Parks and City Light Committee 5/20/2026

Great.

Thank you, Seattle Channel.

Good afternoon.

It's good to see all you folks here today.

Today is, I'm gonna call our meeting to order.

Today is May 20th.

This is the meeting of the Parks in City Light Committee.

It will now come to order.

It is 2.03.

I am Deborah Juarez.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Strauss?

Here.

Council Member Saka?

Here.

Council Member Rivera?

Present.

Vice Chair Kettle?

Here.

Chair Juarez?

Here.

Chair, there are five members present.

Great.

We have a quorum.

Let's move on in our agenda to approval of the agenda.

If there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Not seeing any or hearing an objection, the agenda is indeed adopted.

Today, folks, we will have three public comment periods.

There will be a regular public comment period before items on the agenda and comments should be related to the items on today's agenda and within the purview of the committee.

The second is a public hearing on the first agenda item, Council Bill 121199, which we are required to have for items that grant deeds of right to the State of Washington.

Comments during this public hearing should be related to that specific Council Bill.

The third is a public hearing on the fourth agenda item and that's Council Bill 121211 which we are required under state law for applications for current use taxation.

Comments during this public hearing should be related to the specific council bill So today we have six ordinances and one resolution on the agenda I'm going to briefly go through is the chair what our agenda looks like and then we'll get going So as I shared there are six ordinances one resolution The first ordinance in which we will have the public hearing and then I'll have to suspend the rules to vote is an Endangered Species Act land deeds acceptance.

This presentation speaks to the utilities' environmental mitigation efforts under the Endangered Species Act.

This is part of the City Light's ongoing work to help protect critical habitat in the Skagit River and Tolte River watersheds.

there'll be a public hearing.

The presentation will be presented by Seattle City Light and those folks when they get up to the table could introduce themselves.

The second ordinance is a, oh I should add that the first ordinance, I understand that Seattle City Light has a five page PowerPoint to go with their presentation.

The second ordinance is an easement allowance in which the City Light is granting a portion of fee owned property in Bellevue to Puget Sound Energy for fair market value payment.

That is a seven-page PowerPoint which they will walk us through as well.

The third ordinance is an easement allowance in which City Light grants a portion of fee-owned property in Skyway, unincorporated King County, to King County for a fair market value payment for the purpose of installing curb ramps and sidewalks.

Again, this presentation will be presented by Seattle City Light.

The fourth ordinance, again we will move to suspend the rules because we will have a public hearing, is approving the application of a P patch for District 1 for the current use taxation under the King County Public Benefit Rating System.

And my understanding is this presentation will be with our own Karina Bull from Central Staff and we have folks from Department of Natural Resources and Parks and Grow.

The fifth and sixth ordinances authorize Seattle Parks and Recreation to renew leases with the Madison Park Cooperative Preschool in District 3 to operate and manage the Madison Park Bath House and with Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool in District 5 to operate and manage the Victory Heights Shelter House for an additional 10 years.

Both of these contracts have public benefits and the contract duration is 10 years.

This presentation will be by Michelle Finnegan, the SCL Public Parks Interim Superintendent and her staff.

The final item on the agenda is a resolution about data centers.

This resolution comes as a rapid increase of large data centers, mega data centers being built and continues to boom in AI.

The resolution addresses the need for city departments to take a look at the long-term effects of data centers on our city and residents and our natural resources.

Today will be just presentation only.

We will not be voting on that.

So we have six pieces of legislation and then, of course, one resolution.

Discussion only.

And I just want to add that Council Member Lynn, who is the Chair of Land Use, has his committee on the same day as us, except his committee is at 9.30 in the morning.

So on June 3rd, Councilmember Lin at 9.30 in his committee will be voting on and discussing a data center moratorium.

And then on June 3rd at two o'clock, we come next, and hopefully at that point we'll be able to have more discussion and vote on the data center resolution so the public and everybody, including staff, will have more information and more coverage about data centers and where we're headed.

So with that, we're gonna now move to...

Okay, Paul, please notify remote speakers to check email.

Okay, for corrected passcode.

Okay, from IT, okay.

So that's the note everybody, the secret note I just got.

Please notify remote speakers to check email for a corrected passcode.

Okay, public comment.

We will now use the hybrid public comment period.

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

Clerk, how many folks do we got signed up today?

Currently we have 19 in-person speakers signed up and nine remote speakers for 28 total.

We have, say it again, we have how many in-person?

19 in person.

Okay, and?

Nine remote.

Okay, great.

Okay, since we have 29, so that's less than 30 people, everybody will get two minutes.

Is that correct, Paul?

Don't you have to read something else in there?

Are you ready to read the instructions?

You want to read the rules?

Yeah.

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

The public comment period is up to 60 minutes unless extended at the discretion of the committee chair.

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

We will begin with in-person speakers and then move to remote public speakers until the public comment period has ended.

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

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not end their comments within the allotted time.

The public comment period is now open for in-person commenters.

Hold up, Paul.

Let's do this.

Let's start with the first 10 in person, and then we'll go to the nine remote, and then we'll come back for the last nine in person.

So let's cue up the first 10, and if people could be ready to go three at a time close to the microphone, then we can just move along quickly.

So go ahead and start naming off the first three.

The first 10 in-person speakers are Emily Johnson, Evan Sutton, Michelle Hausman, Audrey Wang Goslin, Ann Goodrich, Alicia Gousen, Bradley Doche, Rebecca Young, Patrick McKee, and Amelia Albert.

So the first three are

The first three are Emily Johnson, Evan Sutton, and Michelle Hausmann.

If you three could come up and queue up, that'd be great.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

So the first thing it's important to understand is that these data centers are not in any way a normal business.

Companies often object to what they call being singled out for differential treatment like higher rates for power.

But in this case, that's absurd.

The large language models that require these massive data centers didn't exist even five years ago, and yet they're projected to use between nine and 20% of all US electricity by 2030. An impact like that absolutely merits special scrutiny.

With their voracious appetite, they have singled themselves out, and we have a legitimate interest in assessing what part we want to play in supporting that appetite.

The silver lining is that as a result of that undeniably legitimate interest, the Seattle City Council has some leverage over these companies, even when they intend to site their data centers in Tukwila, since this committee has oversight of Seattle City Light, which would serve them.

So it's incumbent upon us to help to protect our neighbors in Tukwila too and set really high minimum standards for under what circumstances, if any, we decide to provide them the massive amount of electricity that they desire.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Council Chair Juarez.

As a District 5 resident, I'd like to thank you for your leadership on this issue.

I'd like to address something that I'm sure we will hear from someone today and that we are hearing over and over.

Because it is part of a coordinated misinformation campaign that the AI industry is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to push in all of our communities.

It's something that is very familiar to all of us because it comes straight out of the big tobacco and big oil playbook.

What they are saying, and what we will note out here, is that data centers are nothing new.

You need data centers to run your phone, to check your email.

Seattle already has 30 plus data centers, no big deal.

It's true that Seattle already has 30 plus data centers.

And those 30 plus data centers, according to reporting, draw a total of around 155 megawatts of power.

The five proposed hyperscale data centers that kicked off this whole shit show, pardon my French, would have drawn an approximate 370 megawatts of power.

And these are babies in the hyperscale data center world.

Most hyperscale data centers today are being measured in gigawatts.

Comparing the 30 that we have in Seattle to the ones that they are trying to build here and that they are trying to build all over the country is like saying my bearded dragon is the same as Godzilla.

It is preposterous.

It is intentional misinformation being spread, and we cannot allow the industry to confuse voters on the difference between a traditional data center that powers your phone and a hyperscale AI data center whose only purpose is to replace jobs.

They want to replace everyone from nurses to fast food cashiers to the very agents who drive them with chatbots.

That is the purpose of these data centers, and we must regulate them.

I'm going to ask you a question.

I normally don't do this, but I'm just going to take the chair's privilege here.

What is your name again?

Evan Sutton.

Evan.

Evan, if you can get a hold of our office later to kind of walk us through some of the, I had not heard the term hyper before, even though we've been doing the research and then some, and I'll share more later.

So if you can reach out to our office, someone in my staff is watching, so they'll who do I, not you Paul, he'll let someone else know from our office, come out and talk to you.

And then we can get some more information from you.

I'd be happy to, thank you.

Thank you, sir.

The next public speaker is Michelle Hausman followed by Audrey Wang-Goslin and then Anne Goodrich.

Hi, thank you for taking my comment.

My name is Michelle Hausmann, and I'm here today to urge you to vote yes for the moratorium of data centers in the city of Seattle.

I am concerned about the data center's impact on our power grid, the cost of electricity, and the usage of water that these centers require.

also that we have not done our due diligence and fully researched all potential outcomes.

But mostly, though, I am concerned about our neighbors who will live in proximity to these centers.

What will it be like for them to live next to these visual blight of windowless industrial complexes that creates constant noise and air pollution?

I know I wouldn't want to live next to one of those, and I'm sure anyone on the council wouldn't want to live next to one of those either.

As a City Council member, one of your roles is to create policies that shape our community, and I would hope that you would choose policies that support the physical, social, and mental well-being of your constituents over the interests of out-of-state corporations.

Please choose Seattle, choose transparency, and choose your constituents.

Vote yes on the moratorium.

Thank you.

Before you speak, let me ask our clerk a question.

Paul, we posted the proposed resolution, correct?

It's online.

Okay.

Go ahead.

My name is Audrey Wangusna.

I'm an electrical engineer specializing in power and renewable energy, and I live in District 2. I sit on the board of directors of 350 Seattle, and I lead Out in Climate, an organization for LGBTQ plus professionals who work in climate.

As an expert in the field of energy and sustainability, I'm here today to urge you to approve the moratorium on data centers.

A phrase often uttered within the tech industry is, move fast and break things.

We must not let them move fast and break our critical energy infrastructure.

our power grid is not prepared to handle large load data centers.

Data centers in Seattle would mean higher electricity prices for Seattleites who are already strained by the ever-increasing cost of living.

We simply cannot bear that cost.

A moratorium will give us time to ensure we have the right safeguards to protect our city from the environmental and financial risks of large low data centers.

In the face of climate change and the global energy crisis, we should be focusing on meeting our emissions targets through the build-out of clean energy infrastructure that will power the city and its inhabitants rather than data centers that only benefit corporations and their small handful of shareholders.

Thank you.

I'm going to ask you a question real quick, too.

I normally don't do this, but...

Sure.

Were you on the webinar with Alice Lockhart from 350 when we were on a webinar together?

No.

No?

No, I was not.

Okay, but you know who Alice is?

I do not know Alice.

Alice Lockhart from 350?

Oh, yes.

Yes, I know Alice.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah.

All right, I thought I recognized your name from the webinar, but okay.

Okay.

All right, thank you.

Okay, thanks.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, council members.

My name is Anne Goodrich, and I'm here on behalf of Madison Park Cooperative Preschool.

For over 50 years, our Cooperative Preschool has served Seattle families from the historic bathhouse building in Madison Park through our partnership with Seattle Parks and Recreation.

Today, we serve approximately 130 children and families each year through our caregiver cooperative model.

What makes our preschool unique is that it's entirely caregiver, volunteer-led.

Caregivers are actively involved in the classroom, school operations, fundraising, maintenance, and community building.

Families are not simply dropping children off, they are learning alongside them and building lasting connections with one another and with their community.

Our partnership with Seattle Parks and Recreation has been incredibly successful because our missions align so naturally.

Together we help steward a beloved public space while creating an accessible, community-centered early learning environment for Seattle families.

The Bath House is not just a building to us, it is a gathering place, a community anchor, and a home for generations of children and families.

We are deeply grateful for the strong working relationship we have built with the Parks Department for many years, and we respectfully ask for your support in securing a long-term 10-year lease so that we can continue serving Seattle families for decades to come.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

The next public speaker is Alicia Gousen, followed by Bradley Doche and Rebecca Young.

Hi, my name's Alicia.

I live in District 3, and I'm here to urge you to vote yes on a data center moratorium.

I'm gonna speak just a little bit more from the heart on this one.

We are in a climate crisis.

We know this, and it is time for us to act urgently.

Building data centers is the exact opposite of what we need to be doing if we want to be acting urgently in the face of a climate crisis.

