Sustainability & Renters' Rights Committee 7/15/21

And you can go now.

Fixing your hair, Asha?

Thank you, Eric.

And good afternoon, everyone.

This is a specially scheduled meeting of the Sustainability and Renters' Rights Committee of the Seattle City Council.

Today is Thursday, July 15th, and the time is 2.02 PM.

I am the chair of the committee, Council Member Kshama Sawant.

Would the clerk, Ted Verdone, from my office please call the roll?

Council Member Sawant?

Present.

Council Member Juarez?

Here.

Council Member Peterson?

Here.

Council Member Lewis?

Council Member Morales?

Three present.

Thank you, Ted.

And just wanted to let the members of the public know that Council Member Morales gave me information that she has a scheduling conflict during this time with another regional committee and so has been excused.

I appreciate her notifying our office and thank Council Members Juarez and Peterson for joining us at this committee today.

In this meeting, the committee will discuss with and vote on the final four councilmanic appointments, the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

After these appointments, the board will only have four vacant seats and one executive appointment, and then the three positions that are appointed by the board members themselves.

In today's meeting, we will also continue the discussion on several renters' rights bills related to rising rents.

And it's important that we note that because in the last two months, we put forward several bills related to evictions and minimizing and eliminating evictions.

But we know that the other problem that renters face is the skyrocketing rent.

And so we will hear from a panel of renters' rights organizers about the impact of rising rents on our community.

Importantly, council members will have the opportunity to ask questions, discuss or indicate support for or opposition to the legislation in preparation for votes in our committee meetings.

The first bill requires landlords to provide relocation assistance when they displace their tenants with outrageous rent increases, a process that has come to be known as economic evictions.

Over the past decade, there has been massive displacement and gentrification of our neighborhoods, primarily driven by skyrocketing rents, forcing thousands from their homes, neighborhoods, and often even the city.

Some become homeless, according to nationally recognized studies that show that every $100 increase in average rents in a city results in a 15% increase in homelessness.

In Seattle renters who are displaced by redevelopment are eligible for relocation assistance to the tenant relocation assistance ordinance or what is often called trail, but renters were forced to move by outrageous rent increases who face exactly the same burdens of displacements and all the same costs of having to move to a new apartment.

get nothing.

The bill from my office, the Economic Displacement Relocation Assistance Ordinance, it's a bit of a mouthful, but it's very important for renters.

It will make renters eligible for relocation assistance when they are forced to move by a rent increase of 10% or more.

And we know that is increasingly common.

This bill has been officially transmitted to the council president's office for introduction with the required sign off from the city attorney's office and I've included on today's agenda that legislation.

It is listed on the agenda as a quote unquote draft because it has, it has not been added to the introduction referral calendar yet.

But council members and the public can be confident that the bill on today's agenda reflects the actual legislation that has been sent for introduction.

And I would greatly appreciate it if council members engaged with the bill's specific features, the technical aspects of legislation, and felt free to ask questions to Arsha Venkatraman from our city council center staff, who is available here to answer any questions.

The next bill we will discuss is the rent control.

legislation from our office.

That bill is being reviewed by the city attorney's office.

And renters, we know that renters cannot simply sit back and accept that Washington State's Democrats and Republicans will continue to ban rent control for the next 40 years, as they have done for the previous 40. That is why my office is proposing comprehensive rent control legislation to limit rent increases to no more than the rate of inflation.

with none of the corporate loopholes like vacancy decontrol that have been used in other instances of rent control policy, say in California, for example, to undermine the effectiveness of the rent control policy.

The rent control legislation from my office has what is called the conditional effective date.

It goes into affect the moment Washington state lifts the ban on rent control.

And as I said, for the past 40 years, unfortunately, state lawmakers have ignored the fact that they are standing in the way of the only real renters rights legislation that can actually stop displacement alongside the expansion of publicly owned affordable housing.

If the council passes the rent control legislation from my office, state lawmakers will no longer be able to ignore the issue.

We have no doubt in our minds that it will create tremendous pressure for them to repeal that unfair ban.

Finally, the committee will discuss the legislation from my office requiring landlords to provide six months notice for rent increases.

Currently in Seattle, only two months notice is required.

This bill that is in front of the committee to provide six months notice for rent increases was originally requested by the City of Seattle Renters Commission.

And I wanted to thank, as always, the Renters Commission for being so actively engaged on renters rights issues and making really strong recommendations like this one, and like the winter evictions ban, which my office put forward and the council passed.

more than a year ago.

The way this bill appears on the agenda is unfortunately a little more confusing than it needs to be, simply because of the way the City of Seattle tracks legislation.

On the agenda is the proposed substitute, which makes only technical edits and adds whereas clauses, but does not change anything substantive in the original bill.

So if members of the public read what is listed on the agenda as proposed substitute without track changes, What it is, is simply show you what the bill actually does without filling your screen with the technical amendments.

We hope to bring the six months notice for rent increases and the relocation assistance bills for a vote at our next committee meeting, which is a regularly scheduled meeting.

And I hope we will have a full attendance there on July 27th, if committee members are ready to vote then.

So as I said earlier, I really urge committee members to ask any questions or voice any concerns about the bills that you might have.

And as always, before we begin our agenda items, we have public comment.

We have 20 people signed up for public comment.

I will add, I will read each person's name and each person will have one minute to speak just because we have a full agenda and we have several people signed up for public comment.

So the first person signed up is Daniel Cavanaugh followed by Hannah Svoboda and Jessica Scalzo.

Go ahead, Daniel.

and my name is dan i'm a member of socialist alternative and a renter in the central district and i'm urging all the council members to support the two renters rights bill uh...

from committee chair cut members want uh...

perfectly the bill are requiring landlords provide six-month notice for rent increases uh...

and the fact that they'll are being uh...

mandating that landlords provide relocation assistance when they economically effect or or reference to people have to move and i really want to thank the rank-and-file renters the tenant advocacy organizations, the progressive unions like UAW and SEA organizations, like the Tenants Union, Be Seattle, thank you to Washington Community Action Network, the Housing Justice Project, Socialist Alternative, and Councilmember Sawant's Office for making serious progress on winning a full renter's bill of rights for our city.

You know, we know that this crisis for renters is only deepening and not letting up.

Seattle's landlords have raised rents an average of 18.7% between January and June of this year, that's double the average rate of increase nationally, and these hikes will cost a typical Seattle renter $3,300.

So we need to fight, and I urge renters to join us September 18th at 4 p.m.

in Cal Anderson Park for our Rent Control Now Rally.

Next we have Hannah Saboda followed by Jessica Scalzo and then Corey Brewer.

Go ahead, Hannah.

Hi, my name is Hannah Saboda, and I'm a renter in District 3. I'm calling in to urge all council members again to support those two renters rights bills from committee chair.

So one, especially the one mandating that landlords provide relocation assistance when they displace their tenants with outrageous rent increases when renters are displaced because of massive rental increases.

That's what we call an economic eviction.

Our movement of working class renters and homeowners has been coming to these city council meetings consistently to demand strong renters' rights protections.

At these very same meetings, we've also heard from so-called small housing providers saying that these rental protections would be disastrous for small landlords.

However, playing a corporate shell game with 10 separate LLCs on different buildings doesn't make you a small housing provider.

It makes you a standard corporate landlord.

So the statistics clearly reveal it's not small landlords who are raising rent.

It's the corporate landlords, the slumlords who price gouge their tenants, like Dan just said.

18.7% rental increases in Seattle, which is totally ridiculous.

Small landlords would not be affected by these bills.

And I appreciate the small landlords who have been coming out to defend renters' rights.

We have Jessica Scalzo followed by Corey Brewer and then Inshan Burns.

Go ahead, Jessica.

Hi, my name is Jessica and I am a renter in District 3. I've been a renter in District 3 for 12 years and then before that a renter in District 4. And I am calling in high support for the legislation that Councilmember Sawant has put forward to make sure that landlords give at least six months notice to raise the rent and also the legislation to pay relocation assistance.

I have been pushed out by My rent, which was more than doubled and we only got relocation assistance because there was, they had to like redo all the pipes in the building and it helped a great amount.

And so I think that this is important that everyone should have access to.

And also that it takes a lot of time to look for an apartment.

And I would say it's almost like a full-time job.

And then it also takes a lot of money because of credit checks and so on and so forth.

So I highly support both of these pieces of legislation, and then also the rent control bill, and I'm encouraging all committee members to support these as well and vote for them.

Thank you.

Next, we have Corey Brewer, followed by Inshan Burns, and then Karen Taylor.

Go ahead, Corey.

Hi, thank you.

Cory Brewer with Windermere Property Management, primarily representing the small mom and pop housing provider community.

So I wanted to provide some context about the cost of providing and maintaining rental housing.

I heard one of the candidates running for mayor recently explained that a mortgage is a form of 30 year rent control for a homeowner.

So I did some research.

I looked up a handful of our clients with rental homes in Seattle at random just to track their property tax increases.

And here's a list of some of the year-over-year percentage increases that I found.

10.4%, 11.3%, 12.2%, 15.3%, 17.5%, 19.6%, 24.1%, 29.9%.

I have invited everyone on the council via email to participate in conversation about this with my office.

I'd like to invite you again.

It doesn't seem like you're interested in hearing from a panel of housing providers.

We have Inshan Burns followed by Karen Taylor and Barbara Fennig.

