Seattle City Council Meeting 03/26/2024

Good afternoon, everyone.

The March 26, 2024 meeting of the Seattle City Council will come to order.

It is 2 0 1. I'm Sarah Nelson, president of the City Council.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Rivera.

Present.

Council Member Saka.

Here.

Council Member Strauss.

Council Member Wu.

Present.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Here.

Council Member Kettle.

Here.

Council Member Moore.

Present.

Council Member Morales.

Here.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Thank you.

Council President Nelson.

Present.

Nine present.

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, at this time, we'll open the hybrid public comment period.

Madam Clerk, how many speakers are there signed up today?

We have one remote and seven in person.

Okay, we will start with the in-person public commenters and everyone will have two minutes.

The public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

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

We will begin with in-person speakers and then move on to remote speakers.

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

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not end their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call on the next speaker.

The public comment is now open and we'll begin with first speaker.

Our first in-person speaker is Carolyn Malone.

Thank you for this opportunity again.

I do not carry my cart because I like pushing stuff.

It is good exercise.

But I live in housing instability now, a housing limbo created by Catholic housing staff and Seattle police.

In the last two weeks, I've been given two eviction summons in one day.

because I protest against police presence in my housing, because I protest on street corners, especially about police brutality and the discrepancies, the defects and all things wrong in my housing, which is my right to do.

And for that, I'm constantly threatened with eviction.

The door, my dead boat lock on my door is badly damaged.

It's been that way since December 23rd.

This is in punishment for my protest.

I get through it by coming out and protesting again and again, but I'm also harassed pepper sprayed, tased, and other things happened that shouldn't be happening to a senior in housing.

Now, for those of you who question my veracity, I say also question other women, prominent women who protested against police brutality.

Detective Cookie Bolden, Captain Deanna Nolet, the Asian woman in Kenmore who protested against being called obscene, just offensive names by Burton Hill, a Seattle cop.

Seattle cops are out of control.

And when you're an outspoken woman, speak against their brutality, they target you.

And I guess I'm a good target because I won't back down.

I have a right.

Our next speaker is Jason.

Hi, Council.

My name's Jason.

$35 burrito, let's do it.

So let's call out Working Washington.

This is not working.

Let's call out, you know, Instacart, it's different.

It's not food delivery.

If we could limit the fees, the delivery fees, so that the customer's not paying $35 for a burrito, that would be wonderful.

Maybe like city council could impose something to say, hey, the delivery fees need to be under this amount, this percentage.

So far, it was 17 hours on the platform.

I was ready for work.

Maybe I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I made 45 bucks.

I did three deliveries.

It's kind of like, hey, you guys made this bill, but who's going to pay me for that time?

The people who have the ideas and the solution are these people right here.

That's what I learned on a lean board, is people write down their ideas, and then it goes through the process.

And these are the people, the workers, who are the ones who know how to fix this.

Bike messengers, companies such as, like, West Coast Courier, these are major companies and they hire independent contractors.

They might not be in compliance with this council bill.

So if they were to charge maybe $10 for a three hour delivery and it went one mile, and so you have 180 minutes to do that delivery.

And so instead of like the least expensive service getting the like, it turns into like $79.

Kind of backwards, you know, for like a three hour delivery should be the cheapest option.

If there was like a fee structure for restaurants, like if you got to the restaurant and the food wasn't ready, then you could be like...

Thank you.

Yeah, like a fee structure would be a good solution to start.

Our next speaker is John.

Sorry, Gary and then followed by John.

And a reminder that when you hear that ding ding that you have 10 more seconds.

Good afternoon, Council.

This is day 85 of our sample size for the current gig ordinance.

The minimum wage has damaged our wages.

This is the pay up law It's been paying up substandard wages.

Collectively, I bet there's a system, a mechanism in the civil court system that can force a rollback or a moratorium to losses incurred by 2,700 restaurants.

40,000 couriers and driving, the latest number I've seen, 750,000 Seattle residents and gig companies who lost 60,000 orders in a matter of days.

Individually, we stand small.

If I were to come before you and say, I'm suing you, my damages would be small.

Collectively, if you add those numbers up, we stand up.

Each has a financial loss and instability.

Each needs time to recover.

We need a moratorium.

The restaurants need a moratorium to recover.

We need a moratorium to recover.

We have been going for 85 days on substandard wages.

I request a moratorium now.

Collectively, our damages mean something.

Collectively, those numbers mean something.

2,700 restaurants.

I call as plaintiffs.

Roll back this ordinance before it's too late.

