Seattle City Council Finance & Housing Committee 4/6/21

Good morning, everyone.

Welcome to the Finance and Housing Committee.

Today is April 6, 2021. I'm Teresa Mosqueda, chair of the committee.

The committee is in order now.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

I'm Mosqueda.

Present.

Vice Chair Herbold?

Here.

Council President Gonzalez?

Council President Gonzalez?

Councilmember Luis?

Present.

Councilmember Morales?

Here.

Councilmember Strauss?

Okay, Council President, and that is four in four present.

Councilmember Gonzalez?

Here.

And that is a for present.

Thank you very much.

I think that we have five present with our alternate Councilmember Morales.

Councilmember Morales, thank you for being here on behalf of Councilmember Strauss, Councilmember Lewis, and Council President Gonzalez and Vice Chair Herbold.

Thank you all for being here today.

We have extended this invitation to all other Councilmembers as well, so as other Councilmembers join us, I'll make sure to welcome them and note their attendance.

I don't see anybody else in attendance just yet, but we'll make sure to note that.

Colleagues, I really want to thank you very much for joining us today.

And Council Member Peterson, I see you logging in.

I appreciate you joining us as well.

I'm happy to have all of the council members pop into these Finance and Housing Committee meetings.

Today marks the beginning of our conversations related to the ARPA distribution, our American Rescue Plan Act distribution.

And in our Committee on Finance and Housing, over the next two months, we will have the opportunity to hear from other cities like we are today, we'll have the opportunity to hear from direct stakeholders and really engage in deep conversations about draft bills that we are going to be working on with the executive to make sure that we allocate the city's portion of the American Rescue Plan Act.

This is an exciting opportunity for us to hear from the public as well.

We are going to have every meeting start with public comment as we usually do, but we are going to make sure to end public comment by 10 a.m.

each day to make sure that we get into the heart of the discussion.

As a reminder, we will be having a public hearing.

This is a public hearing in the evening dedicated to just hearing from community members about their priorities and needs that they'd like to see lifted up in our city's American Rescue Plan Act allocation.

That public hearing will be Tuesday, May 4th at 5.30 p.m.

This is an opportunity for us in this committee to make sure that we are hearing from all the public comment at the beginning of the meeting, in that public hearing, and in deep discussions that we've been having over the last year to better understand how we can respond not only to the crisis that is COVID, but how we can respond in the long term to create a more equitable economy as we seek to recover.

We do have a packed agenda today and then every day between here and the end of June actually we've asked folks to graciously hold time on their calendars until 1pm.

My hope is that we will not need that long of a meeting but this is an opportunity for us to do the ARPA discussions during the first half of the meeting and then in the last half of the meeting we will have the opportunity to get into business as regular.

In today's agenda, we have a kickoff panel presentation on the American Recovery Plan Act by hearing from other cities on how they are planning to allocate the funds, if they've already begun allocating, what that process has looked like, and how we can better understand how we can be in harmony across the city as we seek to across our cities recover in a more equitable way.

Really excited to have Council President Lisa Bender from Minneapolis City Council, Council Member Robin Kanish from Denver City Council, and Council Member Vanessa Fuentes from Austin City Council joining us.

These will be our first panel after we do public comment, and they are also members of Local Progress.

Thanks to Local Progress for their work with not only helping to do outreach to have this esteemed panel today, but the work that they've done We will be sending out information about how to find the reports from local progress, highlighting the various ways that cities are working together to get dollars out to those who have been affected by COVID.

The next items on our agenda include the appointment of Dan Torres to the Sweet and Beverage Advisory Board, Joel Shapiro to the Labor Standards Advisory Commission, a briefing on the transparency requirements for contractors, for contract worker recommendations.

Thanks to Council Member Herbold for her leadership and request to have this on the agenda.

We'll have the final conversation on the rental assistance bill, Council Bill 120018, related to allocating about $23 million and possible amendments.

And then we will hear from the mayor's office on their proposed AAPI legislation, Council Bill 120029, and walk us through the proposal and have a chance to hear any questions.

and discussion then.

And we will also have a briefing discussion and possible vote on the jumpstart bill 120030. This is our update to the bill to allow for an additional way to calculate We are going to roll right into public comment so we have at least 20 minutes for public comment.

and we will call on speakers three at a time.

Please introduce yourself for the record and identify the item that you're here to speak about.

Speakers will hear a 10-second chimer.

A little ding will go off.

That's your indication to wrap up your public comment so that your words don't get cut off.

If you do have more that you'd like to say, you can always email us at council at seattle.gov.

And then call back in on the listen-in lines posted on today's agenda or on Seattle Channel.

viewing options.

Thanks again to Seattle Channel for always being here to take our messages and deliberations directly to the public via your computer screen or your TV screen.

Let's open up public comment.

The first three people that we have to speak are Paul Quiñones-Figueroa, Jason Reeves, and Kimberly Wolf.

Good morning, Paul.

Good morning, Chair Mosqueda.

I'm Paul Quiñones-Figueroa.

I work in Washington.

You'll be hearing today for some of our worker leaders who are workers who On gig economy, apps like DoorDash, Instacart, and other apps calling for council to act to raise their pay, protect their flexibility, and provide them meaningful transparency about prices and pay rate.

There's about 40,000 gig workers in our city providing delivery and other essential services that have kept businesses in our economy afloat during the pandemic, but they're being paid less than minimum wage for their work.

Gig workers don't benefit from Seattle's minimum wage law.

There's no forum what gig apps pay, and all the expenses of the work are shifted from the companies to the workers, That means that pay is extremely low.

Data from before the pandemic found pay as low as $7.66 per hour after expenses for Instacart shoppers, $1.45 per hour for DoorDash drivers, and just $1.70 per delivery after expenses in Postmates.

And it's only getting lower.

The pandemic has devastated employment in restaurants and other service sector jobs.

So increasing numbers of people are turning to gig work, driving pay down even lower.

Meanwhile, top executives of these apps are becoming billionaires.

Council has already stepped up, and we are thankful for your work to pass emergency sick days laws for gig workers and hazard pay for food delivery workers.

Council has also passed a pay standard for Uber and Lyft drivers.

Now we're asking you to take the next step and advance permanent policies that lift up all gig workers by raising pay, protecting flexibility, and providing transparency.

We can't afford to wait any longer to eliminate what is effectively a sub-minimum wage for our city's most marginalized workers.

This is what workers are demanding, not just transparency.

Council can jumpstart our recovery by ensuring everyone who works in our city is paid at least the minimum wage after expenses, regardless of whether they work for a restaurant, a warehouse, or a nap.

Thank you for your time.

Paolo, thank you very much this morning for being here.

Jason, good morning.

Hello, my name is Jason.

Hello, my name is Jason.

I'm a gig worker with five years of experience.

I've worked in Seattle and Tacoma.

Gig workers really need these protections put forward by the pay up campaign because the influx of contractors before and during the pandemic have lowered pay and the availability of work because of market saturation, allowing apps to adjust their payouts and lower the officer wage, just like the person before me was saying.

By imposing the wage of $16.25, tips on top, and pay transparency, this will give the independent contractor more power to negotiate his pay, more power to decide which work to take, and more power to keep our most marginalized and most vulnerable independent contractors provided for.

Working Washington has developed its policy with gig workers and addresses the largest problems contractors are facing as a worker in Seattle.

I urge you to pass the worker pay up policy.

The policy would mean more money and more power in the hands of the worker.

Thank you for your time.

And also I would like to thank you guys for letting us talk to you.

Absolutely.

Thanks for calling in this morning.

And then we will hear from Kimberly Wolfe.

Good morning, Kimberly.

We have lost a caller.

All right, thanks so much.

We will look for Kimberly to call back in.

The next three people are Isabel Nguyen, Chris Wilfong, and Raymond Evans.

And Chris, it looks like you're not present.

If you want to call back in, we'll get you before we wrap up today as well.

Isabel, good morning.

Isabel, I see you on my screen, but it looks like you're still muted.

Can you push star six on your end one more time, and we'll, there you are, go ahead.

Now I see you unmuted, but if you could just check your phone that it's not muted on your actual phone.

Sometimes that happens.

Oh, hi, sorry about that.

Can you hear me now?

Yes, now we can.

Please go ahead, thanks.

Wonderful.

Good morning.

I'm calling concerning CB120029.

We in MPOP don't feel we should have been listed even though the slide says they've engaged with us.

If this body did engage like they claimed they would have, they would have clearly understood we don't feel safe with increased police presence.

We don't want police officers on horses patrolling our community.

That's not how community feels safe.

If you engage community, actively listen to community.

Please don't represent us.

I yield my time and thank you for listening to us.

Have a good day.

Isabel, thank you very much for calling in.

I appreciate that clarification and I'll look forward to following up with you as well.

Thanks for your time this morning.

Chris, I see you still listed as not present.

So please go ahead and call in Chris Wolfong.

Good morning, Raymond.

You are up next.

Hello.

Good morning, city council members and fellow callers.

My name is Raymond Evans and I am a gig worker here in Seattle.

I worked for Uber and Lyft and I've worked for TaskRabbit and Handy and Tackle and many others to keep things going.

I am a Black gay male here in the city.

A native of the city.

Very proud to call Seattle my home.

But I sometimes walk around and wonder what kind of culture are we becoming.

I have a philosophy of leaving things better than I found them and that we're only as strong as our weakest link.

And right now it just looks like Seattle has a lot of weak links.

And, you know, there's a lot of effort.

There's a lot of work going on.

It's really, really good work.

But I want to encourage the city council member to continue that legacy, to continue that hard work, and to continue to serve the population and the people in the city.

I know the management of all these people and all these issues is no easy task, but we have the ability.

I'm certain of it.

And if we can have just a bare minimum of equal pay, become a leader in the nation, Just the example of how things are done, like we've always done, innovation, big corporations, legislation.

I think we're on the precipice, but we have it in us, and I want to encourage you guys and thank you for your time, your service, and your effort, and encourage you guys to continue doing your work.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

I really appreciate that.

Thanks, Raymond.

I see Kimberly, you are back.

We're going to go up to you.

And after Kimberly, we'll have Mary Lucesi, Gail Tesai, and Mandalyn Neuer.

Good morning, Kimberly.

And Kimberly, it might still be muted on your phone.

I see you unmuted on the line here.

Can you hear me now?

Yes, thank you.

Sorry, I was dropping the phone and hung up on you guys.

No worries.

Okay.

All right, this thing you're considering doing the independent contractor thing, it is not helpful for gig workers who have contracts but don't have basic pay standards or any negotiating power in their contract.

It's basically for the higher paid freelancers.

I'd like to know who's supporting this.

I doubt their numbers are even close.

to the tens of thousands of gig workers who have been looking for relief from draconian pay standards and who have been asking you to help them for over a year now.

We really appreciate the sick leave and extra pay policies you passed already, but those were emergency measures that are going to disappear once we're no longer in COVID, and we need lasting policies that are going to keep the marginalized gig workers in this city above water.

We can't wait anymore.

We've been asking this for a while.

The local economy is emerging.

And if gig workers were paid reasonably, that's thousands, tens of thousands of workers starting to put money back in the economy.

We're not making enough to live on.

Many, due to the personal circumstances, really need the flexible work that gig work provides.

But they're just not getting enough to live on.

point in case myself, I'm speaking to you today from my tent.

I am homeless.

I am part of the policy of the race to the bottom that the apps are doing, is what pushed me out.

And for me, immediately, what would help is that we raise the pay floor.

We've got to have at least minimum wage, plus expenses with tips on top.

We need to protect our workers flexibility.

A lot of us rely on that.

We have various life circumstances where we cannot do a regular W-2 job.

And also transparency in paid, because how do you know if you're getting paid properly if they won't actually tell you?

Thank you very much.

I appreciate your time.

Thanks for calling in, appreciate it.

We do have about half of the rest of the folks here to speak today, and I wanna make sure we hear from everyone.

So we're going to move the time to one minute to try to hear from everyone who's dialed in this morning.

And we are gonna start with Mary Lusheshi, and then Gail.

Gail, let's do as not present, if you'd still like to dial in, you have time.

And then Mandolin.

Mary, good morning.

Just star six to unmute yourself.

Mary, I see is still on mute over here star six on you.

Okay, Mary, I'm going to come back to you.

And if you want to hit star six.

In the meantime, we'll look for your line to come unmuted.

Good morning.

Good morning, Mandolin, you are up next.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Mandalyn Noir, and I have been working as a gig worker since 2014 through apps like Rover and Wag and Postmates and Dog Vacay.

And it has been my goal as a volunteer with Working Washington to help provide support for the workers instead of being railroaded by the bigger companies.

The bigger companies saw what we did here last year, and they created Proposition 22 in California to try to scare the independent contractors into accepting their definition.

We don't want to see anything like that happen here, and we need your help and support.

Thank you so much.

Absolutely.

Thank you very much.

And the next three people are Arianetta McKinley Keller, Janelle Caldwell, and James Thomas.

Good morning, Arianetta.

Hi, my name is Arianetta.

I was a former Instacart and Postmates worker.

And I'm calling because get worse is real worse and it doesn't get paid like it is causing a lot of people to be homeless or either lose their vehicle.

I myself, I started doing get worse in 2018 and I rely on the flexibility of get worse because I'm a single mom and some jobs don't care about you having a life outside of work.

They find able body there.

And because the pay was so low,

Oops, it looks like you accidentally got put on mute again.

If you can hit star six one more time.

Oh, perfect, we see you back.

I heard you, the pay is so low, if you wanna give her a few minutes more, a few seconds more.

Go ahead, please.

The pay is so low that I was unable to keep my vehicle.

I lost my vehicle, so I'm no longer able to do get work.

And yeah, I just think that these apps make so much money They make millions of dollars, so why they can't pay the people that's out there doing this essential work, especially during COVID.

Thank you very much for your time this morning.

And the next person we have is Janelle Caldwell and then James Thomas, and then we'll go back to Mary.

Good morning, Janelle.

Good morning, city council members.

My name is Janelle and I'm a gig worker and a member of the pay up campaign.

I'm here because the unacceptable practices that Instacart and other apps mistreat their employees.

Janelle, it looks like we lost you.

Sorry, I don't know why we're having technical difficulties this morning, but if you do want to call back in.

Oh, there I see you.

If you can hit star six one more time on your end.

Perfect.

Go ahead.

OK.

OK.

The way they mistreat their employees.

These companies are making trillions and driving their employees into poverty, which is causing people to rely on some form of public assistance.

We need Seattle City Council to step up by creating standards in the gig economy for 2021. I started working at Instacart in January of last year.

I have worked as a home health care aide for 20 years, but was injured on the job and had to find work I could do despite my injuries.

Accessibility of the work was important to me, but soon found myself having to work constantly just to make ends meet.

I drove from Arlington to Linwood, Seattle, seven days a week.

I worked from 8 in the morning until 9 or 10 at night to make only $1,000 a week, including tips.

I was deactivated with no explanation and a straight five-star employee.

But as soon as my car broke down two days later, they let me go.

Very vague why I was deactivated.

We can't do the work if we have no car.

Now that I just spent a ton of money to repair my car, new radiator, brakes, starter, and battery, it has created hard times for me, and I owe money to pay for these repairs.

This happens to thousands, if not millions, of gig workers, and our vehicles are a lifeline in order to sustain our jobs.

We need to address this instability for gig workers.

I had a couple of warnings in which I did no violations.

A customer reported that diapers she ordered were never delivered, and even though I had left them on her porch and taken a photo, Instacart would not remove the warning from my account, even though I had proof.

They sent me to an address that was actually in Las Vegas.

I stayed in constant communication with all customers, but these two batches never responded.

I implore you to pass these measures to stop these companies from deactivating for no reason and cutting our pay and taking our tips.

We need stability.

We need to stand up for Washington and say no more.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you very much, Janelle.

James, you are next, followed by Mary Lushishi, and then Gail Tsai.

Good morning, James.

Good morning.

This is James Thomas.

I've been in the gaming industry since October 2016. What we're here for today needed to be acted on a year ago.

The evidence of that is in Prop 22. Now, as this industry moves forward, by the minute, in several parts of the engine that drives the gig economy, us, the drivers, who are solely responsible for making the entire components come together and pay off, yet we are the most dispensable and treated as such.

We are the part of that is treated as waste and non-significant.

The dictatorial attitudes of the Giga inventors is a senseless, selfish way to develop another society of destitute families who are not sharing in the wealth.

We want our families to prosper in the same flow as the people who we deliver to.

We also want our families to benefit from the future development in the Giga economy.

This industry has been portrayed to the public as something that it's not.

Would you please watch YouTube videos and get a big picture of what's going on?

Thank you for your time.

Thank you very much, James.

The next speaker is Mary, followed by Gail, and then the last two speakers that are present are Matt Landers and Adam Glickman.

Good morning, Mary.

And just star six to unmute.

Okay.

Sorry, Mary, it looks like we're still having technical difficulties.

If you can push star, the asterisk, and then six.

Oh, perfect.

Can you hear it?

Now I can.

Go ahead.

Thank you so much.

OK, great.

Hello.

Yes, this is Mary.

And I'm a deaf part-time worker.

And I live and work in Seattle.

And I'm here as a working still is paid low.

I'm a part-time worker that's paid low and I'd like council to pass the policy to increase the pay.

So we have the pay standards.

I also started working extra income for my other work so I could help with that job.

So I have part-time jobs.

So I needed the flexible time.

It's very important to me.

Last time I worked five hours.

Last night I worked five hours.

And I was paid $55, but 17 of those dollars were in tips.

And then I had to subtract my expenses, so now it was just $22 in paying.

So really, it makes a big difference.

And I'd like to challenge you, and I hope that the council will pass the policy, you know, the permanent So the pay is increased and that we have the good benefits and good pay.

And then I'd also like to have the expenses taken away and permit for the tips to stay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much, Mary.

I appreciate your time this morning and thank you for dialing in.

Our last three speakers that are present are Gail Desai, Matt Landers, and Adam Whitman.

Gail, good morning.

Good morning.

I'm sorry for all the technical difficulties here on my end here.

No problem.

Thank you for hearing my comment.

My name is Gail.

I am a member of MPOP, Massage Parlor Outreach Program.

And I'd like to clarify that the city has posted our organization as an organization that they've interfaced with regarding community safety.

And I'd like to clarify that this is not the case.