Go ahead, Inshan.

they may have been shown burdens are entering district two i just want to draw the distinction between uh...

small landlord and the corporate landlord that are really at the root of problem with these outrageous rent increases that i think people are that i would really urge the city council to deal with by supporting uh...

the legislation from council members to walk office refer to the uh...

housing providers who may uh...

deny the outrageous rent increases uh...

three-year rate of point mentioned by an earlier commenter uh...

the what rents out raised by average uh...

seattle landlords increased uh...

eighteen point seven percent between january and june which is not a year increase if that uh...

process continued over the whole year that would be a forty percent increase outpacing the what twenty five percent that was the maximum last person just said so uh...

you know that this is going to increase people can get forced out of their homes forced into places like kent encourage the process of gentrification, which is something I would really encourage the council to stop by supporting this legislation.

Next is Karen Taylor, followed by Barbara Finney and Blythe Serrano.

Go ahead, Karen.

Hi, there.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Thank you.

I'm just calling in, my name is Karen Taylor, and I'm calling in about getting some heads up, the legislation about getting some heads up about rent increases.

I got really happy that the fixed term lease loophole has been closed.

That's just been an enormous relief in my life.

But then as this legislation came through, I realized Oh, he could still get rid of me with economic eviction.

And it takes me months and months and months to find a place if I can.

And so it just seems like, oh, yeah, that's a great that the common sense way for me to be able to prepare for that process.

I'm already stressing about it many months ahead.

So just knowing what I was knowing what I'm looking, you know, knowing what what's gonna what's gonna I'm gonna have to deal with coming up would be really helpful.

So thanks for proposing this legislation.

Barbara Finney followed by Blythe Serrano and then Matthew Smith.

Go ahead, Barbara.

Hi, my name is Barbara Finney.

My husband and I are longtime homeowners in the Broadview Bitter Lake area in D5, where the majority of residents are renters.

Seattle rent rose 9% from January to April, an annualized percent rate of 40%.

And I would say to the man who just gave property tax rent increases, that's disingenuous to compare it to a rent increase.

I stand in solidarity with renters and urge the Seattle City Council to stand with working class renters, marginalized communities and struggling small businesses and immediately adopt the following legislation from Council Member Shama Sawant.

Require landlords to give six months notice to raise rent and pay relocation assistance three times the rent when they force tenants to move because of a big rent increase.

Thank you.

Blythe Serrano is next, followed by Matthew Smith and Karen Dawson.

Go ahead, Blythe.

Hi, my name is Blythe.

I work and rent in the Central District and I'm calling in to urge the committee to support Council Member Solan's bill to require landlords to provide six months notice for rent increases and provide relocation assistance if they displace their tenants with outrageous rent increases.

You know, currently Seattle law only requires the landlords to give their tenants two months notice for rent increases.

And this staggering case of rent increase means that thousands will be forced to move.

And two months notice just isn't enough.

You know, working people need time to move and uproot their entire lives, especially in light of all the COVID debt that so many of us have been forced to accumulate.

And we also, you know, shouldn't have to shoulder the thousands of dollars it takes to move to a new place just so that corporate landlords can become even richer.

especially given that Seattle-run landlords have raised rents an average of 18.7% between January and June, which will cost a typical Seattle renter an additional $3,300 a year in increased rents.

It's really critical that we pass this legislation now and continue fighting for more renters protections, including residential and commercial rent control.

Thank you.

Matthew Smith followed by Katherine Dawson and Pamela Woodruff.

Go ahead, Matthew.

My name is Matt Smith.

I'm a renter in District 2. I'm calling in to support Council Member Solon's bill to give six-month notice of rent increases, as well as to provide relocation assistance for economic evictions.

My lease is about to come up in about two months, and it is not enough for working people to plan to move.

I had to move after my last lease from the Central District, where my housing was destroyed to build luxury housing that I couldn't afford.

Uh, and, uh, a commenter earlier said that, um, people who rent burden, uh, back in 2017, uh, nearly half of, uh, Seattle renters were paying, uh, uh, over a third of their income in rent and rent burdened.

And that is a huge, huge, uh, struggle for working people when they're told two months before their leases up, uh, they have to, uh, come up with that extra money to pay that rent for the next month.

or face the huge cost of moving.

So I support this legislation.

I urge the council to pass it without delay.

Catherine Dawson, followed by Pamela Woodruff, and then Jordan Quinn.

Go ahead, Catherine.

Hi, I'm Catherine.

I'm a renter in District 3, and I'm calling in support of Council Member Fallon's proposed renter protections, including both the six-month notice for rent increases and the relocation assistance for people displaced by significant rent increases.

As you all know, affordability and health business are both crises in Seattle.

Renter protections can prevent some evictions, which can be devastating, and they're also a step in promoting the affordability of Seattle as housing costs skyrocket beyond the reach of most workers.

Seattle is dominated by a handful of corporate landlords who have hiked rent prices over 18% within the last six months.

We know these landlords aim to maximize profit without interest in the community.

That representative from Windermere just kind of told them themselves by identifying as a small mom-and-pop shop.

The resistance to renter protections comes exactly from those companies pretending to be small landlords, not from individual family homeowners renting out a single room to meet their mortgage or property taxes.

Rent-to-protect systems are a progressive policy that specifically would support lower- and middle-income Seattleites, as many of the richest in the city are homeowners.

We cannot allow behemoth corporate landlords to continue to profit at the expense of everyday Seattleites.

Thank you.

Pamela Woodruff and then Jordan Quinn and then Monica Zazueta.

Go ahead Pamela.

Hi I'm Pamela Woodruff.

Can you hear me OK.

Yeah.

I'm Pamela Woodruff and I'm a small housing provider for the past 10 years of one detached backyard cottage in North Seattle.

I'm not a corporate landlord.

There's no Shell Corporation here.

It's just me.

I'm speaking in opposition to CB 119585 and related bills that require 180 days notice of a 10% plus rental increase and paying three months relocation fee to tenants.

Most of the small landlords, myself included, are operating on a very thin profit margin if indeed we make any profit at all.

Many of us are paying off the renovation loans that we use to create this housing, and their second mortgages on the homes we live in.

My cottage was intended to be a supplementary income for my retirement years on a fixed income.

I'm asking you to slow down and think through the unintended consequences of these and other ordinances.

Many providers are taking their rentals off the market.

If it isn't sustainable for providers it's not sustainable.

Please don't pass this ordinance or if you do make an exception for providers of six or fewer units.

Thank you.

Jordan Quinn, followed by Monica Zazueta, and then Sarah Champernon.

Go ahead, Jordan.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes.

Hi, my name's Jordan.

I'm a member of Socialist Alternative and a renter in District 2. I'm speaking in support of Council Member Sharma Sawant's upcoming resolution recognizing the historical wrongs and urging the city establishment to specifically fund the New Hope Affordable Housing Project, and a supplemental budget amendment that Shawna's bringing forward associated with this.

It's because 50 years ago, Seattle's democratic establishment forced the New Hope Missionary Baptist Church, a historically black church, to give up part of their land, and several working class black families were also forced to sell their homes under the threat of eminent domain.

Now the members of New Hope and the Central District community demand that this land be returned, so that way they can build affordable housing on it.

Black and Brown working class families have been pushed out of the central district for decades by profiteering, gentrifying corporate developers and big landlords.

The city of Seattle has a responsibility to compensate the church for the land that was taken from them and fund the affordable housing projects that would give preference to renters who have historical roots in the community, which are overwhelmingly Black and Brown families.

Thanks.

Monica Zazueta followed by Sarah Champernown and then Sonia Ponat.

Go ahead, Monica.

Am I a mute?

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Awesome.

Um, hi.

Hi everyone.

My name is Monica.

Um, I am from Vancouver, Washington, and I am a low income renter.

Um, I, um, urge, uh, the support of both bills for renters, right.

And it was a council to require landlords to give at least six months notice to tenants that rent is going to be raised.

Um, it's not fair that they want to just renovate and raise rent and my family's lives just get uprooted.

And that's just the way it is.

But if that's the way it is, then if a landlord does raise the rent where the tenant can't afford it anymore, then the landlord must pay their tenant the equivalent of three months rent to assist with moving costs, including time off work, apartment search, and also first, last and security deposit and also pet deposit if need be.

The comment of the full-time job, trying to find an apartment before by a young lady, I also continue on that thought with the mental stress of finding a place.

Not knowing where you're going to live is really scary and our lives are in your hands and we need help.

It's really hard to make it every day, stressing out about money.

And I sent you all an email about inflation.

You all take a look at it, please.

And I thank you all for what you do.

Sorry, Monica, if we cut you off, but I really appreciate your comment, and we will definitely look for your emails.

Please feel free to send your full comment to me, and I will look at it and certainly appreciate the point you made about what is being faced by low-income renters.

We have Sarah Champernown, followed by Sonia Ponath, and then Emily MacArthur.

Go ahead, Sarah.

Hi, I'd like to urge the council to pass six-month notice for rent increases and also relocation assistance.

I support every policy posted on Council Member Sawant's Renter's Bill of Rights, which includes policy that local community organizations and workers have been in need of and fighting for for years, and it's becoming more of an emergency and more urgent.

The post-COVID rent hikes They're only getting started and affordable housing is going to become an even greater crisis.

If nothing is done, or if we go, if we go for like more slower incremental solutions, the human need for housing can't just be used as the latest cash cow for investors.

And that's what I see happening now.

I also support returning land to displaced community, uh, with the new hope missionary Baptist church proposal.

to build 78 units of affordable housing for black central district community, and at a permanently affordable price.

That land never should have been stolen from the community in the first place, and it's now worth millions and millions of dollars.

Thank you.

Sonia Ponat, followed by Emily MacArthur, and then Marlene Marsh.

