Good afternoon, everybody.
This is the meeting of the Civic Development, Public Assets, and Native Communities Committee.
The date is Wednesday, July 17th, and the time is 2 p.m.
I'm Councilmember Deborah Juarez, chair of this committee, and I'm joined by Councilmember Gonzales and Councilmember Bagshaw is on her way.
Thank you for being here today, Councilmember.
So, let's move to approval of the agenda.
If there are no objections, the agenda will be adopted.
Okay, let's go to the chair's report.
Today, we have one appointment, one presentation, and two ordinances for review.
We will be joined by our applicant, Jay Rich, for a reappointment to the Seattle Public Library Board of Trustees.
I'm glad you're here, Jay.
Second, our chief librarian, Marcellus Turner, will lead the library's 2018 Race and Social Justice Initiative Report.
This is a long time coming.
I understand it's a 19-page PowerPoint, so we're looking forward to that.
Third, Seattle Parks and Recreation will present an ordinance that maintains an underground overflow pipeline and channel for the King County-owned reservoir within Discovery Park.
This is a technical yet significant bill, so we will hear more about how this preventative measure will serve us and our water supply in the event of an emergency shutdown.
And lastly, what I'm excited about today, Seattle Parks will brief us on an ordinance authorizing the acquisition of property for open space, park, and recreation purposes.
The property is located on 125th Street.
In District 5, I'm very excited for this acquisition for it extends the goals of the 2000 Thornton Creek Master Plan developed by Seattle Public Utilities.
As I said, this is the north fork of Thornton Creek, which is a watershed jewel in D5.
I've been driving by this property for over 30 years, and we have a lot of people to thank, and I will hold some of those thanks.
But I do want to thank the Thornton Creek Alliance, Councilmember Dombowski at King County Council, and our 46-state legislative delegation.
They all work hard with us.
Moving forward with Seattle Parks and Rec and Seattle Public Utilities, they have partnered on several projects in the Thornton Creek Watershed, that would include the South Fork as well, as part of their effort to protect and enhance water quality and associated natural resource values in the watershed and of course for the City of Seattle.
This property represents a unique opportunity to reconnect the floodplain along this section of Thornton Creek to provide additional salmon habitat and increase the flood retention ability of the watershed.
My understanding is it's about almost one acre, and I think we're buying it for a little over a million, but we'll learn more about that when you do your presentation.
So with that, we are going to move on.
Thank you, Council Member Baxhaw.
Good to see you.
So let's move to public comment.
Negin?
Let me say, we have, how many people we have signed up?
One person.
Oh, one person, okay.
So, oh, it's Barbara.
Hey, Barbara.
Go ahead and state your name for the record, and thank you.
My name is Barbara Finney, and I'd like to acknowledge that we're on the traditional land of the first people of Seattle, the Duwamish people.
I live in District 5, and Broadview is my branch of the Seattle Public Library, and I do occasionally fall asleep while reading a book there.
SPL's rules of conduct, which were last reviewed in 2013, say it's a violation, quote, lying down or appearing to be sleeping in the library, end of quote.
But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in April 2019, and I quote, lying down to sleep is so fundamental and life-sustaining that cities can't bar people from doing it on public property unless there's somewhere else provided indoors for people to go.
A 27-year-old Black man, his address, the Union Gospel Mission, was arrested at the Greenwood Branch Library on March 9, 2019 by SPD.
A friend of mine witnessed the arrest and spoke to a librarian who said it started because he was sleeping.
SPL security was called, things escalated.
SPD was called and the man was arrested and taken to jail.
It's time for the Seattle Public Library to revise the SPL rules of conduct to be a moral document in line with the Ninth District Court of Appeals ruling.
Thank you.
Thank you, Barbara.
And we will follow up with that.
I think you're talking about the Boise case.
Yeah.
Okay.
We are familiar with that, and I will follow up with that.
And Marcellus was here and obviously heard what you shared with us today.
So I promise we will follow up with that, and again, we'll make a note of that.
All right.
Okay.
Is there, we're done?
We're done.
Okay.
So at this point, I will close public comment, and we will move to items of business.
And if I could have the folks up here for the, regarding Jay Rich and our appointment process.
You guys want to come on up?
Item number one, appointment 01377, reappointment of J.A.
Rich as member Seattle Public Library Board of Trustees for a term to April 1st, 2024.
So, you guys want to state your names and then we can have a few questions and then we'll move forward.
Sure.