Collectively, we unite.

We stand up.

Stand with me.

Stand with me, Seattle, and roll back this ordinance.

Roll back the $35 burrito.

Stand with me, restaurants.

Stand with me, drivers and couriers.

Stand up, customers, to these ill-advised, overpriced burritos.

Stand up.

Our next speaker is John, then followed by Michael.

I live in District 3 and I'm here to comment on the pay up bill.

I'm a lifelong liberal voter and believe in the core philosophy of a minimum wage, but this bill has failed that mission.

Last week I worked 61 hours and made $435.

Last year I worked 42 hours and made $992 for that same week.

I'm working 50% more and yet making about 50% less.

That's crazy.

It's negligent to keep this policy.

Don't be another Minneapolis with 10,000 people now unemployed.

Last week, the one bullet point I didn't have time for was about being careful to whom you listen.

There's a lot of misleading information being spread by Working Washington, and it's sad and disappointing.

They refuse to admit the obvious failure and are confusing the public.

Each one of you should order food from the apps and ask the courier yourself how they are doing under this bill.

I understand why some people claim to like the new pay model.

Yes, the payout per delivery is higher, but it also allows certain people to do one single delivery per hour, do it slowly, and milk the wage.

It allows workers to take advantage of the law and discriminates against hardworking people and is bad for customers.

If the network companies return the customer fees to pre January 11th, January 13th levels, customers will have the resources to order and then tip on those orders so workers will have a natural incentive to work faster and harder.

I would prefer you do a full repeal of this bill.

Have a bill that supports hardworking citizens or don't have one at all.

If a repeal is not possible, then suspend the pay up bill and do the necessary work to rewrite it correctly.

Thousands of lives are on the line.

The most important and vulnerable of which don't have the luxury to be here speaking up to the council today.

Please think about those people who don't have that agency.

We ask for your help.

Next speaker is Michael Wolff followed by Arianna Riley.

Good afternoon, Council President Nelson, members of the Council.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Michael Wolff.

I'm the executive director of Drive Forward, a nonprofit association whose 2,500 members statewide are app-based workers.

We have heard from app-based workers like those here in chambers now that the so-called pay-up law has harmed them.

You will hear from groups like Working Washington that we are attempting to roll back worker protections and wages.

This is not true.

We are actually trying to make sure the minimum payment law is delivering on the promises made to workers two years ago that the pay up law has so far failed to do.

What Drive Forward has proposed will make workers better off than where they were before the implementation of pay up on January 13th.

As a reminder, here is what is at stake.

Since the effective date of this law, according to our survey of over 550 Seattle app-based workers, 80% of respondents said they were receiving fewer offers.

64% saying the frequency of tips significantly reduced.

58% reporting dollar amounts of tips significantly decreasing.

Tip-inclusive earnings of app-based workers have dropped up to 50%.

Base earnings before tips have fallen up to 36% below current minimum wage.

In our 2021 survey, before any of this was even formulated, most workers were at or above minimum wage, and only a select few, mostly full-time workers, were at about 5% to 8% below minimum wage.

So the problem has gotten worse, not better, since pay up went into effect.

We have members who have told us that it is so bad out there that they may not make rent this month.

This bill is supposed to help workers, not make them homeless.

I look forward to working with you all through this process.

Thank you.

Arianna.

Good afternoon.

My name is Arianna Riley.

I'm a driver with DoorDash, Uber Eats, and Amazon Flex in the Seattle area.

I want to start by addressing the $5 fee that has been added.

As a longtime customer of DoorDash and Uber Eats, I often ordered late at night, and there was always an extra $4 to $5 added.

These late night search fees have never deterred me from ordering and have been going on nightly since at least 2015. I support the Seattle app-based work minimum payment ordinance as currently written and think it would be a mistake to roll back the pay raises and other changes that the city council had decided on.

My average cost per hour of delivery time for gas alone is $4.50.

If you include insurance and maintenance, it is even more than that.

$26.50 per hour plus mileage is a good starting point for me and other drivers to earn close to Seattle's minimum wage after expenses.

Most of the time I'm not on a delivery for the full hour, so I end up making less than $26.50 per hour while I'm out delivering.

The current rates allow me and other drivers to pay for car repairs and living expenses without having to work 80 hours a week to afford to live in Seattle.

This was not the case before the new law, and the lower rates that are being proposed mean that drivers will go back to struggling to afford expenses in our metro.

The two weeks following the passage of the law and this past week have been extremely busy on both DoorDash and Uber Eats to the point where restaurants are again struggling to handle delivery volume.