Go ahead, Sonia.

Hi, it's Sonia Ponath.

I'm a working mom and a landlord, and I'm urging all council members to support these two renter rights bills coming from Council Member Sawant.

We know the crisis for renters is deepening, not letting up, the pandemic's not over.

We're seeing corporate landlords already started pushing up rents at two and a half times the national average, which is really shocking.

And as a mom, it is looking very unlikely that my children will ever move out of the house.

with such skyrocketing rents.

And I think that should be deeply troubling to many people.

And no one else has answers for this besides council members who want.

And so this is really illustrating why we need rent control.

As a landlord, that doesn't scare me because it's the corporate landlords and slumlords who keep jacking up rent by more than 10%.

Also, please pass rent control without loopholes so you can preemptively avoid those unintended consequences people like Cory Brewer seem to care so much about.

claim they heard the people supposed to help, so they can't possibly support it when really it's about those profits.

So also thanks Corey Brooker for making the tax rich instead of increasing our property taxes.

Thank you.

Emily MacArthur followed by Marlene Marsh and then Jim Henderson.

Hi, my name is Emily MacArthur.

I'm a renter in the second district Last weekend at a community picnic I spoke to an elderly renter who lives in a building primarily of retirees on fixed income.

She was in literal tears as she explained that the landlord of her building was raising the rent by over $150.

She doesn't know where her and her neighbors are going to find that money in the next two months.

Moving household of belongings every year chasing cheaper rent isn't viable for elderly and disabled neighbors.

She and her neighbors are just one of a handful of examples of why we of many many examples right of why we need the six month notice notice of rent hikes.

Moreover rent control to protect the most vulnerable in our city.

Last year our taxed Amazon movement the Black Lives Matter protests Black clergy affordable housing advocates and socialists won dedicated funds from the Amazon tax each year to go toward central district affordable housing.

We know our communities need much more.

We need to increase the Amazon tax to pay for even more affordable housing in Seattle.

I support the renter's bill of rights and I urge all council members to vote yes.

We have three more speakers, Marlene Mersch, followed by Jim Henderson, and then Gabriel Mahan.

Go ahead, Marlene.

Hello.

My name is Marlene Mersch.

I am a public high school teacher and have been a public high school teacher for over 20 years.

My partner and I have a modest home with an ADU, which we have rented for below market value for many years.

We're concerned about the current proposals.

We strongly believe in rent control and having affordable housing.

However, we would like the council to consider, to please identify and distinguish between corporate and multi-unit landowners versus the single family homeowners when you apply these new rules.

You're comparing a David and a Goliath.

Obviously, what you're...

This is not what the council is aiming to do.

This is my opinion, but I definitely believe this would hurt the rental market as the Davis would not be able to support renting units with such draconian measures.

We would like the proposals to be fair and just for single family homeowners as ourselves who support our tenants and share the property with them.

Please consider separating out single family homeowners from these draconian measures.

Thank you.

Jim Henderson followed by Gabriel Mahan.

Jim, go ahead.

Good afternoon, Madam Chair and committee members.

My name is Jim Henderson representing more than 5,000 small housing providers of the Rental Housing Association of Washington.

My members oppose the 180 day notice to increase rent.

This bill will directly and significantly impact residents that rely on the housing that our members provide in your community.

A 180 day notice for rent increase doesn't allow housing providers to match the increased costs of providing housing and maintaining that housing.

Many of our members have not received rent during the past 16 months while still continuing to pay the mortgage, property taxes, insurance, maintenance, and other expenses.

Housing providers haven't increased rent for more than 16 months while cost to provide that housing has continued to increase.

We know from history that if housing providers aren't able to meet the cost of providing housing, the quality of housing will decline.

This bill will create another incentive for my members to sell when they aren't able to afford the cost of providing housing and further reducing affordable housing and housing choices in all communities.

Thank you.

Our last speaker for today is Gabriel Mellon.

Go ahead, Gabriel.

Hey, my name is Gabriel.

I'm a tech worker and resident and renter in the Central District, and I'm calling in support of the Councilperson Sawant's two proposals for 180 days notice for rent change as well as rental assistance in the case of eviction.

Our whole apartment building was recently bought by another corporate manager, and all of the residents in the 40-plus units are totally anxious about how much their rent is going to go up or not go up, because we know that the new management company has speculative aspirations of how much they can get.

But for many of us, it's not clear if we can continue to stay in our units or not.

And this 180 days notice is just a no brainer.

And I haven't met a single renter or person in the community who doesn't share that opinion as well.

So please help stability for our communities and to our apartment complex and pass 180 days notice and rental systems.

That's the way.

Thank you.

Thank you to everybody who spoke in public comment.

And I also wanted to share with members of the public that we got a message from Council Member Lewis's office several minutes ago saying that he's still wrapped up in the Board of Health meeting, which I believe is a meeting that Council Member Morales is also at, but that he will get to this committee as soon as he's done.

We appreciate that notification.

And our first agenda item, as I announced earlier, is a community panel of renters and renters rights advocates who will give their viewpoint on, and also share data on why they believe some of these bills are extremely important.

I will read out the names and, you know, as many of you already know, please sort of introduce yourself and your organizational affiliation.

for the record and then go ahead with your point.

I was going to start with Tram Tram Larson, because I know they have a time commitment that they have to get to.

So please welcome Tram.

Hi, good afternoon.

Thanks for having me.

So I'm just here in support of the proposed bills that Council Member Solan's office is introducing.

At HJP, we strongly support tenant protections.

Moving is really unaffordable for most folks, and especially if you're asking them, you know, to move in such a short notice.

And if they can't afford the place, I mean, right, families are risking like thousands of dollars having to save up, and the majority of Americans don't even have like an extra few hundred in the bank lying around.

So I think it's just, it's really an impossible ask for folks and as Seattle becomes more and more gentrified, things like these are just really necessary.

So I'm just here to express my support as well as HJP as a whole.

And we thank council member Sawant for introducing this.

Thank you so much, Tram.

I really appreciate the comments and also, as always, the work of yourself and everybody at the Housing Justice Project.

You all have done tremendous work and it was a real pleasure to be able to work with you all on the right to counsel.

And I would just note that, as I've noted before, that we need to follow it up by whatever legislation is needed to stop the default evictions, which we know is a huge problem, right?

Absolutely, absolutely.

Right to counsel is great, but I think we all know without laws to back them up.

You can throw all the attorneys in the world at the problem, but at the end of the day, they can only do what's allowed under the law.

Absolutely.

That's very well noted.

And yes, my office absolutely intends to and is looking forward to having a little bit of time so we can work on that.

And just to share with members of the public, again, the Housing Justice Project has reported this repeatedly, that default evictions end up becoming, I think, half the evictions in that affect our communities.

And we know that communities of color are so disproportionately affected by eviction.

So this is an absolutely urgent necessity.

And as you pointed out, Tram, the people are now already saddled with COVID related debt.

And all of this is just sort of coming down the pipeline for them.

So because Tram needs to leave early, I wanted to ask council members, would you have any questions for Tram and any comments that you would like to make before she has to leave?

I'm scanning the Zoom screen to see if there are any requests.

I don't see any at the moment.

Tram, please stay if you're able to, but if you need to leave and whenever you need to leave, totally understand, really appreciate it.

And we will be in contact with your office as a housing justice project as always.

I would like to welcome Violet Levathai, who is Executive Director of the Tenants Union, Washington State.

Oh, sorry, I have a note here that she can only come at 3 p.m., so I will wait for that.

We do have Gina Owens, who is a member of the Seattle Renters Commission and has also been a longtime advocate with the Washington Community Action Network, who is today speaking in a personal capacity.

Gina, can you please introduce yourself for the record and then go ahead?

Thank you, council members.

I appreciate you asking me to be here today.

I also appreciate all of the other council members who are here today because these issues are important.

I do wanna talk a little bit about the two bills, but before I do, I wanted to just give a short, brief about why these bills are personally important for me.

In the year 2000, I was in a car accident.

I think a lot of people know that story.

But because of that car accident, I have damage to my spinal cord and my doctors have noted that I'm no longer strong enough, stable enough to work.

And so that took away my income.

Months later in early 2001, I was evicted.

I went through the whole homeless in Seattle situation there, the shelters and the transitional housing.

dealing with the case managers and the social workers was really demoralizing for me and for a lot of people who go through that.

And so that has been the reason why I do the advocacy work I do in the community.

That being said, these two issues are personal for me.

One, because I lost my income, and so I wasn't able to pay my rent, which led to the eviction.

So the six-month notice for rent increase I think is very important for me because Seattle renters right now are in extreme crisis.

Partly due to skyrocketing rents and partly due to the enormous call from landlords for evictions which are happening across the state, but we're focusing on Seattle for this meeting today.

I want to talk about that.

Seattle people need six months.

I think it's important so that they have the time, especially after the pandemic we are just now coming out of, they need the time to look for new housing, to get their jobs back, to rebuild and create a new nest egg of money for them to move.

The current law right now requires landlords to give 60 days notice for rent increases.

Before the 2015 declaration of Seattle being in a state of housing emergency, 60 days would have been enough.

Since that 2015 declaration, Seattle has increased housing costs, food costs, utility costs, and more, but our wages for workers have been stagnated.

I've been working with individuals and their families during my advocacy that are stressed to the point of mental depression because of what I call the three hardcore issues we are now living.

pandemic, the economic warfare, and I say warfare because frankly, it's the working class versus the wealthy class, right?

And the third, but most important, job loss.