The tech companies that want to build these data centers have walked back their climate commitments and climate goals because they want to build the AI of the future.

These data centers need just insane amounts of energy and water.

We do not have the energy infrastructure or the water to support these mega center data centers.

We are going into our fourth year of drought.

I have lived in Washington my whole life, and the water, the wetness, the greenness of this state isn't just something I love about it, it's something that I think is a deep part of my identity as a Washingtonian.

And I am afraid for the future, not just for me, but for future generations where this water, this land, the food, the air that is provided by our Earth will no longer be a resource that we can rely on.

and we are going to really run head on into climate catastrophe if we say yes to AI and not yes to building the renewable energy that we need.

We can have great jobs building mass transit, homes, wind farms, solar farms.

That's the future I dream of.

Thank you.

The next public speaker is Bradley, followed by Rebecca Young and Patrick McKee.

Welcome, Brad.

Hi, good afternoon.

My name is Bradley Dosh.

I'm in Council District 3. I'm a Seattle City Light rate payer.

I work in renewable energy development and microgrids.

I feel grateful that Seattle City Light is municipally owned, and I can even come to a comment period like this and talk to the utility.

I'd just like to read some mission, vision, and values from the City Lights website.

City Lights mission says to provide our customers, which is us, with affordable, reliable, and environmentally responsible energy services.

Its vision is to create a shared energy future by partnering with our customers, that's us, to meet their energy needs in whatever way they choose.

Some values are customers first, environmental stewardship, equitable community connections, among others.

And so reading these on the website, I'm struggling to see how building data centers aligns with these goals, these visions, values, and missions.

In this 2024 annual report, City Light mentioned a peak demand of two gigawatts during January 2024 during that cold snap, which is an outlier for the entire city.

But make no mistake that one data center alone can hit two gigawatts easily, which is an immense amount of power.

But as we're seeing the trends, they are moving in that direction and greater.

Just the one in Utah alone is nine gigawatts.

So it's infuriating to see the discussion at conferences and with City Light leaders to bring on natural gas, fossil fuel generator resources, dispatching those to meet those demands.

We know we cannot bring on more fossil fuel generators.

The natural gas emits methane.

So I urge you to please vote yes on the data center moratorium and do the right thing for us, the customers.

Thank you.

Thank you, Bradley.

Next is Rebecca Young, followed by Patrick McKee and Amelia Albert.

Wonderful.

Good afternoon and thank you.

My name is Rebecca Young.

I'm a voter, parent, and homeowner in District 3, and I'm here to express my strong support for the proposed data center moratorium.

I am deeply concerned about the potential impacts of additional large data centers on Seattle's electric grid and climate commitments.

Seattle is already managing record high electricity demand due to electrification needs, population growth, and our legally binding emissions targets.

Large data centers would compete for the same electrical capacity that's urgently needed to decarbonize our city.

Public utilities should prioritize public needs, including climate, over the profit interests of big tech.

These large data centers would be competing for that same capacity.

I'm also concerned about the environmental justice impacts of large data centers.

New data centers would likely be placed in South Seattle and Tukwila, communities which have historically borne the brunt of industrial development and pollution.

These communities should not be treated as sacrifice zones for data center expansion without a comprehensive evaluation of potential harms and benefits.

I urge you to pass this data center moratorium and use this time to perform a comprehensive environmental and impact review.

I also urge you to establish processes to guarantee public transparency, community buy-in, and democratic oversight of any proposed data center projects.

This moratorium is an opportunity for our city to be a leader for other communities and demonstrate how to prioritize people, climate commitments, and democratic transparency over unchecked speculative data center expansion.

I thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Rebecca.

Next is Patrick McKee, followed by Amelia Albert, and then remote speakers.

Hi, I live in West Seattle.

I'm a father and a grandfather, and I fully support recommendations from council members for a data center moratorium, not just in Seattle, but in the greater city light service area.

I'm concerned about data centers' intensive demands for power and water.

Recent proposals call for adding as much as one-third to Seattle's daily power consumption.

Our best hope for cutting climate-wrecking GHG emissions is to green, electrify as much as we can, as fast as we can, and I'm concerned about our capacity to support this increased supply at the necessary scale.

I'm concerned about supply region-wide.

We have a commitment to honor treaties signed over a century ago with the tribes guaranteeing their ability to take salmon and those fisheries depend on the removal of the lower Snake River dams from the Bonneville grid.

I'm concerned about the deleterious impacts of artificial general intelligence on human brain function.

I'm concerned about the industry's own predictions of the displacement of millions of workers.

I'm concerned about big tech's threat to democracy.

So there's a lot of issues to consider when we propose to multiply electrical demand to satisfy the speculative strategies of monopoly tech interests.

and I'm concerned about transparency.

It's not clear why our public utility is signing NDAs with tech companies in the first place.

Maybe there are larger questions about whose interests are served by the current composition of the City Light review panel.

But with the moratorium in place, we can start to have some of these conversations.

So thank you for your leadership on this.

Thank you, Patrick.

Patrick, I just wanted to thank you for bringing up the tribes.

And also I wanted to thank you for bringing up, which we won't have a complete discussion.

I normally don't do this during public comment, but I know it's important for some of these issues that we should not be outsourcing our critical thinking.

No one has talked about the human brain stuff.

So thank you for that.

Go ahead.

Next speaker is Amelia Albert followed by remote speakers.

Hi, my name is Amelia.

I'm the liaison with Seattle Parks and Recreation for Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool.

My son has attended Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool for the past three years, and the program itself has been around for 40 years in the Seattle Park Shelter House.

Today we have 42 students attending the school and family volunteers keep the preschool running.

Preschool families take care of the building and work with the Parks Department to make sure it is maintained and safe.

We have always met our obligations while serving the children and families of Seattle.

We love our school and we love our community.

Victory Heights is one of the few affordable preschool options for families in our area.

This 10-year lease with Seattle Parks and Recreation gives our school the security that it needs to thrive.

We are looking forward to our new long-term contract.

Thank you.

Thank you, Leah.

Go D5.

We'll now move on to remote speakers.

The first remote speaker is Sage Wallen, followed by Nino Mingus-Civilli.

Reminder for remote speakers, when you hear the prompt that you've been unmuted, press star six.

Each speaker has two minutes.

So let's, Sage, do I see Sage on here?

Are they?

Star six, Sage.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi, am I here?

Yep.

Hi.

I'm calling to support the moratorium on the AI data centers.

I'm actively very terrified of what AI is doing to not only our environment, our brains, and it's going to destroy jobs.

It's not going to bring them.

I don't know why we would ever, honestly, entertain the idea of large-scale AI data centers in Seattle.

My utility bill is already so high that I can barely afford to live.

And if we just increase it more, I'm really scared for that.

I'm really horrified at what nonsense we hear coming out of certain AI billionaires talking about how intelligence is going to be something that is a utility that not everyone's going to have because they know what AI is doing to our brains.

I would just really hope that this moratorium becomes a permanent thing in the long term, but I'm really grateful that you guys have brought it up in the first place, and I really hope that you continue to push it through.

Thank you.

Thank you, Sage.

Next is Nino, followed by Patrick and Ariana.

What was the first name?

Nino.

Who?

Nino.

Nino, okay.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yep, go ahead Nino.

Hi, good afternoon.

Hi, my name is Nino and I'm a PhD student in computer science at the University of Washington and I'm a resident in District 4. I wanted to speak here today because I fully support a moratorium and data centers.

AI's environmental impact has actually been the subject of my research over the last three years and The more that I have learned, the more just astounded I have been and terrified, as others have mentioned.

Just in terms of emissions projections estimate that AI-related data center emissions will increase from they're currently at 4% globally to anywhere from 9 to 20% in the next five years.

This is a very unprecedented case.

It's very different and more substantial than emissions from just the internet and more substantial than emissions from video streaming.

and more substantial than even emissions from the aviation industry.

So given the fact that we are in a climate crisis, we cannot afford to be adding these extra emissions to the atmosphere and harming the environment.

And although tech companies will say that these data centers might be powered with renewables, case study after case study has shown that the reality is very different.

They will kind of add renewable power sources either as lip service or to offset some of the energy costs, but much more significant capacities added through non-renewable sources such as natural gas and fossil fuels.

And more than that, I'm also just really concerned from a social justice and environmental justice perspective.

I do a lot of work with communities in South Seattle and Superfund sites which is already overexposed to pollutants.

So I really urge you to make a decision for a just and more sustainable future and pass the moratorium on data centers in Seattle.

Next is Patrick, followed by Ariana and Twyla.

Patrick, please press star six.

Hi, I'm Pat Corwin, District 1, born and raised Washingtonian and computer programmer for over two decades, and I urge approving the data center moratorium.

I've always been interested in new technology and read a lot of sci-fi as a kid, but these large data centers are being peddled as part of the golden futures I read about, but what's being delivered are destructive sludge factories.

As others have noted, these hyperscale data centers are nothing like what we already have.

Once built, they don't provide jobs, but instead have an insatiable need for energy and resources.

And if we're to believe the tech companies, their aim is for AI to replace as many jobs as possible.

We already know from others' misfortune the toll these large data centers have of rising energy costs, illegally tapped water lines, ruining the environment, and avoiding property taxes.

Seattle has already been working hard to reduce burning fuel, which is great, but that means that there's an increased load on our grid.

And with the continued rise of gas prices, electric cars are looking real attractive right now.

And I'm just not seeing the benefit to our community to build these massive resource-guzzling buildings with the intent to remove more jobs and overload an all-way strained electrical system.

On top of this, these gate centers are not profitable.

Anything that looks like profitability comes from dumping the cost onto the community's disingenuous peak usage accounting and supporting illegal activities.

Tech companies like to brag that they can do things quote-unquote at scale, yet they cannot keep users safe online and instead have made ransomware and deep fakes available to even the most budget-conscious scammers.

No thanks.

These companies are hiding behind NDAs that want to strip us of our resources and make us flip the bill.

We need to keep these hyperscale AI data centers out.

We don't need them.

We have an opportunity to lead by example and show what it looks like to protect our citizens.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Patrick.

Next is Arianna, followed by Twyla and Jackson.

Paul, you're going to have to speak up.

I can't hear you.

Do you have a microphone?

Hi.

My name is Ari.

Can you hear me?

Arianna?

Hi.

Hi.

Go ahead.

Okay.

I'm a 20-year-old university student speaking today to encourage the moratorium on data centers in Seattle.

I'm against AI in general, including the partnership between the Department of Defense and most major AI developing companies, which will allow AI to be used for mass surveillance of the public, despite the contract phrasing that bars, quote-unquote, unconstrained monitoring.

On a local level, I have great concerns about the mass amount of energy and water that would be diverted to data centers should they be built in Seattle.

Data centers in Seattle would raise the cost of energy for residents, which can make the difference between having a home and living on the street for lower income families.

And further, the nature of data centers as energy hoarders and heat producers increases the risk of power shortages and heat stroke for residents, especially those living near the data centers.

I've grown up witnessing the effects of climate change and I'm scared about the impact of data centers and AI on my neighbors and on future generations.

Please help us protect our people and our planet by voting yes on a moratorium for data centers in Seattle.

Thank you.

Thank you, Arianna.

Our next public speaker is Twyla followed by Jackson and Nevy.

Did you say Twyla?

Can everyone hear, Paul?

Or is it just me?

I can hear them just fine.

Sorry, but I'm also on the computer.

So we have...

Hi, everyone.

Hi, Twyla.

Hi.

Hi, Twyla.

Yes.

Thank you for letting us share our thoughts.

I live in District 1. I'm a homeowner, voter, and parent.

I think this is a critical time for us to prioritize people, ecosystems, democratic accessibility and public infrastructure.

My concern lies deeply in the overloading of our grid and having large scale, hyper scale companies moving mass amounts of gigabytes, as mentioned before, 2 to 9 gigawatts per center.

I'm also very alarmed at the underlying purpose of AI to lay people off.

I know many people who have been affected and had their jobs eliminated because they trained AI models to be able to speak and write like them.

So the widening gap between these climate commitments and energy realities underscores the need for this deliberate governance.

Please vote yes on the moratorium.

Thank you.

Thank you, Twyla.

Our next remote public speaker is Jackson, followed by Neve and Angela.

Jackson.

Jackson.

Howdy.