And we would like that changed effective immediately.

as well as, because if they had listened to us and they did interface with us, they would have understood that regarding CB120029, we need some more clarity around where the funding is coming from, if it's coming in regards to this.

If they listened to our voices, they would have known that we actually, a lot of the things that they are suggesting in terms of If this is money that's being allocated, I'm sorry, towards the bias crime prevention coordinator, this is something that we would like clarified because this actually is not listening to our voices.

Thank you for your time.

I would appreciate some follow-up on this.

Thank you very much.

We will make sure to follow up with you, Gail, and the presentation from the mayor's office.

We'll have a chance to ask those questions later today, and we'll absolutely follow up with you.

Thank you for flagging that.

Last two people are Matt Landers and Adam Glickman.

Good morning, Matt.

Good morning.

My name is Matt Landers, and I'm here on behalf of GSBA, Washington's LGBTQ and Allied Chamber of Commerce, as well as the Capitol Hill Business Alliance, to support council bill 120030 to add an additional and alternate method to calculate payroll taxes under the jump start bill.

This is a relatively minor change that adds flexibility to make it easier for some businesses to calculate what they owe and we appreciate these efforts to take feedback from the businesses during the rules making process on how to make the administration of the jump start program better.

While the current system is an all or nothing approach, this bill will allow businesses with more mobile employees to take that into account.

The bill would allow businesses...

We lost you, Matt.

If you're still there, we will hear the rest of your testimony because you still have time.

If you can give Matt another 30 seconds.

Sorry about that, Matt.

I'm not sure what happened.

Okay, not sure.

This bill would allow businesses to choose which approach is best for their situation, even if it involves additional tracking on their end.

It's a small and easy fix, and it provides greater flexibility for taxpayers.

We ask that you support Council Bill 12030. Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you very much, Matt.

And last but not least, Adam Glickman, thank you for waiting.

Good morning, Council Members.

Adam Glickman, SEIU 775. As a union of caregivers who have long been excluded from basic labor protections, we understand how important it is to continue to expand labor standards and protections for all workers.

The city council has done great work on that in recent years with domestic workers, with TNC drivers, with initial steps around sick days and hazard pay protections for delivery workers.

We're asking the council to take the next step to expand city labor standards to cover the thousands of gig workers in Seattle who are providing delivery and other essential services but are paid.

less than the minimum wage.

We understand the value of transparency and clarity for independent contractors.

We believe the proposal doesn't go far enough, doesn't address the key issues that many drivers have raised today and urge the council to set a wage floor that ensures gig workers minimum wage and expenses and other basic labor protections.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you very much, Adam.

And that wraps up all who are present.

We didn't have a chance to hear from Chris Wolfong, Nancy Callahan, or David Haynes, who were listed as wanting to speak but not present.

So that concludes today's public comment.

Thank you all for dialing in.

Again, first 20 minutes of every meeting.

We'll also hear public comment on April 20th.

Madam Clerk, let's move on to items of business.

Can you please read item number one into the record?

Madam Clerk, you may be on mute still.

Agenda item number one, present from cities on American Rescue Plan funding for briefing and discussion.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

Well, we are really excited about the panel that is in front of us today.

I see our colleagues from across the country in esteemed cities like Austin, Denver, and Minneapolis.

I'm very excited to have, hello, Council Member Kanish.

I'm very excited to have Council Member Robin Kanish from Denver City Council.

I see President Lisa Bender from Minneapolis City Council.

And I believe we also have Vanessa Fuentes from the Austin City Council.

and we'll be looking for her to join here momentarily.

This is an amazing opportunity to see friends from afar.

We haven't had the chance to get together at our regular conferences, but we have been touching base frequently to understand what's going on in other jurisdictions as we've all been.

responding to the crisis that COVID has in many ways exposed but not caused in terms of harm on our economy and our hardest working workers and small businesses.

So today is really a great opportunity to hear from other cities, our peers about what they've been doing in the process that they're engaged in now as they look at the ARPA funds that have been allocated to local jurisdictions.

Before we get into the panel presentation, I want to ask Ali Panucci from Central Staff very briefly to give an orientation to how this is the first kickoff to the conversations we will have soon.

And Ali, if you could just briefly walk us through the timeline that we're talking about here, that would be wonderful.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

Good morning, council members and guests.

I am Ali Panucci of your council central staff.

I am just going to briefly share my screen.

And what I am sharing here is the finance and housing committee's webpage.

Can you see that okay?

Yeah.

Great.

So this, the finance and housing committee's webpage includes a high level summary of the general schedule and plan for the committee's consideration of federal COVID relief funds.

And so as the chair described briefly in her opening remarks earlier, this is the first sort of meeting following up on some preliminary discussions in the last two committee meetings.

So today we will start with hearing from other cities about what they were thinking in terms of their use of the ARPA direct aid and that will be followed by a community panel at the next committee meeting and then that's where we will begin discussions of the first appropriation bill.

Right now we are looking at at least two appropriation bills for consideration of use of the 2021 direct aid expected from the American Rescue Plan, as well as some of the remaining CRF funds from 2020, which is about $18 million.

Following that, there'll be a public hearing, so an opportunity to hear from the community about their priorities, and then we'll continue the discussion on the first ordinance and ideally be voting that out as early as May 5th, and then moving into the discussions of the next bills.

Throughout these conversations, what we will try to do is describe what is in the bill before the committee at that time, as well as starting to outline what the broader plans are, as that might inform decisions about what you want to do in the first bill or the second bill.

So the overall plan is to take up those two bills in committee.

and have decisions made and appropriation bills adopted by June for the entirety of the funds, although discussions may be ongoing through the summer as we learn more about targeted aid and other opportunities to support the community.

I'm going to turn it back over to you.

≫ Wonderful.

Thank you very much, Ali.

And just to orient us about what the expectation here is in Seattle, colleagues, again, we have about $239 million of direct aid that will be allocated in two tranches, just over half of that, 119 million is the first tranche that we're talking about related to ordinance one and two here.

The pandemic-induced revenue losses that we saw in 2021 and are also the issues that we are able to address with the dollars in front of us.

We will have approximately 130 million of deficit in the general fund revenues, which excludes our jumpstart payroll tax.

So there is a huge need to make sure that we're supporting existing base expenditures as we look at recovering from this a crisis economic revenue forecast will give us a much more clear picture of what we can anticipate in the in the out years.

And we are very excited to be able to initiate this conversation today by hearing from leaders across our country, local progress leaders, leaders within their own jurisdictions and on city councils across this country who have been in many ways fighting against the inequities that we see exposed by COVID over the years, even before COVID, trying to create greater housing stability, worker protections, and access to small businesses and BIPOC community members to have the support they need to open their small businesses.

So a huge thank you to Ari Schwartz and Tarsi Dunlop from Local Progress and their work in figuring out how to weave together this national conversation amongst cities and jurisdictions as we respond to COVID.

They have put out some information in terms of how cities are looking to provide equitable relief and connecting various cities.

And Local Progress is going to continue to make sure that we're connecting leaders across the country.

not only as we respond to the crisis that is COVID, but in the longer term as we think about what equitable recovery looks like, investments in public goods and services, and look forward to sharing that initial analysis with you all.

I think it's posted on our webpage and we'll make sure to share it in the federal advocacy roundup page that we are going to be pushing out on our social medias as well.

Today we have joining us Council Member Robin Kanish, an at-large Council Member from Denver, Colorado, who has championed causes for working families, from food access to affordable housing, energy efficiency, fighting for $15 minimum wage.

Thank you very much, Council Member, for being with us.

We also have Councilmember Vanessa Fuentes.

I see you on the line, Councilmember.

Very good to see you and excited to have you from Austin, Texas, a longtime champion of health care as a human right, fighting for fewer health care disparities, affordable housing, and equity-based policy solutions.

Councilmember Fuentes sits on the county's Hate Crimes Task Force and has already, in her short term on council, made her mark in supporting residents in District 2. And finally, our friend Lisa Bender, a huge leader within Local Progress and Council President for the Minneapolis City Council.

We've looked to you for many issues, especially related to public safety and housing and zoning.

Very much appreciate your tenure on council and look forward to continuing to hear more from you today as we engage in how we can expand on many of the things that you've championed, including transit mobility, fighting for green equitable economies, and Green New Deal-like investments in our local jurisdictions.

So incredibly happy to have all of you with us today, and I will, without further ado, turn it over to you all to really share with us the work that you're doing right now to get out the allocation from ARPA and want to make sure that you all know that we have not only the finance and housing committee members here present with us but we've extended this invitation to our full city council as well so we have some guests from the city council who are not usually part of our finance and housing committee to hear from you and look forward to learning from you.

So Council President Bender, perhaps we should start with you.

Thanks again for your work, especially on bike lanes and expansion of zoning and housing, as that helps to create the foundation for more equitable economies.

But looking at what's happened in the wake of COVID, how is your city, how is your city council looking to allocate the ARPA funds that you've received and any grains of knowledge that you'd like to share with us?

We appreciate it.

Perfect.

Yeah, thank you so much for having us today.

And I think, you know, I I love this idea.

So maybe I'll see if this group of council members can come to Minneapolis as well.

I think we are probably the smallest city in this group.

So our population is just about four hundred thirty thousand.

That meant that we did not receive direct CARES Act funds in the first in the CARES Act.

So we really relied on a partnership with our county, Hennepin County, to program the funds that they directly received because they did meet the population threshold and then eventually our state.

We have one of the only I think maybe actually now the only.

divided politically two houses in our legislature.

So there's a lot of gridlock at the state between the political parties.

But eventually, they worked it out and allocated funding more directly to cities over the summer.

So we had a little bit of a different journey with our CARES Act dollars than bigger cities did.

I wanted to highlight in Minneapolis recently, and I think because we've learned so much from what other cities are doing, we have taken a really planful approach and a policy approach to the issues that are facing our city around housing stability, around climate justice, around transportation access, all of which have a huge racial disparity component in Minneapolis.

We have some of the worst racial disparities in the country.

We're taking that very seriously.

And so we really took a policy approach to these issues.

We have adopted the first strategic race equity action plan in the city earlier this term.

We have adopted our big master plan for the city, the Minneapolis 2040 plan, which has 100 policies within it.

We've adopted Vision Zero and transportation action plans, which have a lot of specificity in terms of prioritization for transportation and infrastructure projects.

We have a climate action plan, a renter first policy that talks about our commitment to protecting renters.

And then we've also taken a geographic approach to identifying particular areas of our city for investment priority.

So we have a green zones prioritization as well as cultural districts.

And both of them are essentially Sectioning off different parts of our city for investment and policy priority parts of the city that have higher health impacts.

Parts of the city that are lower income and have higher concentrations of communities of color.

And so we're able to use those existing policy frameworks and these geographic designations.

to focus resources to meet our race equity goals.

I think that's really helping us as we both figure out what to cut in our budgets, as well as when we have opportunities for spending like the American Rescue Plan offers.

I thought it'd be helpful to give a little context.

So our 2020 budget was originally $1.89 billion.

About a third of that is general fund, and the other two thirds are fee revenue, water, infrastructure systems, et cetera.

So about $500 million in general funds in an average year in Minneapolis.

And we've been growing, so that's been going up during my time in office.

Over the summer, we cut $86 million in spending.

We implemented a hiring freeze, and we used some of our reserve funds to balance our budget as well for the 2020 budget.

Like, I'm sure all cities were facing massive revenue shortfalls.

And then eventually, we did receive $32 million directly from CARES Act.

You know, like a lot of cities, we had a horrible year.

I think probably even more so in Minneapolis, just handling the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd and the social unrest that followed.

As of January, it's higher now.

We had about 30,000 COVID cases, just under 400 deaths.

We have many homeless encampments throughout the city.

about 144,000 unemployed people, 1,700 businesses that were closed because of the pandemic.

And then we also had $350 million worth of property damage after the social unrest that happened over the summer.

So our response to COVID has also been a response to all of these various economic and social factors that are affecting our city.

We were able to invest about $26 million in immediate relief and response last year.

That was kind of in probably three or four buckets.

We were responding directly to coronavirus by getting PPE to our own city staff, but also in the community, and then also doing COVID testing.

We have our own city health department in addition to the county and the state's health department.

And ours is often an extra layer on top of those others.

And we really focus our investments in meeting race equity and health equity goals specific to Minneapolis populations.

So for tests, for example, we put up testing sites in population centers that we really wanted to reach specific to Minneapolis cultural populations or lower income parts of our city.

I think we've also done a much better job in recent years of making sure that our outreach and engagement is culturally specific.

And, you know, so we have a whole COVID website set up that very specifically acknowledges the harm that many communities in Minneapolis have experienced in interactions with government in the past.

And just really trying to help create more partnerships with community-based organizations that have more trust.

So we've kind of done a mix of direct service from the city as well as funding organizations that are more community based and community rooted.

We also focused a lot of our funding on housing, emergency shelter, and homelessness outreach.

That was really done a lot in partnership with our county.

Like I said, we have probably the best relationship with our county that we've had in a really long time.

So we've been able to pool our resources for shelter and housing supports.

Sometimes they have capital dollars and we have operating dollars.

The city has, in recent years, been more open to using funding for shelter operations than we had been in the past because in Minneapolis, our county is really responsible for shelter operations, but we have really started to step up and recognize that the city needs to play a bigger role for us to really meet the need.

and it's a constant debate, as I'm sure you have, because like many population centers, we have the vast majority of shelter beds in our county, in our city.

We are doing a lot to provide for a regional homelessness response, even a statewide homelessness response in our city, but we also aren't quite meeting the need without the city stepping in.

We did direct relief payments to small businesses in the form of forgivable loans.

as well as we put city money and federal dollars that were passing through the city into emergency rental assistance.

Both of those things were also funded as well by the county and the state directly.

And then we also looked to waive fees in particular for businesses that were impacted by property damage from social unrest, but generally looked at ways that we could reduce property taxes and fees for businesses that were affected by the pandemic as well as social unrest.

And of course, like all of you, we transitioned our entire workforce to COVID protocols and social distancing and remote work environments.

So I think like lots of cities, the needs in the community increased at the same time that our budgets decreased.

So that's the tension that we're all balancing.

As we look to ARP, the 2021 budget context, so our 2020, we adopt an annual budget at the end of each year that starts for the January calendar year.

So our 2021 budget was adopted in December and started in January for the calendar year.

That budget was $1.7 billion.

Again, about a third of that is our general fund.

Right now, we're holding 395 positions vacant, which is about 9% of our workforce.

So we have just over 4,000 staff typically in our city.

And so we're planning to hire back about 44 of those positions right now under the 2021 adopted budget in a phased manner.

But part of the question for us as we look at ARP dollars is how much of that should we invest in our own city staffing, which has taken this large cut versus, and in addition to getting money out the door directly to community-based organizations or directly to renters or business owners, et cetera.

And I think, you know, this is particularly important I think as we look at gender and race equity within our own workforce.

I think we've seen anecdotally that women and workers of color in our city have taken on a lot of the burden of the situation that we see in our budget.

So while we have a hiring freeze in place and we have fewer staff available to do the work, we're asking more and more of our staff, our community is asking more and more of the city.

And I would say that that burden is falling disproportionately on staff who identify as women and who are people of color.

And those, we do not have gender and race, sort of, we do not, we have a, Our staff does not reflect the population in terms of gender and race breakdown.

We have a lot of work to do to get our workforce better reflective of our community.

And I'm concerned, and I think a lot of leaders are concerned about the dynamic of women and people of color taking on so much more as staff.

So that's part of, I think, the consideration about how much to invest back in the city itself.

is are we taking into consideration the needs of our staff who have done so much more in 2020 and how are we meeting our workforce goals around gender and race equity.

as we move forward.

And so we do have employee resource groups that have formed.

We have one specific to women identified staff and some of the cultural communities within our city have formed employee resource groups.

And so those are being consulted as part of our process very early on.

our budget staff are going to the employee resource groups and saying, when is this year been like for you?

How is it, you know, how can we invest better in our city staff to make sure that you're being fairly compensated for the work that you're being asked to provide?

We will receive $281 million in the ARP directly because it changed the cutoff for population size.

Thank goodness.

And then we also expect, I'm sure as everyone does, CDBG and ESG dollars on top of that.

So we're planning to, as you are, do two rounds of funding.

Our first round, we're beginning now.

like you are.

In Minneapolis, the mayor proposes the budget and the council adopts the budget.

We're going to use that general approach to the ARP dollars.

So our mayor is convening groups of staff along with our finance budget staff within the city staff enterprise.

They've convened four staff work groups, public health and climate, economic rebuilding, sorry, five, housing, safety, and city capacity and performance.

And those five staff work teams have provided ideas for funding, which will help inform the first round of AARP funding, and then also our city's 2022 budget, because we'll be folding this sort of second bigger chunk of AARP dollars into that more typical city budget process.

And then they're also meeting with the employee resource groups, as I mentioned, and they solicited ideas from city council offices as well.

So the mayor will propose his first pass at our ARP first round of funding, which I anticipate to be something like 50 to $70 million.

That will be mostly focused on sort of immediate enterprise needs that we weren't able to fund in 2020. or in the 2021 budget, as well as really an emphasis on getting money out the door to communities who are in need.

And then the bigger amount will go through more our typical budget process where we're adopting the final budget in December for the following year.

As you are, we're going to be weighing what things make sense to spend quicker versus over the three-year time of eligibility.

I think there are some things that we may want to really think about that three-year time frame.

So we've been moving toward having right to counsel for all low-income renters facing eviction in Minneapolis.

So for example, that's one thing that I think looking at a three-year time frame, we might be able to say, let's make sure every low-income renter in Minneapolis facing eviction has a lawyer in housing court.

We have a housing moratorium in place, an eviction moratorium at the state.

but knowing that those evictions may be coming.

Just one example of the kind of topic that we're thinking about using over that three-year time frame.

Otherwise, I think we're really looking at ways to support our small businesses, support renters facing eviction, building out shelter, purchasing hotels with the county.

And all of that is really helped and informed by these policies that we have in place.

So because we adopted the 2040 plan, we've been able to really quickly adopt a lot of zoning regulations and reforms that are enabling us to build shelters very quickly, buy hotels and turn them into SRO housing, which wouldn't have been possible before our zoning reforms.

Thank you.

Council President, thank you very much for the overview.

And there's a lot of similarities.

Really excited about the overview that you provided.