So many thousands of people are still in this situation where they have lost their job, either because businesses have gone down or because they're not ever going to reopened, but there are still thousands of people out of work.

180 days notice before rent increases will mean more time for renters to look for a new place and build enough money for that kind of move without the stressors of mental issues and living through all of these things that we're forced to live with now.

In terms of the relocation assistance, rents rose 18.7% from January to June alone.

That's more than double the national average.

This means that thousands of renters are facing insane increase on top of already high rents in a time when we are all struggling to recuperate from this year and a half long global pandemic Renters everywhere, specifically in Seattle, will need eviction assistance because let's face it, thousands are still jobless and at their breaking point, like me.

Even as corporate landlords are vying to make a comeback profit on the backs of our working class people, Passing council members who wants relocation assistance bill will help to slow this process down and ensure fair practices for all people concerned, tenants, as well as landlords.

And that concludes my notes.

Thank you for listening to me.

Thank you so much, Gina.

I really appreciate your comments and Yeah, and I would urge all our speakers if you're able to please stay just in case council members have questions or comments of you.

I also wanted to note.

I'm sorry if you mentioned this you know and I missed it but I just wanted to note that Gina and others.

from the Washington Community Action Network played just a really incredibly crucial role when in 2016 when we won the renters legislation to require landlords to limit moving fees that landlords can charge and also to require landlords to allow Renters to pay moving costs over a period of time, which, as I've noted before, we would not have won without Washington Community Action Network and also the Seattle Education Association playing a very important role.

And Gina, personally, you were there, so I really appreciate that.

Our next speaker that I wanted to invite is Sharon Crowley, who is a member of the Seattle Renters Commission also and is a member of UAW 4121. Go ahead, Sharon.

Hi there.

I want to thank you for having me here.

And Shama, as always, I want to thank you for being a stalwart champion for working people and renters in Seattle.

It's inspiring and it's a pleasure and an honor to be here today to speak in favor of the legislation that you're proposing.

As Shama said, I'm Sharon Crowley.

I'm an organizer and member of UAW Local 4121. I'm also a member of the Seattle Renters Commission, and I'm a renter in District 6. In the past, I have rented in District 3 and District 5, and also District 4, actually.

So, yeah, my union represents over 6,000 academic workers at the University of Washington.

These are tutors, graders, instructors, and researchers who are also undergraduate and graduate students at the same time, and then also postdocs.

Our members have been hit hard by the housing crisis, which started long before COVID-19.

Over half of our members are rent burdened, and over a third pay more than half of their income in rent.

So we know this trend isn't just limited to our members, too, of course.

It's affecting all renters and workers in Seattle.

It has been all along and it's having disproportionate impacts on black and brown people in communities in our city.

and everywhere.

So long before COVID, we've seen these problems afflicting communities in Seattle.

It has led to economic displacement, as many have said before me today, the destruction of longstanding communities like the Central District, which is the example that lots of people are citing, and it's also starting to spread further out from the core of Seattle.

And again, particularly communities of color, developers are buying up properties, they level the existing structures, and then they replace them with sleek, expensive housing that the existing residents of that community cannot afford.

We all know the story, and everybody just sort of throws their hands up and doesn't know what to do about it.

but we have to do something about it.

So, I mean, COVID led us to sort of push a pause button on rent increases and evictions, which was a big help to a lot of people, but we knew it was temporary.

Now, as the restrictions are beginning to ease, we see that rents in Seattle have gone up by almost 19% just since January.

This is way faster than the pace of inflation and way faster than anywhere else in the country.

But workers and renters have barely had a chance to regain work and wages so they can rebuild their lives.

Meanwhile, we're struggling with, you know, all of the health and mental health impacts of the of the pandemic and how it's impacted our jobs and our lives and our families.

And now so many people are burdened with huge debts.

And on top of all of the rest, they're facing the looming threat of eviction.

So taken together, these two trends are squeezing renters and workers from both directions.

Rents are rising and wages are not keeping pace.

This is true for our members and for all renters and working people in Seattle.

The average rent in Seattle is now almost $2,400 for a one-bedroom apartment.

I personally could not afford that.

almost $3,700 for a two-bedroom apartment.

So the average Seattle renter would have to earn over $84,000 per year just in order to be right at the edge of being rent burdened, which is paying more than a third of their wages in rent.

So that would put them right at paying one-third of their wages in rent.

So most of our members are 50% FTE employees.

who make well below $84,000 per year.

And even among those of our members who are 100% FTE, it's rare for them to make that much.

And this might be surprising because these are folks who are graduate students and postdocs at the University of Washington, but yeah, it's true.

They're doing world-class research and they're being paid as little as the university can get away with paying them.

Seattle's housing and homelessness crises also predate COVID, of course.

The pandemic has made things worse.

We know that rent increases lead to evictions, and right now there's also that looming threat of evictions from COVID debt.

And I mean, for most people, even before COVID, 60 days is not enough time to pull together the amount of money and the resources that it takes to move.

They're the costs associated just with moving your stuff from place to place, and then also the move-in costs that you face.

Security deposits, pet deposits, first and last month's rent, and in many cases, also monthly pet rent.

which I won't even get into that, because it's not relevant to our discussion, but it's outrageous to me how many ways landlords find to charge tenants more money over and above just the base cost of rent.

And remember, these people who are looking for new places to live are the same people who've been facing the threat of eviction from their COVID debt.

It's just untenable.

unsustainable.

So for these reasons and more, but this is enough for now, we all of us renters and workers in Seattle, we need both of these pieces of legislation.

It's a moral imperative to ensure that we do everything we can to alleviate the COVID related burdens that have fallen the hardest on the most vulnerable people among us.

I urge all of the council members to vote in favor of both of these bills.

Increasing the amount of notice that a landlord would have to give from 60 to 180 days would be a huge help for all renters.

I know for a fact that it would help our members because I've been there chased from neighborhood to neighborhood in Seattle by rent increases and this was before COVID.

It's worse now.

It takes time and effort to find an affordable place to move when you're already rent burdened because rents are increasing and you have to move further and further away.

So also passing legislation that would require landlords to pay relocation assistance.

would be a huge help for people facing that situation.

It's a crucial piece of addressing our housing crisis in Seattle.

We know that rent increases are the primary driver of homelessness, so this assistance could really help prevent thousands of people, countless people really, from becoming homeless.

it could mean the difference between people being able to get by and losing everything.

And nobody should have to live on that knife edge, in my opinion.

So again, I want to thank Council Member Sawant for proposing these two critical pieces of legislation.

I think we have to pass them.

And as I said earlier, yeah, I urge all of the members of the Council to also vote in favor of this legislation and to get it into place as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Sharon.

I really, really appreciate the the force with which you have brought in the voice of not only renters in general, but of the members of UAW 4121, as you pointed out, you all do all the work that UW's stellar reputation rests on, but you all get squeezed.

And in fact, if you compare the salaries of the workers to the salaries of the executives at UW, it tells quite a story.

And I know your union, especially during your contract battles, have put a spotlight on that.

Some of your comments reminded me of the rent control press conference that we had recently in the Central District.

And Amzai Jeffs, who was a member of your union, now he's moved for postgraduate studies on the East Coast.

But I was really struck by what he said.

He said that when he was preparing his remarks for the press conference, it suddenly dawned on him that he has had to move every year, that he has not had one year in Seattle.

When he didn't have to move.

So I think, to your point, all these bills really speak to the immediate needs of the work of working people as a whole, but also specifically UW members.

Just one question before I go on to our next speakers is in terms of your members, UAW members, what are you noticing in terms of the COVID?

Obviously, we are not out of the pandemic, but the problems have eased.

Much of our population has been vaccinated.

So are you observing that students, graduate students who are maybe in their home cities are moving back?

Are you seeing that sort of phenomenon?

And is that going to obviously make the question of rent even more prominent?

And the second question is, Where do you believe most of the UAW members live?

I mean, are they forced to live farther and farther away from the U district just because they have to find somewhere they can afford?

I may not fully remember the first question.

I'm sorry.

I'm a little distracted by all of this, all of this stuff.

And I have a little bit of stage fright.

But so you're asking, The first question, I'm sorry, could you repeat the first question again?

Oh yeah, just if your union has noticed any pattern where maybe some of the graduate student workers were sort of living at home during the pandemic and now are moving back and is rent now going to be more of a life question for them?

Yes, absolutely.

And even among those who stayed in Seattle, they may have had partners that helped them to stay here, but a lot of folks' partners also experienced the loss of wages because of COVID.

So, even those who stayed here were were struggling but yeah a lot of folks have did move back home.

Remember that about 40% of our members are international scholars, so home for them meant overseas and many of them have not been able to return.

But yes, the UW is.

They're trying to impose restrictions on people working remotely, which is going to make it very difficult for existing and new grad students and postdocs who are international folks to navigate this, because many of them are in places where there are still travel restrictions, and so UW is squeezing them still.

And in answer to your question of where most of our renters live, I think the majority still live in the U District, but in much tighter quarters than previously.

They're living in situations where there's lots of roommates crammed into a smaller place than is ideal.

But yes, a lot of folks have had to move further out.

I myself did when I was still a graduate student.

I ended up living in Lake City and was right at the edge of the border with shoreline and was looking at moving even further away.

But I think a lot of our members do still live closer in, but in much more cramped circumstances than is ideal for somebody who's a graduate student.

But really, I think it's not ideal for anybody.

So yeah, I think both of those things are happening.

People moving further out and just cramming more people into a smaller space.

Thank you so much.

That does offer some glimpse into what it's like for a lot of the graduate students.

Really appreciate that, Sharon.