Am I coming in, Cora?

Yep, you are.

Perfect.

Lovely.

I hope you're doing well today.

My name is Jackson and I am a resident and voter within District 6. I am concerned about these data centers and I would love for you to pass a moratorium for data center construction in this city and to create a transparent and accessible rulemaking process about how we approach this issue long term.

Many people in our fine city are struggling right now under the yoke of rising costs across the board.

An increase in electricity rates caused by data centers in the city means the difference between getting by and getting kicked out on the street.

Additionally, with a grid already strained by increasing AC usage and increasing electrification, as many of the fine folks here today have talked about.

Having this further reduced grid capacity could mean that elderly or low access residents suffer and possibly are harmed during a power outage during a heat wave, which we've already seen increasingly hot summers here across the region.

And, you know, our homes aren't really built for this increasingly warm environment that we're finding ourselves within.

Um, I mean, who could forget the heat dome that happened five years ago and all the folks that were harmed by it.

and it is in my estimation that our city that we pride ourselves as stewards and with being one with our amazing natural environment.

Why should we seek to harness that reputation for something that as other speakers have mentioned would create minimal economic benefits and a whole lot of negative environmental externalities.

I implore you to please pass this moratorium and to make the rulemaking process for this as transparent and as accessible as possible.

Thank you for your time and I hope you have a lovely day.

Thank you, Jackson.

Our next remote speaker is Nivy, followed by Angela and David.

I'm actually here, can I just, I'm Nivy.

I'm sorry I didn't catch your name.

Nivy.

Nivy, okay.

Yeah, I'm in the phone queue because my bus was running late.

Well, then you're here.

And my note card pretty much says, why are we talking about this?

Someone please help.

So I can't really use it.

My name is Nivy.

I am the founder and CEO of an organization called Soapbox Project, where we create joyful community spaces for climate action every week in Belltown.

I don't think it should be a secret that we are all very, very scared of what's happening with AI and the climate crisis.

I moved to Seattle from San Francisco where I was working in tech.

I was impacted by a 2018 wildfire that was the worst in the state while working in tech.

Came up to Seattle because I saw a future where the tech industry was booming, but it still seemed to be a lot more human than that of the Silicon Valley.

I feel like us even indulging an AI data center landscape here is eroding the humanness and the connection with nature and all of the wonderful things I love in Seattle.

Thank you.

I'm also a renter, so cost is a big issue for me.

But the main thing that I wanted to say that I don't think has been said as much is that the mental and physical health impact on younger people from AI is something that I don't think we can even begin to quantify.

At Soapbox, we see like 30-ish people every single week, many of whom work in tech.

And we feel powerless.

We feel like no one's listening.

And now when we're seeing NDAs signed with these nameless tech companies that don't live here, that don't work here, that are not creating jobs here, it drives us further and further into the situation where we live in a city where we feel like nobody cares about us.

So not only are data centers jeopardizing all of our natural resources that Seattleites care so much about, they are also posing an existential threat to the climate crisis, to our mental health, and I think we should use this moratorium to not just say no, but also lead on things like community microgrids and a better energy future for us all.

Thank you.

Our next remote public speaker is Angela, followed by David.

Hi, I'm Angela.

I'm also here.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Welcome.

I moved to Seattle in 2022 to attend an HCI and design program, master's program at University of Washington.

And so I am a user experience designer by skill, but graduating in 2023 meant I was facing a job market that was and has only been getting worse for tech workers because of AI.

I cannot even open my...

Oh, I am asking you to approve the moratorium on building the AI initiatives.

But basically, AI taking people's jobs and designers like me being expected to...

enhance how much output we can get from our labor.

It's just very stressful to work in tech because we're expected to do so much using AI, and there's just so much desperation and instability among tech workers.

And so I'm sharing that this is My experience with AI, after all of the amazing commentary that has already been made, that you already know about how these data centers are unsustainable, we're facing a climate crisis, nobody wants to live near these AI data centers, it does not fit the character of Seattle, and also AI is quite frankly being used, I think, by billionaires to manipulate society, create more desperation, more instability.

This is not conducive to democracy.

This is just not conducive to humanity, quite honestly.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our final remote public speaker is not present, so we'll come back to you, David.

So moving back into in-person public commenters, we have Ben Jones followed by Anolia and Lauren.

We have Ben and who are the other two?

Anolia and Lauren.

So Anolia and Lauren, if you're here, can you line up behind Ben so we can move?

I think we're all getting an Amber Alert.

That's what's on our phones right now for a Native American child.

Go ahead, Ben.

Yeah, it feels a little strange just to keep going past the amber alert, but my name is Ben Jones.

I'm the communications director for 350 Seattle.

I'm testifying in support of the resolution for data center moratorium.

I checked before coming up here of at this point, this council and mayor has received 93,270 messages in support of this moratorium.

And part of that process, we've had an opportunity to talk with so many people in our city about how they feel about AI, how they feel about data centers.

And over and over again, people just say that they feel like gifts to the rich.

They don't see themselves in AI.

They don't see themselves in data centers.

They don't see how it's good for the city or how it's good for our future.

Another concern we hear over and over again is about the process of these non-disclosure agreements, where the scale of these facilities should not be something that we're learning about through the Seattle Times and breaking investigations.

These should be the sort of things that we're hearing about in committees or that we're hearing about years in advance.

You know, and last year, half of all proposed data center proposals were withdrawn.

You all are aware that we are in the midst of a national backlash to facilities like these.

And I think it's a huge opportunity for Seattle, for this council, to show leadership.

It's a chance to show that even here place that's very much associated with big tech, that the people and council reject this sort of inevitable future being shoved at us, reject the reckless rollout of these data centers and facilities.

So I'm urging this council to show leadership.

I also think this is an opportunity to show what a partnership between a city and a utility could be, and as well as this could be an opportunity to sort of move the rest of the conversation about what is possible for people to be able to have and how these facilities can benefit communities.

So I'm looking forward to working with you throughout this moratorium process.

And thank you for your leadership on this.

Thank you.

I'm Anulia, I'm a union steward at UAW 4121, and I'm a PhD researcher student at University of Washington, researching data centers.

I also used to work in the tech industry as a software engineer.

I urge you to endorse the moratorium.

Seattle needs to follow other places that have endorsed moratoriums.

To the best of my knowledge, there are 57 counties, towns, and townships across the U.S. that have active moratoriums across bipartisan lines.

I'm going to read some of those.

Georgia, Nevada, New Jersey, Iowa, Wisconsin, Arizona, Missouri, Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Indiana, Kansas.

I think that said twice.

Michigan, California, North Dakota, North Carolina, Maine, Ohio, Alabama.

I think we want Seattle to join this list and lead by example to establish leading standards.

Also because I read and analyze data center industry reports, Many of these companies are looking towards building data centers through prefabricated modules to reduce as much unionized labor on site as possible, so during the construction and assembly processes, even as they speak of job benefits.

Yeah, and data centers produce lots of noise pollution from their diesel generators, gas turbines, the cooling HVAC systems, noise impacts data center workers, communities, and wildlife.

So I urge you to say yes to this moratorium.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Lauren Redfield, followed by Paul Wang-Goslin and Lauren Tosi.

This is Lauren.

Who, Lauren?

Lauren Redfield.

Can you call three names so all three of them can come up at the same time?

Lauren, and who are the other two?

Lauren Redfield, Paul Goslin, and Lauren Tozzi.

Is there two Laurens or am I the Lauren?

There's two Laurens.

There's two Laurens.

Okay, am I taking somebody's space?

I'm Lauren Tozzi.

Is the other Lauren first?

Lauren Redfield is first, and then Paul Wang Goslin.

Is Lauren Redfield here?

I do not see her, so we'll go to the next person.

Okay, we'll move on to Paul Wayne Gosselin and we'll come back to Lauren Redfield.

And then following Paul will be Lauren Tozzi and then Renaissance.

Hello.

I'm here in support of the moratorium against data centers.

You heard here and before probably many points that are very important regarding the grid, the pollution, both noise, atmospheric, everything.

I just want to add a warning to that, is that it would be foolish to believe that we could avoid those aspects by adding some regulations or some limits when we authorize data centers.

Truth is, in Mississippi, Elon Musk's data center was caught using unauthorized gas generators.

in Fayetteville, Georgia, they found out that the data centers stole literally 30 million gallons of water.

My point is the tech billionaires have a recurring strategy, and they don't hide it.

The strategy is break the law, break things, and maybe ask for forgiveness when you get caught.

which is too late, basically.

So my point is very simple.

We should not give them the opportunity to do that.

So say yes to the moratorium and no to those data centers.

Thank you.

Thank you, Paul.

Now we have Lauren.

Thank you for your receptiveness, by the way.

Okay.

We have Lauren.

Next speaker is Lauren Tozzi, followed by Renaissance, and then followed by Brooke.

Now we have Lauren.

Lauren, number two.

Hello.

I'm gonna read what I have to say because it's always a little nerve-wracking to come up here.

Okay, it's all right.

But I wanna thank you all for having this hearing.

It is so very important.

My name is Lauren.

I've lived in Seattle since 1980. and I'm clearly and strongly in support of a moratorium on the building of data centers, data centers, and in Seattle or any other town, city in our state.

There seems to be a rush to get these data centers built across the country and I feel that that's extremely alarming.

There's no sufficient info on land and water usage, effects on utility rates, effects on our public health and public safety.

the electric grid capacity and the environmental damages that can come.

We all know that fast-tracking policies are myopic and can lead to dangerous results.

So I ask all of you to take into account and seriously remember our comments and take into account why the public is so very wary of these data centers.

Please, I ask you no business as usual.

Thank you.

Thank you, Lauren.

Next is Renaissance, followed by Brooke and Maximilian.

Renaissance?

Renaissance.

Renaissance, I am an organizer with 350 Seattle, and I am in support of a moratorium on the data centers.

I want to start by saying that I was quite impressed by the statement of intent for this moratorium.

and I've been coming down to city council for many, many years.

Often times I've been walked out of these chambers.

But in none of those times when I've been here have I ever seen an important issue running through two committees simultaneously.

And I think this marks something very important about what's happening in our city right now.

Many of us believe that it is vital for us to put in a pause before we jump headfirst into a project that could have damaging ramifications for generations to come.

So I really want to implore this committee and the other committee for really putting that in play.

And what I hope that by the end of this process is that we have a unanimous vote when both of these get to City Council.

My fear is that if we don't do that, then the cost of these data centers will be borne by folks who are not giving consent for this.

And this is normally borne by folks who are poor, who are marginalized, who are vulnerable, who don't often have a lot of the opportunities to show up into these spaces, don't feel empowered to show up in these spaces.

And it'll be taxed in terms of how much the price of energy goes up and how much water we have access to.

I'm very concerned about that as climate change progresses about whether or not we will have enough water to fund all of this stuff.

And so please, continue voting yes for this moratorium.

Let's figure out how to do this right.

Thank you.

Next is Brooke, followed by Maximilian.

Hi, thank you for taking my comment.

My name is Brooke.

I am not an expert on any of this, but a concerned citizen, mother, voter, homeowner.

I echo all of my my peers' concerns and fears about the rate in which AI is taking hold in this country.

It feels similar to the race for the atomic bomb in the 1940s, especially with the secrecy and NDAs and who's involved and what the true outcome that we're seeking is.

It feels like it's profit over people over and over again.

The harms are insurmountable.

They've been stated over and over in this session.

The benefits seem to only benefit few.

And I would hope that we can all agree to vote yes on this moratorium.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Maximilian.

And then we would go back to Lauren Redfield and remote speakers.

Good afternoon, Council.

I'm Max from District 7. I think enough of these people have talked about AI's risks on the environment, electricity grid.

I kind of want to focus on its effects on humanity.

Are you guys aware of who Peter Thiel is?

Mm-hmm.

Right, right.

I think we all do.

Head of Palantir, they've collected around $1.8 billion from the United States government for AI weapons manufacturing.

Deep Roots in the CIA, by the way.

And Peter Thiel was interviewed and asked the question, should humanity endure?

And if you've watched that interview, you understand that his response was basically, I don't know.

It was something other than yes, which alarms me.

So I would urge that any time a piece of legislation comes across your desk, about AI, you remember what the leaders are thinking about the future of humanity.