And Council Colleagues, I'm going to ask you to hold your questions until we hear from the next two panelists.

And then we'll have a chance to have questions as well.

I want to turn it over next to Council Member Robin.

Kanish from Denver City Council where I was born.

Got a place in my heart, always Denver.

And I've also been just in awe of Council Member Kanish's leadership on housing.

We had the chance to first meet in Chicago at a convening around housing and housing equity and trying to make sure that we're looking at displacement and building new opportunities.

It's been wonderful to learn from you over the years and look forward to hearing what you're up to in Denver.

I want to make sure you get the chance to share your slides as well.

So if we haven't already made you a co-host, we'd love to do that so that you can share your slides and we will then hear from Austin.

So Council Member Kenesha, if you would like to start, we'd love to hear from you and make sure that you have access to all of our technology tools to share your slides as well.

Good morning.

I appear to have the power to share my slides.

I just want to say first how humbled I am.

It's always usually us learning from Seattle.

And so it's always humbling to be here.

I hope you can see my screen.

But I, I guess I want to commend you.

First of all, I read your resolution that your council passed to set some priorities.

So what I thought I would highlight is where there were things that I either saw, maybe not mentioned in it, or might be slightly different.

And I think that will be the focus.

I appreciate all the groundwork.

We are very similar cities in some ways, size-wise.

Denver and Seattle, about 700,000 folks in Denver, so similar size-wise.

We are a city and a county, so that creates a few differences.

We operate our human services system here.

There's not a separate county.

We are the city and the county.

We operate the city.

The city operates a jail.

We have human services.

So we have some of the things that you all might have in a typical county.

Um, in your community, so we also are a much stronger mayor form of government, I think, than either Minneapolis or Seattle.

And so, like, Minneapolis, our proposals will originate with the mayor.

We may not even need to amend our budget for some of these things.

Council approval is required for contracts over a half 1Million dollars.

But in some cases, the type of money that comes in from the federal government may or may not require a budget amendment, depending on the type of funds that the final Treasury guidance.

So a few differences.

We also use an annual budget process that begins in January of the calendar year.

And like Minneapolis, I think you're going to see we are thinking about some dollars being spent right away, but utilizing the budget process.

I don't think we want to see an emergency rush.

to program all the dollars in a temporary kind of fashion.

We have a lot more robust public engagement in the budget process.

There is more transparency that happens.

You can see where city dollars match federal dollars.

So there's some things you get when you put the dollars through the budget process.

So real quick, I'm just going to breeze through a few background pieces.

Let me see if I can get this to go.

So our mayor's administration, these are the objectives that they've laid out.

So getting some funding out in a timely manner, right, but then also using the budget process for a portion of the dollars.

Sustainability is the thing that we've been talking about here.

Lisa mentioned the fact that there's a lot of workers in the city that are furloughed or out of work.

I think we do want to bring back city services.

I want to be clear, we don't want to bring back city workers just because it's good for them as individuals.

It's good for our city to have folks who are able to deliver services and those workers purchase things in our community.

It is stimulus.

Their employment has as much of an economic effect when they go out and spend their paycheck as other workers.

But we also don't want to hire back city workers that we can't keep on the budget in the long term.

We're being thoughtful where we have a backlog, for example, for permitting.

We might use some contractors, for example, rather than restoring staff that we may not be able to keep on for year 3 and year 4. We'll just have to be looking at all of that to see where we want to use an outside provider, a community provider, where we want to grow the city staff because we want sustainability and then similar in all cities, the equity and the racial equity lens for proposals.

So these are the 4 buckets that our administration has proposed.

I'm not going to read these and I can share the slides with the committee staff afterwards, but restoring services, supplemental services.

These are the things I mentioned that are like backlogs, right?

They're not necessarily the level we'd be doing for Minneapolis.

This might be, for example, where some of your repairs and things from the.

the civil unrest might go because they're not ongoing services, but they require an infusion.

The emergency response, although I want to just say I think we all want to be really thoughtful about using federal dollars that are designated for a specific recovery purpose first, before using our flexible local government dollars, right?

So if there's funding and there is for a particular human services need or a particular food assistance need, we should be using food dollars for food before we use general flexible dollars for food.

So I think that that's a principle we're thinking about here.

And then economic recovery.

So just a few of the things our mayor's administration is thinking about and presenting to us as a city council.

So these are the types of priorities, just like it sounds like in Seattle, you all went to what are priorities we've set previously.

We're not changing the direction of the city because we got new dollars, right?

We're asking, how do these new dollars help us achieve the direction of the city that we already set?

And so these are examples.

You can see the top are very pandemic specific public health and food assistance and things like that.

You can see the bottom half are longer term mitigating and reducing involuntary displacement.

You know, there is a pandemic, perhaps escalation.

We see development is not slowing in our city.

just because of the pandemic.

It's a recession hitting different segments differently, right?

So we still have those pressures of displacement.

So you'll see that our broader priorities are broader than just the pandemic.

And we're gonna think about ways to address those long-term priorities as we go.

So here are some things I thought about as I was reading your list.

And we are at a very similar early stage because we don't have guidance yet from the U.S.

Department of Treasury.

We don't yet have a quote unquote plan.

We're doing our rounds just like you are about the same timeline.

But here are things I've been thinking about.

You have a lot in your resolution about the what, right?

You want to do gender equity, violence prevention.

You want to do work on homelessness and housing.

I want to encourage you all, and we're thinking a lot about the how.

So we know that food assistance, for example, can be done in kind, but it's very inefficient, right?

You have to find a place to store the food.

You have to get folks there.

You have to have a distribution system.

We're learning a lot internationally, and Denver's been trying to bring some of those lessons in about the value of cash assistance, right?

And I know you're doing some grocery cards there.

We've created something called the Left Behind Worker Fund.

For workers who are not eligible for unemployment or for stimulus checks, this Left Behind Worker Fund is benefiting them with direct cash assistance.

It's one time.

It's designed in a way to hopefully minimize any impacts to their immigration applications should they make them later, depending with the time we set it up, there was still a public charge rule in effect.

Hopefully that all goes away, but we wanted to be thoughtful.

So we're using one-time assistance for that set of workers, mostly benefiting immigrants and refugees who are not eligible for other forms of assistance.

You could think about it with food.

I will also just say we have a pilot that's coming from a private sector leader about homelessness and the Vancouver New Leaf program is for those experiencing homelessness who may not have the long-term deep embedded issues that require supportive housing, but they might be newer homeless or shorter-term homeless, and those individuals receiving cash assistance, they're going to experiment with one-time assistance, and they're going to experiment with monthly assistance, and they're going to study the results.

We should be trying new things with these dollars, and we should be studying the results of them.

for the purposes of scaling them up and sustaining them as a new way of doing business going forward, right?

So I think thinking about cash versus in-kind is a really important thing we can be thinking about.

You know, Lisa mentioned transportation and mobility.

I know that's a priority in Seattle as well.

There is a stimulus effect of using dollars for one-time infrastructure, no question.

And like Minneapolis, we have a number of plans pointing us in that direction.

But I will just say, it's often us as a city choosing which projects to fund.

I believe that these funds, especially given the fact that they are rescue funds intended to really reach deep into our communities, we could be using participatory budgeting to help decide what intersections in your neighborhood should we be prioritizing for safety, right?

where is a bus stop needing improvement?

And so thinking about ways to bring participatory budgeting to the decision making for a portion of these dollars is something we're thinking about.

Next is, you already have some pretty robust programs for workforce training and construction in Seattle.

But for us, as we see new investments in one-time infrastructure, we're just beginning our apprenticeship utilization requirements and targeted hiring.

We have a very disparate, small, tiny number of women in the construction trades working on our city projects.

So if we're going to be doing infrastructure as a form of stimulus, we have an obligation to make sure that the jobs are being filled by more women and people of color.

And so we are thinking about how do we right now we have pre apprenticeship programs, but you're not paid to participate, you have to decide whether to give up a paid job right or to keep your job and then try to you know so if we want people to change careers, we need to give them an income.

while they're changing careers.

So talking about stipends, talking about women and BIPOC communities.

And then we have an alternatives to policing program.

So we know that the pandemic has exacerbated mental health challenges.

We have more people in crisis.

It's been a little harder to get services during periods when things were closed.

We have a program called the STAR program, which is our Support Team Assisted Response.

It has been in operation since June 1st.

It is a social worker and an EMT who goes out on calls.

We are right now sending that team in one neighborhood, or central part of our city.

I shouldn't say one neighborhood, but one zone of our city.

they are doing about less than 1% of the calls they could be doing, right?

Instead of sending a police officer, we've had zero arrests, zero use of force situations, very successful.

So how is it that we try to bring that more sustainably into the budget?

Land, you all talked about buying buildings, but honestly, it doesn't have to always be a building.

It could just be land, but where we can use these funds to bring land into public ownership, it may be for affordable housing and other community purposes, child care, right?

That's a major theme of Our pandemic gaps and so where we have control of the land, we can set the terms for how it's used, even if we're not going to be the long term land holder.

We might do a long term land lease and have affordable housing and child care operated by others.

But we then are dictating that use in ways that can prevent displacement.

And then I just put in here, I want us to think about the pros and cons of replicating funding.

You know, there's a lot of business assistance coming from federal government and in Colorado, our state government as well.

I think we need to be really thoughtful about triple downing on the same industries.

I think it's really important we help our industries recover, but I also think it's really thoughtful about what city dollars need to be doing.

In many ways, we keep getting asked to fill these gaps.

that other levels of government, frankly, are not doing their responsibilities.

Finally, they're stepping up at these other levels.

So I think we just want to be really thoughtful about that.

If and when we do business assistance, though, we have to be building the economy back better.

We're all deeply concerned about the right to rehire.

Who gets hired back?

Are you going to be less likely to hire back BIPOC residents?

Are you going to be less likely to hire back someone who's older and considered more vulnerable?

really ensuring that if we're giving business assistance, that they are hiring back in the order that workers were left from the job.

So I'll stop there.

And just wanted to give you guys some things that maybe weren't quite in the memo, but you might have been thinking about.

And I want to learn from all of you as well.

So thank you.

Thank you very much, Councilmember.

That was fascinating, and I really appreciate you providing that context, both with the PowerPoint and sort of juxtaposing that with what's in our resolution.

Very helpful, and I think there is a lot of crossover.

And next, let's hear from Councilmember Fuentes from Austin City Council.

Very excited to have you here.

We have not had the chance to meet in person yet, I don't believe, because you are relatively new.

So tell us a little bit more about what you've been up to.

And as we said already, we know that you've already made a mark on the work that you are doing in Austin and so look forward to hearing the framework that you're bringing to the ARPA allocation and what's happening in Austin.

Yeah, well, first, thank you so much for inviting me.

I actually hit my 90-day mark this week.

So I've been in office, first time elected, 90 days.

Thank you all.

I'm very humbled to be here with you all to talk a little bit about the work that Austin City Council has been doing.

And so I guess first, I would kind of, to give you all some context, we are a manager council form of government.

And with in Austin and in Travis County, we have taken a different approach with our ARP dollars when we compare it to the cares act funding.

So, the city of Austin is receiving, or is approximately slated to receive a hundred and ninety six million.

And Travis county is slated to receive 247Million with many other of our surrounding cities also getting a sub allocation.

So, we decided to really look at it from a more regional approach, understanding that that's 500Million dollars that's coming into our area.

and wanting to leverage this opportunity to look at how can we utilize these funds, not only to address the needs of today, but to really leverage it in a transformational, once-in-a-generation way.

And so it's a little bit different.

And of course, we're waiting on the FEMA eligibility for specific guidelines, but it appears that there might be some flexibility for us to use these dollars to address some of our biggest, most pressing challenges that we have here in Austin.

And so I'm really proud to be part of a progressive coalition that is willing and ready and able to address some of our biggest challenges together in a formative way.

And so with that, I did put a link in the chat if you wanted to see the presentation that our city staff initially presented to council a few weeks ago.

That was just the first one, the initial proposal.

And from there, our city council, and I was proud to co-sponsor a policy that further directed city staff to invest and address four priority areas in our city, that being homelessness and related housing with mental health and substance use.

Also looking at early childhood, Early childhood care and education, including high quality and affordable looking at jobs and workforce development and our and our work programs and then.

4th, being a food insecurity and really addressing the food deserts that we have here in the area.

So those were the 4 things that we outlined in our resolution and I'll pop the link here shortly.

But with that in mind, that was the lens that we're hoping to take with our funds.

And so.

Once city staff presented that initial spending framework, we gave additional policy guidance and they'll come back with some additional more specific ideas and programs to build off of the work that we did with the CARES Act.

We're very fortunate here in Austin to have maintained a healthy amount of reserves so we didn't have to do layoffs.

We did do a round of freezing of any of our vacant positions and assessed each one to ensure that if they were front of the line, frontline employees, that we were able to bring those back on first.

So we fortunately are able to look at the ARP dollars not needing to fill a deficit, but looking at how can we build off of the work that we were doing during the pandemic.

And so the largest target expenditures for us include economic recovery, looking at services currently funded by the hotel occupancy taxes, our hotel taxes, or we use those a large part of it for creative art spaces, which we know.

our creative sector has been hard hit during the pandemic.

And then also, you know, keeping a very close eye on our public health response.

Here in Austin, our mortality rate has not been equitable.

Latinos make up nearly half of all of the deaths of COVID.

And so we are making sure that we are doing similarly to what the other council member mentioned earlier about that you know, wanting to have testing sites and vaccine distribution done in an equitable way and really centering our marginalized and vulnerable communities.

We want to continue to build off of that.

And just a few weeks ago, we launched a mobile vaccine program to get us into hardest hit neighborhoods as another way to address some of the barriers that we identified just with the online registration process.

You know, many of our communities are struggling With digital access and you are working families who don't have necessarily the time to be waiting in line for a lottery style appointment process, but I digress and so.

So I mentioned earlier waiting on FEMA to get back to us or to give us a final determination of the reimbursable amount.

And from there, we'll be able to make more detailed line items with these dollars.

The other thing I wanted to mention about public response efforts You know, with the expense categories that fall under the cobit emergency management that we will continue to leverage those daughter those dollars for testing testing and shelters.

We did protective lodges, converting hotels into into isolation.

Areas for individuals who need, you know, keeping a close eye on multi generational settings and so.

We want to be sure we were able to offer a space for individuals who have coded to go to self isolate as a heel.

And the, and then moving on to the economic recovery bucket, some of the ideas that are the process we're taking on as far as public engagement includes.

having city staff has gathered 125 stakeholder engagement events or have held 125 stakeholder engagement events.

And they have an online portal process to receive additional feedback from the community.

And that's open through April 23rd.

And the idea there is to utilize ARP funding for the first two years to use this feedback on how we should use our ARP funding for the first two years.

And let's see.

Some of the programs that are outlined in the presentation from city staff that were recommended for Austin to do include ongoing workshops and counseling and mentorship programs for small businesses.

Also looking at business co-ops, temporary permitting exceptions, and reduced fees for businesses as they begin to fully reopen.

And the other critical component I want to touch on, of course, is child care.

As we know, this pandemic has not affected everyone equally, and women certainly are bearing the brunt of it.

And so we want to ensure that we do more in the child care space.

And we're looking at, we did establish a child care grant relief program for child care centers in Austin, and so we're going to continue to fund that program and offer financial incentives for individuals seeking to open a child care center or reopen a home-based, high-quality child care setting.

And that's particularly important to my district.

I represent Southeast Austin, which is a predominantly Latino area.

And let's see.

Let me make sure.

Some of the programs I'm really excited about that we're going to dig into once we learn more is when it comes to food insecurity, as I mentioned, Aria, that was the fourth bucket that we're looking to really invest in, includes equipping residents with tools to grow their own food at home.

So really empowering communities and giving them the tools to learn that skill and to be able to have their their own food forest, so to speak, or community garden.

Also looking at closing the digital divide and then of course assisting local arts and cultural organizations.

Right now we're in the process of setting up navigators to help our restaurants and small businesses apply for those big funding buckets that are already outlined in the ARP.

We want to get as many Of our businesses in line because that one is a first come first serve billion dollar investment that's outlined in the ARP.

So we're wanting to make sure that we're positioning our businesses to understand the process and to apply from the for those federal dollars and If we're able to get as many of our businesses the support that they need, and our restaurants the support that they need, that also opens up funding for us per the local allotment to really dive in and target investment.

and recovery.

And so those are some of the things that I just wanted to touch on really quickly.

And I'm happy to, you know, dive in more.

But I'm especially looking forward to how we're able to leverage these dollars to address homelessness.

That is an issue that I think many of our big cities are facing right now.

And so I really want to I think that this, if we're talking about doing a once in a generation, you know, having $500 million come into our area, that is the number one issue and area that our council has built consensus around addressing.

community.

I think it's important for us to be able to do that.

Thank you so much.

Thank you very much Councilmember Fuentes and thank you all very much for your presentations.

I really appreciate the opportunity to hear from all of your cities and again local progress.

Council President Gonzalez with us today is on the board of local progress.

Councilmember Herbold has been a longtime supporter and was there with her predecessor as well as local you all providing the feedback directly to council members so that we can learn from each other.

It's just incredibly exciting.

And I think this is exactly what we should be doing right now so that we don't miss a minute with learning from other jurisdictions and helping to create more harmony and equity as we recover from these crises.

I loved what you talked about in terms of permitting, expediting permitting and decreasing fees for small businesses as they're opening the doors.

and the navigator program.

We've been thinking a lot about that for not only small businesses, but also folks who need access to rental assistance and other types of assistance programs across our city.

In Denver, I love the emphasis on the cash assistance, direct cash assistance, recognizing that people should have the license to use those dollars and often know best how to use those dollars.

So look forward to hearing more about the two approaches that you're using for direct cash assistance.

But the overall message there was really helpful.

And in Minneapolis, I'm fascinated about how we can do more with our county partners as well about how we look at capital dollars and matching those with operation and maintenance.

It's often one versus the other.

And I heard you lift up both of those investments and trying to find ways to you know, get away from those excuses and really push forward with innovative strategies.

So very excited to hear from all of you.

So let's open it up to any questions or comments from our colleagues here today.

Council members, anything you'd like to ask of the council members with us today?

Okay.

I am not seeing any additional questions.

I did have a question about the STAR program in Denver.