I'm M.T. Marcellus Turner.
I'm your chief librarian.
And I'm J. Rich, currently the president of the Seattle Library Board.
Good.
And we're here because it is time for Jay's reappointment.
As you know, Jay has served out one of the terms of his appointment.
They have two-year terms and has served us admirably, both as a member and then stepping right immediately into the role of President of the Board of Trustees.
I think that His record stands for itself.
He's been very diligent in leading the organization.
He has the full support and compliment of the other four members of the, three now, members of the Board of Trustees.
So we're all pleased with the work that he's doing and leading and has shown a very good representative for the library.
So he's here.
Jay, you want to give us some words and I think my colleagues may have a few questions.
Well, I'd be happy to entertain questions.
I'm honored by the proposed reappointment.
It's a humbling experience, and I am sort of fully committed to the notion of the library as really a bellwether of civic culture.
That's exactly the term I used, bit of a flight of rhetoric, but I used it at the Seattle Times in the context of the levy renewal, because it seems to me that given everything that the library does, being a free and open space for all citizens, regardless of age or background or ethnicity or income, a free space, it really seems to me fundamental to our democracy and to what we think of ourselves and the pride we take as a city.
And that's why I support the library and I'm honored to serve even in this capacity in any way that I possibly can.
Colleagues?
Well, I don't have questions, but I want to say thank you.
Jay, I think I've known you since 1987. You worked both as an attorney for Metro at that point, but also we met after you were a White House fellow.
Your reputation around this town is stellar.
The fact that you want to do this, very impressive, and I'm grateful that you do.
And thank you, Marcellus, for all of the work.
that you've been doing.
What did we call it?
Democracy University?
Or there was a great term in your video.
What was it?
The Free People's University?
And I use the Central Library regularly and just appreciate all of the changes that you're making and Godspeed on your leadership.
Thank you very much.
So I want to, Council Member Gonzalez?
Okay.
All right.
I just want to say a few things.
First of all, Jay, it has been an absolute pleasure working with you since I got this committee three and a half years ago.
And all your hard work on the levy, the reimagination of the libraries, how we've been going about how we address what issues needed, how libraries needed to change in the 21st century, and what kind of services the library should be providing.
And, you know, I did not know this from looking at your confirmation packet that we have the same boss, Governor Locke.
We did indeed.
I did not know that you were his deputy chief of staff when he left the governor's office and went to D.C.
to be head of commerce.
That's right.
So we may have crossed paths.
It was a wonderful job, a great experience.
The issues that come to that level are rather dicey.
Right.
Yeah, I work for Governor Locke, so it was a very, I learned a lot.
It was a pleasure working with him that way.
So with that, I think if there's nothing else, we'll just go ahead and move, right?
Okay.
So this is the reappointment of Jay Rich and Anita, I was going to say Anita.
Nagin already read into the record.
I move the committee pass appointment 01377. Second.
Motion has been moved and seconded.
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
All those in favor, no.
The ayes have it.
The confirmation will move forward to full council Monday.
Thank you for coming down again and all your hard work on the levy.
I think you need to stay.
You have to stay, too.
That's right.
You have to stay, too.
And we have two people coming up to join us.
Let's do that.
It's my meeting now.
Hold on.
I know.
I'm sorry.
I know you want to be in charge.
No, I'm good.
Let's let Nagin read item number two into the record, and then we'll get started on the fun stuff.
Item two, 2018 Libraries Race and Social Justice Initiative Report.
Please disregard the five minute time mark.
You have 25 minutes.
Thank you.
Oh, wow.
Okay, Nagin.
Okay.
Well, we will certainly move fast.
I will ask two of my colleagues to join me, Helen Tapping and Andrew Harbison, to join us with that.
And while they're approaching the table, I will share with you that the library is reviewing its rules of conduct starting September of this year.
So, for the patron who was interested in that, we are doing a rules of conduct review starting in September of this year.
Go ahead.
Well, I should add before, can we, can you both just introduce yourselves again so people, so for the viewing public as well?
Sure.
Good afternoon.
My name is Andrew Harbison.
I'm the Assistant Director of Collections and Access.
And past chair of the RSGI change team at the Seattle Public Library.
And I'm Helen Tapping.
I'm the head of marketing and online services, and I'm the current co-sponsor of the RSGI team.
Okay, great.
First of all, MT, thank you.
I know we've been talking about your presentation to us on the RSGI report for a while, so we're excited to go through your report today.