Remember that Peter Thiel said, I don't really know if humanity should endure.

Even the CEO of Anthropic admits that they don't even know what they're building anymore.

And I think that we might be at one of the most catastrophic points in humanity.

I really do believe that.

And I think that every step that even the city council takes is an important one.

So I would say yes to this moratorium on AI data centers and urge you to handle this with the severity that it deserves.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Is Lauren Redfield here?

Lauren and then who do we else have online and then a remote speaker Tessa you will be next okay Lauren

Good afternoon, counsel.

My name is Ken.

I'm a candidate member with the American Party of Labor.

I urge you to pass this moratorium, and I urge you to consider making it a permanent moratorium.

I want to ask you a question.

Who would the data centers benefit?

Is it us?

Is it the unhoused people who would be swept to make room for these centers?

Is it the low-income and marginalized communities who will be forced to live next to these centers?

Is it the people in the Seattle area who would have to sacrifice water and electricity for this?

No, it's not us.

It doesn't benefit us.

I have another question.

Why do you think AI is free?

Most services presented to us by big tech companies are paid.

So why would this be free?

It's because it's data collection.

It's because it's surveillance.

It's because it's dangerous.

Now, there are several reports from around the country about how these data centers are causing people to get these weird, rare kinds of cancer.

It is affecting them in their homes.

It's affecting them with a weird humming noise to where they can't sleep.

It's affecting them to where their drinking water is contaminated.

There's soot and there's particles in their water.

That would be coming to us in Seattle.

That's absolutely unacceptable.

And by the way, this is not your land to sell.

We are an unceded land.

This is not yours.

This is not ours.

It is irresponsible to allow data centers to be here in Seattle.

It's dangerous.

Kettle, you're not gonna experience this in Queen Anne, but we are.

That's absolutely unacceptable.

You need to pass this moratorium.

You need to make it permanent.

You need to think about us rather than whoever's lining your pockets.

Thank you.

Our final public speaker is Tessa, please.

Oh, Tessa's here.

Come on up.

Hello, my name is Tessa.

I'm here to say yes to the moratorium.

I'm here because of Soapbox as well.

I'm a part of that community.

And one of the questions, they did a theme on AI for one of the months.

And one of the things they wrote and talked about was like, what happens when When AI is successful, when you are more productive, your emails are being written for you, your images are being created, what do you do with that extra time?

I feel like when you are talking about creating data centers or encouraging them and allowing them to be built, you've got to think about what are you allowing to happen from those data centers?

What is the consequence?

AI is in our lives everywhere now.

It's unavoidable and it is not going away.

But I don't know about you, I go online now and I can't trust anything.

I don't know what I'm looking at.

When I had a phone call the other day, I had a text message with my phone company and the person was amazing.

I was like, are you real?

And they said yes and I couldn't trust that.

So what data centres are backing is an AI that's actually making us start to question what reality is.

This feels very heady, but I think we can't avoid understanding that this is questioning how we interact, how we exist in the world with each other.

AI's not going away, but that's why every single point we need to inject humanity into it.

We have to put humans in there making decisions, humans talking to each other in rooms, and human beings engaging in every aspect of it, because that's the only way we're gonna be able to live alongside it.

Please, please put this moratorium forward and give many more human beings, the people here of Seattle, the chance to engage in what's gonna happen in the future for us.

Thank you Tessa.

So we're good on in-person and online, all right.

Before we go on to our agenda, I normally don't do this, but I've been doing this today, so I might as well just finish it up.

I'm gonna close public comment at this time.

And before we go to items of business, I wanna make a couple of clarifications and a few comments.

First of all, the moratorium will be on June 3rd at 9.30 in Council Member Lynn's committee, which I will be there as well, and we've been working closely with Council Member Lynn's office.

and then on June 3rd, which is a Wednesday at two o'clock, we'll be back here in my committee for the resolution.

So we have the moratorium and we have the resolution and we are working together with the Land Use Committee and Seattle City Light Committee.

I might have to go back to the Pearl Jam guy.

I kinda like that this is probably, I don't wanna use the word geek, but this is probably the most techiest crowd I've ever seen in all my years on Seattle City Council.

And I wanna thank you all for showing up and paying attention.

because we certainly have been paying attention since before the new year.

The question, one of the points I wanted to make is, and again, I'm just gonna say this because this is who I am.

Gigawatts are more than megawatts, right?

Okay, good.

Yes, okay.

That's what I thought, but I wanted to write that down again, because when I was hearing it, that's been an issue between gigawatts and megawatts, and that's going to become an issue.

So I'm going to ask and encourage all of you on June 3rd to come at 9.30, and then go have lunch, and then come back here at 2. And so people will vote on the moratorium that morning, and then we will vote on the resolution on June 3rd as well.

Today is the briefing, we have central staff coming, and you've all seen online, we had the resolution posted, the summary and fiscal note posted, and the PowerPoint posted.

So all of those things are online for you to look at, make comments, send your comments to Council Member Lynn, of course, and of course to, and his committee, and of course to myself, Deborah Juarez, and our committee.

And I just want you to know that Seattle City Council and the discussions that we've had in the hallway offline Those of us attending webinars and going to GeekWire events and paying attention to anthropic and planetaire and looking at other cities and someone out here said something which I think was really important.

They read off different cities and states that are doing.

I just want to point out that Indian country and tribes start doing this six months ago because of water rights, treaty rights, protected treaty rights, federal consultation, state consultation, city consultation.

So include that on your list as well.

And then I'll have some closing comments when we get to item seven, which is the resolution regarding the research that we have done.

And if there's more information you want us to see or look at, please send us the information in the link and we'll get to it.

and again, I wanna thank all of you for your heartfelt public comments.

We don't always get a lot of informative public comment.

So it's kind of nice to have people be nice and kind and respectful in the people's house.

So with that, thank you.

All right, let's go to our agenda, our items of business.

First, I have a business, which, do we have to have another public hearing on this one?

Okay.

So Mr. Clerk, will you please read that?

Item one into the record.

Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 121199, an ordinance related to the City Light Department accepting deeds to properties in Skagit County, Washington for salmonoid habitat protection purposes, ratifying acceptance of the salmon recovery funding board grants and funding for property acquisitions, ratifying the city's grants of deeds of right to the state of Washington for these properties for salmon recovery and conservation purposes.

There will be a public hearing, briefing, discussion and possible vote.

All right, I'm gonna have the presenters go ahead and present themselves, and then I'm gonna go ahead and, well, actually, I'll just do it right now, then I'll let you guys talk.

Okay, so as presiding officer, I'm now opening the public hearing on Council Bill 121199. And clerk, do we have any speakers to that item, item number one?

There's one remote speaker signed up.

All right.

But he is David, if you're listening, sign in.

David, are you here?

Going once, going twice.

No David.

All right.

So we have had a speaker, then we don't.

So there are no remote speakers.

There are no speakers in chambers.

So at this point, we will go ahead and...

Do I close public comment then, Mr. Kalirk?

Okay, then I will close public comment on that item and with that, oh here we go, if no speakers, thank you Paul.

Close the public hearing, now I'm going to allow the folks at the table to introduce themselves and then I should add that we have a PowerPoint and a summary fiscal note regarding the Endangered Species Act lands deed acceptance ordinance.

So with that, go ahead and do your presentation and then we can go through your PowerPoint.

Good afternoon, Chair Juarez, Vice Chair Kettle, and council members, members of the committee.

I am Dennis McLaren, and I serve as the Deputy General Manager at Seattle City Light.

In that role, I oversee communications, government relations, environmental management and real estate, natural resources and hydro relicensing, and the Office of the Chief Information Officer.

I appreciate the opportunity to be here with you today to discuss several items from our Environmental Management and Real Estate Business Unit and The first item, as Chair Juarez indicated, is we're bringing forward an ordinance to accept property associated with environmental mitigation efforts under the Endangered Species Act.

This is part of City Light's ongoing work to help protect critical habitat in the Skagit and Tolt watersheds.

It's work we've been doing for many years in partnership with others across the region to support salmon recovery and care for these important natural areas.

Today's action allows us to accept required property interest tied to grant-funded acquisitions and continue that work.

And with that, I'll turn it over to Denise Crownbell, Strategic Advisor at City Light, who will walk you through the presentation.

Okay.

Good afternoon, Councilman.

Thank you.

Yes.

Chair, point of personal Point of order, I guess.

On Zoom, the chamber's Zoom control is not showing what is showing on Seattle Channel, so I've got the TV on mixed with this PowerPoint.

So just wondering if there's a technical fix that we can make so that we can see into chambers.

So, Councilman Stiles, are you saying that you can't see the PowerPoint?

I can see the PowerPoint, but the...

Presenters?

I cannot see into chambers.

Okay.

I can on Seattle Channel, but not on the Zoom.

Okay.

So, Madam, Mr. Clerk will contact Seattle Child to fix that, correct?

There it's fixed.

There it is.

There you go.

See, Council Member Strait.

Thank you, Wedge IT.

Legit.

That's what we do for D6.

Okay.

Amen.

Thank you.

Go ahead, folks.

Okay.

Well, Council Members, thank you very much.

I'm Denise Crombell, Strategic Advisor with Seattle City Light, and this is the ESA lands deed acceptance ordinance.

This program is a voluntary program.

It started in 2000 with the listing of Chinook and bull trout, and Steelhead was included in this work with its listing in 2007, and it's essentially to protect habitat that is critical to those species.

With this ordinance, we are covering up and including in the past 3,900 acres in the Skagit and the Tolt watersheds to date that are being protected.

These are all purchases that are consistent with regional salmon recovery plans in both the Skagit and the Snohomish Basin, which the Tolt is part of.

And just to talk about how this expands ratepayers' funding, that since this program's begun, we've used $6.9 million of City Light funds have accessed $10.6 million of grant funds, and that's mostly from either Salmon Recovery Funding Board or National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

Denise, can I ask you a quick question?

Sure.

So the Skagit's up north.

When you're saying the Tolt watershed, are you talking down south by Mount Rainier?

No, the Tolt is part of the Snohomish, so the Snohomish enters Puget Sound by Everett, so still north of us.

Okay, they both are, okay.

I mean, where the outlet is.

The Tolt itself is out by Carnation and Duval.

Okay, thank you.

Sure.

So this map shows overall in red all the properties that are currently in the ESA lands program.

The ones with the yellow label are the properties that are covered by this specific ordinance.

And then there's one property that is also green and red, and that just is a property that was purchased with both ESA funding and then current Skagit license, wildlife and fisheries lands, or money.

Next slide, please.

And this is showing the property that was purchased in the Tolt on the Meyer property and showing the other holdings in the Tolt.

And I do want to say that City Light partners with King County to look at specific areas in the Tolt that are areas that would be good to acquire land and get people out of harm's way.

So, Denise, what's the big red square for?

That is the Stossel Creek purchase, and that is our climate adaptation property where we're doing a lot of different tree plantings to see how they'll respond to climate change.

and that would be a whole nother presentation that I'd be happy to give you at some time.

No, I just want a bigger map, that's all.

So I'm just squinting from the printer and the thing, but thank you.

I just want to make sure the viewing public can see it as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And then for the specifics of this ordinance, we're accepting these deeds for eight properties and then it's for these properties in both the Skagit and the Tolt, 366 acres in the Skagit and just shy of one acre in the Tolt.

and this ordinance ratifies the acceptance of the grants and specific to these properties, they were funded with $860,000 in City Light funds and $5 million in state grant funds.

Thank you.

And with that, I'm happy to take any questions.

Are there any questions from my colleagues before I move to suspend the rules?

Everybody, I guess everybody's good with the map.

I guess I'm the only one that can't see.

So thank you, Denise.

And so I'm gonna go forward then.

If there are no objections, the council rules will be suspended to allow the committee to vote on legislation on the same day the public hearing was held.

Hearing no objection, the council rule is suspended and the committee will proceed with voting on Council Bill 121199. I move that the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 121199. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

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

I see no further comments.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Council Member Strauss?

Aye.

Council Member Socker?

Aye.

Council Member Rivera?

Aye.

Vice Chair Kettle?

Aye.

Chair Juarez?

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor and zero post.

All right, the motion carries.

Council Bill 121199 will be sent to the June, is it June 2nd?

June 2nd?

I thought that was canceled.