We have Star Willie, who is a Seattle renter and a Starbucks barista.

Welcome, Star.

Please introduce yourself for the record.

And yeah, and please share with us what you're hearing from your fellow workers and what life is like as a barista and as a renter in the city.

Hello, everybody.

Thank you, Shama.

My name, Council Member Sawant, excuse me.

My name is Star Willie, and I'm here as a Starbucks barista in Seattle, urging city council members to stand with renters, stand with the working class, LGBTQ, and trans community.

affordable each time I renew my lease because they raise the rent every year and I'm very very lucky to be able to afford have found this little place that I can afford.

It would help me and many other renters in Seattle if I had more notice six months before the rent increases.

Nothing has improved about my apartment.

The only thing that changes every year is the rent goes up.

If they raise the rent

Star, you keep freezing off and on, so we're missing a lot of what you're saying.

Oh, OK.

No problem.

Just keep going.

Can you hear me now?

Yes.

OK.

Seattle rents, as other people have said, have rose 18.7% just from January to June.

Those rent hikes will cost the typical Seattle renter an extra $3,300 a year.

I certainly can't afford that.

If the landlords raise the rent here 10% or more, I definitely couldn't afford it and I would have to move.

I would not be able to afford moving costs if this were to happen.

And if I had six months to plan, that would be a huge help.

I urge you to vote yes on the relocation bill being put forth today.

I can't afford to move and if my rent were to increase by 10% or more, I would have to, but without assistance, part of decreasing homelessness.

I've worried about having to live on the street and as a trans person that could be very dangerous.

Trans people face discrimination in the workplace and are three times more likely to live in poverty and face many extra life-threatening challenges when they are homeless.

Everyone I talk with at work and on the street about renting in Seattle agrees that rent is very high and it's very hard to live here with corporate landlords increasing the rent so often with little Also saying that I fully support the movement that council members want and the renters rights movement.

And beyond June 30th and closing loopholes to Seattle law that allowed landlords to evict renters at the end of a fixed term lease.

I urge council members to add the additional protections of six months notice for any rent increase and relocation assistance for renters facing a significant rent increase.

But we also need to pass rent control to prevent rents from rising more than the cost of living.

Without this, renters will continue to be driven out by rent increases that far outpace the increase in wages.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to participate and share my experience as a working class renter, barista, and member of the LGBT community.

Star thank you so much.

As you said, speaking as a member of the LGBT community and also as a barista we unfortunately missed a lot of your comment because of technical difficulties.

I would appreciate it if you could email your full comment to my office and then we will add it as the written record of this committee meeting.

And also I wanted to know that Council Member Lewis joined us several minutes ago.

Thank you so much for being here, Council Member Lewis.

We have a few more community speakers.

We have Jacob Shear, who is an organizer at WheelChange and is a member of the Book Workers Union.

Please go ahead, Jacob.

Introduce yourself on the record and then speak to your points.

Welcome.

You're on mute, Jacob.

Sorry about that.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember San Juan, for having me and for putting forward these, yeah, two really crucial pieces of legislation.

And thank you so much to all the speakers and all the folks who spoke during public comment in support of these.

My name is Jacob sheer I'm an advocacy organizer for real change, and I just want to talk a little bit about how these pieces of legislation would impact the vendors who sell our newspaper.

So for the low income and housing unstable vendors who who make a living selling our newspaper rent increases economic eviction and displacement or each drivers which can lead back to living unsheltered on our streets.

And I want to thank Council Member Selwyn for really eliminating with this legislation all that goes into being forced to find a new place to live, and the anxiety and uncertainty that accompanies being displaced.

Being forced to move is expensive, time-consuming, and really, really stressful.

The expectation that someone being forced from their home can be expected to find a more affordable, safe, and comfortable place within 60 days in Seattle is incredibly unrealistic.

And we need legislation that acknowledges the reality of trying to navigate the affordable housing crisis that Seattle continues to face.

Specifically, low-income and housing-insecure folks like our vendors do not have the luxury of taking time off from work to spend hours pursuing housing leads following up with landlords, navigating the barriers to housing posed by work history, credit, and onerous criminal background checks that stigmatize the poor.

And even once housing has been secured, deposits, moving fees, first and last month's rent mean that moving is a massive financial setback.

You know, the American Moving and Storage Association estimates the cost of moving locally to be somewhere around $2,300, which is several months' rent for a low-income person in Seattle.

That total is likely much higher.

And navigating the Seattle housing market as a poor person poses incredible challenges that we need to acknowledge and respond to if we want to actually address homelessness and housing insecurity.

And expanding the time required to give rent increase notice to 180 days and requiring landlords to provide relocation assistance are really crucial anti-displacement measures that will immediately benefit those suffering the worst consequences of gentrification, of skyrocketing rent, and of the lack of affordable housing.

And these measures will help also help incentivize landlords to stabilize rent and to keep tenants in their homes.

We know that rent has gone up nearly 20% citywide throughout the pandemic, and that corporate landlords are reaping record profits.

And as we join Council Member San Juan in her push for rent control that Seattle renters desperately need, measures like this, which simply take into account the realities of moving and mitigate their most damaging impacts, will help ensure that being forced to move does not lead to destitution or back into homelessness.

So that's all I have, kind of a brief statement, but happy to field questions.

And thank you so much for the opportunity to speak.

Thank you so much, Jacob.

And thank you to everyone at real change, absolutely making this crucial link which we know is represented tremendously in statistics between the struggles of renters and then finally what happens when you become homeless and that the Availability of affordable housing through affordable rents is a crucial component of preventing homelessness in the first place.

So really appreciate your presence here and the point you made.

We also have Violet Levati, who is the Executive Director of the Tenants Union of Washington State, but I don't see her here as of yet on Zoom.

Ted, can you confirm that we, or Nick, can you confirm that I'm not missing her?

Yes, Council Member, currently Violet is not present.

Okay, if she arrives later, we will try and make time for her.

And I also wanted to note on, you know, that Gina and Sharon, who are both members of the Seattle Renters Commission, I just wanted to note that the Renters Commission has formally supported both the six months notice legislation and the economic evictions relocations legislation.

So thank you to Gina and Sharon, and also all the other members, current and past members of the, city of Seattle renters commission who have played a tremendous role in really advocating for renters rights.

Do council members have any questions of our panelists or any comments to make while we have the panelists.

Thank you Council Member Juarez for letting me know.

And also I don't see any, thank you Council Member Peterson.

Appreciate you all letting me know whether you have comments or not.

So our community panelists, you're most welcome to remain.

I would love for you to remain, but also understand if you have to leave, we will be in touch with you as we continue the work of the committee and we're hoping, as I mentioned earlier, Uh, we can bring these 2 bills up for a vote at the next regularly scheduled meeting, which is July 27th, and we will keep in touch with all the committee members as well.

So, we've had a really good glimpse into what our community members are, you know, the conditions they're facing and why they're supporting these 2 bills.

But now we also have, you know, our 2nd agenda item specifically on the economic.

And we have Asha Venkatraman, as I indicated earlier, from city council central staff available here to answer any questions from council members about the details of the bill.

And she had presented a comprehensive presentation at the last committee meeting that was, I believe in June 22nd.

That presentation has been attached to today's agenda as well, if council members wanted to peruse through it.

And I also have Ted Verdone from my office, who will briefly introduce an overview of the bill, just to sort of walk everyone through what that bill will do.

And as I mentioned during the chair's remarks, this bill has been transmitted to the council president's office for formal introduction, which we hope will happen soon.

And we will let the committee members know when it is ready for a vote.

So Ted, did you want to introduce yourself and go ahead?

Council member.

I could briefly erupt, Violet has just joined us.

Oh, thank you so much, Violet.

Before we have Ted go ahead with his presentation, we had other community speakers already speak to the two bills, the six months notice and economic evictions, but we are really happy to have you here.

So please go ahead with your comments and introduce yourself for the record.

You're on mute, Violet.

Sorry.

Hi, my name is Violet Labatai and I'm the Executive Director of the Tenant Union.

We advocate for tenants in the state of Washington.

We started in Seattle and I'm here today to talk about more renter tenant protections.

And I really am so glad that this legislation CHAMA has put forward will help many of our community members.

mostly black and brown people in the community who feel, who gets, you know, evictions, higher eviction rates in our state, not only in the city of Seattle, but also in our state.

With this legislation, it will help immensely.

And so I'm glad to join the meeting today and would love to hear more about everything Shama, so thank you.

Thank you, Violet, and thank you for all the work that the Tenants Union does, both in terms of advocacy and, you know, for new bills, and also the work you do helping tenants with the enforcement of the law, which is another extremely important component.

Really appreciate that, Violet.

And so, yeah, Ted, please introduce yourself and go ahead with the presentation.

Edward Owen, Office of Council Member Kshama Sawant, and Nick, if you can share the screen of the presentation.

And I have limited bandwidth on my internet connection right now, so apologies if I cause any problems there.

So this is just a quick overview of the main policy objectives and aspects of the Economic Displacement Relocation Assistance Bill regarding economic evictions.

Next slide, please.

So the bill right now, the legislation right now, the law right now in Seattle, there is relocation assistance in some situations.

There's the tenant relocation assistance ordinance that's currently on the books.

Under the tenant relocation assistance ordinance, people have, renters have the right to get relocation assistance if their landlord evicts them in order to demolish the unit or remodel the unit.

But it's really only in those cases.

In every other case where a renter is forced to move, there's no relocation assistance.

And of course, from the point of view of the renter, their costs are the same regardless of whether their former landlord intends to demolish the building after they leave.

