Seattle City Council Transportation & Utilities Committee 8421

meeting of the Transportation and Utilities Committee will come to order.

The time is 9.32 a.m.

I'm Alex Peterson, chair of the committee.

Council President Gonzalez and Councilmember Strauss are excused.

I thank you, Councilmember Juarez, for being here for as long as you can in your role as alternate committee member.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Herbold?

Here.

Councilmember Juarez?

Here.

Councilmember Morales?

Here.

Chair Peterson.

Here.

For present.

Thank you, the next item is approval of the agenda.

And if there's no objection, I'd like to move item one down to item two on our agenda, because we have a couple of guests who will be joining us as panelists shortly.

So no objection, we'll start with the second item, which is the Swedish Hospital items.

Hearing no objection, the revised agenda is adopted.

Good morning.

We've got 10 items on the agenda today, which will encourage us to keep our discussion succinct so we can potentially vote on nine of the 10 items out of committee today during the next two, two and a half hours.

I'm looking forward to the first, well, the first, but now second item on the committee agenda, which is Councilor Juarez's proposal to name the Northgate Pedestrian Bridge after national civil rights leader, John Lewis.

We have multiple items related to street vacations and term permits.

We also have a public hearing and possible vote for Seattle City Light to accept parcels of land to protect watersheds.

And our last item is a presentation on the 2020 financial audits of Seattle Public Utilities lines of business.

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

I ask that everyone please be patient as we operate this online system.

We're continuously looking for ways to fine-tune this process of public participation.

It remains the strong intent of the City Council to have public comment regularly included on meeting agendas.

However, the City Council reserves the right to modify these public comment periods at any point if we deem that the system is being abused or is unsuitable for allowing our meetings to be conducted efficiently and in a manner in which we are able to conduct our necessary business.

I will moderate the public comment period in the following manner.

The public comment period for this meeting is up to 20 minutes.

Each speaker will be given two minutes to speak.

I'll call on two speakers at a time and in the order in which registered on the council's website.

If you have not yet registered but would like to speak, you can sign up before the end of this public comment period by going to the council's website at Seattle.gov forward slash council.

The public comment link is also listed on today's agenda.

Once I call a speaker's name, staff will unmute the appropriate microphone, and an automatic prompt of, you have been unmuted, will be the speaker's cue.

That is their turn to speak, and the speaker must press star six to begin speaking.

That's star six.

Please begin speaking by stating your name and the item that you are addressing.

As a reminder, public comment should relate to an item on today's agenda.

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

Once you hear the chime, we ask that you begin to wrap up your public comment.

If speakers do not end their comments at the time of the allotted time provided, within the allotted time provided, the speaker's microphone will be muted to allow us to call on the next speaker.

Once you've completed your public comment, we ask that you please disconnect from the line.

And if you plan to continue following this meeting, please do so via Seattle Channel or the listening options listed on the agenda.

If you're calling about the Seattle City Light legislation, item nine, please wait until later in the agenda for that public hearing on that item.

The regular public comment period for this committee meeting is now open, and we will begin with the first speaker on the list.

Actually, it looks like we have just one speaker for public comment today.

So that, please remember to press star six before speaking.

Good morning, Jean Branzel.

Go ahead, Jean.

Gene Branzel, you can start by pressing star six on your phone.

Oh, I see you're muted, Gene Branzel.

So go ahead and press star six to unmute.

Okay, we're waiting.

Gene, if you don't mind, try to press star six, star, then six on your phone, the asterisk, then six.

We have only one speaker signed up for public comment, so let's give Gene just another moment to press star six to unmute the phone.

And if Gene or anybody else is not able to call in and provide their public comment, please email, send an email to us at council at Seattle.gov.

And that'll go to all nine council members.

And these items we're talking about today will eventually be going on to the full city council.

So there is time between this committee meeting and the full city council meeting to get your views into the council members, including the committee members here.

Okay.

So we are not able to hear from Jean due to technical difficulties, but Jean can go ahead and send us that email.

Thank you very much for trying to get into the meeting.

That was the last speaker signed up.

So we will go ahead and move on to the, that'll close the public comment period and move on to the first legislative item, which is item two on our agenda.

We switched up a little bit at the beginning here to give a couple of panelists some more time.

So go ahead to our clerk to read items, what on the agenda are listed as items two through four.

Agenda items one through three, council bill one, two, 0133, an ordinance granting Swedish Health Services permission to construct, maintain, and operate a pedestrian tunnel under and across Minor Avenue, south of Columbia Street, and north of Cherry Street for a 15-year term, renewable for one successive 15-year term.

Council Bill 120134, an ordinance amending Ordinance 125142, granting Swedish Health Services permission to construct, maintain, and operate a pedestrian skybridge over and across Minor Avenue between Columbia Street and Cherry Street.

Clerk File 314477, request for an extension to the conditional approval of a petition of Swedish Health Services to vacate the alley in Block 95, Terry's second addition to the City of Seattle.

For briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you, colleagues.

These three pieces of legislation are related to the already approved construction of additional medical facilities for Swedish First Hill.

In 2016, Swedish received from the city conditional approval for an alley vacation, a tunnel, and a skybridge to facilitate the development of the new medical office and support service building pursuant to Swedish's 2005 major institution master plan Construction of the buildings has been delayed.

Swedish requested that approval of the vacation skybridge and tunnel essentially be extended.

The legislation in front of the committee would extend the terms of approval or grant a final approval for one of them with the condition.

So the central staff memo is excellent, provides ample detail and rationale for this legislation.

So as usual, we'll look, we'll offer our central staff analysts opportunity if they want to speak to this and then we'll turn it over to the relevant department, in this case SDOT.

So Lish Whitson, good morning.

Is there anything you wanted to discuss?

Good morning.

You took the words out of my mouth, so I think I don't have anything more to add.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

And I used your memo to craft that introduction.

So thank you for that.

So let's go ahead and turn it over to the executive departments involved with this.

I think Beverly, will you go first?

Yes, yes, I'll start us off.

So thank you for having us.

And I think, Chair Peterson, you'd really covered everything.

This is an already approved project.

Swedish Hospital needs a little bit of additional time.

We have a very brief PowerPoint of just three or four slides that will remind the committee of the location.

Oh, Bill, this is the district energy tunnel.

So we'll get the right PowerPoint up and then we have Brad Hanthorn who is the architect who will speak to the three slides.

We also have Mike Denny here from Swedish who wants to say you know, just a couple sentences about this, but from the S dot perspective, we support the extension.

Um, all of these three projects were approved by the city council and just given everything that's going on and with COVID, uh, they need a little bit more time and we fully support that.

So here, here it is, Brad, if you want to, um, take a couple minutes to remind the committee where this is at.

Um, and then, um,

And then Mike can say a couple of words as well, but thanks Beverly.

This is the image of the building, which is referred to as Block 95 until we come up with a better name.

If we could click to the next slide.

Just as a reminder, as has been mentioned, there were three petitions approved in 2016 having to do with Block 95. There's the alley vacation between Sherry and Columbia.

There's the Minor Avenue Skybridge, which is a new skybridge that connects this building to the main hospital.

And there's a tunnel under Minor Street that serves as the sort of umbilical cord for all the new services in Block 95 that will connect to the hospital.

So those are the three petitions that were approved and all the associated public benefits and the whole process that we went through.

So we are quite pleased, even though there has been some delay, as Beverly mentioned.

Go ahead to the next slide, sorry.

that we are preparing to break ground this fall and looking toward substantial completion in 2025. So we're very excited that we're moving forward.

And I think that was it, Mike, unless you wanna add anything.

No, I just appreciate the council's attention to this and look forward to

So I think that's all we needed to cover.

Amy is here if there are questions on the tunnel or the SkyBridge.

I can answer any questions on the vacation.

But this is a very simple request for additional time, which we do support.

So we'd be happy to address any questions.

And Brad and Nancy Rogers and Mike can cover anything about the project.

But I think that's all we wanted to cover.

Thank you, and I appreciate the briefing before the meeting as well to ask any questions about this.

But I concur that this is essentially an extension request, just something that was approved back in 2016. And we'll get to see this again for final approval after the construction takes place and the conditions are met.

And so, Lish, is there anything that you wanted to add?

I should just clarify that for the tunnel, this is the initial approval and I'll grant a 15 year term for that tunnel.

Conditional approval was previously granted in 2016, but this is the formal.

Thank you for clarifying that on the tunnel item.

And so we will be making, I'll be making three different motions to approve these items.

And then with the clerk file, we'll actually be incorporating your central staff memo into that item.

Is that correct?

Yeah, it's the attachment to my memo includes the conditions that would be placed on this alley vacation.

Yes, so we will be incorporating your central staff memo with the attachment into the clerk file as part of the motion so that it's more official.

Councilors, any questions for central staff on this, these three items?

Okay, well, I'll go ahead and, yeah, Councilor Herbold, please.

I'm a little slow on the uptake here.

And so we are, We are considering item four as part of this packet.

Is that correct?

Correct.

Yeah.

Thank you.

And so as it relates to the, um, to the block 95 construction schedule, construction scheduled to complete at the end of 2024. I'm just wondering the thinking behind this particular extension going to 2029.

Beverly, are you going to answer that?

You're on mute.

Sorry, the mute defeats us all.

I think when we look at the approval time period, we want to make sure that it's really adequate.