You may have heard of our HealthONE team here in Seattle as well, where we have firefighters paired with case managers and are trying to relieve 911 of the calls related to health-related issues and hopefully more mental health-related issues as we scale up the program.

We've gone from one van to now three vans to cover three of our five zones for the firefighter ladder divisions.

And looking forward to scaling that up.

But Council Member McKinney, I'm wondering if maybe we could do some sort of analysis as well about how those programs have relieved calls from having to go to traditional 911 armed officer response.

And if there's any sort of analysis that we could do together, we'd love to do that.

But is there anything else you'd like to share about the STARS program and when that started?

Well, I will just say that we don't have an external evaluator yet.

I hope that we actually will go there in terms of true return on investment.

But what I can tell you is that our data is showing that those responders are spending about 30 percent less time than a police response would require.

It's both different personnel who, frankly, probably are lower cost than what an officer who's armed would cost, but it's also that they're doing it faster so that it really is freeing up and reducing the hours spent on armed police response.

That's one data point we've got, and we are in the process of trying to expedite our expansion.

So it sounds like you've jumped ahead of us in terms of your quantity.

We're trying to get four more vans going, but having some debate about that timeline.

Thank you.

Vice Chair Herbold, please go ahead.

Thank you so much, Chair Mosqueda, for this line of questioning.

I just stepped away from my computer, so that was perfect.

Just a follow up on the questions about the STAR program.

Are you anticipating potentially seeking ARP funding for your scale-up.

There certainly has been an increase in our communities for the types of response that result from various types of crises, mental health crises, domestic violence crises, substance abuse disorder crises.

You know, people are in crisis now to a greater extent.

And I think a lot of experts in the field associate that uptick with COVID-19.

And I'm just wondering if you are considering that to make it possible to apply for ARP funding for your expansion.

We are currently using a combination Denver voters have been very generous and we have a dedicated sales tax that provides funding for mental health services and that grant funding is what started the program.

We did win some general fund dollars for it as well in the 2021 budget.

And I think the short answer is it depends.

We have kind of a informal agreement that we would do an expansion and additional expansion using maybe some of our reserves or our contingency dollars that we save.

We couldn't quite get there in the budget cycle, but we.

We anticipated a mid year conversation, so there are potentially local funds available.

But if we, if we can sustain a bigger expansion more quickly by using those dollars, and then keep it going by bringing it into our general fund budget in year 3, because obviously these are 2 year dollars.

We actually can expend them through 24. So in some ways they're three or four year dollars.

But our goal is to never fund something we can't keep going if it's going to be an ongoing need.

So I think that's, we'll wait for the treasury guidance like everybody.

to see um whether or not it's eligible and and all of that but I think if I I hope that we don't if if we can fund it with our local dollars and then use the ARP dollars for something else that's needed that's a win-win too right in my mind it's all about using the dollars for what they're eligible for but that then allows you to be more thoughtful about other dollars excellent yeah

Excellent, thank you.

Well, the other thing I wanted to really lift up that it sounds like is commonality across jurisdictions is the ways in which you're looking to use these ARPA dollars to make sure that city services not only get re-initiated but also maybe expanded in certain areas where folks have been harmed by the trauma that is COVID and whether that's expanding services and child care or trying to figure out more access to community centers.

I think I can't remember the wording that was used but it was a community-oriented sort of strategy to bring people together and reinitiate those community gatherings again, I think is a way to also help with the mental health and the trauma of isolation and potential depression that a lot of our families are facing.

depression and anxiety numbers have just gone through the roof for both those who are housed and unhoused.

So trying to figure out ways that we can pull community together relies on us also funding community-based organizations and our direct service providers through the city.

So I loved hearing some of those themes and look forward to learning from you on those pieces as well, both in terms of how we respond to the trauma that individuals are suffering with and reinvest in our economy to make it more equitable and to do so with a racial justice lens on everything we're doing.

Well, thank you all very much.

I'm not seeing any hands.

And I know that you all are very busy with your own recovery efforts.

So thank you once again.

Thanks as well to Local Progress for connecting us.

And I really do look forward to one day seeing you in person so that we can all have a chance to gather again and celebrate, hopefully, our more equitable recovery path that we're all laying right now.

Congratulations on all that you've accomplished and look forward to continuing to learn from your cities and you as individuals.

I see lots of hands.

So we'll just send you off with a huge thank you.

Thanks, everyone.

Thank you.

And for folks viewing, we will make sure to share these links that people have shared with us in the chat, access to the PowerPoint presentation that Austin City Council talked about, the strategies for the left workers who are left behind fund from Denver and from Minneapolis.

We also have the opportunity to share with you a link about community safety and the ways that they're trying to create alternatives to the 911 response as well.

So we'll provide those links on our websites.

We will move on to item number two.

Hi, yes, I'm here today.

Excellent, wonderful.

Hannah, I understand that you are here on behalf of Dan Torres, who was not able to join us.

And you have a statement from the Office of Sustainability and the Environment to read for him.

And that this is a mayoral appointment, colleagues, to the Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board for the Early Learning position.

And I will let you go ahead, Hannah, and maybe fill in if there's anything that I think we want to lift up.

Happy to have you here, Hannah.

Perfect.

Well, thank you for having me and good morning to everybody.

Again, my name is Hannah Hill and I'm with the Office of Sustainability and Environment and I'm serving as the interim staff liaison for the Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board.

As you know, the Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board was established by the same ordinance that created the beverage tax.

and the role of the board is to develop recommendations for the mayor and for city council on programs and services to support with sweetened beverage tax revenue that align with the ordinance's priorities around food access, child health and development, and prenatal to five services.

So according to the ordinance, the board shall consist of 11 members who are residents of the city of Seattle or work within the boundaries of the city of Seattle.

And so today, as was mentioned, we're here for the confirmation hearing of Dan Torres for position number 11, which is reserved for an early learning representative.

I will share a little bit more about Dan and his interest in joining the board and see if there are any questions.

Dan is a senior program manager at the Bezos Family Foundation where he cultivates partnerships for the Vroom Program.

And the Vroom Program provides science-based tools to families and caregivers to further child development.

Dan brings to this role more than 17 years of experience in the nonprofit and public sector with specific expertise in systems change work and early childhood development.

Prior to joining the Bezos Family Foundation, he served as the executive director of the Washington State Essentials for Childhood Initiative, a cross-systems public-private partnership with a vision that all children in Washington State thrive in safe, stable, and nurturing relationships and environments.

Dan also previously served as the Director of Policy and Partnerships at Thrive Washington.

In that role, he directed the community momentum strategy for 10 early learning regional coalitions and developed Thrive Washington's legislative agenda.

Dan is a fervent believer that strong community engagement is essential to achieving goals around equity.

He has been involved in several community engagement processes as both a participant and designer, and has seen how community engagement can engender collaboration and enable a better understanding of community needs and aspirations.

As someone who has had the privilege of working at the local, state, and national level on early childhood development and education, as a father of a six and nine-year-old, and as the first and only person from his family to go to college, Dan would bring a unique and important lens to his work on the board.

And with that, I will turn it over to the committee for discussion.

Thank you very much, Hannah.

You have lifted up all the things I was going to mention, including the policy partnership with Thrive as the director, and all of the amazing work as the executive director of the Washington State Essentials for Childhood Initiative.

Really exciting appointment.

Any questions or comments?

Thanks, Hannah, for your overview.

Council colleagues, I move the committee recommends passage of the appointment of Dan Torres to the Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board.

Is there a second?

Thank you, Council President.

It's been moved and seconded.

Are there any additional comments?

Hearing none, let's do this.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of the appointment?

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Vice Chair Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Morales, can you repeat that again?

council.

That is a five in favor and none opposed.

Thank you very much.

Madam Clerk, the motion carries and the committee recommendation will be sent to the April 12th City Council meeting for a final vote.

Hannah, thanks for being with us today.

If you can please pass on our appreciation and please note that Mr. Torres does not have to be in person with us via Zoom on the 12th.

We will be happy to pass on the information about this appointee and our recommendation.

So thank you very much for joining us.

Thank you for having me.

Absolutely.

Let's move on to item number three.

Madam Clerk, can you please read item three into the record?

Item number three, appointment of Joan Shapiro as member of the Labor Standards Advisory Commission for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Wonderful, thank you very much.

And I see Karim Levitas with us.

Thank you very much.

And Joel Shapiro, thanks for waiting.

I know that you were also able to participate with us in that presentation.

I'm really excited about the LSAC conversations here.

We have Gay Gilmore and Liz Ford on the line as well.

So maybe I will let folks introduce themselves.

And Karim, maybe we'll start with you and you can turn it over to the folks who are with us here today.

Yeah, hi.

Good morning, Karen Levitas.

I'm here to say a few words about LSAC and briefly introduce Joel.

I think Joel is going to say a little bit more about himself.

And so I'll just let folks introduce themselves and then kind of circle back to what I was going to say about LSAC.

But I'm here on behalf of the Office of Labor Standards and as commission liaison to LSAC.

Wonderful.

And as a precursor to the next item to come, Liz and Gay, I know that you are also here for item number four, but since you're on screen, I'd love to have you introduce yourselves so folks know who you are, and then Joel will come back to you.

Sure.

I'm Liz Ford.

I am co-chair of the Labor Standards Advisory Commission, and I teach a workers' rights clinic at Seattle University School of Law.

Excellent.

Thank you.

And Gay?

Hi, everyone.

I'm Gay Gilmore.

I'm co-founder of Optimism Brewing Company located on Seattle's Capitol Hill, and I'm a co-chair of the commission with Liz and a business representative on the commission.

Thanks for having us.

We're excited you're here.

So let's start with our first item related to LSAC, which is the appointment of Joel Shapiro.

And I will turn over to Karim for a brief overview of what you've been up to and an introduction to our friend Joel and Mr. Shapiro.

Then you'll have the chance to introduce yourself and talk a little bit more about your interests on the board.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

Just a few quick words.

As folks on the committee know well, LSAC serves a valuable advisory function to our office, to the executive more generally, and to city council as well.

And LSAC is unique in that it combines business owners and advocates, workers and worker advocates, and community members to provide insights on advancing labor standards.

Commissioners are invested in improving workplace conditions for workers and ensuring that businesses have the tools and information they need to comply with labor standards.

And I am thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Joel Shapiro going forward.

And as you'll hear more from him soon, like the other business owners on LSAC, Joel offers the valuable perspective of not only running a business, but of creating work opportunities for workers that value them and protect their rights.

and doing all of that in the gig economy.

As the city and OLS moves and changes its focus to thinking about the future of work and how to create labor standards for this new economy, his expertise will prove invaluable.

As the committee knows well, frequently Seattle is not merely advancing best practices for labor standards, but creating them.

And in this groundbreaking work, the inside of LSAC has proved a valuable stakeholder group for us to have real-world implications on policy development, enforcement, and outreach.

I look forward to continuing to partner with LSAC and to working with Joel.

And with that, I'll turn it over to Joel to say a few words about himself.

Thanks, Cram.

Thank you for having me.

My name is Joel Shapiro, and I'm one of the founders and co-CEO of Dumpley.

And at Dumpling, our big goal is to really level the playing field for workers in the gig economy through an ownership model that allows personal shoppers to start their own local grocery delivery businesses.

Using this model, personal shoppers can set their own prices.

They can work with the clients that they want to work with.

And ultimately, and most importantly, they earn significantly more money per shop than they do with the traditional on-demand apps.

We currently support over 2,000 personal shoppers across the U.S. in all 50 states.

And when we first founded Dumpling almost five years ago, one of our big goals was to really elevate the voice of workers, and specifically workers, the working class.

And what we didn't expect was how many independent contractors, specifically in the gig economy, we're going to really voice huge concerns about feeling underpaid, exploited, and undervalued by the on-demand apps and the gig economy.

And so we quickly started to really focus, really to understand what was going on and learn about how traditional employment law was being sidestepped when you remove HR departments, when you remove all kinds of laws and you start to manage people by algorithms.

and to really reduce them down to a cog in the wheel, it really exploits the workers.

And so, ultimately, what we wanted to do was to understand what was going on and build a company and build a model that really centered the worker, the people that are doing so much of the work and that are making these incredibly fast industries grow, and build something that works for them and allows them to continue doing the great work they're doing.

I think, you know, listening in on this call today, and hearing so many people from working in Washington to all of the different app-based workers call in and explain and share their experiences, they're not the exception.

And some of the horrifying things that we heard about pay and how pay gets removed really are kind of the standard.

And so what really excites me about the opportunity to work with the LSAC team and the city council through that is to be able to share kind of the experiences that I've learned, that our team has learned about kind of the tricks that a lot of these companies do, how they kind of work around so many of the things and really exploit workers, as well as the other things that we've learned in terms of what's really helpful for people and what are the types of things that can help them continue to do the important work, the essential work that we see that's carried so many of us through the pandemic.

and to do so in a way that really allows them to create value, to build wealth and ultimately make a good and fair amount of the money that's going in from the work that they're doing.

So appreciate the time and it's nice to be here.

very inspiring.

Thank you very much.

And thank you very much, Karen, as well, for the overview.

And we will have the chance to hear in just a minute more about what LSAC has been doing and some various recommendations.

So, are there any questions for Mrs. Shapiro?

An extensive background, really, really impressive.

Council members?

Oh, please vice chair.

Not a question, just an expression of my appreciation, Joel, for seeing that there is an exploitive model that has elements to that exploitive model that appeals to people and finding a way to offer a different model that still has those benefits for workers that workers are seeking without the exploitive elements and allowing workers to empower themselves.

Really feel that that's incredibly visionary and look forward to working with you more and learning more about the work that you do.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Well, very, very well said.

Thank you very much, Vice Chair Herbold.

Joel, I think that we are ready to move on your appointment.

And thank you again for your interest in serving on this board and for the history that you've already been bringing to these discussions and the incredible work you've done in the past.

I move the committee recommends passage of Joel Shapiro as member of the Labor Standards Advisory Commission.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you very much, Vice Chair Herbold.

Is there any additional comments?

hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of the appointment?

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Vice Chair Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

One more time, Council Member.

Yes.

Thank you.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much.

It is unanimous.

Congratulations, Mr. Shapiro.

And you, again, don't have to be present, but we will take your motion to the April 12th City Council meeting.

The motion has carried and the committee recommendation will be discussed there on April 12th at the City Council meeting for a final vote.

Thanks again to all of you.

And this conversation will continue on LSAC-related issues.

Let's move on to item number four.

Madam Clerk, will you please read item number four into the record?

Agenda item number four, transparency requirements for contract workers for briefing and discussion.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

And we still have with us Liz Ford, Gay Gilmore, members of the Labor Standards Advisory Commission.

We have Karina Bola here with us from Central Staff, and Karim Levitas from the Office of Labor Standards.

And Mr. Shapiro, you're welcome to stay with us as well as a member of the Labor Standards Advisory Committee.

I know you are also very busy, so if you do feel like you have to leave at any time, no offense will be taken.

But excited to have you here and participate as well.

Let us turn it over to you all, I think, to talk about what we're doing here.

And before we do, I'd like to actually ask Council Member Herbold if you'd like to have any opening comments as a reminder of what we're doing here today and the conversations that are to come.

Thank you.

You're so kind.

You're kind to give me an opportunity to say a few words, but you're especially kind to make time in your committee to discuss this issue as I think folks know it's sort of a legacy issue for me from when, once upon a time, I had the Office of Labor Standards in my committee.

During that period of time, I was really interested in exploring the definitions of what is considered a misclassified worker and what is somebody who's considered an employee, and was feeling at the time that more and more of our workforce was being misclassified.

as contract employees and thus not entitled to the growing number of workers' rights that we were, along with workers, fighting to pass in our city.

On one hand, we were increasing workers' rights for employees, and on the other hand, more and more people were being classified, I believe, misclassified as contract workers and not being able to benefit for those increased rights.

And this is a tension, I think, nationally as well, the question of whether or not we make a legal argument or a legislative argument that people who are classified as contractors are that there's a different test to determine whether or not they're employees or whether or not we just simply extend the rights that we have extended to employees to people who are rightly or wrongly being classified as contract workers.

Because this national debate has been going on about how to approach this growing issue, this growing problem, I worked with council to pass resolution 31863 that called on LSAC to develop recommendations to the council for how we should address this issue.

Last May, LSAC sent a memo to Council with some recommendations for what they describe as a first modest step forward to create more transparency and access to information among those currently classified as independent contractors.

And we'll hear more from them about their recommendations, including policy requiring hiring entities to provide independent contractors information so that they can understand the terms of their engagement and determine whether or not those terms have been satisfied.

In addition to thanking you, Chair Mosqueda, for making the time here, many thanks to all the members from LSAC for engaging when the council asked that you take on this issue with passage of our resolution.

And thank you also for being here to present to us today.

And thank you as well to Kareem and the whole team at Office of Labor Standards and our own central staff, Karina Bull, for taking the time to be here in case there are technical questions.

Thank you very much.

And we do have a memo from the LSAC commission to the office of labor standards that's also in our materials from May 6th of 2020 as a refresher as well.

So I'm going to turn it over to Liz.

Thank you very much, Vice Chair Herbold.

And we do have about 20 minutes for this presentation, so around 1135 we'll try to wrap up here.

Council Member Ford.

Liz, would you like to take it away?

Of course.

So thank you so much for being here, for inviting us here to present on the proposed or the recommendations that we made to OLS back in May of 2020, which seems like a lifetime ago, given all that we've been through between then and now.

So in this very short presentation, I will take some time to introduce the commission and how we came to this recommendation and describe the basics of it.

And then I'll turn it over to Gay, who will then talk through some of the coverage limitations that we recommend and also touch on outreach and enforcement.

And so let me start by not for so much council members who I know are very familiar with LSAC, but for anyone who might be listening who doesn't know what LSAC is, I wanted to just take a second and say that the commission was formed by council in 2014 as a part of council's creation of the Office of Labor Standards and its very innovative approach to labor standards enforcement and outreach.

And the idea was to continue to provide a space for business worker advocates and community advocates to come together and make recommendations to the office, to council and to the mayor.

So you can see here, I've just extracted from the stat, from the ordinance, this overall goal of LSAC and how that goal is met.

And so the question then is how is the commission comprised?

Well, it's 15 members total, seven of those are appointed by the mayor, seven are appointed by council and one is appointed by the commission itself.