And in particular, as it relates to this legislation, if the landlord raises the rent, And the renter is forced to move because the landlord raises the rent.

There's in Seattle right now there's currently no relocation assistance and that's what this bill, this proposed bill will address.

Next slide please.

So the.

So what this bill does, the eligibility criteria for getting relocation assistance, there's basically two things that need to happen.

First, the landlord needs to raise the rent by 10% or more in a single year.

Now that doesn't mean that they can raise it, you know, 9% each month.

It's over the course of that year, 10% or more increase in rent.

Their rent increases by 10% or more.

And there's other bills in Seattle that have in the past used 10% as that threshold for what counts as an extremely large rent increase for a single year.

And the other thing that needs to happen is that needs to be sufficient for the renter to have to move.

So if the landlord In discussing with landlords in the past, people have raised situations where they say, I talked to my tenants, I needed to raise the rent by 15%, but made sure that it was something that my tenants could afford.

And so they didn't move.

No problem.

They didn't move.

That second condition was not met, so there's no relocation assistance because nobody was displaced.

Or if a renter moves because they get a new job in another place, and they just move to that other location, and it's not because the rents have been raised.

The rents were only raised at the rate of inflation.

2%, 3%.

Again, there's no relocation assistance required.

That's something that the renter chose to do in their own life.

It wasn't forced by the landlord raising the rent.

But if both things happen, if the landlord raises the rent and the renter moves as a result, that's when the renter is eligible for relocation assistance.

The amount of relocation assistance is three times one month's rent.

So if you think about Some of the costs of moving are varied.

There's first, last, and security deposit that you have to pay when you move in, which is a good kind of way to wrap your brain around three months' rent.

But in addition, there's the actual physical costs of moving.

I think that in the community panel, these points were made.

Many people have to take time off work in order to actually go seek a new apartment.

So there are many costs that are involved in having to move.

So relocation assistance helps with those costs and this legislation sets that to three months rent.

And then who pays that relocation assistance?

It is the landlord who raised the rent, who is responsible for paying the relocation assistance.

That is different from the way TRAIL works, the Tenant Relocation Assistance Ordinance, in the cases where there's a remodeling or where the landlord needs to remodel the building.

or has evicted in order to remodel the building.

Under TRAO, the city pays half of the cost of the relocation assistance.

In this legislation, the landlord is paying all of it.

But in this legislation, the landlord has raised the rent by 10% or more and is not even spending money on remodeling.

So there is a certain assumption that the landlord has made this decision and has the money coming in in order to pay for it.

Next slide, please.

This is a map produced by the Puget Sound Regional Council in their 2019 housing travel survey, which they do the survey periodically.

And the 2019 one, for the first time, asked people the reasons why they moved.

And that's provided some data about those reasons.

So you see these color bars on the right side of the screen there's the red is when it 35 is those red regions are worth 35% of people that moved gave a reason that is. that is considered being displaced.

The survey gave many possible reasons that people could give, and several of them are grouped together as displacement-related ones, and the increased housing cost is, of course, by far the lion's share of that.

So 35% in those red blocks are people who say displacement was the reason they moved.

So this bill, So this is not specific to 10% rent increases.

It's more general than that.

And it's not just Seattle.

If you look, this is the whole Puget Sound region.

But you can look at where Seattle is on the map, and there's a whole lot of red there and a whole lot of yellow there in the Seattle area of this map.

So this gives an idea of just how significant a piece of legislation this is.

This is a bill that's going to affect many people.

Many people are economically displaced.

We got this information from the city demographer and they are They are currently working on isolating the Seattle data.

We'll come out with Seattle data soon that we'll be able to look at to give more precise numbers about the impact of this legislation.

Next slide, please.

Next slide, please.

There we go.

So there are many things that this legislation does.

This slide identifies a couple areas of further work, either as an amendment within this bill or in some cases it may have to be subsequent bills.

So first there's the question of creating a fee to fund the administration of this program, a fee that landlords would pay when they economically evict people.

The way the legislation is designed, there's no direct payments between the landlord and the renter for relocation assistance because there's too much of an unfair power dynamic there.

So instead, all the money goes through the city.

The landlords pay the city, and then the city pays the tenant.

And that means that, and the city pays the tenant if they're eligible, regardless of whether the landlord pays the city and then the city has many tools in place to collect money that's owed to them.

But that allows the powerful city to make sure that anybody who's owed money actually gets paid.

And that's actually the same as how the tenant relocation assistance ordinance works.

But this does mean that the Seattle Department of Construction and inspections has a significant administrative role in this legislation.

And that's something that could be paid by a fee on landlords, you know, to cover that because it is currently actually a burden on the Seattle Department of Construction inspections.

fulfilling their obligation under the Tenant Relocation Assistance Ordinance.

Although again, with that one, the city actually pays half of it, so it's not exactly an apples and oranges comparison.

It is an apples and oranges comparison.

It's some kind of fruits.

The other area for future work is this legislation is focused on economic evictions when renters are forced to move by rent increases.

And the tenant relocation assistance ordinance is focused on when landlords, on one type of no fault eviction, when a landlord evicts somebody in order to remodel or demolish the building.

It's not the renter's fault, but the landlord does have that right to do that eviction under the Just Cause Eviction Ordinance, but relocation assistance is required under TRAO.

But there's other types of no-fault evictions that are not covered by TRAO and are also not economic evictions, such as if a landlord evicts somebody in order to sell the property.

So that is another area of work that needs to be addressed.

And the final slide just says questions.

Thank you, Ted, really appreciate that overview.

Council members, if you have questions or comments on this presentation, please feel free to direct them to Ted, or as I said, we have Asha Venkatramathan here as well.

Asha, is there something you wanted to add, just based, I mean, based on your comments the last time when you presented, or anything?

Sure, I'll just make a couple additional comments.

Asha Mekatraman with Council Central staff.

There are a few changes that are reflected in the new draft that's on this agenda that were not included in the previous draft.

And the major one is the addition of the ability for STCI to pursue citations rather than just notices of violation.

And so in our discussions with SDCI about how to implement the administration of this new program, they expressed a desire to have flexibility to do one or the other depending on the violation itself.

And so...

And Asha, just for everybody to be on the same page, can you also explain the difference between what's a citation and what is a notice of violation?

Sure.

So citations are primarily the the SECI finds that there has been a a violation of the law and just sends a citation that basically says, you know, here's what the violation is.

Here's how much you pay and you have to pay in order to comply.

And so it's it's just like a almost like a ticket that's sent to the landlord.

A notice of violation can be a little bit more involved just because it is it may involve a little bit more of an investigation and then the penalties are more discretionary than they are for the citation.

The citation itself that is included in this draft of the legislation, I believe pegs the penalties at $1,000 for the first penalty and then $2,000 for subsequent penalties.

And the notice of violation can be a little more flexible about what that is.

At the point at which this legislation gets introduced and then discussed in committee, the memo that I'll prepare will lay out all of the reasons you do citations versus notices of violations.

and then what the differences are between those things.

So there will definitely be more detail about that addition.

I just wanted to flag it as a difference between what we presented on in the last committee meeting and what has been included in this draft legislation.

The only other thing I'd add is we do have some more information from SUCI and the hearing examiner about what the staffing and resources is going to take to be able to implement this legislation.

And those you'll see are reflected in the draft summary and fiscal note.

That's not information that we had at the last presentation.

But it looks like to be able to set up the IT infrastructure, we're looking at about 1.2 to 1.3 million dollars.

excuse me, $1.2 to $1.5 million to add to SBCI's existing IT infrastructure.

So it can do all the work of accepting the complaints, figuring out when the payments come in, when the payments should go back out.

And then they'll also need additional staff support in the form of a code compliance analyst to be doing the actual work around determining whether somebody is qualified for relocation assistance and making those determinations.

And so because this is a new program, it does require some changes to how SUCI will go forward in administering all of the payments based on the deadlines in the bill.

Then as far as the hearing examiner goes, the cases that would go to the hearing examiner are appeals of the determination from SDCI.

And then with this new edition of the citations, any appeals from that citation process would go to the hearing examiner as well.

And so both STCI and the hearing examiner have the current versions of these bills.

And so if there are updates to any of the caseload issues or the workload issues, they will be sharing those and we will update the summary and fiscal note at that point.

Thank you so much, Asha.

I really appreciate the thoroughness with which you have, and also the staff at STC have approached this.

If it is possible, I totally understand if it's not, but at the next meeting, and maybe in preparation for the next committee meeting, it might be helpful to get sort of a flow chart of what is it that tenants should do if this law goes into effect, which I hope it will, you know, and your, rents going up by 10% or more have forced you to move, then what are the steps you should take?

Just a pictorial view might be helpful to share with both members of the public and also council members to just follow through if that's possible.

Absolutely, I'd be happy to prepare a flow chart for easier understanding.

Fantastic.

Council members, any questions or comments while we have Asha here and also?

And also, obviously, this is not the last opportunity.

Please look over the latest version of the bill and let my office or ASHA directly know if you have any queries or any clarifications necessary for any time between now and July 27th.

Not seeing any comments, I will go ahead and move to the next Item on the agenda, which is a discussion of the comprehensive rent control policy.

And at our last committee meeting, council members, you will remember we had a presentation on the frequently asked questions, which is a resource that.

That my office prepared based on all the knowledge we have on existing our past when you know either currently existing or past when control policies in different parts of the nation and you know what economists have gleaned in terms of what works and what doesn't work.

And that is available on, that obviously was available as the agenda materials for the last meeting.