As well, I see the names of many regular customers ordering as often as they did before the new law.

It would be a mistake to roll back our hard-earned wage gains based on one month's slow sales in a notoriously fickle industry.

I urge the City Council to keep the law as written and to side with the many drivers working here that deserve to also be able to afford to live here.

Thank you.

Our last two in-person speakers, we have Alex Zimmerman, followed by Paul.

Thank you.

Hi, my name Alex Zimmerman.

I want to speak to you about something that is absolutely critical and very important.

I spoke in the Consulate Chamber for more than 30 years.

I came to the Seattle Consulate Chamber almost for 20 years.

For 20 years.

I never find one consul who know constitution, freedom of speech, and who respect America and American people, never.

Your dismiss my trespass last time, show you.

So this absolutely what is I cannot imagine and I wait for this for 20 year, guys.

So what does this mean?

This means somebody from you right now, a real American, who respect America, respect American, respect Constitution, respect U.S.

Supreme Court decision for 50 years, is start understand what is going on.

Why?

Because it's very important.

I explain to you why.

Why Seattle right now in deep hole, you know what this means, for last 10 years?

This never happened before.

I live almost 40 years here, and I remember good time before.

So when something happened right now, this means somebody from you right now maybe can come and just go bigger and bigger and bigger so we can bring Seattle back to normal life.

What is I can told you about this?

Absolutely important.

Make Seattle great again.

Because when you dismiss this trespass, what is I wait for 20 years is we have a chance restore Seattle and bring Seattle back.

Stand up, Seattle people.

You know what this mean?

We need bring everything back what is we have before 10 year ago.

Because fascism, what is we have here?

Corporation is a classic fascism with corporation.

What is government?

This is exactly what we need to stop and come back to America.

Thank you very much.

I don't know who did this, but I very appreciate you because you are my friend.

Thank you very much.

The last in-person speaker is Paul.

This one?

I didn't really have time to prepare anything, so I'm doing this extemporaneously.

I think that we're dealing inherently with an exploitative engine, which is the gig economy.

And I think that's where the cornerstone of a lot of the confusion of which way to go.

I think everybody has good sentiments on both sides.

Ultimately, the agenda is people just want to make enough money to exist.

And whether that direction that this council took or somebody else took is hampering that.

It's not really the problem.

The problem is that you're dealing with an entity that has to have some kind of authority over it.

When they decided to give us more money for our salary, which I have no problem with, what should have happened is make sure that the companies are the ones who are going to pay for it, not the customers, and they don't have the ability to transfer over that fee to the customers, which is basically price gouging, which is indicative of what's going on in almost every industry.

And unless we...

unless the governmental agencies have the authority to go ahead and legislate some kind of injunction that they can't just go ahead and transfer the costs onto the customers, there isn't a clear path forward.

And I think that's where a lot of the...

challenges are coming from.

So going forward, we have to have some sort of compromise so everybody can go home with some sort of positive outcome from this.

And that's really what I hope to gain from this, so that we can pay our rent, our college debt, and everybody else in the council can go home without these headaches from all this constant onslaught of bickering.

And that's, I think, really what the issue is at hand.

And we have, you know, basically an entity, which is Uber and DoorDash, who are basically gaming a situation towards their own end.

And how do we fix that?

Do we fix that by the government having more power over them?

And that's basically where I think it should go forward, should happen.

And protect the customer's fees also.

All right, we'll move into the remote public comment.

Public service, by the way, not just the luxury.

Absolutely essential service, I would say, especially during the pandemic.

Our remote public commenter is Joe Kunzler.

Hi, thank you for having me.

Joe Kunzler here.

A couple of things.

First, through your office, thank the Seattle City Attorney and the Seattle Police Department for the way you handled that malicious disruption at the end of February.

It was handled properly and after multiple warnings, arrests were made, and I'm looking forward to watching the trial of the Seattle Disruptive Six.

Also, I don't understand how Alex Zimmerman got back in.

I think that's deplorable.

I think whoever dismissed that really needs their head to shake.

We don't need a hate speech platform anywhere, especially city council, death squad, running around the country, calling up city councils and hurling the most vile anti-Semitic hate you can possibly imagine.

This is a time to be strong and courageous and stand up for the commons and continue to work A few heroes who have gone before, like Heidi Wills, and Bruce Harrell, and Irina Gonzalez, and Teresa Mosqueda, and now Sarah Nelson and Dan Strauss.