June 2nd?

Oh, okay.

Oh, sorry.

Okay, thank you, both of you.

So this will be sent to the June 2nd City Full City Council meeting.

All right, let's go to items two and three.

Now, this is gonna be interesting, because we have items two and three, but we have the same PowerPoint, correct?

All right, so if we have new people at the table, they can introduce themselves.

I know that you guys have a PowerPoint that you have in front of us.

I'm gonna let the clerk go ahead and read items two and three into the record, then I'm gonna say something and then we'll go back to the table.

Agenda items two and three, Council Bill 121204 and 121205, ordinances relating to the Seattle City Light Department authorizing the general manager and CEO to grant an easement over a portion of fee-owned property to Puget Sound Energy and King County and accepting payments of the fair market value for the easement.

There will be briefing discussion and a possible vote.

Okay, so just so I can, so some clarification, I know me and the clerk were making sure we understood this.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, folks, particularly you, Paul.

Council Bill 12104 has to do with Puget Sound Energy, the easement, fair market value at 6,800, and Council Bill 12105 has to do with fair market value, $500 easement payment to King County.

All right.

Those are the two matters.

All right.

I will let you go ahead and reintroduce yourselves for the record and the viewing public, and then I will let you go through your PowerPoint.

Great.

Thank you, Chairwoman Juarez.

As the clerk and you both indicated, we're bringing forward two ordinances that allow City Light to provide limited easements to King County and Puget Sound Energy on City Light-owned property.

These are limited easements that support partner infrastructure projects while maintaining City Light's operations and system reliability.

Both are actions consistent with our ongoing coordination with regional partners and include fair market value compensation.

And I'll turn it over to Katie Tassery, our real estate services manager, to walk through the details and answer any questions.

And she has some supporting cast with her as well if there are questions.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council.

I'm Katie Tassery, the out-of-class real estate manager for Seattle City Light.

I'm here to present on these two topics, and we've got the order a little bit different in the presentation.

Hopefully that's okay.

I know.

You reversed them on me, so that's why I was getting confused, but go ahead.

And I'll pass it over to Bill.

Good afternoon.

My name's Bill Devera.

I'm the Director of Environmental Management Real Estate.

Good afternoon, Andy Strong, Seattle City Light Engineering and Project Delivery Officer.

And I'm Eric McConaughey on the Council of Central Staff.

All right.

So we're here before you because the city charter requires property actions, including dispositions of easements, property rights, to be approved by city council before City Light can execute on them.

And these two projects, two separate agreements, would allow our partner agencies to move forward with projects and have no impact on City Light operations.

So the first one here is an easement conveyance to King County.

This is a fee simple parcel that Seattle City Light owns in Skyway, which is unincorporated King County.

It's part of our transmission corridor.

And next slide, please.

King County has a project to do some roadway improvements at seven intersections, one of which overlaps with our property.

It's just a teeny tiny overlap.

Next slide, please.

So you can see here, the scale on this, it's a 65 square foot triangular portion of the Seattle City Light property.

King County needs a permanent easement for an ADA accessible sidewalk ramp to be installed at that intersection and no impact to City Light operations.

So that's that one.

Any questions on that one?

Any questions, folks?

Not seeing any.

And then the next property transaction here is another fee simple property that Seattle City Light owns.

This time it's at the junction of I-405 and I-90 in Bellevue.

kind of the Wilburton neighborhood.

And there's a transmission pole on this property which has some equipment that's owned by T-Mobile that City Light leases out to T-Mobile for.

It's like a cellular cluster, so they can broadcast their signal for cell service.

and T-Mobile requires a generator as backup power to power their infrastructure.

The nearest power supplier is Puget Sound Energy and they have a natural gas line.

Next slide, please.

Wait, let's hold up here.

So this is where we had a little bit of heartburn with some folks.

Upgrades require generator power from nearby Puget Sound energy gas line.

So can you just explain a little bit more on the existing T-Mobile equipment, what happened here?

So the T-Mobile equipment is powered by electricity currently, but if there's a power outage, they'll need a backup source of energy to be able to continue their equipment to broadcast the signal.

So they originally proposed a propane energy source, which we declined because of the risk to infrastructure.

And on the next slide, I think you can see a little bit more clearly the distances between the natural gas line, which is highlighted there in yellow, the generator, which is about 42 feet away from the transmission pole, which is highlighted in green, and the lines from the transmission pole go in opposite directions from the generator and the natural gas line.

So 41.6 feet is the minimum distance between the natural gas line and that transmission pole.

So they use electricity now, and you're just saying if power goes out, then the generator will just be powered by the gas line.

So it's not like switching over to gas from electricity.

That's right.

Okay, that was the question that some council members had.

All right, I want to clarify that.

That's on...

I'm looking at slide six still, and now we're on seven.

Okay, got it.

Chair, may I jump in?

Yes, I'm sorry.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I did not see you, Council Member Strauss.

I should have saw your hand up.

Go ahead.

No problem.

Just asking a stupid, weird question of if we are talking about either having a gasoline generator, a propane generator, or a natural gas line, how all of those are explosive, all of those are near our transmission tower.

How are they different?

How are they the same?

And we don't need to take a lot of time in committee today.

I'm just, I still have concerns about putting combustibles near our transmission towers.

And if that's an issue with T-Mobile, I guess I openly I wonder out loud as to maybe they need a different place to put their tower.

But I don't, you know, I'd be happy to have a response from the table.

I'll likely, I'll be weird today and I'll abstain because I still have concerns about putting combustibles near our transmission towers.

Actually, I'm glad you asked Councilmember Strauss.

I think that's a very intelligent question to ask.

But it did allow me to break out my, Mark's Handbook of Mechanical Engineering to find an answer for you.

Oh, fellow nerd.

That goes way back.

The good thing about natural gas in this perspective, it is lighter than air, so any accumulations tend to dissipate quite quickly.

There is not a storage tank associated with this particular placement.

And so that means that the amount of actual explosive material is really quite small.

I calculated it to be about 560 joules if the gas line were to break.

That's approximately equivalent to a one-pound object being dropped from about 125 feet.

so quite a small impact if something were to happen combined with the distance from the transmission tower itself I don't anticipate any impact thank you Andy I'm happy to continue the conversation I think you've only you you haven't satiated my worry one pound from 125 feet is

that's not a light impact, but I'm not a mechanical engineer.

And then I still have the questions of a ruptured line is a continual source of combustible, and that's an issue.

So the question still remains of if T-Mobile needs this type of infrastructure for their cell towers, maybe this is not the best place for it.

and I'm happy to continue those conversations offline and thank you for understanding my weird concerns and why I'll be abstaining today.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Council Member Kettle.

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Strong, I do appreciate the jewels coming up.

I was having flashbacks to God knows what class, God knows how far along back.

In terms of context, I seem to remember, and I've seen, you know, there's many of our utility poles, I guess across the board, but including City Light, where this is not a one-off in terms of a, like a cell provider using the equipment.

Can you give us like some context in terms of how often this has happened across the, you know, the network?

And, you know, is this, you know, is it a regular thing?

Is it, you know, can you just give some context to it?

Because I seem to, I mean, I have one near my house, It's not T-Mobile, I don't think, but whatever it was.

Can you give some context to this?

Is this a one-off or is it part of a standard practice kind of?

It's certainly not a one-off.

We are required to host small cell sites and other telecom infrastructure.

And so we do work with telecoms to place it throughout.

You know, our service area, I couldn't tell you the exact number of small cell sites that we currently host, but it is considerable.

Most of these are hosted on our vertical wooden infrastructure, our utility poles.

We work with a number of telecom providers in the areas to do that placement.

If the council would like, I certainly can get the exact number for you.

But it's safe to say it's in the thousands.

Okay, then you don't have to give me a number.

That shows that this is, you know, a standard practice, if you will.

Yes.

I get, you know, to be honest, I recognize the threat to lines and so forth.

My bigger concern is like with climate change and grass fires and, you know, wildfires and that threat is, I would imagine, dwarfs anything that we're talking about here today.

Yes, it does.

All right.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Are there any other questions?

Did you have any other follow-up?

You good?

So just to wrap up the slide here, the easement area is for a 10 by 90-foot, like, following the path of the natural gas line, and it's been appraised at a fair market value of $6,800, and that's the action we're hoping to take.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, so with that, that is the Council Bill 121204. So with that, are there any more questions?

I'm going to go ahead and move.

I move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 121204. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

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

Any further comments?

Not seeing any.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Strauss.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Vice Chair Kettle.

Aye.

Chair Juarez.

Aye.

Chair, there are five in favor, zero in post.

Thank you.

The motion carries.

Council Bill 121204 will be sent to the June 2nd, 2026 full council meeting.

All right, let's move on to the second piece here.

I now move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 121205, and that's the King County easement for fair market value of $500, right?

Okay.

All right.

Can I get a second on that one?

Second.

All right.

Got it first.

I moved it.

It got second.

I'm your second today.

Well, you are my vice chair, so thank you for that.

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

And after that, clerk, please call the roll.

Council Member Strauss.

Abstain.

Sorry about that.

Abstain.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Vice Chair Kettle?

Aye.

Chair Juarez?

Aye.

Chair, there are four votes in favor, zero opposed, one abstention.

Thank you.

The motion carries.

Council Bill 121205 will be sent to the June 2nd City Council meeting.

All right.

So let's move on to item number four, which we have to have another public hearing.

Will the clerk please read the title into the record?

Agenda Item 4, Council Bill 121211, an ordinance relating to current use taxation, approving an application for classification of property under King County Public Benefit Rating System.

There will be a public hearing, briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you.

We've got some new presenters at the table.

We've got our own Karina from Central Staff.

Is it just you, Karina?

There are two presenters remotely, that are attending remotely.

Oh, do I see them yet?

Oh, are they?

Oh, here we go.

There's Bill.

Thank you guys.

And who else do we got?

Eric Totter.

I just see Bill on there.

All right.

Oh, I think he just joined.

Okay, so did you already read it into the record?

Yeah.

Okay, I'm sorry about that.

Okay, thank you.

As presiding officer, I am now opening the public hearing on Council Bill 121211. Clerk, are there any speakers signed up?

There is one remote speaker and zero in-person speakers.

Okay, can you please, is our remote speaker online?

David, if you are online,

David?

Star six?

I do not see David online, do you?

Okay.

So with that, we do not have anyone in chambers.

We had a speaker, but I don't see it online, our speaker online.

So with that, there are no members of the public present for this public hearing on Council Bill 121211. The public hearing is now closed.

So we will now move forward.

I'd like to invite our, there's our presenter.

So after that, I'm gonna go ahead and let you introduce yourself and we'll move forward on this particular bill.

Floor is yours.

Katrina.

Good afternoon committee members.

Karina Bull with council central staff and there are also two individuals joining remotely who might want to introduce themselves if they're online right now.

I am Bill Bernstein with the King County Department of Natural Resources and Parks and I administer the public benefit rating system or PBRS open space program.

And is Eric with us?

All right, well, I'll launch in and he might join later to answer any questions.

Today's presentation concerns Council Bill 121211, which would approve an application for the current use taxation program for a 5,700 square foot property known as the Buyer's Bulldog Garden Pea Patch in West Seattle.

It is owned by GROW, a non-profit organization founded over 50 years ago that creates community gardening opportunities and supports the city's pee patch program.

Currently, GROW operates eight pee patches in Seattle.

The current use taxation program is established by state law and provides an incentive for property owners to voluntarily maintain open space by taxing the property at a lower rate based on its current use rather than the potential market value for its most profitable use, such as for residential or commercial purposes.

In recent years, properties in Seattle approved for the current use taxation program include property north of Kubota Gardens owned by Indigenous Creatives Collective, that was last year's application, the open space surrounding Anhalt Hall, a city landmark in the U District, and other P patches owned by Grow such as those in Hillman City, Hazel Heights, and Judkins.

Those were all approved in the past several years.

Applications for current use taxation are evaluated under a public benefits rating system known as PBRS.

It is administered by the King County Department of Natural Resources and Parks.

Mr. Bernstein is the coordinator of that program.

and properties with higher point totals for available open space resources receive larger reductions on property taxes.

Examples of open space resources include public recreation areas, buffers to public lands, view corridors, and there also are bonus points for certain categories such as unlimited public access.