And it's also available on my council office website.

So please feel free to look at that.

I just feel that because we are over time for this committee meeting and we did do that last time and we will be coming back to that next time.

If there are no objections, I will hold this discussion for our next meeting.

Seeing no objections, we will move to item number four, which is the bill to increase the notice required for rent increases to six months from what we have today, which is a two months notice.

The legislation is, I believe, fairly straightforward, but again, our chairman is here to answer any questions that council members might have at this point.

Council member Peterson, go ahead.

Thank you, Chair Sawant.

I did have a question.

I'm sorry I didn't raise my hand fast enough.

I did have a question about the previous bill.

And I'm glad Asha's the same central staff analyst, so she's still here.

May I ask the question about the previous proposal?

Absolutely.

OK.

And thank you to your staff for their presentation.

The question I have is, Just trying to work through a hypothetical example.

So if a landlord's charging $2,000 a month in rent and they want to raise it by 10%, let's say, and so that's $200, if the tenant can't afford that and leaves, then the city would pay that tenant $6,000.

And so if the landlord is successful in re-renting that unit to somebody else for $2,200, I mean, it would take a couple of years for them to recoup that $6,000.

So I just want to make sure that that's a, appropriate or that's an accurate hypothetical.

Because I thought I heard in the presentation somebody saying the landlord could afford to do something to pay the $6,000, and it wasn't clear to me they necessarily can.

But I understand the logic of the three months you're saying, because when they move, they're going to have to pay it first, last month's rent, and security deposit is pretty common.

I just want to understand the math there.

And so I was just nodding.

So I think I'm understanding it.

So I appreciate that.

The only clarification I'd add is that the tenant that moved out would get that $6,000, assuming that they were the only household that was paying the $2,000.

And so it's just based on how many, the whole amount of rent and how many households are within that unit.

So the way you explained it is correct for one household.

If it turns out that it was two households that were paying a total of $2,000 and, for example, one of the tenants decided to move out but the other didn't, then the landlord would be paying $3,000 to that tenant.

So the whole unit would be If both tenants were moving out, it would be $6,000.

But if just one tenant were moving out, it would be $3,000.

So the calculation for the unit is going to be the same.

How much the tenant gets just depends on how many households the rent is being split between, if that makes sense.

OK, so if it's a two-bedroom unit and it's $2,000 and the landlord attempts to raise it to $2,200, both tenants move out.

they would each get $6,000.

They would each get $3,000.

They would each get $3,000.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you for clarifying that.

Appreciate it.

That was the only question I have right now.

Chair Solon, thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Peterson and also Asha for your response.

And in fact, on that, just to follow up on that, I know we were looking at information from other states to see what is being done in other cases, like maybe Oregon or some parts of California, if you remember off the top of your head.

I don't have the exact numbers, but they are comparable.

In Oregon, there's relocation assistance for economic evictions like this, and it is a relatively similar amount.

I think in both Oregon and, I'll have to go back and look at the exact numbers, but in some cases, it's a set amount rather than being a, rather than being a relative to the amount of the previous rent.

So like, so for example, it would be $4,000, regardless of how much rent was being charged previously.

When we were looking at the different policy questions in this legislation, we thought we found that the, That the reality is there's a big difference between the relocation assistance that's needed for one person moving out of a studio, and the relocation assistance of eight people moving out of an eight person house.

We go a lot farther for that single person moving out of a studio then split between eight people in an eight person house.

So, we found that it was a more a better policy, and just generally more fair.

to have it be relative to the amount of rent that was being paid previously.

And also, to a certain degree, that's a good indicator of what the cost of relocation is, because it's a good indicator of what sort of rent the person is going to expect to pay in the new place that they move into.

So in Oregon and California, places in California that have these bills, it is somewhat comparable, the size of the relocation assistance, but it's also been changed by some legislation.

There was one one city in California attempted to change it to something like something like a million dollars.

And the court said that because really they were trying to create a form of rent control in that way to just make it impossible to pay.

And the court said, well, you can't do that, that would be rent control, but the amount that you were, that the relocation assistance was pegged at, which again is comparable to this legislation, the court said that is okay.

So that's just, again, I'm sure committee members will want the actual numbers and I don't have them at my fingertips, but that's what we looked at in drafting.

Thank you, Ted.

It will be useful.

In addition to everything that Asha shared with us, it will be useful to have, maybe if you can get more precise numbers, we can share it with all the committee members once we have that.

Thank you for that question, Council Member Peterson.

Any other questions on either of the two bills?

I don't see- Madam Chair?

Yeah, Council Member Juarez, go ahead.

Thank you.

I just have a quick question.

I was going to ask offline, but it's pretty straightforward.

I had a chance to look at the ordinance.

This is item number four.

So I had a chance, obviously, to read the ordinance and the summary and fiscal note.

Thank you for that.

So why six months or 180 days rather than, I mean, I understand 60 days.

Why six months?

What is the reasoning behind that?

Was there a reason for that number or time period?

Ted, go ahead.

I see your hand raised up.

So there's again, there's a precedent.

In this case, it's Montreal.

But the other and that and.

The way that that precedent came to us is the Seattle Renters Commission was looking at this issue, and this is a couple of years ago, but they were looking at this issue, and they looked at best practices around the country and around the world, and they wrote a letter to the council urging six months based on that, and it was on their recommendation.

But we don't have another city to look to that gives The landlord has to give six months notice that they intend to raise the rent.

It's just that Montreal City of Montreal, which is fine.

I'm just trying to.

It, yes, I mean, city of Montreal and yeah, unfortunately Seattle, it would be great if other cities did great things first and then we followed them, but that's not been true in the case of many renters rights.

So in that sense, no, we don't have those examples, but Ted is accurate in reporting that we didn't, you know, my office didn't come up with this number.

We really took the recommendation of the renters commission who recommended based on the data they've looked at and felt that that was the fair lead time for renters.

Yeah.

And I'm not trying to do a gotcha thing or anything.

What I'm trying to get at is with the way the rental market is and how difficult it is, and particularly with the pandemic and particularly with people with families and what we've been dealing with, I'm wondering if we can have maybe some offline discussions and then back in committee about maybe not six months, but certainly more than 60. I'm more inclined to see that and talk a little bit more through that.

And maybe if there's a way to escalate that up to six months.

That's just me trying to be practical about addressing an issue.

and getting it across the finish line, if that's something you want to entertain later, Council Member Sawant.

So I'm just letting you know now what my thinking is.

So I just want to share that with you and be straightforward and honest.

And me, I'm a little bit more practical about how we make things move forward.

But I appreciate what you've given us to look at, and I appreciate the briefing from Ted and from Asha.

Thank you, Council Member Juarez.

I appreciate you being upfront about what you're thinking is, obviously, I would, you know, anything, anything significantly more than what we have today, which is two months, would be a significant step forward for renters, obviously, needless to say, as you know, I'm also straightforward.

And so I will, of course, Stick to what the renters commission have recommended, but at the same time, I really welcome any discussion with your office on this.

So please, please make sure that your staff reach out to my staff, or I'm happy to, you know, if you want to set up a meeting where we all meet alongside our staff, that would be great as well.

We have about, yeah, I don't know, a little over 10 days.

I also appreciate that.

And this is just quickly regarding item number three.

In principle, I agree with you about rent control.

I think we just have differences what that means.

And I know that this has been an ongoing discussion that you and I have had many times offline, both professionally, personally, and intellectually.

And I am supportive of that.

But again, I think we just have different ideas about how we would implement that.

I still welcome and I still appreciate that you're very candid with me and very straightforward about how that can become a reality in the city, whatever Seattle rent control looks like.

So thank you.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

And when we meet, I'm happy to have a conversation both on more urgently on the six month thing and also on rent control, which is coming up.

We have a special committee scheduled in September also to go forward with that.

And also just in terms of what you were saying about practical, I mean, obviously, as I said, I welcome any discussions that we can have as committee members.

I do feel obligated to point out that for renters, I mean, this is a question, I mean, when we arrive at recommendations based on housing advocates who study the issue, I do believe that they come up with these recommendations not out of wanting to have a gratuitous approach against landlords.

It is really from a practical standpoint, like what is it that renters need today given just the onslaught of rent increases and everything that they have faced in the last years and just looking at the actual statistics.

So just to let you know, that's our starting point as well.

It is a practical standpoint.

It may not be practical for some landlords who, want to exploit their tenants, but unfortunately, that's just the way it is.

Okay, we'll leave it there.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And again, I really appreciate you being very frank about that.

I prefer, as you know, I prefer that much more than if we are not able to speak frankly with one another.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Any other comments or questions from council members or Asha, if you had anything to add?

I don't see any requests so I will move ahead to, you know, thanking everybody who was present here and Asha as always really appreciate your ongoing thorough work on this, and also please convey our thanks to the Department of Construction Inspections for engaging on this very important Bill, I thought it was useful what, Ted, you presented the statistics.

I think that's important to note that we haven't had these statistics.

I mean, what is the, what are the major causes of displacement?

And it's important that we have some statistics from the 2019 study of the Puget Sound Regional Council, which showed that the rent, the cost of housing, or in other words, rent for renters, is the primary cause of displacement.

That's very useful to look at.

Thank you.

Again, thanks to everybody who engaged in all of these renters rights items.

Items 5-8 are Green New Deal oversight board appointments.

We have Jose Vasquez from the office of sustainability and environment to introduce the appointees.

Please go ahead, Jose.

Just from a technical point, if somebody with the power to do so could promote the three appointees from the attendance list to the panelist list so they can speak.