And that you've just confirmed our appointee for which we are very grateful and we're so excited to have Joel with us.

And the commission itself should be roughly equally comprised of business representatives, worker advocates and community advocates.

And I'll show you a little bit, a little visual to give you a sense of who we are right now.

So this set of logos really describes the membership of commission.

As of now, it includes the several mayoral nominees who should be before you in the next several weeks for confirmation.

So you can see we're getting there in terms of getting that tripartite balance.

And so then the next question is, how did we come to make this recommendation?

The commission created, actually, back in about 2018, Council Member Herbold, just probably as you were thinking about this question of definitions, the commission created a working group to think about the same thing.

And the composition of that work group is on the left-hand side of your slide.

It included Mona Smith from GSBA, myself, Artie Nosrati from Working Washington, and Anthony Burnett from MD.

D.B.

staffing.

That's the group that initially did the groundwork and came up with the recommendation that you'll see, that you've already seen and I'll describe a little bit.

This is sort of a rough timeline.

So the working group completed its first recommendation in April of 2020, sent it to, approved it, the commission as a whole considered and approved it.

in May of 2020, and we forwarded on to you in June.

And we are delighted to have this invitation in February.

The Independent Contractor Working Group continues on slightly, the compositions changed slightly to include Joel, of course, and also Gay.

So the charge from you in the resolution from 2019, there it is, asking us to provide input to OLS on this very difficult question.

And as the working group started on its work, we quickly discovered that it would be important in order for us to achieve consensus to take this in bites.

And so we did that.

So you're going to see and have seen that our recommendation is targeted.

It is not intended to be mutually exclusive with other means and methods of addressing the question of independent contractor misclassification and also exploitation.

So one of the things we noticed in your resolution is that one of the whereas clauses led us to the Washington Department of Commerce study.

And we took a look at that, and one thing jumped out at us quickly, and that was that this graphic here, which I'll describe in a second, has suggested that there's a really basic information gap with independent contractor workers.

So the top line, that red line, indicates the 1099 filings, the sort of percentage of 1099 filings.

The bottom two lines are self-reported status.

How do people report themselves?

And you can see there's a major gap there.

And so if workers are not even sure if they're independent contractors, it was likely to us that they lacked other really basic information.

And in fact, we knew this to be true from our own experience on the task force.

And we have folks who represent low-wage workers in employment claims.

and folks who organize low-wage and gig workers, as well as businesses that interact with independent contractor workers.

So this was consistent with what we believe to be true, which is there is a serious information deficit, especially among low-wage independent contractor workers.

So what did we look at next?

We looked at, okay, what's basic information that an employee would be entitled to?

under Seattle ordinances.

So here it is, right?

It's just the kind of information necessary that you can look at, what was I supposed to be paid?

What was I actually paid?

Do they match?

So who's my employer?

How do I get in touch with them?

What's my rate of pay?

If there's tipping, how does that work?

Am I paid on commission or piece rate?

And then when should I get paid?

And then to compare on the pay stub, you need a version of that same set of information.

So from that, We thought, well, what seems very sensible to us is to a policy that requires that same sort of parallel set of information.

So independent contractor workers should be able to understand the terms of their engagement and then be able to figure out if they've been paid right.

And this is Council Member Herbold, the piece that you called out at the top, This is intended to be a first step and not a last step.

All right, so here is the same visual depiction of the independent contractor disclosures that we're proposing or recommending.

There is a pre-contract set and a time of payment set, and they look very similar with some important distinctions.

So, you know, who's my hiring entity?

How do I contact them?

How am I being paid?

And importantly, what are the typical expenses that will be unreimbursed?

So what should I expect to pay out of my pocket and therefore deduct from what I'm, how I'm budgeting?

How am I paid?

Is this a piece rate?

Is this a flat rate?

What is this?

If there's tipping, how does that work?

And then when do I get paid?

Time of payment, same sort of comparative set of information.

What did I just get paid for?

which is important in the independent contractor circumstance to us because it could be a per item payment.

What am I being paid for now?

How am I being paid?

Are there tips?

How does that work?

And what's the total?

Did you deduct anything?

So that's sort of the basic recommendation.

Now I'm going to turn it over to Gay to go a little further and talk about some of the details.

Thanks, Liz.

The gist of what we're advocating for is, of course, letting people know what their labor is going for in plain English and repeatedly.

So if you're working for someone, you deserve the right to know all of the things that Liz was talking about.

If you're an employee, an employer relationship, that it should be no different if you're an independent contractor.

and hiring entity relationship.

And we really truly believe that having this sunlight into what's happening will be the best first step in protecting our most vulnerable workers by standardizing this disclosure.

And it could be that a consequence of not having this proper disclosure means that you're in an assumed employer relationship.

it kind of ups the stakes if you're not able to provide this kind of common disclosure.

So when it comes time to implementing this, right, we only were talking originally about exactly how to stop misclassification.

And I think what we're saying is the first step in this policy is to provide a common disclosure across everything.

And then once we're implementing this, as actual regulation, there are some additional consequences.

And so outreach and providing some type of standardization, as well as making sure we're not sweeping up people in the legislation that we don't want to, is critical.

So along those terms, we're suggesting that OLS provide a very great website that will help walk workers and employers and hiring entities through some type of flowchart that will really help them determine what relationship they're in and what disclosures are needed in some of the most common cases, because we know what a lot of those common cases are, as well as making sure that we are not sweeping up certain groups unnecessarily.

So next slide, Liz.

And actually, can you, yeah, there we go.

So some of these coverage limitations are some of the same things that we were considering that we see in some of the other OLS regulations.

So making sure that we are not sweeping up just the smallest of businesses.

So our suggestion is to cover anyone who's retaining five or more independent contractors on a consistent basis.

So obviously the largest groups of of hiring entities like temporary agencies, the TNCs, the online platform hiring agencies, but not necessarily bringing in some of the smallest of businesses.

Likewise, we don't want to sweep in some of the short-term contractors.

So even an individual like myself hiring a plumber, or, you know, the relationship I have with a hairstylist.

Some of these things, you know, these are independent contractor relationships, but we don't want to sweep them up under this legislation because this is not what we're trying to protect against.

On the other side, we don't want to sweep in some of the largest but not vulnerable workers who are typically in independent contractor relationships, lawyers, accountants, freelance designers.

And our suggestion is anyone making over $75,000 a year.

But the goal is at the baseline to provide all workers of their rights while protecting the most vulnerable workers from at the same time.

Next slide, Liz.

So with that, we have to think through enforcement.

We're the Labor Standards Advisory Commission.

We advise the Office of Labor Standards.

And what they do is a lot of enforcement, a lot of outreach and education.

And so these are some additional suggestions that we made.

You know, unlike other labor standards, this recommendation will only require notice.

We're really talking about being up front with all workers and repeatedly informing them about what they're doing.

We talk about it colloquially as having kind of a nutritional facts box around your labor contract, what you're getting paid for.

It should be very clear and easy to understand.

And if we can put it on every packaged food, we should certainly be able to put it on every worker and give them the rights that they deserve.

So with this, because it is only notice, we have to be careful because there will be unique enforcement rules.

you know, models around it.

And of course, we are going to have to do a ton of outreach and education, because as Liz was mentioning, we have people who don't even realize that they're in an independent contractor relationship with their company.

And so this is going to require a lot more outreach to the workers, the hiring entities, as well as even individuals who will now worry that they might be being swept into this, labor standard.

And so, you know, there's going to be some implications to it.

The one thing I want to just quickly say in summary is that we, of course, our whole commission is about protecting workers.

I was very moved by the public comment at the opening of this meeting.

You know, we we think transparency is a key foundation to protecting workers rights.

And we believe that as more and more people become independent contractors, they deserve the same sort of protection.

And this is a critical first step in enabling people to understand what their labor is, understand what the expenses are that will come along with being an independent contractor, figure out how they're going to be paid so that they can take action.

when things are not, you know, when they are not getting what they deserve, what was disclosed to them so that they can have some action or work with us or the Office of Labor Standards to come back on enforcing that.

Liz, back to you if you have anything else you wanted to say in summary.

No, we, thanks so much for giving us this opportunity and we welcome any questions that you have.

Council Member Herbold, anything in closing?

I'm just curious, you touched upon the fact that a policy like this would benefit from a unique enforcement approach.

I'm just wondering, have you had any thoughts about what that would look like and whether or not there would be penalties and fines and how those might be sought by an aggrieved

I don't know if you want to take a shot at this, Gail.

I'll take a shot at this.

Councilmember Herbold, we had some conversations about that.

Actually, you can see in the recommendation itself, we didn't make specific recommendations on that, but we've discussed it since.

And there are a couple of key sort of principles about it.

an insurmountable burden on the Office of Labor Standards without also matching that with resources.

And so recognize that, that's why we're sort of emphasizing the outreach as much as we are.

And in terms of enforcement, a couple of pieces.

One is we would envision sort of a, almost like a parking ticket, a limited investigation citation process that with the possibility, I suppose, of an appeal, but just very limited citation process.

But more to the point, and you have this already in the employment context, if you create an, now I'm gonna sound like a lawyer, if you create an evidentiary presumption that if you fail to give this notice that what the worker says is presumed to be true, So for example, if I am hanging drywall for Joe's drywall, Joe didn't give me any disclosures.

I thought the terms were $50 an hour.

Joe thought the terms were $40 an hour.

When we end up in small claims court about this, the judge will have no choice but to say, accept my version of the facts.

So that's a way that you could make it sort of self-enforcing.

So those are a couple of ideas we've talked about.

The third is the one that Gaye mentioned, which is to say, if you fail to give the notice, you're presumed to be an employer.

Anything you want to add, Gaye?

Okay.

Yeah, I caught that.

That's a really interesting concept that creates a deterrent effect, I think, for those who are operating as a contract employer for the purpose of avoiding the rights and responsibilities of an employer to their employees.

That's, I think, an interesting concept that I hadn't considered, but really, really appreciate that.

Yeah, so we, I think you all acknowledged listening into public comment today.

We heard testimony from folks who are supporting what's being called a pay up policy campaign.

that includes a minimum pay that guarantees workers make more than a minimum wage after expenses, makes clear that tips are on top, protects flexibility, has some transparency recommendations as well.

And just interested to hear from LSAC how the recommendations that you're making today can lead us towards having that other next important discussion around the – not just the transparency, around the remuneration that workers receive for their labor, but regulating some of our expectations in a way that ensures that it's not continuing to be an exploitive model.

I can take a stab at that.

I think one of the things that we heard was that transparency is really important.

And specifically for workers in the gig economy, it's oftentimes a black box algorithm with no idea of like what's being used to calculate their actual pay.

And that oftentimes has changed constantly.

And so I think part of the goal here is if we can provide transparency and a vehicle for transparency, to get that in writing and to get that down.

I think then future steps of looking at what is pay, does that match kind of the pay up legislation and ideas?

Is there kind of a mismatch there?

I think will help moving forward to really understand, you know, what are the terms of the pay?

Is it below minimum wage?

Should it be more, you know, how are expenses being calculated?

So we'd see this really as a first step to really be able to enforce as well as just to be able to more clearly articulate the expectations and accountability for meeting those.

Now, I just want to say thank you very much.

You're welcome.

And thank you very much, Gay.

Thank you very much, Joel and Karim.

We appreciate you all being here.

Karina, thanks as always for walking us through this item.

Council Member Hurdle.

Thank you.

I just want to be transparent in that I have been working with Karina on draft legislation to implement the recommendations of LSAC in this area.

But I am, as always, open to working with members of this committee if there are steps that we want to take towards the recommendations of the pay up campaign within the context of this bill, or perhaps we want to create some expectations for ourselves within the context of this bill for next steps around the pay up proposals.

I'm open to how we might do that, understanding that there is a lot of overlap between the recommendations that we have I want to highlight the work that we've been doing in public comment and the work that's been done before us today from LSAC and what we're hearing from gig workers.

And I just want to highlight that, you know, even though I have been working on a bill that focused on these particular

Thank you.

And we will follow up with you offline about that.

And if there's other council members that are interested, please do let Council Member Herbold know.

Thanks, everyone.

Great to see all of you.

Appreciate your time today.

And we will see you very soon.

Okay, Madam Clerk, could you please read item number five into the record?

Item number five, Council Bill 120018, an ordinance relating to grant funds.

from non-city sources for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Excellent.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I see Director Emily Alvarado from the Office of Housing here, Tracy Ratcliffe from Central Staff, Eric McConaughey, and I believe Brian Goodnight.

Hello, everyone from Central Staff.

Thanks for being here with us.

And again, Council Member Peterson, thanks for joining us early today and staying with us for this agenda topic as well.

Colleagues, as a reminder, this rental assistance bill was discussed in our last committee.

This is tied to the December 2020 COVID relief bill that Congress passed.

This is our opportunity here in City Council finally to have the conversation we had been long anticipating.

The legislation was transmitted to us just before our last committee meeting, and we now have the opportunity to really walk through the proposed amendments in front of us, and I ask that we go through the presentation and go ahead and save questions and comments specific for each of the amendments as we have them.

Tracy, did you have a presentation that you wanted to walk us through today?

I do, very briefly.

Council Member, if that's okay, I will start to share my screen here.

Let's see, make sure I've got the right one.

Okay.

You all can see that, can you?

Mm-hmm.

wonderful.

So Tracy Rathliff, Council Central Staff, and I am joined today by my Central Staff colleagues, Brian Goodnight and Eric McConaughey, who are knowledgeable about Seattle Public Utility and Seattle City Lights utility assistance programs, should questions come up about these programs in light of this legislation that does include some utility funding.

So as you indicated, Council Member Mosqueda, at the March 16th Finance and Housing Committee, there was an initial presentation discussion of council bill 120018 that allocate $22 million of federal funds for rental and utility assistance.

On Thursday of last week, I emailed to the council members a memo that provided a summary of this legislation and the three proposed amendments that will be discussed at today's meeting.

So just very briefly, to remind you, and $22 million that would be allocated, proposed to be allocated consistent with the way that we actually allocated about $9 million of rental assistance that the city received last year.

Proposed uses include rent and utility assistance.

Eligibility criteria, again, people qualify for unemployment or have experienced a reduction in household income.

demonstrate a risk of experiencing homelessness or housing stability, and also have to have a household income at or below 80% of area median income.

Eligible costs that can be funded with these resources, 90% has to go for direct financial assistance, including rent, rental arrears, utilities, and home energy costs, and arrears of those costs, as well as other expenses related to housing.

And then 10%, up to 10% can be spent for housing stability services and administrative costs.

And just to remind us about the ongoing need for rental assistance, the latest poll survey that's done by the Census Bureau showed that more than 13,000 Seattle renters are behind on their rental payments.

Typical arrears range from one and a half to three months, or $3,000 to $5,000.

And we see there the demographics on those reporting that are behind on rent payments, again, with a disproportionate number of those in the Latino and Black households indicating that they are delinquent on their rent payments.

In terms of the proposed allocations of the $22 million, $8 million is proposed to go to the United Way to provide rental assistance for low-income tenants.

It would also allow small landlords to apply on behalf of eligible tenants.

$7 million would go to the Office of Housing for rental assistance for low-income tenants and publicly subsidized affordable housing.

$6.2 million would go to community-based organizations to provide rental assistance and support services for low-income tenants disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 And finally, $1.5 million would go to Seattle City Light and Seattle Public Utilities.

Seattle City Light getting $1 million and Seattle Public Utilities getting $500,000 that would be used for emergency utility assistance for low-income renters with outstanding utility bills.

In terms of the proposed amendments, I should make sure, are there any questions about the legislation as proposed?

Thank you, Tracy.

If you could go back a page, I do have a question about The community-based organizations, I think a lot of folks have expressed a lot of interest and support with making sure that CBOs get direct cash assistance as your previous slide showed.

Twice as many individuals who are from African American and Latino communities are facing eviction compared to their white counterparts.

So the question I have about the CBO allocation of funds is do we have a list of the proposed organizations that will be responsible for dispensing to make sure that the process is indeed addressing the disparities that we see.

Chair Mosqueda, Council Members.

So the proposal for the community-based organizations is that we will proceed with a really light-touch RFQ process, an application process that would seek to identify community-based organizations who have experience providing rental assistance and who have expertise serving communities who are disproportionately impacted by COVID and by housing instability.

So for example, we've done a lot of outreach and engagement already with community-based organizations because there are rent assistance programs that have been previously run by the Human Services Department in partnership with the housing levy, with the state and with the county.

There already are many community-based organizations who have done this work.

And we've been talking to groups like, so I'm just giving examples, Bird Bar Place, and Chief Seattle Club, and El Centro de la Raza, and Muslim Housing Services, as example, Interim CDA, as examples of agencies who have expressed interest and who fit this category of essentially being BIPOC-led organizations with expertise in rental assistance services.

So we're going to see how many folks apply through that process with a goal of turning it around very quickly and allowing them to have the maximum flexibility as allowed by the federal guidelines to then administer those resources on behalf of their community.

Okay, thank you very much.

That's helpful.

I know that there was a lot of community of color led organizations who have stepped in to provide COVID relief during this last year, who typically don't provide rental assistance, but have stepped into that area specifically because of the trusted relationship that they have with black, indigenous and people of color communities.

and as an organization, they wanted to provide that service.

So what I'm hearing is that that's specifically the type of organization and direct service that you're hoping to serve here, to make sure that communities of color have the chance to have direct connections funded so that they can provide rental assistance.

Okay, great.

Council President.

I had a similar line of questioning.

Mine, And I just want to make sure that I understand, because the way I was looking at it was the full $22.7 million, not just the $6.2 million.

So I want to know how these allocations, regardless of who they're going to center the needs of those disproportionately impacted by COVID-19, by inability to pay rent, which was shown on the previous slide.

So I just want to make sure that the entire $22.7 million is being utilized in a manner that is reflective of the need within our community.

And there is no doubt that there's a disproportionate need within within the Black and Latinx communities and don't have a clear sense of how these dollars are being used to align these dollars with that known need.

Thank you for that question, Council President.

I mean, I think your framing is exactly right.

We have proposed three different strategies that all seek to achieve the outcomes on focusing and centering on those who have been most impacted, but they do it in different ways.

And so first I would say that we use the United Way program and the Office of Housing Programs previously.

And they both did show strong outcomes as it relates to racial equity.

But we have also heard in terms of demographics served, I should say.