After King County issues a report with the application's PBRS point total, both the city and King County, in no particular order, must each hold a public hearing and take legislative action to approve the application.

Approval results in lower property taxes for the property owner and shifts the tax obligation to other property owners at a marginal rate of increase with no impact to the total tax collection for the city.

The application that is under consideration is the Byers' Bulldog Garden Pea Patch in West Seattle.

The garden is named for the Byers' family who owned and gardened on the undeveloped property for many generations.

Where did Bulldog come from?

They had bulldogs.

The last owners, Margaret Beyer and her spouse had a bulldog.

There's a picture of them holding their bulldog on the Beyer's bulldog garden pea patch photo on the Department of Neighborhood's website.

Grow acquired this property in 2024 from the estate of Margaret Byers, who left it to the organization upon her passing.

It is currently being used as a community garden with collective garden beds and produce available to the public.

Much of it is donated to local food banks.

And in the future, Grow plans to install accessible walkways and add more garden beds.

King County assessed this property using the PBRS criteria and ended up recommending a total of 10 points for two categories, public recreation area and the bonus category of unlimited public access.

This rating would result in a 50% reduction of market value and a corresponding 50% reduction in taxable value.

So to put this in context, using the 2025 appraised values, the property was valued at about $500,000, property tax at about $5,000.

Enrollment in this program would reduce the total taxable value to about $250,000 and the property tax amount to about $2,500.

If approved for the program, there are controls.

GROW would be required to maintain the open space in the same or better condition as of the date of enrollment and submit required monitoring reports.

If ever disqualified, GROW would be required to pay the difference between the amount of tax paid as open space and the amount that would have been paid for a maximum of seven years plus interest and possibly a 20% penalty.

Okay, let me ask you a quick question.

So who would be monitoring this?

Is it gonna be the city or is it gonna be Bill at King County?

My understanding is that it's Bill at King County.

Can you confirm that?

Okay.

Yeah, King County staff would be responsible for administering the property's participation, dealing with monitoring any compliance issue.

We would be the ones maintaining a regular communication with the property owner.

Perfect, thank you.

Procedurally for this application, if this committee votes to approve it, it could be considered for a council vote as soon as June 2nd.

The King County Hearing Examiner is scheduled to hold a public hearing on May 28th.

If the King County Hearing Examiner recommends approval of the application, the county council would vote on it soon thereafter.

and if both the City Council and the County Council both approve the application in whole, King County would incorporate the lower taxable value of the property in its 2027 tax rolls.

And that concludes the presentation.

So we're basically lowering the tax impact by 50% so it can be a pee patch.

Correct, and so that it would be an open space into perpetuity and open to the public or green space.

So first of all, let me just say a few things before I hand it off to my colleagues.

Karina, thank you for your memorandum.

I appreciate that.

We also got a copy of the coordination agreement, so thank you for that.

And then of course the wonderful PowerPoint with page numbers, so thank you for that.

Are there any questions from my colleagues regarding Council Bill 121211?

Okay, not seeing any.

Now, oh wait, I gotta move to suspend, all right.

So if there are no objections, council rules will be suspended to allow the committee to vote on the legislation on the same day as the public hearing was held.

Not hearing or seeing an objection.

The council rule is suspended and the committee, excuse me, will proceed with voting on Council Bill 121211. I move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 12111. Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you.

I had a second.

It's been moved and seconded.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Councilmember Strauss?

Councilmember Strauss?

Raise your hand, yes or no?

Aye.

Sorry.

Councilmember Saka?

Aye.

Councilmember Rivera?

Aye.

Vice Chair Kettle?

Aye.

Chair Juarez?

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor and zero post.

5-0, it's unanimous.

The motion carries.

Council Bill 121211 will be sent to the June 2nd full council meeting.

With that, we will go into item number five.

Will the clerk please read item number five into the record?

Agenda Item 5, Council Bill 121212, an ordinance authorizing Seattle Parks and Recreation to enter into a 10-year contract with the Madison Park Cooperative Preschool to operate and provide management of Madison Beach Park Bathhouse.

There will be briefing discussion and a possible vote.

All right, so we have the Madison Park Cooperative Preschool folks and our Seattle Public Recreation folks here.

I'll let you all introduce yourselves again for the record.

Clerk's already introduced it, but go ahead and introduce yourself and go from there with your, I should say we have your PowerPoint with us in our summary and fiscal note, so go ahead.

Thank you for the tech support.

I'm Michelle Finnegan, Interim Superintendent with Seattle Parks and Recreation.

I'm Kathleen Gantz, the Contracts Manager for Seattle Parks and Recreation.

Karina Bull with Council Central Staff.

All right.

Thank you, Council Members.

Today we'll be presenting two pieces of legislation for cooperative preschools operating at Seattle Parks and Recreation facilities.

The two facilities we'll be talking about today are less than 2,500 square foot buildings, which Kathleen will give a little bit of history about momentarily.

But as you know, council members, sometimes these smaller facilities are harder for Seattle Parks and Recreation to activate consistently.

and we also have not had a lot of public investment in these facilities over the recent years.

I'm pleased to share, however, that as you hear more about today, these two cooperative preschools have been operating consistently in these facilities for many years.

These organizations positively impact the facilities and also provide eyes on the park, raising potential issues to Kathleen's team, which are public benefits beyond what she will enumerate in the proposed contracts momentarily.

With that, I'll turn this over to Kathleen to walk you through the details of the proposed contract at Madison Park Cooperative Preschool at Madison Beach.

I should add that we have your 69-page operation and use contract with us as well with your PowerPoint, so thank you for distilling this into this.

I appreciate that.

They got much longer when they had to be double-spaced.

Well, I appreciate it, so thank you.

Absolutely.

Go ahead.

So the purpose of this legislation, as Michelle said, is to execute a new contract between Madison Park Cooperative Preschool and the City of Seattle through Seattle Parks and Recreation.

Madison Park Preschool provides early childhood education programs as well as community-based activities for the Madison Park neighborhood.

In this presentation, I'll walk you through all of the details of this contract.

So the primary goal of this contract is to ensure that the preschool provides accessible and affordable early childhood programs to the greater Seattle community.

Their programs serve children from infancy through five years of age and include preschool classes, parent education opportunities, and community events.

In addition, the preschool plays an important role in maintaining and caring for the bathhouse facility and the surrounding park.

Their programs help support the broader mission, vision, and values of Seattle Parks and Recreation.

The Madison Park Bath House opened in 1938 and is a unique example of early wood-framed public facilities in Seattle.

The preschool has a long and meaningful history tied to the Madison Beach Park Bath House.

Operations began in 1970 as a small babysitting cooperative and later expanded.

By 1986, formal preschool operations were established in the building.

Since then, they have remained a consistent presence, contributing not only to education and community events, but also to the preservation and use of this historic space.

The public process for this new contract began in 2024, when a letter of interest was published for the community.

SPR received only one response from Madison Park Cooperative Preschool.

Seattle Parks and Rec then awarded the new contract to the preschool and began negotiations in the summer of 2024. Throughout this process, the preschool has continued offering its programs through their previous contract.

Currently, they are serving approximately 130 children and families in their programs.

So this slide highlights the key terms of the new contract.

Overall, the agreement focuses on the preschool's role as the operator of the bathhouse, providing early childhood programs and family events.

It also reinforces expectations around program delivery, facility upkeep, and alignment with city goals.

The preschool will be responsible for minor and custodial maintenance of the facility, while SPR will remain responsible for major maintenance specific to the envelope of the building and all major systems.

The new contract outlines how resources are managed to keep programs affordable while maintaining the facility.

The table on this slide shows the use fees and required public benefits as outlined in the contract.

Please note that the use fee is the cash payment SPR will receive for the operations.

We'll touch on public benefit on the next slide.

With regular increases every two years, we are able to focus on balancing affordability for families with the sustainability of the program in the building.

We want to ensure the preschool programs remain financially accessible while being stewards of this public facility.

Can I stop you for one second?

Can you go back to page seven real fast?

Me and my Chief of Staff Kelly were going back and forth on these numbers to make sure we understood them.

So is the 274,800, is that the total for, is this two year total?

that's the 10-year term total that's the 10-year yeah okay that's what I thought it's okay so you do the two-year until you get to the very end and then after 10 years this would be the public benefit total $274,800 that's the total total cash and public benefit for 10 years correct for 30 kids 130 130 kids or more okay as the years expand okay that's what we were trying to figure out on the care side and then what it would be at the end of 10 years.

So this is the number after 10 years.

Correct.

Instead of doing CPI, which is unknowing and hard for them to plan for, we did this kind of increase so that they know exactly what to expect.

Okay, because I was looking at, okay, so then, all right, so when we get to page eight then, I'll let you get through eight because there's a few questions that we had on that one as well.

Okay.

So public benefits are an important element to many of SPR's facility contracts.

They allow nonprofit organizations to pay a portion of the use fee by providing services and resources to the community and through capital improvement to the facility.

Annually groups provide a public benefit plan for the coming year and then a report for the prior year.

The reports monetize the public benefits provided to ensure that they reach the required amount that is identified in their contract.

The amount required for Madison Park starts at $9,600 annually and is adjusted every two years as was shown on the previous slide.

The contracts team within SPR reads, reviews, and works with our contractors to ensure that they meet the required amount and provide true public benefits that meet the needs of the community served.

In the contract, the preschool has put together a plan that includes items they may provide in any given year.

This is a menu of sorts that allows them to build the annual plans from this contract.

If the preschool was to provide everything on the plan every year, they would far exceed their financial requirement.

The contracts team has worked closely with the preschool to develop the plan and the contract to ensure that they can meet the financial requirements of the contract and the needs of the community they serve.

So, Madison Park Cooperative Preschool provides numerous public benefits.

Annually, the preschool has provided $15,000 in scholarships to children and families to ensure that preschool and their programming is obtainable, and they plan to continue to provide scholarships at this level as needed.

They serve families from all over the greater Seattle area, including Madison Park, Capitol Hill, the Central District, and the Rainier Valley.

In addition to preschool, they provide free community events and parent education for both their enrolled families and the greater Seattle community, while also partnering with co-op preschools such as Victory Heights, Rainier Valley, and White Center, and the nonprofits Friends of the Children Seattle and Refugee Women's Alliance.

In support of their partners, they also hold drives to provide school supplies, clothing, and basic needs for underserved children and families participating in these preschools and nonprofit programs.

If they were to provide all proposed activities in one year, they would have over $40,000 in public benefit.

As funds allow, the preschool also plans to provide capital improvements to the bathhouse, which may include painting and replacing flooring and cabinetry.

Their first focus remains on the children and families they serve, but when possible, they want to support the greater community in helping to maintain the facility and creating a welcoming environment for all who use the park.

And finally, the preschool ensures continued care and use of a historic public facility, keeping it active and accessible to the community.

Having eyes on the facility and surrounding park contributes further to the public benefits in this contract.

So the question I had, and I think he answered it.

So for 2025, I was looking at, I can't remember what page of the contract, maybe 65, I can't remember.

So there's $15,000, eight quarter scholarships that add up to 15,000.

That's the annual amount.

So they have four quarters, fall, winter, summer, spring.

I did that out of order.

And within that full year, they have provided 15,000.

That's their current amount.

Okay, and thank you for following this.

When we get to Victory Heights, I see that you follow the same format, so thank you for that.

Yes.

All right.

Okay.

With that, are there any questions from my colleagues regarding the Madison Beach Park Bath House Cooperative Preschool?

And again, thank you for the summary and fiscal note and the PowerPoint and the operation and use contract.

What?

Oh, Council President.

Hello.

Hello.

Do you have a question?

No, I just came for a quick comment because I know the agenda item is packed.

Thank you for having this on your agenda.

Thank you for Seattle Parks Department for sending this down just in support of the preschool and it's a really big asset to the community.

I know a lot of people that send their children there and just really grateful that this is on the docket and just wanted to just lend my support to my colleagues that this is really important to our community.

So thank you.

Also, you're representing D3.

Correct.

And this is in D3.

This is correct.

This is our neighborhood.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

Are there any other questions, comments?

Okay, I'm not seeing any.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Go ahead, Councilor Kettle.

Thank you, Chair.