I see it's happening right now.

Yeah, thank you, Ted.

And thank you, Council Member Sawant and fellow council members, again, for the opportunity to come here in front of you to make recommendations for the following four appointments for the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Coming up today, we have, it is my honor to introduce Emily Myers to be appointed to one of the Labor Union representative seats.

One second, I'm getting my screens confused here in front of me.

Emily is currently the staff organizer and serves as an elected executive board member for UAW 4121, where she develops and implements organizing strategies and membership engagement for 6,000 academic student employees and postdocs at the University of Washington to build collective power, advocate for fair working conditions, equitable higher education, and social justice.

She co-facilitates their local political work group, climate justice work group, and Communications Work Group, which organizes and advocates for climate justice at the intersection of labor and climate.

She works to develop union members to be leaders on climate and worker issues.

Unfortunately, due to some scheduling conflicts, she wasn't able to attend today, but she sends her regards and is thankful of this recommendation to be appointed to the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Next, we have also a union labor representative recommendation for appointment, Andrea Ornelas, who is currently the assistant political director for member outreach and serves on the executive board for Laborers Local 242. where she works with membership to organize events in the community around our elected leaders.

Andrea has helped uplift community voices and leadership, working with MLK Labor Council through a series of educational workshops focused on economic recovery and unions and anti-racism.

She also volunteers through a new pre-apprenticeship program as a diversity speaker on economic empowerment, mentoring teens, and adults seeking information about union trades.

Andrea, we wanted to open up this opportunity to see if you wanted to share a few words about your appointment to the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Yes, I do.

Thank you, Council Member Kshama Sawant and everyone for appointing me, I really, I appreciate it.

And there's a lot of work that I'm ready to get involved with and get done.

I just want to iterate that I would like, as we transition from fossil fuel to zero carbon, that we save jobs for people in the field and help the communities as well that will be affected equally at the same time.

So thank you guys.

Thank you, Andrea.

Up next, we have Deepa Sivarajan.

I hope I'm saying that correctly.

Deepa is currently the Washington Policy Manager for Climate Solutions, where she develops policies for local governments and institutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, with a current focus on decarbonizing the built environment.

She works with coalitions such as Shiv Zero and with statewide and community partners, including Stand.Earth, Friend and Centered, Sierra Club, Northwest Energy Coalition, Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, Masaska Talks, Washington Environmental Council, Citizens for a Healthy Bar, Sunrise Tacoma, People for Climate Action, 250 Seattle, and more.

Through coordination with the Department of Construction and Inspections and the Office of Sustainability and Environment, she has helped advocate for the passage of the strong commercial energy code this year that eliminates most fossil fuel usage in the new commercial and large multifamily buildings.

She also advocated for the Seattle Public School Board to pass a clean energy resolution that commits the district to operating with 100% clean energy by 2040, along with a strong coalition of students, educators, parents, and other environmental advocates.

Deepa, would you like to say a few words?

Yes, thank you so much for having me here.

And I'm really honored to be recommended for this appointment.

I'm really looking forward to working with Andrea and Emily and all of the other great members who have already been appointed to the board.

I know that it's a great group of folks from different sectors and really happy to be having so many labor and environmental folks on together.

And just wanting to reiterate that my aim in being here is to really elevate the voices of frontline communities in responding to the climate crisis, both in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but also making sure that we're addressing health impacts and safety impacts, as well as jobs and adjust transition as we figure out how to move off of fossil fuels.

Thank you.

Thank you, Deepa.

And last but not least, we have Christina Chu, who is being recommended to be appointed for one of the youth seats here for the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Christina is a 23-year-old Seattle resident who was inspired by the reading of On Fire, The Burning Case for a Green New Deal.

to want to be a driving force and a participant in local policy creation and implementation that reflects the just transition.

She holds an undergraduate degree in environmental engineering and looks for ways to harness the technical knowledge she has in envisioning a greener future in a collective space.

She organizes with Sunrise Seattle and hopes to use her participation in the Green New Deal Oversight Board to get other young people involved in climate organizing.

Christina, would you like to share a few words?

Sure.

Um, hi, thank you again.

And I just want to echo what Deepu was saying about hoping, um, that my appointment can help bring in a lot of voices and, um, from the different partnerships across the Seattle area.

And then also on the broad spectrum, um, beyond that geographically.

And I think that, um, I'm really excited about the group that we have forming and I'm excited that we're finally going to be meeting next week.

And Jose, it's also nice to meet you too.

So thank you.

Yeah, thank you everybody.

And with that, it is an honor to be presenting these four appointments, which would bring us to a total of 15 members out of the 19 oversight board members, allowing us to start meeting.

And like Christina said, we're gonna hold our first meeting greet starting next week, and then dive deep into the work of establishing and moving forward the Green New Deal for Seattle in the next few months.

So we look forward to coming back with some recommendations and some really great advice from our frontline diverse stakeholders that we have here at the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

Thank you so much, Jose.

I really appreciate you doing this work.

And I also wanted to recognize Ted Verdun from my office also has been doing a lot of work.

And I know he's talked a lot with all of you.

I know Deepa and Emily, of course, personally, really appreciate you both.

I know Emily's not here today, unfortunately, but I appreciate your willingness to serve.

Looking forward to getting to know Andrea and Christina, but I've heard a lot about both of you and I'm really excited as Jose, I'm really excited that this board is finally going to meet.

I know it was a long road getting here and we had some obstacles, but finally it is happening and it's great.

And I also wanted to note how important it is that our nominees have spoken about the need to focus on, you know, include the question, real, real question about just transition and how the effects of climate change are felt disproportionately by the same communities who are actually affected by the skyrocketing events that we were just talking about.

So all of these issues are connected.

I have a council member Peterson with a question.

Please go ahead.

Thank you, Chair Sawant.

I wanted to commend Jose and Ted and your office for assembling an amazing board.

I mean, when the appointments came in a couple of weeks ago, I was really impressed by the backgrounds of everyone.

And then to have four new stellar candidates here, it really makes a strong board.

I really appreciate Climate Solutions and we've worked with them on some things and their science-based approach.

I wanted to say some nice things about Dr. Emily Myers, who I was on the campaign trail with her in 2019. She was a very strong advocate for having the city address climate change issues.

And we had several strong candidates in that area like Kathy Tuttle.

But Emily Myers was very strong bringing her science background to the campaign trail.

I'm just really glad to see that she'll be on this board.

Thank you.

Thank you for that comment, Dr. Peterson.

Are there any other comments?

I will note that the work of the advocates like we have on the board now is going to be crucial because we know that despite the pressures on Washington DC to actually do something, we know they are under pressure.

We know we're seeing proposals.

that are headed in a better direction than before.

But we've already seen now what happened with President Biden's infrastructure bill.

Some of the most important components have been left behind in the name of compromise with the Republicans.

And so it is going to be crucial.

the work that you all are going to be doing.

Obviously Seattle alone can't do this.

I mean we need advocates in every city but then conversely every city does matter.

So I just wanted to situate the work that you all are going to be doing in that larger context.

I'll read the four appointments into record.

Appointment 01966 appointment of Emily J. Myers as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th the 2022 appointment 01967 appointment of Andrea Ornelas as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th, 2022. Appointment 01968 appointment of Deepa Sivarajan as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th, 2022. And appointment 01969 appointment of Christina Chu as member of Green New Deal Oversight Board for a term to April 30th, 2023. If there is no opposition, I will move the confirmation of all four appointments as a single vote.

I move appointments 01966, 01967, 01968, and 01969. Second.

Thank you.

All in favor of these appointments, please.

Oh, sorry, actually, we can't do that.

It is still Zoom.

I knew it.

I knew it.

I know, I noticed that.

It is still Zoom, so Ted, I will ask you to do the roll call.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Juarez?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

for in favor.

Thank you so much, council members, and thank you especially to the nominees.

Obviously, this will move to the full city council, but I have no doubt it will be heartily approved.

I wish you good luck with your upcoming work, and we're looking forward to keeping in touch with you and having you back to discuss your concrete recommendations, which we need to move forward on post haste, given the crisis we're facing.

I'm sure everybody experienced the heat wave.

Should be a reminder enough what a crisis has befallen us and it is not something in the future.

It is happening now.

So it's important that we deal with it.

That was the last agenda item in our committee.

I just wanted to make sure that we just leave members of the public and also committee members with just a note about our upcoming meeting.

That is the regularly scheduled time for our committee.

It is July 27th at 2 p.m.

And that is Tuesday because that's our regular time.

And we will, as I said, I'm hoping that the two renters rights bills can move forward for a vote.

Appreciate Council Member Juarez's comments about where she is and I would like to discuss further.

And if Council Members Peterson, Lewis, and Morales can let us know if they have any questions, comments, or concerns on either of the two bills, I would really appreciate it.

My office will continue to follow up with you all.

and I look forward to having renters again testifying and also landlords.

Appreciate that landlords testified today.

Just to clarify, And as always, none of the renters rights bills will affect small landlords who are not gouging their tenants.

So I hope that the small landlords are understanding that.

And we have every time just to share with members of the public, every time we have small landlords speak in public comment or write to us, we are reaching back out to them.

Sometimes we may not be able to reach agreement.

But we appreciate that ability to communicate with you all, and I will be reaching out to the new small landlords who testified today as well.

And I especially appreciate the landlords like Sonia Pornath, who spoke today and has spoken before, and others who have written to us or filled out our petition saying that they support those renter's rights.

Having said that, and if there are no further comments, I will thank everyone for being here today and adjourn the meeting.

Thank you so much.

Bye-bye.