This work to defend our commons must continue, and that includes excluding Alex Zimmerman and armoring our defenses against any City Council death squad attack that may be inbound to our Puget Sound.

So I hope I've sounded the alarm today.

I hope I've been polite and professional, and I want to wish you well as always.

Go Seattle.

That was the last public commenter.

Thank you very much, everyone.

We'll move right along here.

If there is no objection, the public comment period is officially now closed.

If there is no objection, the introduction and referral calendar will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the introduction and referral calendar is adopted.

And if there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing none, the agenda is adopted.

We'll now consider the proposed consent calendar.

Items on the consent calendar include the minutes of March 19th, 2024, Council Bill 120755, payment of bills, and then we've got several appointments, which I'll read out in clumps.

Appointments 02766 to 02770, appointing Linda Chavez-Lowry, Diana Garcia, Megan Kiskaden, Yolanda Spencer and Joel Barakil to the Seattle Arts Commission.

And then the reappointment, which is appointment number two zero zero two seven seven one is the reappointment of Ricky Grabowski as member Grabowski as member of the Seattle Arts Commission.

And then we've got two additional appointments, appointment 02772 of Samantha Wong as member to the International Special Review District Board, and appointment 02773, reappointment of Adrian Lamb as member of the International Special Review District Board.

That's what we've got on the referral calendar.

I mean, on the consent calendar.

Are there any items that council members would like to remove?

All right.

Hearing none, I move to adopt the consent calendar.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to adopt the consent calendar.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the consent calendar?

Council Member Rivera?

Aye.

Council Member Saka?

Aye.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Council Member Wu?

Yes.

Council Member Hollingsworth?

Aye.

Council Member Kettle?

Aye.

Council Member Moore?

Aye.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

And I did not hear Council Member Wu?

Yes.

Thank you.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

All right.

The consent calendar items are adopted.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the minutes and legislation on the consent calendar on my behalf?

Thank you, everyone.

So the one committee piece of legislation with the clerk is item H on our agenda.

Will the clerk please read the short title of Item 1 into the record?

The report of the Governance Accountability and Economic Development Committee, Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 120747, relating to grant funds from non-city sources, authorizing the Director of the Office of Economic Development to accept specified grants and execute related agreements for and on behalf of the city.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you very much.

As chair of the Governance Accountability and Economic Development Committee, I'll address this item, although you've heard about it several times already.

On September 14th, 2023, someone smashed the large windows of the Wing Luke Museum on South King Street here in Seattle.

and in an apparent hate crime, and the City of Seattle and the State of Washington Department of Commerce jointly committed $100,000 to assist in the repairs of the museum, although the actual expenses far out seeded that amount, and I can...

at least double that amount because the wooden window casings also had to be replaced among other damage.

Anyway, this particular piece of legislation, Council Bill 120747 authorizes the Office of Economic Development to accept $50,000 as a grant from the Washington State Department of Commerce and amends OED's budget in the amount of that grant.

And the other $50,000 was already approved last year.

This legislation passed unanimously out of committee.

And I would love to hear any comments or questions people have.

All right.

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Council Member Rivera?

Aye.

Council Member Saka?

Aye.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Council Member Wu?

Yes.

Council Member Hollingsworth?

Yes.

Council Member Kettle?

Aye.

Council Member Moore?

Aye.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

All right, thank you.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

Will the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf?

Okay, there were no items removed from the consent calendar and there is not a resolution for introduction and adoption today.

So we have one other item of business, unless somebody else has an item of business, but if there is no objection, I would like to adopt the work programs that I've already spoken to.

If there's no objection, adopted resolutions 32124 and 32127 will represent the city council's work program for 2024 and 2025 for the purposes of defining the work program as referred to in the council rules.

Hearing no objection, adopted resolutions 32124 and 32127 represent the city council's work program for 2024 and 2025 for the purposes of defining the work program as referred to in the council rules.

There we go.

There is that issue settled.

And is there any other business to come before the council today?

Council President.

Yes.

I'd like to request to be excused from briefing on Monday, April 8th.

Okie dokie.

If there's no objection, Council Member Morales will be excused from City Council meeting.

Is that a City Council meeting?

Briefing.

Just a briefing on Monday.

On Monday.

The date that you said.

April 8th.

Thank you.

Okay.

Hearing no objection, Council Member Morales is excused from that meeting.

Anything else?

All right, we've reached the end of today's agenda.

Our next quarterly scheduled city council meeting will be held on April 2nd at 2 p.m.

And with no further visits, we are adjourned.

It is 2.29.