vary a lot.

But the increases that they would see for a month would be under $5 and then for UDP customers, which you'd see on the bottom part of the graph there, that it would be, the increase would be one to $2 per month as a result of the increases that we're proposing in this ordinance.

Thank you.

Council Member Herbold.

I had a question about a previous slide, but now that we're on this one, I don't understand the, the end block, the second block rate not changing?

So this is as one of our rate design strategies is to narrow the step up between the first and the second block in part, because as we move towards offering customers a choice between our standard rate offering, which is this historical block rate and the time of day, it makes things a little bit simpler.

And, and then also again because we know that customers are.

This block rate harkens back to a time when the narrative was that a progressive rate is one.

where lower users benefit.

And what we're seeing is that, you know, with changing technology, evolving housing stock, customers' energy use profiles growing more and more diverse, that the block rate structure is maybe not as progressive as it was 30 years ago.

And so we are evolving the structure to have the blocks be closer together so that it isn't, you know, so that the customers that have high use aren't getting as much of a price shock.

I don't know, right?

Well, and the other thing is, and this is part of it, it's a great question and it's tough.

It feels counterintuitive.

Yeah, no, it is.

But here's the thing.

There's two things I would say.

One is that, as Kirsi said, this is a very old rate structure.

When I worked at E-Web, we had it.

E-Web got rid of it altogether because, in fact, in the ensuing time from the 70s when most utilities put in these kinds of rate structures, Customers no longer need the financial incentive to invest in energy efficiency or to be efficient users of our product.

For the most part, even as Craig mentioned, our customers and customers everywhere are extremely knowledgeable in becoming their own energy experts.

We no longer find the need to financially incent folks to use less.

What we find is that we need to incent them to use the power at different times of day.

So that's why the introduction of time of day rates.

And at the same time, as we look to this decarbonized future, tiered rates don't incent folks to electrify.

They actually discourage electrification because that second block or those subsequent blocks for some utilities are higher.

We want folks to electrify because that's how we turn the needle, move the needle on climate change and on carbon.

And so we certainly don't want a rate structure that disincents them, even as we're encouraging them to take on new vote.

Makes sense.

And I think you mentioned something that was a segue to my earlier question.

On the time of day rates, which I love that idea.

And I love that you're thinking about equity in moving towards time of day rates.

And I take your word for it that there are lots of smart products, smart appliance products out there.

that are affordable, but what might be affordable to you and I may, I would just love some sort of a comparison of products that are on the market, appliances that are and aren't, because it might be something that we wanna look at providing some sort of a rebate for, like we do for solar panels.

So that would be just a really interesting body of work if you could consider it.

Right.

And our energy efficiency team, as we design programs, we always lead with the equity lens.

And so we're looking for ways to provide more tools for customers to understand more about their use in ways that they can shift with or without the use of technology, and then also ways to make technology more accessible to them.

And it's important to note too that part of the timing, the timing on this, and I expect to get some hard questions from Council Member Mosqueda on this, but the timing on this is really driven by our technology projects and the need to complete and have accurate historical data within our system on homeowners and renters consumption so that they can go on to the portal, the utility portal, and they can price what their bill would look like under both rate structures.

So we're committed to not making this change until customers can be assured that they personally will not lose.

So that's why 2024, because that's the soonest that we will have enough historical data to allow customers to go through that process using the portal.

The other thing that we're trying to do here is make sure that we take the time, I mean, not just to rush and put out a rate, but that we design an experience for customers that, you know, provides them with an accessible journey and not just one that we design among ourselves and then say, great rate, you know, go for it.

We know that's not going to work.

So we want to take the time to do a, to map the journeys with customers and then comprehensively engage community.

And then last thing I'll just mention as we're tag teaming here is that within the budget that we've submitted to the mayor's office, and of course that process is just moving through its own timeline.

There is a budget change request that has a comprehensive evaluation of the UDP program by a third party that's a joint project between Seattle Public Utilities, HSD and City Light.

So we're very committed to looking at how we can continue to be the most progressive utility in the country where limited income rates are concerned.

Thank you.

Don't you have a slide that says questions?

No, it's, I'm just kidding.

Thank you very much.

This was a lot of information to take in.

And the, Eric, can you please just address where the actual legislation is?

And then I just have one final question.

Hello, council members.

So the legislation, I believe today is, well, I know for sure today's Wednesday, and I believe that this legislation will be transmitted today.

and then it'll move through the regular process to get to what is called the introduction of a referral calendar, and then it will be available officially before the committee for a vote at the next meeting, should you wish to do so.

And that's the status that I know about the legislation.

It's, as you might guess, largely technical.

I make changes to the municipal code, put these rates in them.

It's 60-some pages to take all of the good work that the folks have done in citywide to the rates and make them happen in the code, but we expect to see it today.

And if I've got that wrong, the folks from City Light, if you have different information, please correct me.

And the good news is that we've got a month and my colleagues can dig into this information and send questions to Eric.

In the meantime, before we come back from the 14th, one question.

You mentioned the oversight panel, I believe, Christy.

I was, I'm not sure if I've got the nomenclature correct, but the review panel, I believe, formally weighed in on the strategic plan.

So does that, which includes the rate path.

So is it implied then that they endorse the rate ordinance as well?

Yes, and I think owing to some vacation scheduling mishaps, we weren't able to get a quorum at our last meeting, but we are having a special meeting with the review panel, I believe 20 something, but we do know that they support our proposal and they're prepared to provide council with a letter in advance of the vote in September.

All right, thank you very much.

Okay, well, if there are no other questions, thank you very, very much for this very thorough presentation.

And congratulations on these innovations.

I know that there was a lot of work that went into this, a lot of partnerships and stakeholder input that went into these innovations.

So thank you very, very much.

Yeah, we really thank you for your time and recognize that this is a lot to process.

And so just know that we're happy to provide briefings to any of you individually or with your staff if that's helpful as you work through this.

So just reach out and we will make that happen.

Thank you very much.

All right, folks, if there's nothing else, this concludes the August 10th meeting of the Economic Development Technology and City Light Committee.

It is 11.33.

Our next meeting is scheduled for September 14th at 9.30.

And so if there's no additional business, this meeting is now adjourned.

Thank you.

you