This is their best expectation that seems very grounded in reality.

But with the last extension, there were circumstances that were unanticipated.

So rather than being in the position of granting a tight time frame and then needing to come back when construction might be midway, I think we're trying to look at really realistic time frames.

other unanticipated things, a pandemic or something, a steel shortage.

So it really is just to make sure that they have more than adequate time to complete everything so we don't have to come back and say, we didn't make the time frame, which uses a lot of committee time when you already supported the project.

So it's just caution.

Thank you.

Council members, any additional questions?

And Lish from our central staff, just to confirm the attachment that we are incorporating, are we incorporating that into the clerk file item?

Correct.

Okay.

So it's an update to the conditions that were placed on the street vacation and the only change is to extend the date.

Okay, great.

Oh, I see, thank you.

Okay, council members, I'd like to start moving these items for a vote to send them on the full council.

Council members, I now move that the committee recommend the passage of Council Bill 120133, which is item two on our non-revised agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

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

Any final comments?

Will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that the bill be approved for forwarding to the full city council?

Herbold?

Yes.

Loras?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation is that the bill be sent for approval to the August 9th city council meeting.

Council members, I now move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120134, item three on our non-revised agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

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

Are there any final comments?

Okay, will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that the bill be approved for forwarding to the full city council?

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries, and the committee recommendation is that the bill be sent for approval to the August 9 City Council meeting.

Now for the clerk file.

We're going to move the clerk file, and then we're going to add the attachment to it.

I move the committee recommend approval of clerk file 314477. Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded that the committee recommend approval of the clerk file.

And then I will now move to amend the clerk file by adding attachment one that Lish mentioned, attachment one of the central staff memo, which includes the council conditions.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the clerk file to add attachment one.

Any final comments on this as amended?

Okay, will the clerk please call the roll on the amendment to add, excuse me, give me a second.

Yes, we have to vote on that.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the amendment to add attachment one.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Chair Peterson.

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Okay, the motion carries and the clerk file is amended.

Any final comments on the committee recommendation on the approval of the clerk file as conditioned and amended?

All right, will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation of the approval of the clerk file as conditioned?

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Okay, the motion carries and the committee recommendation that the clerk file be approved as conditioned will be sent to the August 9 City Council meeting.

Thank you to the folks from Estad and from Swedish and thank you, Lish.

So we're gonna go, committee members, we're gonna go back to the original item one on our committee agenda.

And, Let's start by having the clerk please read that title of the first, the original first item into the record.

Agenda item four, Council Bill 120145, an ordinance naming the pedestrian and bicycle bridge across Interstate 5, connecting North 100th Street to First Avenue Northeast as the John Lewis Memorial Bridge for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you.

And for those following along, this is item one on the published agenda, which we just moved down to the second big issue to discuss.

And colleagues, Council Member Deborah Juarez is joining us today.

And I believe we've got former Martin Luther King County Council Member Larry Gossett.

And we might have another guest with us as well, but I'll just turn this over to Council Member Juarez to talk about this item, which I'm very supportive of.

to name the pedestrian bridge after National Civil Rights leader, John Lewis.

Please, Deborah Juarez, welcome.

Thank you, Chairman.

Before we get started, Council Member Gossett and Dr. Shamim Crawford are both here.

First of all, thank you so much, Chair Peterson, for your support of this bill and all the work that we put into it.

and bringing it into your committee today.

And I do have a few prepared remarks before we turn it over to Council Member Larry Gossett and Dr. Crawford, if you don't mind, Chair.

Great.

Okay.

This bill today consists of months of collaboration and actually years in the making about naming historical markers and honoring those other than Jefferson, Roosevelt, Washington, Nathan Hale, Lincoln, and Franklin, and I could go on.

So we have actually been implementing this when Council Member Bagshaw was still with us, or on the city council.

We've been working with the community and citywide, and we started by completing an inventory, a citywide inventory of all the names of public infrastructures in the city of Seattle.

And what we found out, and it wasn't that shocking, that there was very little black, indigenous, Asian, and LGBTQ people acknowledged, memorialized, or landmarked.

And in particular, in District 5, there is currently not a single school, park, street, library, pool, or natural habitat, that would be a river, lake, or stream, because we have Thornton Creek up here, or a community center named after an African American or a Black leader.

So, working with community, we considered the many names for this bridge and decided to put forward the name of the Honorable U.S. Representative John Lewis.

As you know, John Lewis passed away on July 17, 2020, after serving as the U.S.

Representative for Georgia's 5th Congressional District for more than 30 years.

In honor of his incredible life and legacy as a civil rights icon and voting rights advocate, I'm sponsoring this bill to name the Pedestrian and Bicycle Bridge in Northgate, the John Lewis Memorial Bridge.

I'm joined today by two incredible leaders, former King County Council Member Larry Gossett, and the President of North Seattle College, Dr. Shamene Crawford.

At this time, Mr. Chair, I'd like to go ahead and hand it over to Mr. Larry Gossett, and I understand after that, Dr. Crawford will speak, and then I will have some closing remarks.

Okay.

Mr. Gossett, or Council Member Gossett, it's all you.

Thank you very much.

I hope that everyone can hear me this morning.

We can.

Okay, thank you.

I'd like to first thank City Council Member Deborah Juarez for recommending this name for this important pedestrian and bicycle bridge that we're building in North Seattle.

I think it's particularly significant to name the bridge after John Lewis at this historic juncture where we're having a national debate over whether or not we should accept the John Lewis for the People Act as a way of mitigating against what I believe is a horrible trend of creating voter suppression legislation in these 48 states in our union.

And some of the states have already passed this, and the only way we can maximize, in my opinion, support for voting rights is to pass this measure.

But here in Seattle, it's very important that we adopt this suggestion that we name the bill in honor of John Lewis.

I did not know the statistics that Council Member Juarez mentioned a little bit ago.

All of those statistics reinforce the importance of making this main change at this time.

I wanted to be supported and have the City Council and the broader community know that I strongly support the measure because I I met John Lewis back in 1966 when he was living for a short period of time in New York and staying active in the Civil Rights Movement.

He and I both attended an anti-Vietnam War event in Manhattan, and we got to know each other.

We just kind of accidentally found out that he and I both have the same birthday.

That's February 21st.

He's about five years older than I, but we started our relationship by communicating with one another every couple of years, from 66 until he passed a few years ago.

I can't think of a symbol, a namesake for an entity in Seattle that will be more revered than this proposed change will be.

Most people in Seattle, most people in the country, in my estimation or opinion, love the work that John Lewis did to support democratic change and improvement of the basic citizenship rights of all Americans.

So in due respect, I'm honored to be the first person at this committee meeting to get the opportunity to reinforce the measure that Council Member Juarez has just put forth in honoring John Lewis by having this important bridge that provides a really excellent link to major transportation entities in our community for the people of Seattle.

Thank you very much for allowing me the time on your agenda.

Thank you, Council Member Gossett, and thank you, Dr. Crawford, for being here with us as well.

We'd love to hear from you too.

Absolutely.

Thank you so much for inviting me.

And I prepared remarks as well.

I know there's a time limit and I could go on and on about this topic.

So I'm gauging myself here.

Good morning, council members.

I'm Dr. Shamim Crawford.

I'm a North Seattle community member and educator who is also president of North Seattle College.

And I would love to tell you that I truly had a personal friendship with Representative John Lewis, because that would mean I would have had an amazing mentor who fought for the rights of all people to vote.

and who work tirelessly to assure that our children inherit a healthy planet and have many opportunities in a just and progressive nation.

What I can tell you is that just a few years ago, I had the opportunity to meet and spend time with John Lewis during an American Association of Community Colleges conference in Washington, D.C. You see, I was part of an affiliate council of AACC called the National Council on Black American Affairs.

The NCBAA back in those days annually sponsored a very elaborate display in the convention center's visitor area to educate conference attendees about Black American affairs, particularly targeted toward educators.

Being in Washington, D.C., we took a chance and reached out to Representative Lewis' staff to see if he could simply stop by our booth to do a meet and greet, as our booth was normally very popular during this particular annual convention.

But being in Washington, D.C., we made every attempt to just take it over the top.

And not only did he say yes, but he agreed to sign copies of his latest book.

His staff made arrangements to have copies of his most recent books sent over.

He agreed to sit with us and sign copies for those who wanted them, and we were blown away beyond expectations.

Well, it turned out that the Dreyage Company for the conference failed to deliver books in a timely manner, and he arrived and they did not.

Fortunately, one of his aides brought a box of books with him.

However, we were very concerned that Representative Lewis would simply show up and leave once he found out that the majority of his books had not arrived.

Fortunately, he did not leave.

He signed the books he brought with him and copies of his other books that conference attendees brought with them and actually stayed there with us for a few hours, shaking hands, greeting people, discussing public policy and taking photos.

You can imagine that we were grinning from ear to ear, and you've probably seen the photo floating around of all of us.

We know that there are many politicians who would have made an exit shortly after finding out their books or merchandise hadn't arrived, and Representative Lewis did not do that.

He was gracious and very generous with his time, and he continually thanked us as educators for doing this work and for staying the course, reminding us that as educators, we are indeed causing good trouble.

I was inspired and encouraged by spending that time with him.

So here in the story, you may ask, what does this got to do with naming a bridge after him in North Seattle?