Well, we're excited to be here and talk with you about the work that is occurring at the library to address race and social justice.
I am happy to be joined by Jay, the president of the board, because he can represent the interest of the board in this topic.
And I'll give him some time to speak first.
Great.
Thank you, council members.
I'm here representing the board to demonstrate the board's commitment to race and social justice equity.
And I can say with conviction that that commitment is deeply stitched into the fabric of the library's culture.
And I say that not as empty rhetoric, but because of the actions and the outcomes that we have pursued and the hard work that we're doing.
I think those of you who have been involved in race and social justice equity understand that it is difficult work and often uncomfortable work.
But I subscribe to the notion that unless it's really uncomfortable a bit, You're not doing the work, and we have engaged.
As a board itself, we have developed and pronounced a policy to not only demonstrate leadership in the issue for the whole institution, but also to demonstrate a commitment to its implementation.
And among other things, beyond the words, it acknowledges that the policy is not just a feel-good thing, but is really rooted in the unfortunate and tragic history of institutional racism, and it has to be understood in that backdrop.
And it commits not only our work in that effort, but the resources to the extent we have to make sure that we make progress to that.
And I would say, you know, it's an elusive goal that requires work every day and every year, so I think it's totally appropriate to have an annual report on the progress that we've made.
And I turn it over to MT and the staff to give you a summary of that progress.
Thank you, Jay.
So I know that you've received a copy of this, so I'll walk you through it.
It's very self-explanatory, but I'll add the tidbits and highlights as we go along.
So just to give you an idea of some of the work that we took over in 2018, as Jay just mentioned, we had a board-approved RSJI policy.
One of the other things that we're quite proud of is our relationship with the Seattle Public Schools, where we've created a library link library card, which is an electronic library card that we make available to all grades six through 12, and we are proud to say that we're in every junior high and high school in the Seattle Public School District.
We've also really worked to address digital equity and outreach programs with our Somali community.
We've added SPL hotspots at city-permitted villages.
We've made new and accessible community-informed website.
and we also have libraries and program service assessment to make sure that we're being equitable in our work.
And then we've had some really great programs this past year to highlight some of the work with our prioritized populations.
They include Legendary Children, Beyond the Frame, Indigenous Artists in Residence, Youth Incarceration in our Asian and Pacific Islander Communities, and Cultural Celebrations and more.
So these are just some of the programmatic things that we've done over the course of the year.
With regard to our library approaches to our work, our senior management team and our leadership teams combined identified several goals that we wanted to make as a priority.
The first one is to always lead with race.
But in terms of leading with race, it required us to do some active engagements on our part.
One of them was that we would be open to continuous learning and listening at all levels of the organization.
excuse me, strive for equity and access services and programs, represent and invest in people of color and other prioritized audiences and communities, and steadily work toward closing the opportunity gap for children of color.
With regard to the package that we were asked to speak to, we've identified four toolkits where RSJI was applied to the library work in 2018. The first one is with regard to the library restroom policy that we had to address back in June 2017. I know that you as members of the council were involved in this as the information made its way to you.
Well, over that time period and culminating in 2018 when the board approved a new restroom policy, we had to spend some time doing a lot of work with this particular LGBTQ and trans community.
But it was a staff-driven effort to establish a restroom policy affirming gender-neutral access for all.
And I'm happy to say that all of our restrooms, single-use restrooms, are compliant.
And we also had our change team engaged with the transgender staff and community public services staff and managers to regain the community trust that created that harmful experience.
As you know, some of the recommendations coming forward were more single-use restrooms across the city in our libraries.
And as you might imagine, that comes with quite a few challenges to implement.
But certainly, as we look at opportunities to reimagine, we try to address those as much as we can.
And I just want to add and thank you because when this all happened you literally called me that day of and the next day and we met and responded so thank you so much because you were on top of that.
No and thank you for your support so that was very good for us.
The second program we wanted to talk about is our Fresh Start program and our Fresh Start program is actually a re-energized, rejuvenated program that we've had in place for a little bit of time.
And that was where we worked with teens who had fines on their accounts to help them remove those fines on their account.
And that was such a successful program for us.
But over the years, one of the things that was still challenging about it is that fees were still attached to these records.
So this past year, working with the foundation, and our circulation and borrower services staff, we were able to create a new program that helps or re-energize the Fresh Start program so that it energized the program with an opportunity to remove fees from a patron's record.
And so since 2018 we've had over 1,100 teen patrons who've been helped with this.