But we have heard very explicitly from community-based organizations led by folks of color that demographics is not sufficient.

And so an added strategy of using trusted partners helps to round it out.

But I will say, here are a few things that underpin all of the programs that demonstrate their targeting.

First, the United Way is working in parallel with the King County's program, and King County is investing significant resources in rent assistance.

Under that program, they are targeting the AMIs to folks at or below 50% of area median income to really ensure we're driving to those lowest income households, which is consistent with both the federal guidelines and national best practices, and more overlays with communities of color income.

Second, I would say that for the Office of Housing, we know that people living in city subsidized housing are also even more lower income than the general population of renters.

Those folks are at or below 60% AMI already.

And most of those people served under our last program were at or below 30% of area median income, many of whom disproportionately in the portfolio are represented by folks of color.

In both of those strategies too, I should say, both United Way and Office of Housing, we are also working with community-based organizations.

So United Way subcontracts with Urban League, for example, and Solid Ground, and Wellspring, and Neighborhood House, who all have some community connections.

Through our Office of Housing, we will be providing support for largely non-profit landlords who are also community-based organizations like Community Roots Housing, Lehigh, Skipta, Interim, and others.

So I do believe that there's an underpinning of driving those outcomes across the strategies, but they do it in different ways.

Councilor, we have, just to support what Emily is talking about, we have a report that was provided to us from the Office of Housing that shows the demographic breakdown of those who are helped by the Office of Housing, by United Way, and HSD's contractors from the last round of resources, the $9.9 million, just to support what Emily's saying.

Great, thank you so much.

Thank you very much, Council President.

And Director Alvarado, one other thing that we can get more information from you about offline is how referrals are processed either at the city or within United Way.

One of the questions that I had been receiving is how do community organizations who provided referrals know that those individuals have been processed?

have received assistance and what is the follow through with especially community of color led organizations that are making those referrals.

Obviously not everybody is going to be able to be served by the community based organization allocation that we're now considering today.

So there will continue to be referrals to United Way and Office of Housing and making sure that there's a closing of the loop with those groups would be really important.

So we can talk about that offline unless you have an answer right now.

I'd be happy to provide you more information offline, but I would also say, and this is probably in addition to Council President Gonzalez's question, which is we are proposing some small scale grants to community based organizations who can help facilitate language access and marketing to help people know about the availability of resources.

We've been working with those organizations through a survey process and now in partnership with OIRA are helping to provide these language access grants, which we think is another strategy and tool to ensure those equitable outcomes.

Excellent.

Are there any additional questions on the underlying bill?

Okay, let's move on into amendments.

So moving to amendment number one.

So this amendment is sponsored by Councilmember Mosqueda, and it would eliminate the $1.5 million proposed for utility assistance and would reallocate that funding to rental assistance programs.

$750,000 to the United Way.

bringing that total to $8.75 million and $750,000 to the office of housing, bringing their total to $7 million.

Attached to your agenda is version two of this amendment that's different than what I sent to you last week in the memo.

I inadvertently left out a section of the introduction section to the appropriation section when we struck the appropriations, but there was language that also talked about the grant acceptance by Seattle City Light and Seattle Public Utilities.

And that amendment strikes that grant acceptance language as well.

So it really is kind of a technical cleanup and backs up the existing appropriation language, which strikes the appropriation for those two departments and then reallocates the funding to those other two entities.

Great.

Well, if we want to do this, colleagues, maybe what we'll do is pause on each one of these amendments and we can consider them as we go forward.

Okay, great.

Just to add a little bit of additional context to what Tracy mentioned for amendment number one, this is version two that we have in front of you.

The American Rescue Plan Act adopted in, I'm sorry, adopted this year provides an additional $22 billion for funding emergency rental assistance and can be used for things like rent and utilities.

It is likely that the city of Seattle is going to get a direct allocation of this funds in addition to this $23 million that was allocated by Congress last December.

This would give us additional flexibility provided to both in terms of relief for rental assistance and can also be used for utility relief.

This can also be used for commercial rate payers, which will be necessary to help small businesses make it through the remainder of the emergency.

We're still awaiting final word on the amount and the timing from the federal government, but I wanted to flag for folks that there is additional assistance specifically for utility assistance and rental assistance forthcoming.

There's also $4.5 billion of low-income home emergency assistance funding included in the American Rescue Plan Act.

This funding can cover things like heating and cooling bills and repairs of heating systems for homes.

for homeowners and renters.

And this program is able to serve households at 150% or below the federal poverty level.

This is a great example of where we can continue to see additional support for not only providing direct payment assistance for rent, but additional assistance for those who need help covering the cost of utilities.

in the city of Santa Barbara.

The city of Santa Barbara provides $500 million in assistance for low income clean water customers as well.

There is additional support coming for the public utilities.

Again, information is forthcoming about how the program will be administered and the strategies for how cities can access those dollars.

I think this is an important element to consider that was not We did send a memo out last Friday, I'm sorry, last Thursday to colleagues, including the proposed changes here.

And I understand that the public utility departments have raised some concerns about desiring the $1.5 million here.

My intent with this legislation in front of us is to make sure that every dollar, as the council president also said, every dollar of that 22.7 million gets directly into the hands of those who need rental assistance.

And given the additional information that we've received since the drafting of this legislation, the possibility for there to be additional utilities assistance, and my understanding from talking with Representative Macri as well, state legislation which has prevented individuals from being evicted for failure to pay utilities, I think if we had to look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the most important thing that we can do right now is help directly pay rental assistance and helping to keep rents, sorry, helping to keep roofs over people's head.

The amendment that Councilmember Peterson and Councilmember Herbold are bringing forward, I think both are in that same vein of trying to make sure that we're getting as much directly out the door as possible to keep roofs over people's heads.

I appreciate that there is an ongoing need to expand the utility discount program, which I've been a strong proponent of, especially when I was chair of Seattle City Light, and will continue to be a strong supporter of with the chair of public utilities currently.

I think that the $22.7 million today really provides us with the direct opportunity to get these dollars.

we have to make sure that we are getting all of these dollars into the hands of people who need it to keep the roofs over their head.

I would love to have your support as we look at the possibility of directly allocating all of these dollars.

I know even 1.5 million was not enough.

I'm hoping that these future iterations of federal assistance will provide the sufficient amount that the utilities need in order to deal with back rent.

Again, looking forward to doing everything we can to make Are there any questions?

Council Member Herbold, please go ahead.

I haven't moved it yet, just we're in the discussion phase.

Did you want to do that?

Sure, should I go ahead and do that?

Okay, I'll do it.

Let's put the bill in front of us so that we can then move the amendment.

My goodness.

To get this bill directly in front of us and to consider the amendments, I move the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 120018. Is there a second?

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

So now we have the bill in front of us officially.

And since I described Amendment 1, Version 2, I'm going to go ahead and move it.

I move the committee amend Council Bill 12018 as presented in Amendment Number 1, Version 2. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

And now Amendment Number 1 is in front of us.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

I did offer a second so that we could discuss this further.

I'm a little bit on the fence about this.

I didn't really understand your Maslow's hierarchy of needs reference because, you know, absent an eviction moratorium, you can get evicted just as easily for nonpayment of utilities as you can for nonpayment of rent.

So I'm not quite sure I understand why rent assistance is a higher need than utility assistance.

So thank you for asking that question.

And maybe that wasn't the best analogy to use.

But one of the ways that I'm seeing this is with the current eviction moratorium in place.

We know that water is not being shut off.

Electricity is not being shut off.

And evictions are not happening because of failure to pay those.

However, for example, if someone doesn't have the ability to pay their internet, which we're going to talk about in a second, and they can't keep their job, then it's likely that they're also not able to pay their rent.

So for me, this is really about how we make sure that these direct dollars go directly into payments for rental assistance.

And with we're going to be able to do that.

With the new information that the federal dollars are able, the forthcoming federal dollars for ARPA, which we'll be discussing very soon, will be able to go into things like utility assistance.

My thought was that we use all of the $22.7 million that was allocated in December's federal allocation and try to put all of that into rental assistance.

My question was given that we are in an eviction moratorium, so people aren't being evicted for not paying their rent, but they are acquiring bills associated with not paying their rent.

People are also not being evicted because of nonpayment of utilities, but they are also acquiring bills.

associated with their nonpayment of their utilities.

I don't understand why, given what we already know about the large number of people who are struggling paying their utilities that will have a debt that in the future they could be vulnerable for eviction because of that debt.

from just our sort of limited analysis of the numbers of rate payers that are behind, I don't understand why we would not move forward with some of this assistance now, even given our commitment to address utility needs in a subsequent allocation.

Well, my understanding was, and if there's others on the line who have additional intel here, my understanding is that the state legislature changed the law a couple years ago to ensure that in cases of nonpayment, people cannot be evicted for not paying their utilities.

They can only be evicted for not paying rent.

And according to the data that we tried to get from Seattle Public Utilities and City Light, we're not aware of any statistics on the number of renters who've been evicted due to non-payment of utility bills.

No information has been shared by SPU or City Light related to this issue.

and we're going to continue to look for additional strategies to help provide them with relief so that they can provide back payment of debts from individuals in the utility discount program.

But that, since those dollars are available in the upcoming ARPA funds, and again, maybe this would have been better to lump together with the ARPA discussion like King County is doing, we have to look at those two chunks of funding together today.

So what I'm suggesting is instead of doing 1.5 million to the utilities today to pay on those back debts, we address the back debt issue in the ARPA discussion which will be forthcoming.

Tracy or Emily, do you have anything else on that?

I don't.

I don't have knowledge of the legislation that you referenced, the state legislation.

We'll have to go back and do some research on that.

OK, great.

Councilmember Herbold, I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to talk with you more about this in detail in advance of this discussion, but that is my thing.

And it is true that non-payment of utilities is no longer considered a reason for an eviction under non-payment of rent, but it is absolutely still considered a reason for eviction for violation of the rules of your contract.

That may be the distinction.

Oh, Council President, did you have a question?

I see that Councilmember Peterson has his hand up and I do want to hear from him because he's the chair of our Transportation Utilities Committee.

I guess I understand the spirit with which this amendment is being proposed.

We all have a strong interest, shared interest, in making sure that we have as many dollars available for rental assistance as we can have.

I, I, um, but I do, I do worry that, um, in doing so we may, um, be, um, Overlooking the fact that, you know, yes, nobody's getting it while it may be true that folks aren't, um, actively having their utilities shut off by city light or.

SPU in the moment, that doesn't mean that they're not accruing debt.

Like they still, we haven't, we've waived late fees and fines, but we aren't actually waiving the cost of services.

So for those households that, that are unable to pay their light bill and are unable to pay their water, you know, sewer, trash bills, they're that, you know, sort of the calculator is, is ticking and those costs are accumulating in addition to back rent.

And so I'm a little worried that we're potentially going to move this bill forward now that makes dollars available now that would be able to be utilized by households for utility assistance and getting out of, you know, clearing that debt.

I'm a little worried about punting that down the road to when we have the ARPA dollars.

But again, I think this is more of an issue of timing.

And I think my preference without knowing more would be to make sure that people still have access to dollars now in order to address accumulated and ongoing accruing debt related to utility services so that they can, you know, sort of be as clear as possible as soon as the eviction moratoriums end.

Councilmember Peterson, did you have something you wanted to add to this?

And thanks again for joining us today.

Thank you.

Yes.

And even though I'm not a member of the committee, I do appreciate the invitation to speak, especially to amendment number two about internet.

And speaking to this, just because I did some research on this when I saw it and talked to central staff and to, we did get that letter from both utilities, SPU and Seattle City Light.

I think all the council members who spoke are all, everybody's correct in what they're saying.

There's this great need and we all want to keep people in their homes and we're grateful for these federal dollars and now we have to decide how to allocate them and when and how.

So, you know, I think what the chair said is is spot on in terms of the ARPA dollars being available for utility assistance.

I think even the third bucket to community groups, you know, if somebody's coming into one of those community-based organizations and saying I'm about, you know, I'm having financial difficulties and I need help I need help paying my rent.

I need help paying my utilities and helping my internet.

I think there's some flexibility at least in how the federal government is defining rental assistance broadly to include utilities.

So for those, at least for that community-based bucket, I think there might be some flexibility there for that.

And I look forward to those ARPA dollars where I think we can allocate more toward utilities then.

But in terms of right now with this bill, I am fine with Councilor Mosqueda's amendment.

and also recognize the concerns raised by the utilities.

But I think it is a timing issue where we'll be able to address that with ARPA.

Thanks very much, Councilmember Peterson.

And again, I think my thinking here is, as you saw on the slide before, there's $3,000 to $5,000 available on average to each family.

That's about how much each family is receiving in rental assistance.

If we take a conservative estimate of how many families could be served by allocating out the $1.5 million, that's at least over 700 families that could be served.

So given the need right now for rental assistance dollars and the fact that there are people without even rental assistance support in hand, this was my attempt to try to get those dollars out.

this is hard to do without a sense of, you know, what the universe of those ARPA dollars looks like to come.

But if there is not support for this amendment right now, I am willing to pull it from today's discussion, given the need to keep moving here.

We've got two more big items on our agenda.

But I will note that this is going to mean, for me at least, that there is going to need to be a continued heavy emphasis on rental assistance.

we're going to have to look at the ARPA funds to come, which we all already knew that there was going to be, but even underscoring that point even more.

Okay, I'm not seeing anybody who's interested in speaking up.

Council members, I'm going to go ahead and pull this amendment for today.

Let's move on to amendment number two.

Okay, moving to amendment number two, this amendment would add internet services as an eligible cost that could be funded with the resources allocated to community-based organizations.

These organizations would be working directly with clients to determine the need for such assistance relative to the need for rental assistance and will, as appropriate, be structured in such a way to be able to make payments to internet providers if that assistance is necessary.

And this is sponsored by Council Member Mosqueda on behalf of Council Member Peterson.

Okay, Council Member Peterson, I'm going to move your amendment to get it in front of us.

I move to amend Council Bill 120018 as presented under Amendment No. 2. Is there a second from our committee members?

Second.

Thank you very much, Council President.

Council Member Peterson, would you like to speak to your amendment?

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda, and thank you again for the open invitation for this committee when dealing with these federal dollars, and specifically for this amendment, Amendment No. 2. I want to thank your office for working with my legislative aide, Kara Valle, on this amendment.

We know that COVID this amendment would simply add Internet services as an eligible cost that could be funded as part of the assistance being allocated by the community-based organization bucket of these dollars.

residents are meeting with those community-based organizations and articulating what their needs are.

Internet could just be part of that because those are provided by private companies that could shut them off.

And as we've learned, a hard way during COVID, people are struggling without good internet connections to pay their bills, to connect to jobs, school, other services such as healthcare.

So this would just really open up the options for the community-based organizations.

Excellent, thank you very much.

I did have the chance to check in with a handful of folks who are working right now with making referrals, and hopefully will soon be able to do direct rental assistance themselves.

And some of those organizations who are BIPOC-led did say that they, on an individual basis, do hear of situations where paying internet is really critical for folks keeping their job in this work-from-home environment, and let alone kiddos being able to learn.

But if they don't keep their job, then they can't keep their home.

So I think that there's an important nexus there.

And my understanding is the CBOs having direct ability to make those decisions on an individual basis, having direct contact with the folks in community will make this really feasible.

So we'll look forward to supporting you, Council Member Peterson.

Any additional comments or questions on this?

Okay.

I just wanted to say, I just wanted to say thanks to Council Member Peterson for bringing this particular amendment forward.

I think it's a smart amendment to make.

It doesn't appropriate specific amount of dollars to internet services as sort of an eligible cost, but it does make the important addition to allow for our community-based organizations who are on the ground providing the services to have flexibility to provide internet service dollars as as needed and expressed by the families that they are serving.

So I think, you know, we did some outreach as well to some community based organizations who told us that this is definitely something that they are hearing more of from the folks that they are serving.

And so I think this is a good way to allow community-based organizations to be nimble in this space and to make sure that they're creating as much of a stable home environment as they possibly can for those seeking rental assistance.

So a huge thanks to customer Peterson for advancing this and look forward to supporting it.

Thank you, Council President.

Any additional comments?

Okay, I'm seeing none.

Madam Clerk, let's go ahead and will you please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment 2?

Oh, aye.

Vice Chair Herbold?

I'm sorry, Vice Chair Herbold, I don't think we heard your vote.

Okay, Council President Gonzalez?

Councilmember Morales?

Yes.

Councilmember Herbold, you have the last amendment in front of us.

Is there any explanation, Tracy, that you'd like to give before we move?

Very briefly, this amendment would direct the Office of Housing, in cooperation with United Way, to do proactive outreach regarding available rental assistance funding to landlords who may be struggling with mortgage debt due to rental payment delinquencies.

Councilmember Herbold is the sponsor.

Excellent.

Councilmember Herbold, let me go ahead and move the amendment for us, if that sounds okay.

or if you'd like to, you're welcome to as well.

Okay.

Council Colleagues, I move to amend Council Bill 120018 as presented on Amendment Number 3, sponsored by Council Member Herbold.

Second.

Thank you very much.

It's been moved and seconded.

Council Member Herbold, would you like to describe it in more detail?

I think it's a good, efficient way to add an additional benefit, sort of a twofer, so that these rental assistance dollars don't only help tenants, but also so that we can put an because of lost rental payments due to the pandemic.

The amendment doesn't set aside a particular amount of funding for this group.

Instead, it ensures that small landlords receive information about the rental assistance already available to them and their tenants through the United Way of King County.

As Director Alvarado explained to us the last time she spoke with us on this issue, under the United Way program, landlords with up to four tenants in need of assistance are able to apply for the funding on behalf of their tenants, and tenants can apply directly.

This amendment directs the Office of Housing and the United Way of King County to do proactive outreach regarding available rental assistance funding to landlords, not only that are small landlords for a fewer rentals, but also landlords who might be struggling with mortgage debt due to rental payment delinquencies.

So again, the goal is to not only provide assistance for small landlords who are at risk of foreclosure and hopefully in the long term work to help preserve these naturally occurring rental we're going to be able to reduce the number of housing units for the tenants who live there and into the future.

By reducing the likelihood that the landlords that own these properties lose them.

the motion carries unanimously.

I am seeing none.

A lot of anticipation to get these dollars out the door, so let's go ahead and move it.