Well, let me share my personal perspective with you.

The legacy that John Lewis has left for this entire country is one of service, not just to or for Black people, but for justice for all people.

The voting rights and justice that he, Dr. King, and others walked across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to defend back in 1965 continue to be manipulated and are in jeopardy today in the 21st century.

We must never forget and never stop crossing bridges to assure equity and justice for all.

Current and future generations must know this American's name and how he helped to ignite a fire by crossing a bridge.

Representative Lewis authored a few books in his time here on earth.

One that stands out for me is entitled Across That Bridge, A Vision for Change and the Future of America.

And I'm hoping that the bridge being considered today be a bridge that leads anyone who is willing to their own vision of positive change in their lives by seeking out a better life through higher education.

Those heading east on the bridge, I hope that they're heading for the light rail to hop on and get to that job or place that helps them live a better life and that helps them feed and shelter their families.

I'm optimistic that this bridge will be a bridge of hope for those who cross it.

That it will one day lead into a community that reflects images and the history of all of us.

The naming of this bridge after Representative John Lewis is a start and a good start to good trouble.

I want the youth in this community to know the names of people who look like me and other BIPOC people who have worked tirelessly to make this country safe and just for all of us.

The type of honor being considered today isn't only for a certain part of town or for certain neighborhoods.

The thought of that in and of itself is a microaggression, which isn't very micro at all, frankly.

That idea suggests to those who are listening and watching that maybe you don't belong here in history or otherwise.

For America to be that which she was born to be, this way of thinking simply cannot stand.

You know, I grew up in the 60s and the legacy of John Lewis and others shaped my worldview and possibly influenced my decision to become an educator.

There's so many who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge back in 1965 who absolutely had an impact on future generations.

However, no one described the experience better than Representative John Lewis by encouraging us to, for the right reasons, get into good trouble.

Thank you for your time.

Man.

Thank you, Dr. Crawford.

It's really powerful.

Colleagues, we normally give our central staff analysts a chance to talk about legislation.

Calvin Chow, I don't know if you have anything you want to talk about with the committee members.

And I know we'll have other, we might have some other questions and comments on this item before we go.

No, Council Member, I'm just here to support the conversation.

Thank you.

Great.

Council members, any comments or questions for our guests or for the sponsor?

Council Member Herbold, did you?

Yes, please.

Thank you so much.

I just want to request the prime sponsor, Council Member Juarez, to add my name as a sponsor of this legislation.

Thank you so much.

I really, really appreciate you bringing this forward.

I would love it if I could benefit from the research that you've done.

on the naming conventions here in Seattle is broken down by district.

I'd love to learn more about what's lacking in District 1. I have a constituent who has been for years now advocating that we rename Stevens Street in District 1 because of the role of that governor compelling the indigenous tribes of Washington by intimidation and forcing those tribes to sign treaties that ceded their rights.

and lands, the fact that this governor imposed martial law to better impose his will on both Native people and whites who opposed his views, and that he, you know, waged a brutal campaign against the Yakama tribe and unjustifiably executed the Nisqually chieftain Leschi.

So would love to use the research that you've done to help justify righting this wrong as well.

I really appreciate the wisdom and counsel of our guests here today, and I loved hearing of their personal experience.

this is with the great John Lewis.

We know that it was just a year ago that he crossed the Edmund Pittus Bridge for the final time when his body was carried across in a horse-drawn carriage.

And though this city council can't rename that bridge, I love that we are honoring him with a bridge here in Seattle.

So thank you, Council Member Juarez.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

Mr. Chair, I don't know when you're ready for me to, I'm guessing we have some colleagues that may have to, and then I'll close out whenever you're ready.

Thank you.

And thank you for bringing this forward.

I know that there've been some comments we've received about naming other assets that the city has.

And I think that this, I hope this sparks a naming effort throughout the city.

And one of the suggestions I've heard is, I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about that.

I know there's been talk about former Councilmember Richard McIver who helped to work with Sound Transit when it was created.

to be renaming things throughout the city.

So thank you for sparking this.

And on a personal note, when I was trying to get an internship in Washington DC decades ago, I went from office to office knocking on doors and the only elected official who met with me was John Lewis.

And so I got to meet him back in 1991, which was really powerful.

Thank you for bringing this forward.

Any other comments, colleagues?

Council Member Juarez, would you like to close it out for us before we vote?

I would, and I want to respond to Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

I do want to give credit to former Council Member Sally Bagshaw, because we did do a slide back in 2018, I believe, and started talking about, with parks, renaming.

And I want to thank Abigail Echo Hawk and her family for taking down particular signs on Thornton Creek that said indigenous people were gone.

And so we've seen this as chair of parks since 2016. So, you know, I'm up for a Shirley Chisholm golf course.

So, you know, we got a lot of work to do and I'm really glad that council member Herbert understands the history of former governor Stevens and the eight treaties that he signed with indigenous people here.

And I hope that we can continue the conversation without people thinking that we're taking away or it's canceled culture or we're taking away their history because this is a great country with all of our histories.

Um, and with that being said, I do have a few comments.

I want to really thank council member Gossett.

He's been my friend for over 30 years.

I remember when he had King County changed to Martin Luther King and Martin Luther King way in the day and the heat that he took.

And he's always been a mentor and a dear friend of mine along with uncle Bernie white bear and um, Roberto Maestas, you know, all of our friends, Uncle Bob, those were the days when I was, you know, 14. And I want to thank Dr. Shamene Crawford, who's become a fast and dear friend of mine with her leadership at North Seattle College and all the work that we're doing.

She's been amazing, opened her doors.

And we also work with Dr. Brown.

when he had the job before Dr. Crawford, and we try to meet once a month and put our heads together and we just get stuff done.

And I really appreciate that.

I just wanna end on this note, besides thanking our two esteemed leaders that are here, is in our culture, we believe that people don't actually die or go away, they're always here, but they're only here as long as we say their name and remember who they are.

And that's why we have structures and that's why we have markers and that's why we have all of these things to remind us in this country who helped build it.

And we need to have more of Black leaders, Native American leaders, LGBTQ leaders, Asian leaders.

And we've gotten some letters about some people that weren't too happy about this naming.

But I want to say to those people who aren't happy that Thornton Creek, John Thornton never set foot in the city of Seattle.

He lived in Clallam County.

He was a railroad speculator that bought the title in 1889. And while I welcome Mr. Thornton and we have Thornton Creek and Thornton Place, you know, it's time for people to make space for other people and great leaders who made this country great and sacrificed their lives for the things that Dr. Crawford spoke about and Larry Gossett about the right to vote.

In particular, without me going into the whole issue of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, and the violent attacks that were recorded and disseminated throughout the country, which came to be known as Bloody Sunday, and also his fight that we're doing and we're continuing to do from 1965 to 2021, 56 years later, we are still fighting for the Voting Rights Act and the democracy.

The bedrock of our democracy is voting, and we are still fighting that as we watch what's happening in Texas.

And so for me, it's more than just that John Lewis was the conscience of Congress, that he reached across the aisle, that he was a bridge builder.

All of those are poetic.

They're illustrative.

They're demonstrative.

But more importantly, it shows that that is the America who we are.

That is the America that I love.

That is the America that I take joy and pride in.

And I think people like the Honorable John Lewis should be honored.

His name, his personal, his professional sacrifice should be a bridge.

So when people walk over it, they say, I know who John Lewis is.

I know what he did for this country.

I know the sacrifices he made for everybody, not just black people, everybody.

And so with that, I will be joining, I'll end on this and start, stop.

This is, as you can see, a very emotional piece for us.

And getting back to what Council Member Herbold said, we did this inventory and a big shout out to Layla, our intern, but this isn't something that was brand new.

I had always known this.

I just wanted to see it in writing.

I'll get all my colleagues a copy of the, I think I sent it to the chair.

Chair Peterson has it.

And I also shared it with Dr. Crawford, because it's very stark when you see that, and some of the letters wrote in said, well, why can't the John Lewis Bridge be somewhere else in the city?

And for me, that's code four, why isn't it down South?

And that's just, that ain't right.

It has to be everywhere.

So let me end with this.

Thank you again, Chairman, for putting this on the agenda.

Thank you colleagues for being supportive.

Thank you, Larry Gossett.

Thank you, Dr. Crawford.

I will be joining Council Member Gossett and Dr. Crawford on Converge Media Monday morning show this Friday at the Paramount, where we hope to go into greater detail, not only about this proposal, but this history and this legacy and revisiting history and naming those important structures in our city and across our great country after other people and other great people that have done great things to make our country better.

So with that, I will close it out.

Thank you.

Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Juarez.

And thank you to our guests for joining us today.

It was very powerful to hear from you.

Any final questions or comments before we vote on this Council Bill?

Council Members, I now move that the committee recommend the passage of Council Bill 120145, item one on our non-revised agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, it's been moved and seconded to recommend passage of the bill.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that the bill be approved for forwarding to the full city council?

Yes.

Juarez?

Aye.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, the motion carries unanimously.

The committee recommendation is the bill be sent for approval to the August 9 full city council meeting.

Thank you, Council Member Juarez.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please read the short title of the next agenda item into the record.

Agenda item five, council bill 120137. An ordinance vacating the alley in Block 20, heirs of Sarah A. Bell's second addition, founded by 7th Avenue, Blanchard Street, 8th Avenue, and Lenora Street in South Lake Union.

For briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you.

Council Bills 120137 and 120136 confirm that Amazon met the conditions of street vacations already approved for the so-called Block 20 and Block 21. Block 20 is bounded by 7th Avenue, Blanchard Street, 8th Avenue, and Lenora Street.

Block 21 is bounded by Bell Street, 7th Avenue, Blanchard Street, and 8th Avenue.

As colleagues may recall, street vacations are done in two steps.

The most important step is granting the conditional approval with the public benefit conditions listed up front.

And the second more ministerial action is to confirm the completion of what was agreed to under the first step after the construction is completed.

These two pieces of legislation constitute the second and final step.

So we will welcome again, from our Seattle Department of Transportation, Beverly Barnett.

But let's start to see if Lish Whitson from our city council central staff has any opening remarks about these two items.

Nothing to add, thank you.

Okay, thanks, Lish.

Hello again, Beverly.

Go ahead and take it away.

Wonderful.

Thank you.

I'm glad we all got to be here for the previous presentation.

That was very powerful.

So with this, as you've indicated, Chair Peterson, this is the final step in a process that the city council has established.

So the two-step approval process means that the city can continue to be engaged as the project is developed.

And we bring the final legislation forward when The fees are paid, the project's done, and the public benefit features have been included in the design, and we have any kinds of easements or anything recorded.

With all vacations, we do what we call a property use and development agreement, which is a recorded document.

It's recorded at King County that binds any future property owner to to maintain and keep open to the public, the public benefit features.

So we have Ian Kell, one of the project managers from the Seneca Group, will be here for both Block 20 and Block 21. And for Block 20, We have a PowerPoint that will be narrated by John Savo, who was the lead architect.

We have a lot of information.

We understand the committee is very tight, so we're going to zip through these, but we want to be available for any questions that you have.

And then as we move to block 21, after the committee finishes its discussion, We'll still have Ian Kell and Peter Kresh from Graphite Design.

We'll zip through that PowerPoint again with more backup documentation if there are questions.

So I think we can start in.

Ian, if you and John Savo are ready, we can zip through your project.

Thank you, Beverly.

Yes, I'm John Savo.

I was the principal in charge for MDJ for What we now call reinvent the project that we'll be talking about today.

Go to slide please.

So today we're here specifically to talk about Block 20. And this is the third and final block of the original three-block development that was called Rufus 2.0.

Block 20 has two office buildings, a 137-story with eight.

And just a reminder of why we pursued alley vacations, which is something we did.

Excuse me, Chair Peterson.

I'm having a hard time hearing.

I don't know if it's just me.

No, I can't hear either.

Yeah, Mr. Sala, your audio decreased substantially just a minute ago.

Yeah, I am.

That's better.

That's better.

It is better?

OK, thank you.

My headphones, I was using them earlier with practice, and they weren't working now.

So let me know again, though, if you're not hearing me.

So just a reminder why we pursue alley vacations as rare as they are.

So in this particular case, they allowed us the maximum tower separation and created generous public open spaces, an opportunity to create East-West through block connections, pedestrian connections, and much better solar access to these new public spaces that were created and improved views, as you can see, kind of towards Elliott Bay.

So construction of all three blocks have now been completed.

The buildings are occupied.

Vacations have already been approved for blocks 14 and 19, and block 20 is the last of those.

Next, please.

The area that should come up next is a reminder that what was here before were surface parking lots and one low-rise, small low-rise building, and it's all been replaced with dense urban infill in our downtown.

So accessible public open space and a through block connection were designed from the beginning to be significant features of the project, which include the commitment to allow free speech activities in public method areas.

The alley vacation public benefits are just one of three categories that we pursued for benefits.

We also had benefits for bonus FAR, some for planned community development.

But the focus, of course, here in the next couple of minutes is just to talk about the benefits associated with the alley vacation itself.

The first of those, you can see the top of this slide, is the 7th Avenue cycle track, which is now completed in all three blocks, as well as on the neighboring block to the south.

They all have dedicated bike lanes and their own signals and street furniture.

Unique to Block 20 is a shared new street on Lenora between Westlake and 7th.

That enlarges and enhances the pedestrian zone into the much larger public area.

And then improvements on Westlake Avenue included enhanced street crossings at a six-way intersection at Westlake, 8th, and Lenora.

We've also elevated the Blanchard Green Street with a voluntary 10-foot setback that allows for some integrated bike benches, a bike lane, and expanded landscape.

There are other voluntary setbacks that ring the taller office tower with additional landscape features such as specimen trees and outdoor seating.

The right-of-way improvements include a double tree lay on 7th Avenue on both sides of the street and an arbor that reinforces human scale and lends a garden quality to Block 20's open spaces.

Our seventh benefit is the completion of the art program.

which features a signature piece, a sculpture and fountain by Jerry Sudakawa, but also a waterfall towards 8th Avenue, a glacial erratic that was actually found during the construction of one of the blocks.

So please note that there were some additional benefits that were completed earlier with blocks 14 and 19. They include some overhead weather protection.

There should be another slide to show that.

Ian, if you can go to that.

And so additional overhead weather protection between the spheres, the office tower on the block across the street, the purchase of a streetcar for South Lake Union and contribution to a neighborhood park, what was called the enterprise site that is now completed.

So as Beverly said, we wanted to be very concise in doing this, but I'm happy to answer any questions and we have some additional detailed slides if it's helpful.

Thank you.

So, Lish, you're still on here.

Just want to confirm it's central staff's view that the conditions have been met from the original conditional approvals?

Correct.

Yes.

OK.

OK.

And Beverly from SDOT, that's your view as well?

Conditions have been met?

Yes.

OK.

Colleagues, any questions about this second step where we're simply It's a ministerial look at back at what was already approved and now what's been completed.

Okay, well, we have the second presentation, but let's go ahead and vote on this item.

And then the second presentation will be similar to this.

One moment.

Okay, so council members, I'm gonna move this council bill, and then we'll move on to the second one.

Council members, I now move that the committee recommend passage of council bill 120136. Oh, excuse me.

Council members, I now move that the committee recommend passage of council bill 120137, which is item five on our agenda.

Is there a second?

Thank you, it's been moved and seconded to recommend passage of the bill.

Any final comments on Council Bill 120137?

Okay, will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that Council Bill 120137 be approved for forwarding to the full council?

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Sarah Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation is that council 120137 be sent for approval to the August nine city council meeting.

We'll have the clerk read the short title of the next agenda item into the record.

As just before they do that, I just want to thank you, but also for what you've done council for the John Lewis bridge.

I was on the design commission when that bridge was in design and some wonderful steps you've taken.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Can you see my thumb?

Thank you.

And the clerk may now read the short title of the next agenda item into the record, item six.

Agenda item six, Council Bill 120136, an ordinance vacating the alley in block 21, heirs of Sarah A. Bell's second addition, bounded by Bell Street, 7th Avenue, Blanchard Street, and 8th Avenue in South Lake Union, for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you.

And this will be a similar presentation, but a different architect and a different look and feel from this different block.

But first, Liz Whitson, are there any comments from central staff on this item, block 21?

No, thank you.

OK.

All right, Beverly, go ahead.

Thank you.

Yeah, so this project is at the same stage.

This was previously approved by the city council and has gone through the development proposal and implemented the vacation conditions as directed by the city council and have paid the fees.

And we finished all the easements and other documents.

So we'd like to do the same thing.

Ian Kell from the Seneca Group is still going to run the PowerPoint.

And Peter Kresh from Graphite Design will do the presentation.

It's our goal to, again, go through this really crisply.

I think the council is very familiar with this location and the development of all these projects.

I would note that this is the final Amazon vacation in this part of town.

So this is the fourth and final project in that Amazon area.

So Ian and Peter, I think we're ready.

All right, good morning.

I'm Peter Crack here with Graphite Design Group and I'll walk through the slide deck here for block 21. Next slide please.

So similar to Block 20, Block 21 is a full block development comprised of two buildings, ground level retail, a fully ADA accessible through block connection, and a collection of public benefit features, some of which we'll review today.

This block is also home to Mary's Place Family Shelter, which occupies a portion of the eight-story South Tower on Blanchard Street on the right-hand side of this image.

While Mary's Place was not a condition of the alley vacation, its inclusion in the project was instrumental in allowing them to continue to provide the services that they do to the community.

As at block 20, the alley vacation allowed for optimal building orientation, extensive active pedestrian frontage, as well as generous public open space and the through block connection between 7th and 8th avenues.

Next slide, please.

Block 21 occupies property that was formerly a collection of low-rise structures and surface parking lots.

The new project brings density and active uses and amenities to the neighborhood, similar to the other Amazon blocks, extending the precedent of high-quality public spaces set by the neighboring blocks to the south.

Slide, please.

The primary open spaces are signed as was discussed by John in a similar fashion here at block 21. And they use design cues to invite pedestrian engagement and welcome the public at all levels of mobility onto the site.

Like the regrade, the open spaces capitalize on the specific siting and orientation of the block, making each unique in the character and use of the open space.

The central plaza here has been designed as a flexible open space that is public, will accommodate a variety of uses, includes planning for future outdoor market.

Next slide, please.

Summary diagrams on the next several slides outline the public benefit features on the block, starting with the 8th Avenue Hill Climb, number one.