71% of teens have cleared fines and fees, have checked out a physical item or digital item in the last six months since that occurred.
And all of this work is privately funded through the foundation, and the community is excited as over 80% of donors to the program are first-time donors.
So we're really excited about this program and liberating some of these patrons to use the libraries again, and I think our teens are really appreciative of this effort.
MT, just really, really briefly, can you just say the foundation, what that is?
The foundation, yes.
Thank you.
The foundation is the fundraising arm of the library and they are recognized as the Seattle Public Library Foundation.
They're celebrating, I think, like their 39th year of existence.
So really dedicated people who are putting forth an effort to help the library extend its reach into the communities.
Thank you.
Sure.
The third area that we are going to speak to is the library's effort to update its current diversity and inclusion policy.
We are working to have that put forward in front of the senior management team in the next couple of weeks so that we can then take it to the board.
But it has been an effort led by our change team staff.
It has taken a little bit of time because our staff wanted to be diligent in their efforts to understand the interest of staff who are looking for opportunities in our organization.
They did some focus group staff surveys of 525 respondents and informing the effort.
which is quite remarkable for a staff of 700. The recommendations that came forward are improved data collection on our staff development, more staff training, prioritizing career development, and increasing participation in equity work at all levels.
So that should be moving forward between our union and the leadership and management teams of the library such that we can get it in front of the board before the year is out.
Let me ask you a quick question.
Can you talk to me a little bit about how does the Board of Trustees and the Library Foundation and our Levy Oversight Committee, how do those three entities work, coordinate or communicate with one another, particularly about this issue?
Sure.
So I'll do, and Jay, I don't know if you were moving closer to weigh in as well.
So the three, there are actually three boards, and I should speak to that too.
There is a third board, which is our Friends of the Seattle Public Library, which is the advocacy arm of the library.
The three boards come together through a three presidents meeting on a quarterly basis so that the presidents come and keep informed of what is going on and the work and efforts.
And then there's a three boards meeting once a year where they all come together so that we can all be on the same page about what the program of service for the library is.
With regard to the levy, the Library Board of Trustees has served on the current levy as the governing board for it, so they are responsible for the implementation of the levy, ensuring that the library adheres to the components of the levy that are called out, and ensuring that we are being great stewards and judicious stewards of the reserves and resources that have been brought to the table.
You might recognize also that they have to manage the levy's dollars with the general fund dollars, so it is a delicate dance that they have to take on each year to do that.
With regard to that, then the foundation and the Friends serve as a fundraising arm or an advocacy arm to support the efforts of the levy.
And they are in a more active position or role of being able to advocate on behalf of the levy.
So hopefully that gets it.
Great.
No, that was important.
Thank you.
I was just wondering whether the three entities also work with you on the RSGI.
Oh, yes.
I'm sorry.
You did ask about that as well.
So one of the things that I will say is that we presented the policy to the Board of Trustees three years ago when we were working on this and they in turn asked us to develop it a bit more so that is how the staff moved into this position in the change team.
With regard to the Foundation and Friends, they did not have as active a role in the development of this, but they certainly recognize some of the challenges that some of our prioritized communities lack.
and have certainly directed their efforts to that cause.
Our summer of learning program where we give away free books, we make sure that we give them away first in the prioritized communities.
Those books are funded by the foundation.
So many of the programs and services that we offer are funded by the foundation and that helps us develop a stronger policy and procedure around this because we're recognizing all of the communities that are impacted.
And I know also that I believe it was the foundation, maybe it was the board of trustees that agreed to fund a social worker case manager in your library.
I thought that was a tremendous step forward and then also addressing some of the concerns we heard earlier about people sleeping in the library because they're sleepy, right?
They need places to be.
Sure.
And you've given me so many points to jump off on, but yes.
Two years ago, or three years ago, we were fortunate that we had a donor who wished to support the work of the library by providing us with a community connector, which is a person social worker who comes in working with DSC to provide a social worker in our libraries to help address many of the concerns of our patrons and daily readers who come in our libraries every day with issues that go a little bit beyond traditional library needs and activities.
Because they had a donor who was willing to support that, that received favor from the then administration such that they were willing to have the library board approve placing that position as a funded position through the city.
So that was supportive there.
And then under this current levy, as you know, there was support from the council to add an additional social worker for us to address some of the needs in our branches and along with special needs of our LGBTQ and teen communities.
So, yes.
Mm-hmm.