Seeing no additional comments, hands, or questions, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of Council Bill 120018 as amended?

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Vice Chair Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

and Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Madam Chair, that is five in favor and none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries.

The committee recommendation that the bill pass as amended will be sent to the April 12th Seattle City Council meeting for a final vote.

Thank you very much for your work on this.

Director Alvarado, Tracy Ratzcliff, I know you've been doing a lot of work on this and you're eager to get these dollars out the door and directly into the hands of community members as well, making sure that people can keep a roof over their head.

Thank you for all of your hard work.

Wonderful.

Okay, colleagues, what I'm going to do is actually ask that we consider item number 7 and then number 6. I believe item number 7 is relatively straightforward, and we can probably do that within the next 10 minutes or so.

That would leave us the last half an hour for the discussion on item number 6 with a larger panel presentation.

So very, with your approval, hearing no objections, let's go ahead and do amendment, I mean, item number 7. and I see that our presenters are with us, so I appreciate that.

Madam Clerk, can you please read item number seven into the record?

Agenda item seven, Council Bill 120030, an ordinance relating to taxation amending the payroll expense tax on persons engaging in business in Seattle.

For briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Thank you very much.

is an amendment to the jumpstart tax legislation that we passed last year as a result of the long work that we did in community with businesses and labor and community partners.

And all of that conversation then led to the passage of a bill, which then leads to rulemaking.

Finance and Administrative Services did a tremendous job of pulling together businesses who would be payors of the tax to implement the legislation.

And through that process, we learned that there was some ideas that came forth in the rulemaking process that could make it easier for individuals to pay the amount that they owe.

Today, we have with us central staff and Director Lee, who will walk us through this small addition.

Again, this is in addition to the underlying bill.

that adds an additional method for businesses to calculate their required tax payments, specifically adding an option for payers that they can either choose to continue to select the existing method, which is predominantly a signed calculation, or they can choose this new method, which we're including in this legislation, to allow businesses to allocate employee payroll expenses based on hours worked in Seattle in proportion to the employees' total hours worked.

To reiterate, this is an option for those employers, as we heard through rulemaking from the businesses that there are businesses that would like to choose one or the other.

And this amendment recognizes the importance of both maintaining the integrity of the legislation, but also the importance of making sure that it's implementable.

and workable.

So I'm happy to bring forward this legislation, as we always say, to make sure that we are iterative in our legislation and are legislating so that if there are needed improvements, we continue to do that.

There is no change in the underlying legislation and the the calculations for who is the payer.

And there's really, I think, a straightforward summary.

So, Dan, Director Eder, I'll turn it over to you and see if Todd or Glenn have anything else to add.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

Good morning, Dan Eater, Central Staff Interim Director.

Tom Mikesell and I provided a Central Staff memo that is linked to your agenda that reviews much of the background that you covered in your opening remarks.

As you mentioned, Glenn Lee, the City's Finance Director, is also on the line and available to provide a perspective from the executive.

I think I won't rehash the description of some of the background and context that you established in your opening remarks.

I'll just highlight some of the key elements of the Council Bill 120030 that's on your agenda.

As you mentioned, the bill would provide an additional method for businesses to use in calculating taxable payroll amounts.

Specifically, the bill would allow covered businesses to use either the original three-part test that is described in some detail in the central staff memo, or a new methodology specifically allocating taxable payroll expenses in proportion to the work done by employees specifically in Seattle as opposed to work done outside of Seattle.

The only other thing I think I will highlight for the committee is there is the potential for some revenue impacts from the change that would be implemented by this council bill.

The 2021 adopted budget relies on $214 million from the Jumpstart Seattle payroll expense tax.

to support general fund expenditures.

Some businesses would likely continue to use the original calculation option, and it's possible that others will choose the new option that's included in the bill, assuming that the bill passes.

It seems reasonable to assume that businesses will choose the approach with the lowest net cost.

Each business will make that determination after accounting for both the resulting tax burden from each of the two options that would be available and the administrative costs of tracking the time of the employees in and out of Seattle.

As a result, the bill could have the effect of diminishing the city's overall payroll tax revenues for 2021 and beyond.

But we don't have enough hard data to be able to update the revenue implications with any level of specificity.

And it is certainly possible that there would be no change in the overall tax revenues, given that the original estimate of payroll tax revenues included a number of assumptions and didn't include any specific additional revenue amount from the higher tax rates that will apply to the city's largest employers because of a lack of data about how many employers and how many employees who work for those largest employers.

So, that's what I would provide in terms of staff comments.

Certainly available to address any questions.

Possibly, Glenn Lee would like to make a statement.

Thank you very much, Director Eder.

Director Lee, please go ahead if you have anything else to add.

Especially on that last point, I think as we look at how it potentially evens out, I know you had I had a chance to sort of think through that question as well.

Yes, thank you.

And yes, this change is being generated based on responses and feedbacks we received during the rulemaking process and it would then.

allow folks to treat the apportionment of the time their employees spend within the city, the expenses they incur within the city and outside the city in a manner largely consistent to similar taxes around the state and others the city has contemplated before.

In terms of revenue estimates, the core issue is that The underlying data that all the staff used was the very best that was available, but didn't explicitly handle the apportionment question.

So we're kind of not really clear what the final revenue numbers would look like from that point of view.

In other words, the baseline data didn't handle apportionment effectively at all, and that has nothing to do with the staff work on either side.

It's just the nature of the data we were using didn't address this.

You know, from my perspective, there's longer term issues, including the important shifts in employment patterns due to shifts more toward telecommuting that are likely swamp anything that's related to this particular bill.

So we'll all work as hard as we can to implement the tax and then look forward to our initial returns to see what's really happening in the economy in this score.

Thank you very much.

I do want to reiterate our appreciation for FAS's rulemaking process and the robust discussions that you had with payers as employers under this existing law.

And I understand that you are ready to quickly get information out to the same stakeholder group that participated in the rulemaking so that there's not a moment lost as we talk about any potential information that those individual organizations need to receive.

Any additional comments or questions?

Thank you very much again for both the rulemaking and for central staff for your analysis here.

I appreciate it.

I move the committee recommends passage of council bill 120030. Is there a second?

Thank you, Council President.

Are there any further comments or questions?

Council President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Aye.

Council Member Morales?

Aye.

Madam Chair, that's a five in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much, colleagues.

The motion carries in the committee recommendation that the bill pass will be sent to the April 12th Seattle City Council meeting for a final vote.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, FAS.

Thank you, central staff, director Eater and Tom.

We didn't get a chance to hear from you, but thank you for your ongoing work on these issues related to revenue.

Really appreciate it.

Director Eater, I'm sure we'll see you again very soon.

Thanks for popping in today.

Okay, Madam Clerk, let's go to our last item on the agenda.

We do have a half an hour reserved for this discussion, and let's move into the presentation by reading into the agenda item number six.

Agenda item number six, council bill 120029 and ordinance amending ordinance 126237, which adopted the 2021 budget changing appropriations to various departments and budget control levels and from various funds in the budget for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Wonderful.

Well, I see a whole host of friends from the executive team.

If I miss anybody, please let me know.

Director Vu from the Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs, Tanya Kim from Human Services Department, Adrian Thompson from the Mayor's Office, Director Ben Noble from the City Budget's Office, and Amara Khan from the Director of the Employee Ombuds.

It's been a while since I've seen you, Director Khan, so good to see you as well.

Did I miss anybody?

Okay, wonderful.

Well, thank you very much.

And Council President, you and I have the chance to sponsor this legislation that was sent to us from the mayor's office midweek last week and wanted to see if you had any opening comments that you'd like to share before the panel begins.

No, I know we're We're running short on time.

So I'd be really interested in just kicking off the discussion so we can ask some questions because I know we have a lot of those.

That sounds great.

Thank you very much, Council President.

Let's go ahead and do that.

Director Noble, are you going to get us started here?

Or whomever would like to get us started, you are welcome to start us off.

Thank you.

Yep, I am trying to share my screen.

Thank you.

chair and committee members for the opportunity to present today to you all on our proposal around the response around hate crimes here in the city.

As many of you know, this past year has been really difficult, specifically for some of our community that have really faced a lot of hate crime issues and we're trying to figure out ways to address.

This was escalated even further with the incident that happened in Atlanta.

And really, we've been working closely with community to figure out what's the best way to really provide a response that is community based and is really around community capacity building.

So we're excited to bring to you today to this committee a proposal that we believe helps address some of the concerns that we've heard from community.

I know the mayor has personally done several walks, roundtables, as well as many of our departments.

with our community members and are going to just do a quick overview of the proposal today, as well as being able to answer any questions that any of you have.

We're going to focus a little bit on a background, the community engagement and what we've heard from community, our proposed response with really the investments, the majority of investments that are really going directly to community.

So I am going to kick this off over to Dr. Khan to do a quick background.

Thank you for having us.

I am going to do a quick job of, we all know the background, the situation ever since the pandemic and even before that is really troubling and alarming in the sense that it puts a target on our Asian American friends, family, and community members.

The hate crime executive order signed in February 2020 named the Office of the Employee Ombuds as the lead executive office primarily because our approach to serving the city's contract management need has been rooted in restorative theory and practice.

One of the cornerstones of our approach has been to help the city community recognize that a system that is permissive of bias and prejudice is also permissive of potential hate.

So we have been, even though the pandemic has We have gotten in the way of an to the city during this entire time.

We should be able to present our annual report in the next couple of weeks to counsel, which details all the data on the work we have, the trainings we have provided on bystander intervention, on responding to discrimination, and also Very soon we'll be launching our cultural intelligence work too.

The pandemic's impact on the Asian American community is profound on several levels.

There's reputational damage and damage to the community's, you know, acceptance and the way community members are treated.

And then there's economic and socioeconomic damage.

The hatred is manifesting in actual assaults.

Hate crime incidents is recorded through the FBI and through a community alliance called Stop API Hate.

has reported nearly 4,000 cases.

And we also understand that these cases are actually underreported.

The true extent of the harm to Asian American community is probably not accurately measured anywhere nationally as well.

So that's a quick background.

Is there more needed or can we move on?

No, we can keep going.

So I'm going to invite Director Buu to help kind of present this and some of the information that we've all heard.

As I mentioned in the beginning the mayor has heard very loud and clear many of the concerns in the community.

Not you know for the past year and greater than that you know her commitment is very much around how we can really provide investments in community to address some of these issues around community capacity building.

So it was really important for us to convene both as a city and then some of our community organizations and partners in the business community, some round tables, and here are some of the strategies and ideas that we could build upon on this type of a proposal that's before you today.

So some of that engagement has included one-on-one conversations, community walks, round table discussions, Several of our departments have participated in these as well through direct outreach and then just feedback that we're hearing from community.

But I'm going to turn it over to Director Rue as well to give a little bit of what she's heard of community.

Director you're on mute.

So sorry.

Even a year later, I forget.

So as Adrian mentioned, the city is always listening, sometimes as an ongoing programmatic function, sometimes personal, myself included, when I heard about the Atlanta shootings and I reached out to folks that I know and just, you know, needing to check in with folks and see how they're doing.

And then more recently, a little bit more focused conversation about how the city responds to anti-Asian hate crimes and bias.

And then there was a little bit of listening also about the draft legislation.

So what you see on here is that first bullet.

Some of the departments that have done this include OLS, HSD, Office of Employee Ombud and OCR.

In some cases, there was direct engagement with community organizations.

In other cases, it was hearing about things that the feedback and then learning more about what some of the organizations were doing.

So with the Korean Community Service Center, for example, one of the questions that we asked ourselves was, what do we not know?

And the Korean community, because of its presence in the northern part of Seattle, it's kind of on the cusp of the city.

And that northern border up there between North Seattle and Linwood, we wanted to understand what that part of the API community was experiencing, which may be different than What I think a lot of folks often engage and are aware of in the Chinatown International District, for example, And then clearly the IDC, the King County Coalition Against Hate and Bias, which includes a number of community organizations.

The Massage Parlor Workers Outreach Project, they talked with massage parlor workers directly.

And I know that some of that feedback was shared with the Office of Civil Rights and the Office of Labor Standards.

And then HSD, because a lot of the community safety and social services contracts are housed there, those are ongoing conversations.

And there were some specific conversations that I'm aware of Mari Suguyama, VP Guerra, did directly with a number of community organizations, including ACRS, CISC, Friends of Little Saigon, API Chaya, and a few others.

We can go on to the next slide.

And what folks heard is that there are a series of community-centered approaches, and folks are urging both the city and allies to uphold.

And so many of these categories are overlapping, but I'll do my best to try to talk about each one discreetly.

One is public awareness and education.

So just overall, creating more awareness around the attacks against our API communities.

And even though some of the numbers that Director Khan mentioned earlier, there are folks who just are not plugged in and aware that these attacks are happening and at unprecedented rates that we haven't seen before.

I remember, I'm old enough to remember Vincent Chin and having gone through, which catapulted my activism as a college student around Asian American studies at my campus.

And it just seems like, you know, that's an ongoing need for education.

But now, some of the education that we need and folks have called for, including I heard from Janice Deguchi at Neighborhood House, that we need bystander training.

so that we can all step in and do something when we witness hate and bias.

And certainly that is incredibly helpful for API communities where more people are reluctant to report or just feel that even if they take action, their concerns and experiences won't be taken seriously.

Around community-led safety pilot programs, In listening sessions, we heard very clearly that community organizations and leaders want an opportunity to develop community centered and community like solution.

So we know, for example.

when Donnie Chin was available.

And that was such a community effort that was centered in community.

And I know there was a desire to kind of bring some of the work that he did into SPD.

But Donnie really saw his work as for the CID community.

And I think in his absence, there's been a lot of thought in terms of thinking about how to make that kind of resource available that's not rooted in SPD, that's not about 9-1-1, but it is really a resource that people, they can call if they feel unsafe.

They can call if they need to report an incident.

They can call if they need to find out what resources are available.

Just a really broad general support that goes beyond reporting, but it's really more encompassing and meeting people where they're at through a simple phone number or other way to reach somebody live on the other end of the line.

And so there may be other ideas that have percolated.

And so having some city resources to support those community-led pilot programs is important.

The third one, community education on policing and anti-Blackness.

And so, you know, as a member of the AAPI community, There been, as you probably also aware in your in your own communities and conversations, both at the dinner table and in and your roles as council members that we've really struggled with and and tried to give a lot of thought to.

issues of policing equity and those intersections with anti-Blackness.

And in AAPI communities, there's been a lot of discussion around that.

How are we complicit?

How are we allies?

What do we need to do differently?

And a really strong desire by community leaders and members in the AAPI communities to align ourselves with that conversation around policing equity and racial justice and making sure that any solutions that we move forward supporting anti-Asian bias or hate crimes is aligned with those lessons and hard conversations that we've had.

And some of this can be under the banner of what people are calling defund SPD.

In other cases, it's just a recognition that what communities really need is more resources and calling into question whether those resources should go to other city departments or SPD and having thoughtful conversations about what that looks like.

Number four is community capacity for mental health crisis support.

This relates a little bit to the to the resource of, you know, having a phone number and a resource like Donny Chien was for the CID, but also other resources to help with the traumatic effects of what we're hearing and seeing.

And I think long term, just people feeling isolated and not knowing what to do when they encounter harassment and and anti-Asian incidents and wanting to be able to identify more resources to support folks for what happens after they experience an incident.

And then around policy and advocacy, this is, I think, overlaps with many of the other points that we've heard.

The other things that we've heard include looking at K-12 curriculum recommendations.

Certainly, the stories in the press that we've heard recently have been attacks against Asian elders.

But our youth are experiencing bullying in schools, and hate, and those kinds of things that our belief is that if we start early and make sure that these are addressed, in some cases in root causes, will have a better chance of curbing these prevalent anti-Asian beliefs.

So school-based curriculum recommendations.

Obviously, letters to council members, to the mayor.

There have been a number of those that I think you have received and the mayor's office has received.

Standing in solidarity with low-wage immigrant workers, and those are the massage parlor workers, respecting that there are different types of work, and making sure that we're able to provide safe working environments for individuals who choose to do the work.

And so these are a few of the experiences.

I know there was a sixth one that we had heard about, which is about media.

And those touch on some of the things that the city has done in the past.

For example, bus campaign ads and the need to ensure accurate representation of API communities and the media, lifting up community voices.

And so there are ways in which we can center community voices as these things happen and as we continue to explore how the city can be a good partner, good ally, and proceed with good investments and good policy.

Thank you, Director Vu.

We do have a hard stop for some Councilmembers at 1 p.m.

And initially had this on our agenda for 20 minutes.

It's been 20 minutes, but we do have 10 more minutes.

So I want to make sure that Councilmembers get a chance to ask questions before the hard stop that some folks have at 1 o'clock.

If we can pause here before going into more detail.

Council President Gonzalez, I have you listed first and then I saw a few other hands.

Great.

Thank you so much.

Sorry.

Sorry for For the time pressure here, but I, I do have to get off the committee call today at 1 o'clock to run to another commitment.

So I have a few questions and they're primarily around slide 3 and slide 4. so I think this is a good time to pose those questions and.

And I will just, you know, like, I just want to get sort of to the heart of the matter here.

So we are trying to do these investments in partnership and cooperation with the mayor's office to meet a community-based need.

And I am hearing a lot of concerns, both in public comment and in my mailbox and through staff, that certain feedback from community was disregarded, ignored, or being misrepresented.

And so that is concerning to me.

And I want to express that concern here in hopes that we can reconcile where the differences are, because I don't feel comfortable advancing a bill that doesn't actually truly represent the desires and the interests of the community members who we are saying these investments are designed to help.

And I believe that the mayor's office is interested in achieving that same goal.

So I'm bringing this up in a very direct way, one, because we don't have a lot of time to dance around the issue, but also two, because Because I want us to find common ground here, and I want us to just address the concerns that we've been hearing.

We heard in public comment, particularly from MPOP, that they believe this presentation misrepresents the engagement that occurred with them, and so I want to get a clear answer to that concern that was expressed in public comment.

I also want to just have a more specific conversation about what the outreach and engagement was.

What did it look like and for which organizations?

And, you know, were there any other organizations that were spoken to, and if so, what was the engagement that occurred with those organizations?

And are there any organizations that you all decided not to engage with in development of this initial proposal?

And then, you know, on this particular slide, it sort of talks about how there's There there is a that the group identified these 5 things and I'm not sure who the group is.