I just wanted to say thank you for the briefing, and as someone, as I've mentioned before, came into this job from being a stay-at-home dad, I really appreciate the service, and I'm a little bit jealous in terms of the briefing, like on slide five.

Thank you for the numbers.

It looks to be fantastic and a little bit jealous about how nice a space that is for the children, and it's fantastic.

and I do like the point about activating the area.

I think that's really important.

So anyways, I just wanted to remark on that, so thank you for the presentation.

Yeah, so 1958 they've been around?

38?

Well, the history is history, and it's a little convoluted, so that's what we know.

Okay.

In the 70s?

I don't remember the 70s.

I wasn't born, so.

All right, not seeing any other questions, I move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 121212. Is there a second?

Second.

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

Any further comments?

And we also want to thank Council President Hollingsworth for joining us.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation of the passage of the bill?

Council Member Strauss?

Aye.

Council Member Saka?

Aye.

Council Member Rivera?

Vice Chair Kettle?

Aye.

Chair Juarez?

Aye.

Chair, there are four in favor and zero post.

Thank you.

The motion carries and council bill 121212 will be sent to the June 2nd full city council meeting.

Thank you very much.

And thank you guys for showing up at public comment and doing the jazz hands.

That's really, really nice instead of screaming at us.

So I appreciate that.

All right.

We will now move to our next item of business, which is item number six, Mr. Clerk.

Yeah, Mr. Clerk, can you please read item number six into the record?

Agenda Item 6, Council Bill 121213, an ordinance authorizing Seattle Parks and Recreation to enter into a 10-year contract with Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool to operate and provide management of the Victory Heights Shelter House.

There will be briefing discussion and possible vote.

We have the same folks.

Paul, help.

You seem to not be seeing the Victory Heights.

I thought I was gonna be able to do it.

Yes, let's hear for Victory Heights D5.

Yes.

And again, thank you for the format and doing it exactly the same.

And I think Michelle probably has something to do with this because she knows how I feel about chronologies and page numbers and attaching the contract and the summary and fiscal note.

Goodbye, Council President.

big page numbers so that I can see them too.

So yes.

Our second presentation today is similar to the first, but with a different facility in D5 and a different contractor.

So I'll let Kathleen walk you through our Victory Heights Shelter House Agreement.

So while these are both cooperative preschools in our facilities, they are unique operations and programs, so I just want to bring that to everyone's attention.

They do also provide early childhood programs, including preschool and community events, and I'll walk you through the details of this contract.

So the primary goal of this contract is to ensure that Victory Heights Preschool provides affordable early childhood programs for children and families in the Victory Heights neighborhood and surrounding Seattle community.

Their programs serve children from infancy through age five.

So in addition to the preschool, they offer free community events, which are open to the public, supporting community engagement and providing fun and free opportunities.

They also play an important role in maintaining and caring for the shelter house facility and the surrounding park, and their programs also help support the broader mission, vision, and values of Seattle Parks and Recreation.

The Victory Heights Shelter House was constructed in 1938, when the area was still part of unincorporated King County.

In the 1950s, a preschool began operating out of the facility, providing programs to the community.

In 1954, the property was acquired by Seattle Parks and Recreation and since at least 1988, Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool has held a formal contract with the city to operate in the shelter house.

This long history highlights both the stability of the program and its importance to the community.

The public process began in 2024 when we issued a letter of interest.

SPR received again only one response from Victory Heights Cooperative Preschool.

Following the completion of this process, we awarded the contract to the preschool and began negotiations in the summer of 2024, and they have also been continuing their programs through their previous contract, and currently they are serving 42 students in their program.

So this slide highlights the key terms of the new contract.

The contract focuses on maintaining the preschool's role as the operator of the shelter house while providing early childhood programs for the 10-year term.

It also enforces expectations around program delivery, facility upkeep, and alignment with city goals.

The preschool will be responsible for minor and custodial maintenance of the facility and SPR will remain responsible for all major maintenance.

The new contract outlines how resources are managed to keep programs affordable while maintaining the facility.

The table on this slide shows the use fees and required public benefits as outlined in the contract.

And again, the use fee is our cash payment.

We'll touch on public benefits next.

With regular increases every two years, we are able to focus on balancing affordability for families with the sustainability of the program and the building.

As described in the Madison Park presentation, Victory Heights has put together a public benefits plan for this contract.

The contract's team will continue to work closely with the preschool to ensure their plan and reports meet the required amount.

For the first two years of the contract, that amount is $13,200 annually and increases every two years as indicated in the previous slide.

Victory Heights contract delivers a public benefits plan that expands access to programs.

The preschool has provided over $2,000 annually in scholarship to support families and make preschool accessible.

Their goal is to never turn a child away due to financial issues.

This amount may fluctuate based on the need over the term of this contract.

They also provide free community events open to the public, creating a stronger sense of neighborhood and community.

The estimate is that they will provide approximately $12,000 in free community events annually.

Ongoing stewardship of the Victory Heights Shelter House and Park are important to the preschool.

This includes volunteer activities in the park and capital improvement to the facility as finances allow.

Volunteer hours are monetized with an hourly rate provided by the independent sector's annual report and are an important part of the public benefits for the preschool.

And finally, having eyes on the facility and surrounding park contributes further to the public benefits in this contract.

So let me ask you this, just so I'm clear, and I think we asked you this, on page eight, scholarships awarded annually, page 59 of your contract for 2025, 22 students?

Correct, this is a little different.

So Victory Heights taps into the PAC scholarships, which come through the co-op overarching through North Seattle.

And so they are offsetting what these other scholarships aren't able to provide.

And so there's, yeah, so it's a missing piece.

They don't count that in their public benefits because they're not paying that.

So that's why their number looks low, but in fact, they have a larger number of scholarship students.

And that's it.

I want to thank our Chief of Staff, Kelly, who figured all that out for me when we were going through this.

Correct.

We had that discussion this morning.

Okay, good.

Thank you so much for answering those questions.

That was just the clarification we needed on the public benefit piece.

So thank you.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Is there anything else you want to add before I ask my colleagues if they have any questions?

I'm happy to take those questions.

Any questions, colleagues?

All right.

I am not seeing any questions.

So after that, then what I'm going to do is I'm going to move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 121213, the Victory Heights Central House Pre-K.

Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you.

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

I've not seen any further comments.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Council Member Strauss?

Aye.

Council Member Saka?

Aye.

Council Member Rivera?

Aye.

Vice Chair Kettle?

Aye.

Chair Juarez?

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor and zero opposed.

The motion carries.

Council Bill 121213 will be sent to the June 2nd full city council meeting.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

All right, let's move on to item number seven.

Clerk, please read item number seven into the record.

Agenda item 7, resolution 32204, a resolution relating to data centers recognizing the potential of long-term impacts of data centers on electrical grid capacity and reliability, water usage, utility rates, land use and development, jobs and the economy and public health, and requesting engagement and cooperation from the executive in the development of a data center policies and potential legislation and anticipates related legislative action.

There will be briefing and discussion.

Thank you.

Before we begin, first of all, thank you, Eric, for being here and working with our office on the data center.

And of course, you sat here during public comment, so you heard a lot.

I'm gonna take the chair's privilege here and make a few comments, and then I'm gonna let you go into the resolution, which again, we are not voting on.

And I wanna thank you not only for the PowerPoint, but the resolution and the summary and the fiscal note.

and the comments that I wanna make are that it is the resolution and we have been working on this for, I don't know, beginning of the year.

I'm gonna say some of my comments for when we actually go through the questions again and go to a vote, because I think there's a few issues that I'm gonna ask you as you go through your presentation that I think we need to probably add to the PowerPoint.

In the resolution itself, and I know you'll go through this, we cover six topics, the electrical grid, water usage, utility rates, land and use development, the economy, public health, and then we heard a bunch of other issues as well from people who work in the tech industry and are probably a lot more savvy than I am.

and so we did our five page resolution and so one of the things that I'm gonna, when we get there and I wanna thank you Eric, is I do want to include even though we have it in the recitals, tribally protected treaty rights to fish and water and those particular watersheds and that would probably bring us to seven emerging topics in the recitals and also in this section of therefore be it resolved.

So with that, I'm gonna let you go ahead and walk us through this, and then I know that my colleagues have questions for you.

So go ahead, Eric, thank you.

All right, well, good afternoon.

So I'm Eric McConaughey on the Council of Central Staff, and Chair Juarez, just to say back to you, what I'm hearing from you is that going forward, there may be an amendment that you'll offer that will change this resolution before the actual vote, according to the topics that you just outlined.

Just wanna make sure that I captured that idea.

Thank you.

To just kind of reorient us to the resolution before us, there is, of course, the data center moratorium.

Folks have talked to that today.

That is different in this resolution, but they were drafted cognizant of each other, in tandem with each other, and one leads to the other.

The data center resolution in front of you would recognize the potential for the proliferation of data centers to significantly impact Seattle in the absence of appropriate policy and regulation.

And in the face of that very real impact that Council's perceiving, it would set up it would request with the executive, with the mayor and all the departments, engagement and cooperation in the development of data center policies and potential legislation to govern data centers.

and it also anticipates relative legislative action and that being the moratorium that we've talked about and we expect this summer from Seattle City Light a new rate that would govern, that would be for a rate class for data centers and the resolution calls that out.

So that's the kind of high level and now I'll step through the presentation.

So just to describe how data centers are defined in the resolution, these are facilities primarily for housing, operating, or co-locating computer and communications equipment.

They handle, store, manage, process, and backup all kinds of digital data, and then all the associated infrastructure that's necessary for those systems to cool them, back them up, provide battery storage.

Just as you mentioned, Chair Juarez, there's a number of items that are called out as potential kinds of long-term impacts, namely the electrical grid capacity and reliability, water usage, utility rates, land use and development, jobs and the economy, and public health.

And we just, as you mentioned, talking about impacts to tribes' tribal rights that are a part of this whole picture.

Yeah, probably treaty protected fishing rights for salmon and water, which will require a consultation, but we can talk more about that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

and to be clear, this is a little different than the moratorium.

It is a higher level.

Something like the work that would be a part of the moratorium work plan in fact sort of tucks into the notions that are in this resolution.

And so it is about developing guiding policies for potential legislation.

For example, the kinds of things that may impact land use that would guide decisions on city light rates.

that could potentially guide budget appropriations and also department actions, how the city would spend its own money to work with and use data centers, but also how to monitor these sorts of things going forward.

The resolution does not lay out that work plan, but it does call for those kinds of actions to coordinate.

Yeah, and the goal is to reduce or mitigate deleterious effects, to hold data center investors and operators accountable for the costs and effects of their operations, and it does say to harvest and maximize any benefits of data center development and operation in recognition of that real potential.

And I mentioned the anticipated legislation, so this slide is just to keep us honest about that.

And with that, we are to the question slide.

Hopefully I didn't rattle through that too quickly, just happy to go back and cover any of those topics again, answer any questions.

There's two things I want to say that I'm going to open it up to my colleagues.

I thought I flagged it in the resolution, but didn't we put language in here in working with the executive?

I thought that we had language in here to work closely with the executive on these type of data centers and potential policy and et cetera.

What page is that on the resolution?

So it would be, I'll call it by section because I'm not sure, well page four or five in this packet is section two.

and I can read it verbatim if you like.

Okay, I see it now.

Yeah, it says, in recognition of potential impacts of data centers and as elected stewards of health, safety, environment, and general welfare for the people of Seattle, city of Seattle, council requests the cooperation of the executive across city departments and the timely development of policies to guide potential legislation, budget appropriations, and department actions.

And then it goes on to talk about the things that I mentioned with regard to data centers.

But I and you're right and what I did is I had flagged it in the summary and fiscal note on page one so that's where I have cooperation with the executive and thank you for taking that language and putting it right into the resolution that obviously we intend to work with the Land Use Committee obviously on the legislative branch but also work with the executive branch Seattle City Light every all the city family to know what we know and what we don't know and then forward looking.

and then the other issue, well then I'm going to open it up to my colleagues because I know they have questions and I'll do some follow-up.

So with that, colleagues, Yes, you do have your hand up.

I'm right here, you don't have to do that.

Go ahead, Councilor Gettle.

Vice Chair.

Yes, Vice Chair.