This connects the intersection of 8th and Bell to the through block connection, is fully ADA accessible, and features integrated seating, a pallet of Northwest native plantings, and old growth stumps sourced from the Olympic Peninsula.

Street enhancements on all four right-of-way frontages also include voluntary building setbacks, enhanced landscaping, and bioretention for stormwater management and pedestrian seating.

Notably, the Bell Street improvements extend design elements east along the right-of-way from Bell Street Park, which begins at 5th Avenue to the west.

Next slide, please.

Both 7th and 8th Avenues incorporate building setbacks and right-of-way improvements similar to both Bell and Blanchard Street.

On 7th Avenue, pedestrian enhancements feature an extension of design elements that John also discussed from Block 20, including the double overlay of trees, pedestrian lighting, and an elevated cycle track.

On the Northwest corner of the site, the intersection of Bell and 8th Avenue also has been improved with roadway, sidewalk, and landscaping enhancements.

Next slide, please.

West of the 8th and Bell intersection, a protected bike lane has also been incorporated on Bell Street to provide a link from upgraded bike infrastructure in South Lake Union to the cycle track network in the regrade.

And finally, to help guide future development in the neighborhood, the Bell Street concept plan was developed in conjunction with the Block 21 project to ensure design continuity from the linear street park that begins at Fifth Avenue to the west, suggesting that new projects extend key design features and amenities from the park eastward along Bell Street.

Block 21 is the first example of this design concept plan being implemented, and you see some photos here on the screen.

So that takes us through the suite of 10 public benefits that we wanted to review today.

As you will note, they're quite similar to some of those that John discussed, and I'm open for questions if there are any.

Thank you very much.

Councilor Morales.

Thank you.

So I do have questions about Mary's case, assuming you'll be able to answer them.

I understand it's not necessarily one of the benefits that was part of this agreement, But can you talk a little bit about what kind of housing is there at Mary's Place?

Is it permanent supportive, transitional?

Is it some other shelter?

I'm happy to address that.

Mary's Place, which occupies, as I noted, a portion of the shorter building, the eight-story building on Blanchard Street, is transitional housing, typically housing women and families for up to to three months within the property.

And they also have emergency shelter provisions for a smaller number of guests for up to 30 days in inclement weather or other situations.

So all told, there's 275 sleeping accommodations for overnight guests within the facility.

So 240 transitional housing and then 30 shelter beds, is that what you said?

275 shelter beds and accommodations for 30 additional guests in less private accommodations that are more temporary.

Thank you.

Council members, any additional questions here about the conditions that have been met?

Okay, well, thank you for presenting this to us.

For people just listening in, this is all on our online agenda.

You can see these materials and this will be voted on at full council if we voted on that committee now.

I'll go ahead and make that motion unless there are further questions or comments.

So council members, I now move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120136, item six on our agenda.

Is there a second?

It's been moved and seconded to recommend passage of this Council Bill 120136. Any final comments?

Okay, will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation that Council Bill 120136 be approved for forwarding to the full council?

Yes.

Juarez?

Aye.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Or in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries, and the committee recommendation is that Council Bill 120136 be sent for approval to the August 9 City Council meeting.

Thank you, everybody, for joining us today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Will the clerk please read the title of the next agenda item into the record?

Agenda item seven, clerk file 314451, petition of Seattle City Light to vacate a portion of Diagonal Avenue South, west of 4th Avenue South for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you.

Colleagues, clerk file 314451 is simply the petition by Seattle City Light to vacate a portion of Diagonal Avenue South, west of 4th Avenue South.

This is an item for which we had a public hearing two weeks ago, so we're merely voting to accept the clerk file today.

As you may recall, the vacation portion of the street would connect Seattle City Lights South Service Station, which includes property on both sides of Diagonal Avenue South at this location.

The Seattle Department of Transportation and the Seattle Design Commission have reviewed the vacation petition in Clerk File 314451 and recommended granting the vacation.

Public benefits proposed as part of the vacation process include transferring property currently owned by City Light in the Georgetown neighborhood, the Flume property, to SDOT and to the Seattle Department of Parks and Rec in conjunction with development of a bike pedestrian trail, improved bike-ped connections between Georgetown and South Park, and an off-leash dog park within the Georgetown neighborhood.

We've seen other legislation pulling all this stuff together as well.

So we have with us, again, thank you.

to our central staff analyst Lish Whitson for being a rock today on so many items.

And then also Beverly Barnett from Estad.

Lish, any introductory comments to this, even though I probably lifted them from your memo already?

Okay Sorry, there's a plane coming in low overhead I

So as with the other, the Swedish street vacation, there is a proposed set of conditions attached to my memo that reflect the SDOT recommendations for conditions on this street vacation, primarily protecting Seattle Pacific public utilities.

ability to put in drainage infrastructure under the Diagonal Avenue right-of-way in the future, and transferring the flume property to Estada Parks for a pedestrian bike trail and off-leash area.

Thank you.

And thank you for the presentation previously when we had a public hearing.

And Beverly, is there anything that you wanted to add?

I don't think we're re-presenting today.

No, we did not anticipate representing Tim Kroll is here from City Light who's been the project manager and he does he did bring one map if any council members want to see the location of the two sites as a refresh.

I think the council is very familiar with this.

This was a very collaborative process between Park City Light and SDOT and the community.

And I think different parts and pieces have been before the council off and on for quite a while.

So we're available for questions.

We have other members of the design team from Parks and SDOT if there are any questions.

If you want the map refreshed.

Otherwise, the committee at the public hearing had a thorough discussion and we're just here to support the committee if there are any further questions.

Thank you.

I don't think we need to have anything shown up on the screen since we saw it at the previous committee meeting for the public listening in or viewing.

These items are republished on our agenda.

So you can look at these items there.

And I'm happy to, if my colleagues are okay with it, happy to go ahead and move this clerk file to be accepted and moved on to the full city council.

Any final comments before I make motions to do so?

And with the previous, just as with the previous clerk file, we will be accepting the central staff attachment as part of it.

So we have to amend it to do that.

Our city clerk has asked us to do that in a more formal way.

So we'll go ahead and do that.

So I'll do a couple of motions here.

I'd like to first move that the committee recommend clerk file 314451 be granted.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded that the committee recommend the clerk file be granted.

Are there any final comments?

Well, let's go ahead and move to the next motion, which is I'd like to move to amend the clerk file by adding attachment one of the central staff memo, which includes the council conditions.

Is there a second?

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the clerk file by adding attachment one.

And we'll go ahead and call the roll on that amendment.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the amendment to add attachment one to the clerk file?

Herbold?

Yes.

Flores?

Aye.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the clerk file is amended.

Any final comments on the clerk file as amended?

Great.

So will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation that the clerk file be granted as conditioned and amended.

Herbal.

Yes.

Flores.

Aye.

Morales.

Yes.

Chair Peterson.

Yes.

All in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation that clerk file be granted as condition will be set to the August 9 city council meeting.

Thank you to our presenters.

Will the clerk please read the short title of the next agenda item into the record.

Agenda item eight, council bill 120135, an ordinance granting ARE Seattle number 33 LLC, a permit to construct, maintain and operate below-grade private utility lines under and across Roy Street, west of 8th Avenue North, and Dexter Avenue North, north of Mercer Street, for a 15-year term, renewable for one successive 15-year term, for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you, colleagues.

This Council 120135 would grant final approval for a structure term permit to build, operate, and maintain these private utility tunnels under city streets for a district energy system in South Lake Union, Council District 7. The tunnels would collect waste heat from Seattle Public Utilities wastewater system and deliver that heat to buildings on three blocks planned and under development.

These tunnels would run below Dexter Avenue North and Roy Street.

We can go ahead and welcome back our central staff person, Lish Whitson.

Thank you very much.

Do you have any opening comments before we turn it over to SDOT?

Sure.

So in December 2020, council provided its preliminary recommendation in support of these tunnels.

So this is the final approval.

It would last for 15 years and can be renewed once.

Thank you.

And welcome back, Beverly Barnett.

This is the Lish Whitson Beverly Barnett show today.

And we really appreciate all of your work to get these pieces of legislation to us.

Go ahead, Beverly.

Yes, we very much appreciate the committee time.

So Amy Gray is our expert on this, and she has a very crisp PowerPoint that will explain the location and the nature of the permit.

Hello.

Like Beverly said, my name is Amy Gray, and I work for the Seattle Department of Transportation on the Significant Structure Term Permits.

Again, I want to thank you.

You had a lot on your schedule today, so I appreciate the time that you have dedicated to hearing this proposal.

Next slide, please.

So plagiarizing list as well.

Again, we're here to seek a new permit for private utility lines that connect the 601 Dexter Avenue North building, the 701 Dexter Avenue North building, and the 800 Mercer Street.

And this is associated with the Mega Block, the Mercer Mega Block.

Next step.

So also as mentioned before, this is the second step in the process.

Council adopted the resolution that provided conceptual approval.

And what this council bill passed will do is issue the permit and the permission to ARE District Energy to construct and operate this heating energy system.

There's some minor changes that were taken out of the proposal for redundant systems.

So it's now just the simple connection covered under the original conceptual approval.

The council bill and the ordinance provide the terms and conditions of the permit, including an annual fee, which for 2021 will be $4,482.

There's a bond associated with it.

There's also insurance protections for the city and inspection and maintenance requirements for the structure.