So I'd like to know details about that as well.

And then and then there was on slide 3 of reference to participation.

I don't really know what participate means.

I mean, was there like.

I don't, I just don't, I need a little bit more understanding of sort of the character and the depth of the community outreach and engagement.

And I want that disaggregated in a way that clearly, you know, tells me that we have done some meaningful community engagement here and that we are not engaging in a practice, whether intentionally or unintentionally of cherry picking what we want and leaving in the bucket what we don't want.

Thank you.

I will start and just say that, and Tanya might be able to provide more detail, that this five-point list came from conversations that we've had with community-based organizations.

led by Mari Sugiyama and VP Guerra, so I can't even take credit for it.

So ACRS, APACE, CISC, API CHIA, MPOP, Organization of Chinese Americans, or OCA, and Friends of Little Saigon.

I may be missing a few, but those are the ones that I recall.

So I turn to my other colleagues to see if there's more to add to that.

Yeah, this is Tonya Kim with the Human Services Department.

So let me add a little bit of nuance.

And I think you're picking up on it.

And so when HSD is saying that we've been a part of communications for what was just discussed, our staff are actually joining other community members, there's a there's a collective group of folks who are meeting that who just named and so we're participants, we're not leading in that space.

These are just some observations that we're picking up.

It wasn't intentional community engagement that will inform HSD's body of work.

So we're proposing to invest back in community for community-led solutions in two different ways.

And that's a slide down the presentation.

When we are doing the RFP that we're proposing to do, or when we're investing in community providers that we're currently contracting with, we're going to do intentional community engagement.

It's just that we've been in partnership with folks And we've been talking with folks.

And these are some of the early initial themes that we have heard.

But we still need to do a specific community engagement that will inform an expedited RFP.

So I just wanted to clarify that nuance.

There are some conversations that we had directly with different organizations that were listed on the previous slide.

And that was really just like, how are you doing?

What are you hearing?

What do you need?

And a lot of the theme is around community has solutions.

Please invest in what we're currently doing, but also in pilots as well.

And so it is consistent with where we intend to go with the additional $100,000 and $300,000 to HSD.

And I would just share, and I appreciate these questions, So the specific direct question around the concern and I I believe Council President you're referring specifically to some of the investments on the SPD side.

The investments here on that we're proposing which is I'm trying to get to them real quick is is specifically around a a we've heard from community members and several business members and we actually shared a list with with the budget chair's office of over 61 organizations, individuals, folks that we've been talking with over the past couple weeks around what are the needs and asks, which is why most of the funding is actually in community-based organizations and going through an RFP process to really identify what those needs are and allow community to really work with them directly on what are your needs so that we can start funding it.

So that's actually where most of the funding is going.

I think those specific to your question is this bias crime prevention coordinator.

One of the things we have heard is from community and from some of the businesses who have been hit also by hate crimes is they had mentioned some concerns around how do we help make sure our workers and community are safe when they visit the businesses.

So anywhere from lighting outside, how a business is set up on a street, inside the business, what are things that we can do to help protect workers and keep our community safe.

And that's really around crime prevention by environmental design.

When we heard that need, we had identified

I don't know why this keeps happening.

You just went on mute, Adrienne.

Sorry about that.

It happened earlier in public.

And I will share with the, go ahead, please go ahead.

Okay.

So all I was sharing is what we heard is the specific need was specifically our crime prevention coordinators, which is actually a non-uniform, non-officer response.

It is an alternative response, which is our crime prevention coordinators are actually trained in environmental design.

And so that's actually what we had identified as based on what we had heard of what the need was.

And so that's why we had proposed doing a bias crime prevention coordinator.

It is not a police officer, there's not a detective, it is actually a non-uniformed response.

So I hope that helps answer that question a little more directly.

Yeah, I mean, and I think that, I appreciate that, Adrian.

And sorry that the ghosts keep randomly muting people today.

I don't know what's happening.

But on the Bias Crime Prevention Coordinator, so there's a couple of things, right?

I think there is a lot of interest in built environment improvements that help with both the perception and the feel of an area being safer, right?

And those programs, as far as I know, are traditionally run through police departments across the country, and we're certainly not an exception there.

I think on the bias crime prevention coordinator, I think the policy question, as I see it, is, is that position better housed within community, like the public safety coordinator position that we funded in direct response and in the aftermath of Donny Chin's murder in the CID, or is that position better housed within the Seattle Police Department?

And I think to me, that's what the policy question is.

And I like to hear from the executive why you have chosen to house the bias crime prevention coordinator within the Seattle Police Department as opposed to outside of the Seattle Police Department and embedded within community like we did in 2016 with the public safety coordinator in the CID?

From a policy perspective, the reason why it's housed in the police department is there was The reason why it's in this particular legislation is this isn't new investment.

This isn't new dollars.

This is actually repurposed dollars that is within SPD and it's actually provisional so that instead of hiring an officer, we're actually directing the department to hire a crime prevention coordinator.

So the budget actually exists within the department itself and it's repurposing it from an officer to actually a civilian position to do this work.

The crime prevention coordinators background again as community had described what they were looking at around environmental design was very specific body of work that crime prevention coordinators perform.

And so the thought is because it exists within the department, it makes sense to go with what folks are describing as the need.

And so that, you know, that's where it's coming from as far as, you know, here's where the budget is.

We're repurposing it from officer to a non-officer position to actually perform the function that the job requirements of the function are in line with what we heard community was asking for.

But what, so you're describing to me, I agree that community is asking for somebody to do this body of work.

I'm not persuaded that community is asking for that body of work to be housed within the police department.

And I think that's where, that's where, that's what I want to understand is sort of why is this body of work?

Because all of the budget things that you just described that that could all happen and the money could still be outsourced to community, which is similar to what we did in the public safety coordinator position.

Um, in 2016. So I just don't, I'm trying to understand why there was a decision to keep the bias crime prevention coordinator within the Seattle Police Department.

Like, what is, like, why, like, can this person not do the work if they're not within SPD?

If they're not within SPD, is, like, is there going to be some sort of, like, practical you know, impediment to this person being an effective bias crime prevention coordinator, if they are housed outside of the SPD, or like, just help me understand the practical implications of this choice.

Yep.

When I directly work with the crime prevention coordinators, I actually have for a number of years, because of their position within the department, one being non-uniform is that alternative response, which is what I've heard folks who are very interested in trying to figure out alternative ways.

But actually having them in the department itself, they have access to information because they are in the actual police department to get access to crime stats, crime data in a way that's more real time.

So when things happen, a crime prevention coordinator from a response phase can respond quicker in that particular capacity.

They also do coordinate with officers to look at what prevention is.

And then they are directly in community working with businesses, working with community to identify areas where the environmental design prevention can happen.

And just their access to information is greater in the police department.

This was a policy choice we made.

I'm not, you know, that because the their role, I mean, I, you know, talk to them in the past.

Part of their role is essential for them when they go perform work being in the department because that access to information is greater.

But that's, you know, they are a what what they perform as a function isn't exactly in alignment with what we heard from community.

I'm not saying that that's what community proposed.

I'm saying I heard what the need was and we had identified a position that was in direct alignment with what the request had been as far as what the need was.

Council President, I know you are on a short timeline.

I see Director Khan's hand up.

Did you have a follow-up or did you want to hear?

I'm happy to hear from Dr. Khan.

Thank you.

Council President Gonzalez, I just wanted to give my two cents worth.

Policy conversations are not normally what I jump into, but in general, I think I would want all of us to consider that if it is our hope to reform the culture of policing, we must hold law enforcement agencies, we should behold them to a standard of success for non-uniform positions.

I think it's wise to at least try to put non-uniform positions that are community facing towards crime prevention and ask the police department to change their culture to help them succeed.

That's just my two cents worth.

I've always wanted to see that happen because it seems like, in general, law enforcement, they are largely supportive of a very uniform response.

because it's a cultural way of doing things.

So in order to invite a cultural change, we might have to request that more of these positions in fact be placed right among them and ask them to support for their success.

Yeah, and I would just say that from a policy perspective, I am not opposed to increasing civilianized functions within the police department.

I've been a big supporter of that.

Ergo, the resurrection of the community safety officer program, which is also a civilianized program, and there's nothing more than I'd love to see that.

be brought to scale.

But, you know, also in just sort of the work as the public safety chair for four years before, you know, I just, we have spent a lot of time digging into how we can increase civilianization within the police department.

So that's not, that's not my objection.

or my concern that I'm expressing here, though.

My concern is just trying, as a policymaker, I feel I have a responsibility to understand why there are choices being made to how certain positions within a department, as opposed to within community.

And I apologize that I keep harping back to the creation of the public safety coordinator position, see that as analogous, and I'm not arguing that it's an apples to apples comparison, but I do think there's a strong nexus between what the city chose to do in a similar realm related to the public safety coordinator position and what we're trying to accomplish here.

And I just want to make the best decision on how to allocate these funds with the you know, best available information, which is why I'm, you know, being a being a stickler on continuing to ask these questions.

And so I'm just trying to understand why we think this position is better housed within the police department, as opposed to within a, you know, community based organization that's still has access to the information that they need to be able to effectively represent community's interests and to be in the strongest position possible to be that liaison between businesses, community organizations, et cetera, and the police department.

And so I think for me, the question just is, do we want this position to be housed within the SPD Or do we want it to just have a strong connection with SPD, but be housed in a community-based organization?

And I'm sorry, but I just don't feel like I'm getting, I just don't feel like I have a clear sense of sort of how this came to be to be able to sort of pass judgment on it one way or the other at this point.

Yeah, Council Member President, that was actually really helpful in what you're describing.

And maybe I can help this a little bit further.

First is you had mentioned the community safety officers and trying to get them to capacity.

The Crime Prevention Coordinators have faced the same issues.

They've had cut after cut over the past several years and to the point where it's almost difficult for them to fully function because they have so much territory to cover because they really are that alternative police response.

And so this is an opportunity to build that back up.

on the civilian side of the crime prevention coordinators and with what we heard described as a need in the community was that work.

What you're also describing is that community-based capacity and that is why most of the funding is towards community-based.

And if we've identified other areas where there's the liaison or other things that we need to have, and it's focused on a community-based organization, that's why so much funding is there.

We can continue to do that work as well.

This isn't meant to be one choice or the other.

So I appreciate you asking that question.

It's really intended to be, here's what we heard as a specific thing.

We've identified a possible solution in that.

That does not preclude us our ability to fund a liaison position or use some of that other additional capacity building dollars to do that work and actually reside in a community-based organization to be that liaison.

But the environmental design is what we had heard and that was what we were trying to solve for, knowing most of the money was actually going to be at the community-based level.

Thank you.

I see Council Member Herbold, your hand's up.

I'm not my finger on the scale of whether or not this is a position that should be funded with SPD existing funds within or outside of the department, but I did want to offer a little more information that may be part of why the executive is making the proposal that it is making.

I did discuss this issue with Chief Diaz a number of weeks ago, and he reminded me that SPD has an individual, Detective Beth Waring, who is The detective who focuses on bias crimes and her title is actually bias crimes coordinator.

And so, even though her function is really focused on.

work associated with bias crimes that have happened.

She is, in essence, doing many of the things that we would expect somebody focused on bias crimes on the prevention side.

She is doing many of those things while also acting as a detective investigating bias crimes.

And so again, I think that is hopefully helpful information about the function that somebody, that a uniformed officer within SPD is fulfilling right now.

And it's, I mean, again, regardless of where the staff for these functions live, it is very clearly a great need and would be happy to help facilitate a conversation with Detective Waring to get more granularity about the prevention side of her work that she has been conducting.

This position is proposed to support her, but not replace her.

I don't understand what the nexus is.

I think the nexus is she is not only investigating bias crimes, she's doing prevention work associated with bias crimes.

And so I don't see it necessarily as supporting her work as an investigator, as a detective, but I do see it as helping on the prevention, the community engagement and prevention work that she has been doing.

Thank you, councilmembers.

I recognize that we're about 15 minutes over and folks are already late for other meetings.

I think the biggest questions that are still in my mind is, and we didn't get a chance to go through the whole presentation, but much of what has been said earlier in the presentation really resonates about the need for community-centered solutions, community-led solutions in light of what to be in existence with Donny Chin's role, how do we make sure that we are resolving issues by really being rooted in those community positions and not directly within SPD is something that I heard, I wrote down from the earlier presentation in terms of what you all had heard directly from community.

that community has the solutions, and that if we invest in the people and community who's most impacted by the issues, that they can drive the answers and solutions, and that we need true, meaningful engagement for longer-term processes.

So those are some of the things that I heard earlier, and I'm really just trying to hold that truth with what options currently exist.

I appreciate that it was flagged that there is a amount of funding that is up to $150,000 that could potentially be used for a position like this.

Council President's question is still something that I'm very interested in getting to the heart of.

Is there a way for us to use that additional dollars and directly fund it maybe through OIR, Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs, directly into community we have a better understanding of what community would like to see.

Obviously, there would be some collaboration with the existing crimes prevention work that is done within the city.

That is a big question mark for me.

I know we are going to lose councilmembers here soon and have already lost I'm not sure that we had a chance to hear all of the questions and look to you colleagues to help inform a path here.

I want to make sure something's very clear.

members and our city council, along with the executive, have been very clear about our joint commitment to addressing hate crimes and to sending a united message to our API community that we stand not only in solidarity against the hate crimes, but in solidarity with direct investments.

That is what the joint statement that we sent out explicitly said.

And in that, we also recognize that there is an important balance there with making sure that we're not that we are not creating any additional harm or unintended consequences as we seek to provide solutions.

That is the tension you are hearing right now.

I want to make sure we reiterate these questions are coming from a place of wanting to have meaningful investments and also not create unintentional harm or to leave out voices that may be trying to inform what we do as our next steps here.

So I just, um, I appreciate the conversation.

I know we didn't get all the way through the, um, through the presentation, but I think we got through most of it.

Uh, I do want to, I do want to sort of do a little bit of a level setting here.

Cause I don't want, uh, members of the viewing public, nor any of us to walk away with the impression that we think that, that a vast majority of these investments are, you know, creating harm or that any of them are creating harm.

I think from my perspective, I acknowledge that a vast majority of the $1.5 million, a significant portion of the $1.5 million is actually proposed to go straight into community-based organizations and community-led efforts.

The only issue where I think we have been focusing in on is, to be very clear, a $150,000 investment of the $1.5 million.

So I just want to be sort of really clear that we're talking about a very small portion of the full $1.5 million.

And so I don't want to overcharacterize what we're talking about in terms of the full package.

So I want to invite us to, If we can, Chair Mosqueda, I want to invite us to consider voting this bill out of committee today with the understanding that over the next few days, we have some work to do to get clear understanding about the $150,000 proposed investment with the community, the bias crime community prevention position in it.

I still have some questions about it.

I don't think I need to belabor those issues in committee today, and I trust that we will be able to have communications here to get clarity around that $150,000 portion of this investment.

But I would hate to hold up the other, you know, almost $1.4 million in investments over a $150,000 question.

if I think there seems to be a lot of agreement around the rest of it.

And I think if, I think if we can sort of challenge ourselves to keep open channels of communication over the next few days before Monday to resolve some of those questions, then I would be, I would feel comfortable, um, seeing this move out of, um, committee today in the, in the spirit of understanding that, you know, again, like a significant portion of these dollars over a million of these dollars are, are being, to be able to do that.

I think that's a really important part of what's being directed into community-based organizations.

few words about my sense of urgency around moving these dollars.

In February 2020, I stood with the mayor and a dozen community members when she signed her executive order addressing hate crimes and crimes of bias.

As a recent chair of the committee with previous oversight of the Office of Civil Rights and somebody who has requested audits on hate crimes in Seattle, this area, I would like to start by saying that the mayor's executive order is one of great concern and passion for me.

The mayor's executive order called for funding commitments to address hate crimes with recommendations due to council in August of last year.

We did not receive those appreciate the conversations I've had with Dr. Kahn and Director Lockhart about those efforts.

But I do think the time is now to move forward with these investments with the understanding that we do have some additional questions that we should strive to get answered before Monday's full council vote.

Thank you.

Okay.

Thank you, colleagues.

Thank you, Vice Chair.

I'm not seeing any additional hands.

I will also add, I have a number of questions specific to the dollar amounts as well.

And Director Noble, perhaps I can share those with you and you can help share around information in advance of Monday.

I wanted to confirm that these are unallocated underspend dollars and that none of these are being reallocated from a purpose that the original funds were intended to be used for that would have any sort of impact.

I know there's a lot of interest specific to the issue around the crimes prevention position, I think that I would very much like to continue to look into this idea and discussion that we've been having today about how that position could potentially be located outside and the opportunities that could potentially exist there.

And I will note that given the short time frame that central staff had to look at the bill, there were a few very technical, you know, edits We have a number of copy edits that we did get flagged for us that didn't get a chance to get included in the introduced bill, so there's a possibility that some of those edits will be needing to come forth anyways before Monday.

So there is clearly some work to do, some questions to be answered still, but in light of what our colleagues have said here today, I think we will go ahead and make the motion and fully recognize that there is additional work and additional questions that need to be answered with that, any additional comments?

Okay.

With that, colleagues, I appreciate the extra time you've spent on the line today.

Recognizing that there will be more work and potential amendments to come before full council's meeting, I move the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 120029 with more work to come.

Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded.

Is there any additional comments?

I do want to thank the folks who have engaged in the ongoing conversations.

I did share the list of people that were mentioned to me from the executive that had been reached out to.

I think the biggest question for me still is whether or not that full list of folks have the chance to review and vet the legislation, because it's different to have kind of a roundtable discussion versus sort of looking at the final legislation.

And so I do really appreciate the work that has been done to pull this together relatively quickly, and all of those organizations and individuals who have provided some level of input.

And we'll be looking forward to continuing to get information from you all, especially those who've raised concerns about either misrepresentation or over-representation.

in their engagement here to make sure that their feedback is also incorporated before a final passage.

Hearing no additional comments or questions, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Vice Chair Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Gonzalez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Thank you very much.

I appreciate all of your extended time on today's meeting.

I will save you the summary of what is to come, but it is another full meeting agenda on April 20th at 930 a.m.

With that, colleagues, thanks for your generous time today and have a great rest of your afternoon.

Thanks to the entire panel for presenting on this last item.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Thank you.