Thank you, Chair Juarez, and thank you, Mr. McConaughey, for the presentation and for this opportunity to address this.

I think it's super important for us as a city to take a stand, to understand what are the considerations and for us to have our voice and to lead, to echo the voices of the community across the board here in Seattle, to include all the public commenters, of which I think we have two.

Thank you for being here.

And it's super important that we do so.

One of the things I think that we also need to do is get to the points, some of which were raised today, and highlight also specifically the data centers such as the hyperscale, which is a term that was used today, large scale, and then there was also AI data centers, which I, you know, AI is in this sense another version of larger hyperscale because of the requirements of the AI piece to this.

And really important to understand the impacts, first and foremost, on Seattle City Light.

to the points raised in your briefing in terms of electrical power and the ability to really balance the needs, the rates, but also what we can do and also mindful of where we're gonna be in the future related to Seattle City Light.

There's a lot of different pressures on City Light in terms transmission, but also the generation, where we get it from, the market, as it relates to Bonneville and others.

And so it's very complicated, bottom line.

So we need to understand these pieces.

And I think it's really important to kind of step through these elements related to Seattle City Light, but also Seattle Public Utilities.

This goes to the question or points made.

I'm noting in the earlier public comment and in what I've seen and read in other locations is the water impacts.

And on this point, by the way, related to water, I think it's really important that Chair Juarez has brought up the tribal governments because we tend to kind of forget, Chair, and we shouldn't forget because we are not the only players in this.

And so this also separately highlights the need to understand who the stakeholders are in this because there are a large number of different stakeholders.

And part of this too in terms of that is other levels of government.

because the system is not, it's the Seattle City light, but the system is much broader and wider than the jurisdiction of the City of Seattle.

So the water pieces, for example, and you know, and this then leads into like, I'm using departments as my means to do this, but you know, office sustainability in the environment and parks and recreation.

but particularly on OSCE, we just had a briefing on the Endangered Species Act Lands Deed Acceptance Ordinance.

The water piece is huge on this related to various species that are out there.

And again, we have to walk through these pieces.

But then there's also deal.

As I noted earlier in the earlier agenda item, I came into this job from being a stay-at-home parent.

still rather young, and I've seen this transition, this early childhood education piece.

So on one hand, we passed the FEP levy, the education levy, and we look at what Deal's trying to do in partnership with the school district.

And on the flip side, we had two people, an older gentleman and a lady, I believe from Australia, I recognize any accent, speak into this piece, which is really important in terms of what is happening to our young people.

And again, as a parent of a relatively young child, I see this on a direct basis.

But also, there's also OED, you know, in terms of economic development.

And I've also thrown in OIR because of the tribal governments piece.

But we also need to work with the county and the state as well.

As we do this, I think it's also very important that we also look at traditional data centers and what they're doing as well.

This past Monday I went to a data center that's about 8, 10 blocks north of where we are right now.

And it's important to do that because it highlights what these data centers, as they've traditionally been, do for our economy, that does for our SPD fire, our first responders, because that location serves our first responders.

It also serves, for example, UW's, University of Washington's digital access program for those that, that are hindered in terms of their digital access.

So we need to step through these pieces because that's really important.

And that example, in terms of the location I visited on Monday, it also goes to the Office of Sustainability and Environment because that data center, interestingly enough, heats about five or six buildings.

in the downtown area.

So the heat, the exhaust heat is actually recycled and it heats, you know, let's just say half dozen buildings.

And during that briefing they said, yeah, that we could do some more too.

So, you know, who knows, maybe 10, I don't know.

But, you know, these are the things that are really interesting.

And so it's like, hey, how can we get the benefits and avoid the, you know, the negative pieces?

How can we square the circle as my staff likes to hear me say all the time?

So for the traditional data centers, we really need to walk through these pieces on a, you know, very deliberative way to ensure that we gain the good pieces, we take advantage of innovative pieces like, you know, exhaust heat, you know, heating buildings, that's super important.

I've often been saying, Chair, as it relates to Sound Transit 3, land use and transportation are two sides of the same coin.

But I'm going to adapt that to say land use and city light are really two sides of the same coin.

And I think this is really important.

For example, the previous meeting, both you and I attended as Chair and Vice Chair of City Light, the Land Use Committee, speaking to these topics.

So it's really important to, you know, ensure that the land use and City Light, so the point about the moratorium and the resolution makes great sense in terms of partnering two pieces that complement each other because we do need to walk step in, you know, lockstep, if you will, from a policy development point of view from land use and City Light.

and so for these things, we should walk through this resolution, also walk through the moratorium piece and do so in a way that shows that we are taking in all the different pieces.

We're looking to protect Seattle's future.

Good governance is also a factor here.

We need to have that strategic, particularly in this area, we need to have the strategic long view approach.

And this goes for the hyper large scale AI data center sets, but also for the traditional data center sets.

We need to think long term in terms of what is happening in these different areas.

And Chair, I'll just note too in terms of good governance, this topic of data centers also highlights just another area that Seattle City Light is facing in this dynamic time.

You know, in District 7, we have a lot of issues with very direct cable.

We have, you know, issues, you know, in terms of, you know, the power production, climate change, how it impacts Seattle City Light.

And so this is a time where we need to have strong leadership.

And I've said this before, we had great leadership for the Seattle City Light.

And unfortunately, the mayor let what we have is a nationally known power industry expert that can work both the power industry pieces but also the environmental aspects within the city government to ensure that we're in the best position.

And unfortunately, we're not there in terms of the leadership piece for City Light.

And I bring this up because these data centers are super important for where we're going to be long term.

and the decisions made today will impact us in the future.

And we have to have that strong leadership that we had, to be frank, in the city with respect to Seattle City Light, but we do not know, do not have now in a sense in terms of long term.

I do have faith in our acting general manager CEO of City Light, Mr. Sandoff.

It's worth mentioning that we do not have a full general manager of City Light.

And unfortunately, Chair, we had a great leader in this, in the industry, and here we are.

So I think it's worth noting.

So thank you very much, Chair, for allowing me to speak to this and to add in the specific Seattle City Light issue.

Thank you, Council Member Kettle.

Trustee Vice Chair.

So I have a few comments if there's anything else to kind of take us out.

Councillor Strauss.

Thank you, Chair Juarez.

Just bringing an attitude of gratitude for your work on this because this is so incredibly important.

I'm not going to repeat all the important topics that the public brought up, whether it's from our electricity consumption to our water usage to not having as I appreciate what Councilmember Kettle said about reusing the heat that these create and if there are more and better ways to use that waste energy and make it good energy not wasted we've got opportunities but until we can understand all of the strains on our infrastructure that are already built here in the city of Seattle I really appreciate that you brought this forward so that we can take a pause to make sure that we're doing this right just didn't want to I'm not going to spend the next 20 minutes repeating everything the public commenters said just saying thank you thank you councilmember Strauss

All right, I'm gonna make some closing comments.

I don't see anything else from my colleagues.

And first of all, Eric, thank you.

I know that you've been putting out with me since January, me sending you links and websites and have you read that, have you done this?

So I'm gonna, I have some comments that we had put together and I just wanna read them into the record and I may repeat some of these at our, is it our June 3rd meeting?

at our June 3rd meeting as well.

And just today we had 30 odd people in public comment and I took copious notes and of course you didn't hear anyone say, yes, yay, let's have data centers.

Everybody is concerned as well they should be.

and let assure the public know that we are going to work hand in hand with the Land Use Committee so that our legislation, our resolution, our moratorium, Eric, that our language complements each other, that we share the same language, responsibilities and sensibilities and characters of Seattle.

and that is reflected not only in the moratorium but in our resolution.

So we brought this resolution and we had been working with it with the Council President as a result as the rapid increase of large data centers being built as they continue and due to the boom in artificial intelligence, including what it's done to the global and national marketplaces of people making money.

These data centers are being built in a rush by organizations and companies that are only, as we believe, some of us believe, concerned with the race to extract resources, mainly water and space.

Rapid Data Center developed focuses on short-term gains while perhaps disregarding the well-being of communities they are being built in.

And as I've said before, water and these other resources are a finite resource for all people.

My office has been working along with other offices and other leaders, including tribal leadership, to learn more about these issues over the last year.

We have attended events hosted by GeekWire, the National History Museum and numerous webinars to understand not just the technology, but to know what we know right now and what we see coming.

We have tracked nine data center AIA bills during the state legislative session with only one bill, Senate Bill 5984 that was passed.

I should add, I wanna thank Paul, our clerk, Paul C. Paul, for attending the state AIA work group that Governor Ferguson put together and coordinated and Paul has been attending those meetings and we will continue to work and attend those meetings and continue to learn more.

I'm actually very happy to share this with you.

We have Sofia Suarez in our office from, is she at Seattle or UW?

UW, where Paul went.

She has been working with Paul and we are gonna be meeting with staff members from the Media Justice to learn about their work on the Superior Court case called Project Blue, No Desert Data Center in Pima County in the state of Arizona.

and this is in Tucson, correct Paul?

Tucson.

And we've been paying attention and reading their pleadings and sharing it with the Chair of Land Use, Chairman Lin.

And so we're gonna meet with the attorneys and the folks that have been leading a lot of the litigation and outlining in a more articulate way than me and particularly in the court process about data setters and what their concerns are and what their research has found.

In our research, we have found that these data centers have the potential to significantly burden our community and impact the electrical grid by, number one, forcing substantial capital improvements.

Number two, consuming large quantities of water resources.

Number three, occupying large amounts of commercial and industrial space.

Number four, impacting jobs and the economy through a boom and bust employment automation.

number one, two, three, four, five.

The effect of public health by producing noise, light, water, air pollution.

And that doesn't even go into the whole issue of what it does to mental health.

It doesn't go into what it does to labor.

people losing their jobs and all the other things that we've all been reading about that we're still learning about in real time.

This resolution seeks and attempted to address the need for city departments to take a look at the long-term effects of data centers on the electrical grid, residential utility rates, land and water usage, economic development, the impact to treaty protected fishing and water rights and public health.

We are a city of technology.

This resolution is focused on responsible exploration of this new field for this and future generations.

It is vital that we more completely understand the impact of data centers and hold data center developers accountable, also through costs, through binding community benefit agreements or contracts.

We must make sure data centers and companies do not pay the costs and long-term effects, pass the costs, I'm sorry, and long-term effects onto our residents, our health, our resources, our rivers, our watersheds, our people, our communities.

and so I did put those comments together for a while with my team who's been working very closely.

Paul and I went to a GeekWire event where we learned a lot and brought central staff folks with us which we appreciated.

So I think we have some more information to include and add and to bolster our resolution and work with Council Member Lynn, Chair of Land Use on his moratorium because I think a lot of this language dovetails and complements each other.

So we're working hand in hand with the issues that were brought today that we heard in public comment and that I'm sure we will continue to learn more and hear more about, particularly after our meeting next week with the folks in Tucson, Arizona.

All right.

With that, let me get back here if there's anything else.

I don't see anything else for the good of the order.

Councilor Strauss has his hand up.

Go ahead, Councilor Strauss.

Yeah, sorry, me again.

the president as you said verbally and I heard you say the city light easement parcel bills were presented in the opposite order in which we voted but I did not conform that to my voting habit so I'm just stating for the record I abstained on the incorrect bill I'm also not going to ask us to re-vote on those because it doesn't matter enough I thought you did but I didn't want to say anything because it got flipped You're always good at telling me when I'm wrong.

Yes, I know that, but I didn't want you on TV in front of God and everybody, but I remember our discussion on the abstention.

I thought he was abstaining on the other one, but okay.

So you're good for where we're at right now because it's going to go to full council.

Yeah, I will.

take it up at full council just asking presenters to make sure that they're doing it.

It doesn't matter.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Councilmember Strauss.

And I would also add and would invite any committee members on the resolution if they could let us know ahead of time if they would like to add their name as a co-sponsor.

Oh, Council President, I'd love to add my name as a co-sponsor.

Great.

Let's let let's add Councilmember Strauss as a co-sponsor to our resolution that will continue to work with Eric and central staff.

And so with that, is there anything else to come to our committee for the good of the order?

Thank you, Eric.

All right.

With that, we have reached the end of today's meeting agenda and we are now adjourned.

Thank you.

Good job, everybody.

Thank you chair.

Good job vice chair.