And there's also provisions to protect other utilities that are already in the right of way with other agencies like SPU and SCL.

And there's also always the remove and restore the right of way clause.

This is a permit.

It would require council action to revoke the permit.

But if that ever happens in the future, which is highly unlikely, the permit holder is obligated to remove and restore the right-of-way.

So the next slide, I'm going to turn over to Todd from Aerie District Energy to describe a little bit of the mechanics of the program.

Thank you, and I appreciate the time and opportunity to come and talk today about our project.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Alexander, we're a life science developer.

We've been a part of Seattle for almost 20 years.

We're now starting to move into South Lake Union.

The buildings that we build have a high demand for outside air, which means they have a high demand for heating, which has traditionally been done by utilization of fossil fuels.

And so the system that we have, come up with, and the term permit is part of building it, would take that demand and tap into the sewer with a heat exchanger to harvest waste heat that would supplement 80% of the heating demand in the building.

So another way to say that is it's 80, we're taking those building, 80% of the demand off of requiring fossil fuels.

It's a pretty interesting opportunity for us, and I think this is pretty exciting stuff.

So the way that our system is designed is 701 Dexter is the first building that's being constructed.

It will have what we'll call the central plant.

that taps the sewer in ways that we can harvest heat.

And then the term permit we're requesting allows us to connect each one of the buildings with a condenser loop that completes the circuit and allows us to move the harvested heat between parcels.

Next slide.

So again, this is some of the benefits that I just talked about with number of square feet, we're roughly 1.4 million square feet of high energy using life science projects.

There's an estimated annual savings from the system we're putting in place.

And then the CO2 savings that is anticipated from moving away from fossil fuels.

Next slide, please.

So here I'm just wrapping it up, showing you the location within South Lake Union.

It is in District 7 and associated with the Mercer Mega Block, as I mentioned before.

And that's the end of the presentation.

And I am here to answer questions and so is Todd.

Thank you very much.

And thank you for the thorough conditions that you placed on this project.

Council Member Morales.

Thank you.

I will admit I've got probably some pretty basic questions.

Maybe this is for Lish.

But I'm interested in, first of all, just understanding where SBU stands on this project and what costs, if any, the city would incur for operation of a private utility.

Do you want me to answer, Lish?

I can talk about the cost.

There's no cost to the city to operate this.

It's actually, we get revenue in the amount of about $4,000 a year.

For all-term permits, they are required to pay to the city an annual fee for basically the private occupation of the right-of-way.

Council adopted many years ago a fee methodology that sets out how this is calculated for all-term permits.

It takes the adjacent property's land value and also multiplies it sort of on the privatization, occupation, reduction of public use for the traveling public.

Since this is below grade, the factor's not huge.

So they are required to pay a fee every year.

So we receive that, so there's no cost to the city.

It's probably worth noting that where we actually harvest the heat is actually King County infrastructure.

Okay.

And so do you charge tenants in the buildings for use of the service?

So the way to think about this system is it's similar to when a building has solar panels on it.

It's part of the building.

The tenant is an occupant in the building.

And they're essentially leasing from us a certain amount of utility.

And in this scenario, we're creating that utility through the heat recovery system and district energy loop.

OK.

And is there anybody from SBU on here?

Just curious what the take is.

As part of the construction permit, and I think if I'm correct, it's the street improvement permit that is issued by SDOT for the construction of all the work that has to happen in the infrastructure and the right of way.

They do coordinate all the construction work with SPU.

I'm not sure if that addresses your question or if it's sort of like an ongoing monitoring, checking in with SPU, but they are part of the review of the technical engineered drawings.

Okay, well, and you said that it's really King County infrastructure that you're tapping into, okay.

And so King County infrastructure, however, we have pulled permits through SDCI, which requires coordination with SPU.

So they are in the loop on this at multiple levels.

And then if I may, Chair, just one more question.

Can you talk about what, if any, liability the city has for the tunnel operation if there's an issue with that?

Yeah, so what the term permit ordinance has, which is the council bill before you, is all the obligations and protections that the city requires.

So, as far as the physical integrity of it, they are required to submit inspections every two years by a certified inspection engineer.

And then on the alternate years, the city sort of does an initial like just a check in with them to make sure that there's nothing changed substantially.

If there is a natural disaster event, they are required to assess the damage to the system as immediately as possible in the case of, say, an earthquake and let us know what what, if anything, and to the degree of damage to the system.

We also have the ordinance bond when it's just this case, it's $15,000 and that's in place for the life of the project.

So if the ARE unlikely, although walks away from the project and these private structures are still there, we keep that bond and it's to cover the cost of Estat in the city going out and removing that from the right of way and restoring it into the current conditions.

And then another protection the city has is the insurance.

We have a very strict insurance requirement that is determined for all term permits.

It's a template for protecting the city.

Risk management gives us the language.

I don't know a lot of insurance language, technical terms, but basically it protects the city as an additional insured.

So we have a number of checks within the ordinance that minimize the risk to the city.

And in addition to the conditions that Amy mentioned, there's also a requirement that they have a duty to defend the city against lawsuits and hold the city harmless.

Yes.

Thank you.

Another thing I would add just to show our commitment.

So during during pre construction, we were approached by a number of groups that wanted to partner with us and own this system.

And Alexandria actually decided that, no, we wanted to own this system.

We felt like it was the right thing to do.

We're long term holders.

were a big part of the city and just felt like that this was for the, we were doing this to help build life science.

We weren't, we didn't want to pollute the idea or the concept with a private utility provider that was offering some pretty interesting proposals to us.

And the ordinance, if in the event ARE decides that they're selling the building into a successor entity, there's provisions in the ordinance that specify the same obligations that were placed on the original permit holder are applicable to any subsequent property holder, and they have to abide by all the same levels of protection.

Thank you, Council Member Morales for those questions.

I know when this was First, propose people excited about the reduction of fossil fuel use and we need to make sure the city is protected in case anything goes wrong.

So we appreciate.

the city staff and our central staff, staying focused on those, having to bake in those conditions into the documents to protect us in a number of different situations that could happen in a negative way, but also excited about this innovation to see if we can reduce the fossil fuel use in a sustainable way.

So thank you very much.

Council members, any other questions about this?

Just checking, see if any hands are raised.

Okay, well, council members, I'd like to now move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120135, item eight on our agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

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

Are there any final comments?

Okay.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that the bill be approved for forwarding to the full council?

Herbold?

Yes.

Juarez?

Aye.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries, and the committee recommendation is that the bill be sent for approval to the August 9 City Council meeting.

Thank you, everybody, for being here on this item.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Item nine, we're going to have a public hearing.

And just a heads up, depending on who calls in for the public hearing, what the comments are, we may, I will likely ask that we suspend the rules and vote on the item because it's accepting properties that have already been purchased to protect our watershed.

But we can talk about that further.

Just wanted committee members to have a heads up on that.

Will the clerk please read the short title of the first, or the ninth agenda item into the record?

Agenda item nine, Council Bill 120146, an ordinance relating to the City Light Department, accepting statutory warranty deeds to the Beeson, Brecht, Chen, Crosson, Frasonc, Judd, Marshall, McElfresh, Metzler and DiLaguno, and Rasmussen properties in Skagit County, Washington, and the Ring Family Limited Partnership property in Snohomish County.

all for salmonid habitat protection purposes, for public hearing, briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you.

These numerous items are part of Seattle City Light's obligations under the Endangered Species Act.

And the city is committed to contribute to the conservation of important salmon and trout habitat in the Skagit and Tolt watersheds.

These deeds are for a number of such parcels along those rivers.

The city's funding is frequently combined with grant funds to increase the positive impact.

Acceptance of these deeds is a formal step in the process.

And again, depending on the content of any public hearing speakers, I'll likely ask committee members to vote on this item today, and I'll make the appropriate motions to suspend the rules to do that.

We can go ahead and we can either have the public hearing first or after.

I don't actually see any speakers.

I will need to open and close the public hearing.

Why don't we go ahead and have the presentation first to see if anybody wants to call in.

So we will go ahead and welcome Seattle City Light and also our city council central staff.

Eric McConaghy's here.

Eric, did you want to have any opening comments before we turn it over to Seattle City Light?

Thank you, Chair Peterson.

Good morning.

Eric McConaghy, Central Staff.

I would just mention that the reason why this is in the form of an ordinance for the committee, which would then move on to the full council, is that the city charter requires that the city accept property through legislation, through an ordinance.

So because of that, while the previous law gave City Light the authority to purchase the properties, the final and sort of official acceptance has to move in this fashion.

And then public hearing today is because of some of these properties, there's some deeds of right through Grants to the State of Washington to protect this property in perpetuity.

in keeping with grant funding that was received by City Light and used for the property.

So that's why the public hearing is happening.

Other than that, So I'm just stitching a little bit more than you already covered, Chair Peterson.

And with that, I think I'll let it go.

Yeah.

And thank you very much for your memo.

That was very helpful to have to dig into all these documents and summarize it for the city council and the public.

So thank you for that excellent memo for us.

You're welcome.

And we also are delighted to see our general manager, Debra Smith here and her team.

So general manager Smith, please take it away.

Thank you so much.

I am having a technology challenge day today.

So you all keep freezing up on me.

So I'm not going to say much except that yes, this is an acceptance of previously taken or previous properties purchased.

It's part of really an exciting program that was part of our last license.

And I'm excited.

Denise Cromwell, who I've had the opportunity to work with quite a lot at City Light.

She's a leader of the Seattle Silence Breakers.

And she is also the woman in charge of this program, which is super cool.

So I'm just going to turn it over to her before I freeze up and get stuck mid-sentence.

So take it away, team.

I'm looking for it to be very super cool now.

Well, hopefully we can, uh, um, deliver on that.

Um, so good morning, everyone.

Thank you very much for being able to come before the committee today to present this.

I'll be talking about, um, the endangered species act deed acceptance ordinance and these properties that we purchased.

And Mara, if you could proceed with the next slide, that'd be great.

So just for a quick overview, I'm going to give you some background on the ESA Early Action Program itself, and then delve into some of the specifics about this ordinance, and then present a few photographs of some properties that have been purchased under this program, and then answer any questions that you may have.

So for background, the Endangered Species Act, or ESA, lands the program It began in 2000 with the ESA listing of Chinook, salmon, and bull trout as threatened in Puget Sound.

And the city developed an entire program about it.

And this portion of the program focuses on fish habitat in the Skagit and Tolt watersheds and authorized city-like to purchase properties to protect fish habitat.

for those species in those watersheds.

And when the initial Skagit license was made in 1995, there were no listed fish species in the watershed.

But since then, there are now three, because steelhead were also listed in 2007. And so when the Gorge Two Tunnel project was being done several years ago, back in the early 2010s, The city went forward with trying to get coverage under the Endangered Species Act since we didn't have that when the schedule license first came out.

And so a portion of this program, the ESA Lands Program, is to cover for that mitigation until we have this now, the upcoming schedule license that's going on.

And essentially what mitigation these lands provide is to help mitigate impacts on any spawning or rearing habitat for these species.

And since the program's inception, we've covered 3,700 acres being purchased and protected.

And that has been funded through $5.9 million in City Light funds and $5.2 million in grant funds from multiple sources.

Okay, Mara, thank you.

And then specifically to this ordinance the before you this year.

It includes the purchase of 12 properties totaling 278 acres in the schedule watershed.

that were purchased from 2017 to 2020, and then accepting the deeds of right, which are required by the grant.

And the deeds of rights essentially state that the city will protect the property with its habitat conditions.

And since that was already what the purpose of the ESA lands program was, that is something we feel is very acceptable to do.

And the only requirement being that if we were to sell the properties, we would need to purchase a similar property to substitute for that.

But that's not the intent of this program, and these deeds of right protect the properties in perpetuity.

And so for these 12 properties, they were funded by $624,000 in City Light funds and $475,000 in Salmon Recovery Funding Board, which is a Washington state grant funding over the years of the purchase.

Next slide.

So this is to give you an idea of where in the Skagit watershed these properties have been purchased.

The labeled properties are directly tied to the properties that are before you today in the deed acceptance ordinance.

The other properties in red are properties previously purchased under the ESA Lands Program.

And then properties in yellow are representing wildlife lands properties that were purchased, and that's part of the Skagit mitigation program.

And with that, Mara, if you go to the next slide.

This property is one that was purchased previously, but it's very similar to the Marble Mount LLC property that's in this ordinance, and it is a Skagit main stem property.

And we're just trying to give folks a feel of the different types of properties that we purchase and the different waters that we purchased properties on.

And you can't see it, I guess it's off the screen, but this and the next two photographs are taken by Keith Lazell.

And these are his professional photographs that we hired him to do, because I can't take this kind of picture with any camera that I could ever be given.

Mara, next picture, please.

Then this is Preston Creek, which is representative of the Judd property, because that's on Preston Creek.

Again, this is a much smaller body of water, obviously, compared to the Skagit and the main stem Skagit.

And next slide.

This last picture is of the Rasmussen property, which is on the Cascade River.

Obviously, another main stem river, but nowhere near, again, as large as the Skagit River.

And with that, I'd be happy to take any questions that you all may have.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for purchasing these properties and we're here to approve the statutory warranty deeds.

I can go ahead and open and close the public hearing that might help us decide whether we have any questions.

So council members, if there's no objection, I'll open the public hearing for this item.

and i am seeing that we don't have any new speakers we don't have any speakers for this at all uh...

but i do need to formally open and close the public hearing but first uh...

folks from our information technology team do you also see no speakers sign up for this public hearing there are no public hearing registrants okay thank you so uh...

I'm going to go ahead and open and close the public hearing.

Before I open the public hearing, I'll remind the public that it's the same procedures we use for regular public comment period.

So in short, people have two minutes to speak.

They press star six.

We have a 10-second warning.

The public hearing on Council Bill 120146 is now open.

and we have confirmed that there are no speakers signed up.

So I will go ahead and close the public hearing on Council Bill 120146, it's now closed.

and people can still write to us at council at Seattle.gov.

We'll probably move to vote this out of committee today, but there'll still be time before it's voted on at full council.

People have comments on this.

So turn it back to council members.

Yes, Council Member Morales.

Thank you.

I just took a tour of the Cedar River watershed with some folks from City Light and SPU.

And so it just raises the question for me about what conversations you've had with tribes about the transfer of property, fishing rights, all of the access to the land.

I'm just curious how that process works, if you could talk about that a little bit.

Absolutely.

In the Skagit Watershed, where these properties were purchased, we are part of the Skagit Watershed Council, and there's an entire protection strategy that was developed that essentially prioritizes properties for purchase and the three Skagit-oriented tribes.

have all, or are all members of the Skagit Watershed Council and participated in the development of the protection strategy.

So these are essentially approved through the strategy and then through the hierarchy of, and the process of the Skagit Watershed Council before I purchase a property, particularly since these are with grant funds.

It goes to the protection committee at the Skagit Watershed Council, then it goes to, and there's tribal representatives on that.

Then it goes to the technical committee for their approval.

Again, tribal representation on that.

And then it gets voted on by the full board of the Skagit Watershed Council.

Again, and there, I believe, yes, there are currently, there's currently representation by the tribes on the Skagit Watershed Council board.

So that's that process.

And then we also, just through, I very much work with several of the tribes and tribal organizations on the Skagit.

and work with them on restoration of these properties.

And so usually when we're Looking at a particular area, I'll reach out to, because most of them are more restoration oriented, and I will ask them, hey, what are your thoughts on this?

Because we have to look at it since we're going to be managing the properties of how that would be as a long-term cost.

And so trying to get their ideas on if this is something that's readily manageable for us and how we can fit it in with future projects.

And we've done that also.

Certainly one of our other projects became part of a mitigation project that Skagit County needed to do for some illegal fill that they did during a flooding event.

And Skagit River System Co-op and the Swinomish Tribe in particular were very helpful in doing that.

And that took place in part on one of our ESA lands.

Thank you.

Council members, any other questions on this item?

Council members, if there's, because we had no public hearing speakers on this, if there's, oh, Council Member Herbold, hi.

I'm so slow on the draw this morning, I'm really sorry.

Just as you're about ready to move things on, I'm just like, here I am.

Thank you so much.

Just a quick question.

I noticed that the needs of the right to use documents indicated that those right to use documents were signed, some of them as early as, many of them as early as 2017. Can you just explain why it seems like, is that the end of the property negotiation process?

If so, why did it take so long to get these to council?

Part of using grant funds, is that we also are required to provide match for grant funds.

And on some of the properties that we purchase, Marble Mount LLC is one of them.

It's a pretty large property and has an upland section that doesn't technically qualify for the grant funds.

So then we're using some City Light funds towards the purchase of that property.

And pardon me, my dog is barking in the background.

So with that, any additional funds that City Light puts towards a purchase can be used as match towards either a current grant or a future grant.

And so as to maximize our leverage of our City Light dollars, which helps leverage other dollars in the basin, we wait to formalize and record that deed until we have essentially assigned all that money to grants, and some of those grants just happened.

And so once that's finally done, that's why we then bring forward the deed of right.

So that's why that one in particular is so late, because I believe it got matched to five grants, which is a record I'm proud of, so.

Thank you so much for that explanation.

That makes perfect sense.

Certainly.

And I did realize, sorry, that for Council Member Morales' question, that For tribes, we also, our lands are public, and we have, they're open for hunting and fishing during legal seasons, and we do work with the tribes and the state, but particularly with the tribes to allow, in particular, hunting, because it's been harder to find open hunting areas for tribal members in the Skagit Valley.

So I'm sorry, I missed that portion of your question earlier.

Thank you.

Thank you, council members for these questions, and really appreciate the thorough answers.

And because we've had no public speakers during the public hearing, if there's no objection, the council rule relating to committees not voting on- Recording stopped.

Recording in progress.

If there's no objection, the council rule relating to committees not voting on legislation on the same day a public hearing is held will be suspended so that we can vote on the item today.

Hearing no objection, the council rule is suspended and the committee will proceed with a vote.

Council members, I now move that the committee recommend passage of this Council Bill 120146, item nine on our agenda.

Is there a second?

Thank you.

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

Any final comments?

Will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation that the bill be approved for forwarding to the full council?

Herbold?

Yes.

Flores?

Aye.

Morales?

Yes.

Chair Peterson?

Yes.

Four in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation is that the bill be sent for approval to the August 9 city council meeting.

All right, council members, we're on our last item and there is no vote on this item, but I hope you can stay for it so we have a quorum.

Will the clerk please read the title of the final agenda item into the record?

agenda item 10 presentation on the outside financial audit of Seattle Public Utilities for briefing and discussion.

Thank you.

Every year Seattle Public Utilities has its financial statements audited by an outside independent auditor using government accounting standards.

Each of these three business lines, water, drainage, wastewater, and solid waste, has separate financial statements.

The independent auditor, Moss Adams, reviewed the utility's financial statements.

I'm pleased to have them here today to report on the results of the audit.

As I understand it, we have good news.

The audits are clean, meaning that the independent auditor issued an unmodified opinion for each of the separate funds and found no material weaknesses, no significant deficiencies.

And we do have Brian Goodnight from our city council central staff here.

Appreciate that.

Before we turn it over to the auditors, just to offer our central staff if they want to say anything to intro.

Council member, I don't have any introductory remarks.

So I'll just let Moss Adams take it away.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Welcome Moss Adams.

Please go ahead.

Good morning.

I'm Todd Ryland.

I'm the senior manager on the engagements for the audits for Seattle Public Utilities.

And I believe there's a presentation to go with this.

Somebody sharing or do I need to share it?

Normally you would share it.

Okay.

I can do that.

One second.

screen.

Perfect.

So as I mentioned, I'm Todd Riley reporting on the financial or not on the financial results, but on our audit of the financial statements for the three enterprise funds for Seattle Public Utilities.

So the purpose of our audits, the financial statements of SPU are used by the Washington State Auditor's Office as in their evaluation of the city's financial statements.

And this is a way that we can really avoid duplication of effort so that SPU does not have to go through an audit with us as well as with the State Auditor's Office.

The Auditor's Office is able to rely on our work there.

Additionally, as I mentioned, the financial statements are rolled up into the city's comprehensive annual financial report.

And the audit opinions for each of the funds are also used in official statements for bond issuances.

They can also be made available to other stakeholders if needed.

And I also wanted to note, I have a thank you slide at the very end, but the help of SPUs employees and management was very instrumental this year.

We had a couple of bond issuances that were coming up for a couple of the funds.

So we had a little bit of an accelerated timeline to deliver the audit reports and very big thank you to the SPU employees and team for being very responsive on all of our requests to help facilitate that, to get us through our items so that we could get those audits out a little bit early this year.

So the scope of our audits, as Chair Peterson mentioned, we do have a separate audit for each of the three utilities.

So the Water Fund, the Drainage and Wastewater Fund, and the Solid Waste Fund.

SPU management is responsible for the preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements.

Our responsibility as the auditors is to express an opinion on the financial statements, specifically whether or not they are presented fairly in all material respects and in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles.

And when we say in all material respects, we have this concept of materiality, which is a judgmental number that we establish in our planning phase of what is an amount that may impact the decision making of the users of the financial statements.

So to that regard, there are certain de minimis items that might be slightly off.

We don't necessarily look into every single item because that would be cost prohibitive.

what I'm referring to when I say within all material respects.

Additionally, we test certain systems within the structure of the internal controls, and we can rely on the controls that are in place to also help us reduce the amount of substantive procedures we need to perform.

So, if there's a strong control structure in place, as there is with SPU, then that's able to also help our audit run a bit more efficiently.

the reports issued.

We had unmodified opinions for each of the separate funds.

Um, as Chair Peterson mentioned, an unmodified opinion is what you might call a clean audit opinion.

Um, we also issued reports on the internal control matters that we, um, had no material weaknesses, no significant deficiencies in the current year.

Additionally, as part of our audit procedures, we would any significant issues that we feel would merit council's attention, we would also provide written recommendations and happy to report we had no written recommendations for this year.

There were one or two small recommendations that were, if you will, best practices, suggestions that have been communicated to management, but nothing significant and nothing that would merit the attention of council.

So our audits are structured with a risk-based approach so that we look at the areas where it's most likely that a misstatement will occur, and we look at those areas through a little bit tighter lens and take a closer look at them.

So these are some of the areas that we looked at in more detail.

The largest areas on there that we spend the most time with would be the utility plant and the related accounts, as well as the bonds and related accounts and the regulatory assets, the assets and liabilities, credits and deferred accounts.

But all of these areas do merit special attention, if you will, when we're going through our audit work.

Within those accounts and throughout the financial statements, there's also some significant estimates.

As you can imagine, estimates require some input and judgment on the part of management to record those assets and liabilities.

So we also look at those with a little bit more scrutiny.

Some of the more important ones here, the allowance for doubtful accounts, so making an assessment of accounts receivable and how much of those are actually collectible, as well as the recovery periods for utility plant, which would be how many years is a particular asset going to be depreciated over, as well as the environmental remediation costs and estimates, and then finally the post-employment benefit obligations and the pension liabilities.

So I touched on this briefly before, but the audit standards require that we communicate certain items to you as those charge with governance over the utilities.

Um, so are our responsibility as the auditors is to express an opinion on whether the financial statements are prepared by management with your oversight.

Um, and fairly presented in all material respects.

So even though we are performing the audit, it does not necessarily relieve you or management of your responsibility for the preparation or oversight of those statements.

Additionally, our audits are performed in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards and making sure that these statements are presented in accordance with the standards promulgated by GASB or the Governmental Accounting Standards Board and is performed according to the government auditing standards as issued by the Comptroller General of the United States.

An important thing to note here is that our design is designed or our audit is designed to obtain reasonable rather than absolute assurance.

And this goes back to that concept of materiality.

If we were trying to obtain absolute assurance, there's just no cost benefit scenario that would make that feasible.

So to that point, we focus on riskier areas and we rely on statistical sampling to get to that reasonable level of assurance.

We also consider the internal controls over financial reporting.

We do not express an opinion on the effectiveness of those controls.

However, as I mentioned, we can use our understanding of those controls and our testing of those controls to customize our audit approach and make it more efficient.

And then finally, what we're doing with this presentation right here, we're required to communicate our findings that in our judgment are relevant to your responsibilities for oversight.

So specific matters to be communicated.

Our audits were performed according to the planned scope and timing as provided by our consultant agreement.

Additionally, significant accounting policies that are used by SPU are disclosed in the footnotes to the financial statements, and we noted there were no changes to accounting policies during the year, either in their application, as well as no new standards that were implemented during the year.

And then finally, the financial statement disclosures were consistent, clear, and understandable.

We're required to communicate any significant difficulties encountered during the audit as well as any disagreements with management.

We are pleased to report we had neither of those during the year, no disagreements or significant difficulties.

If we find any material misstatements, whether or not they are corrected or uncorrected in the final financial statements, we are required to communicate those as well.

Again, we had no material misstatements that were identified in the current year.

As far as we're aware, management did not consult with any other accountants, and there were no other significant issues that arose during the audits.

And again, thank you to the SPU team.

Again, their involvement and prompt attention to our matters was instrumental in getting the audits done.

early this year and we just noted the tone at the top and the attitude from management was very open and collaborative and it was also very instrumental in helping us to achieve efficient audits this year.

So that is all I have and I'm here for questions as well if anybody has them on the financial statements or my presentation.

Thank you very much.

Council members, as you may recall, we enjoyed similar positive results recently for Seattle City Light.

This fiscal responsibility from both city-owned utilities has a positive impact on hundreds of thousands of people in Seattle.

Clean audits help us to earn high marks from the bond rating agencies, which result in lower interest rates on debt for capital projects for these infrastructure-heavy operations.

And this, in turn, generates cost savings that can be passed on to ratepayers.

Since utility rates are regressive, this is very important as incomes that have lower income to pay a higher proportion for their utility bills.

So this work is very important.

So any questions about the audit results here on the three lines of business?

Council Member Herbold.

Yeah, just a formatting or structuring question, and maybe Chair Peterson, you're just doing things differently and more efficiently.

When I was chair of the committee with SPU Oversight, Moss Adams used to come to us with an opening report, or I think it was called an entrance report, and then afterwards an exit report, and that was, I just structured our committee discussions that way, because it was recommended that we do it that way at the time.

I'm just wondering if that's changed, or is this just a matter of being more efficient with our committee time?

I think that might have been related to COVID and the suspension of committee meetings during the extra budget process that we had last year as well.

So I think that we just didn't do it for that reason.

Yes, I know our exit presentation last year ended up, we were delaying it, delaying it, delaying it.

And then one of the other options we can have rather than presentation is to provide a letter.

So last year's exit ended up being a more formalized letter to the committee.

And then we kind of had the same approach this last fall with our entrance.

We just couldn't quite squeeze it into the agenda schedule.

So we provided an entrance letter, but we wanted to make sure to show up to provide an exit presentation this year.

As you mentioned, it has been a little while since we've gotten the chance to come directly to you.

And again, just really please, not just with the findings, but I'm always happy to see the tone at the top reference as it relates to this work that you do.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Council members, any other questions for our independent auditor on Seattle Public Utilities financial books?

Great.

Well, thank you for being here with us today.

Todd, appreciate it.

And council.

Thank you.

And council members, that was the last item on our agenda.

So if there's nothing else for the good of the order, I'll go ahead and conclude the meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, this concludes the August 4, 2021 meeting of the Transportation Utilities Committee.

We will meet again on Wednesday, August 18. Thank you for attending.

We are adjourned.

What an exciting meeting it was.

Thank you.

Recording stopped.