I should make a note that we should thank Council Member Gonzalez and Council Member Bagshaw who were very supportive of me pushing that and adding that and with your recommendations.
Yes, all of you were quite helpful, so yes.
Thank you.
The third item.
that we really focused on in the last year.
It was really advancing our Summer of Learning program.
As you know, the program has been formally known as the Summer Reading Program, but about five or six years ago, we changed it to a Summer of Learning Program to recognize our efforts to incorporate STEM and STEAM into the program so that the learning expands across all of those arenas.
I should also say that this is the 100th year of Summer Reading, Summer of Learning, so we're quite proud that this program has held up for 100 years and continues to go strong throughout its time.
With the work of Helen's team in marketing, we created an activity book this year that was created with seven languages in mind so that we could appeal to more of our diverse communities and prioritized communities.
It was created with more input from youth as opposed to the librarians designing the activity book themselves.
One of the things that I just referenced was the giving away of books and materials.
We ensured that 78% of the giveaway books were to prioritize youth and families.
Excuse me. 24% of our performers and programs were led by persons of color or individuals or organizations.
And 77% of our marketing budget was spent in the BIPOC community.
So we were really quite pleased that we took a very, and the lead for that, Amy Twito, took a very concerted lead to do that, but it was also with the help of Helen and her team in marketing.
I just need to know if that is my D5 library, one of my three.
I don't know which library that is.
I don't know.
I will have to figure that out.
Okay.
I was just trying to get a plug in there.
I know.
I should have known that.
Yeah, you should have known that.
If I might, I wanted to just amplify a couple of thoughts on this that prompted by your question as well.
Summer of Learning program, which has given away books for many, many years, was done without a race and social justice lens at first.
And what the analysis showed is that a lot of the people, a lot of the kids that got the books have lots of books, actually come from relatively affluent family where reading and books are a tradition, they have them at home.
And we, the library, to its credit, saw the analysis and said, we really ought to try to move the books to those where the books would actually be more valuable.
They would make a difference in the family.
It may be the first book they could take home.
And not only do we use a race and social justice lens, but the program is funded by the foundation.
So to your point about how the foundation and the library works on race and social justice and leverages levy dollars, this is a perfect example of that.
Great, thank you.
And I was, they just whispered in my ear that we all think this is, no, I'm not gonna take credit.
They think this is high point library and I'm excluding myself just in case they are wrong.
So, but we will make sure that we find that out.
But again, that is the work that we were doing with that.
With regard to workforce and contracting equity, I wanted to give you some statistics on what our staffing component looks like.
This is the work that we are always continually trying to improve upon.
But I think that we are making great strides in that.
What you notice in the chart on the left is that that is the 2010 census information and what the city of Seattle looked like at that time.
On the right-hand side, you have the chart of our staffing at Seattle Public Library, and you'll see that our numbers are, in many cases, a little bit better.
In some cases, we are equal, and we have dropped in a few places, but that is the result of a continuous effort to improve representation of our staff.
One of the things that is very important is that We have a staff that reflects the community and so we really strive to add positions that are needed and make sure that we are being inclusive in our recruitments.
Does this include, and I'm sorry I should have looked at this quicker, sooner.
Are we going to be looking at language as well?
I know you did race distribution.
So we did not, we do not have language on this chart and we can make sure to get that information to you.
I know that there was an effort led last year by in your shop to identify all of the languages that we have on staff.
And if I'm not mistaken, I think we have about 50. I think it's about that.
50 some languages spoken by our staff so that we can ensure that we can get access or service to a particular patron who speaks a certain language.
Now that does include that we do have some that are One staff member only who speaks that language and that's where we need to shore up some of those reserves as well.
But we can make sure that we get that information included in next year's presentation of the languages represented.
Thank you.
Sure.
The next couple of charts speak to the current staffing patterns for 2018. I will tell you that the key to the right changes a little bit in each one, so it'll be important that we note that.
But in this particular race distribution presentation, the blue recognizes all of the staff who work for the organization, and the gray represents our supervisory staff.
So you'll note what 2018 looked like for us.
And I'll move through these quickly.
One of the things that we'll do for next year as well is we'll make sure that we have a way to represent a comparison of the previous year so that you can see the changes over each year.
What we are able to show right now is just what 2018 looks like.
With regard to this particular screen, this is our hired and promoted staff.
We hired 89 staff.
I should have mentioned the key at the bottom too.
We hired 89 staff and total number of promoted staff is 64. Promotions represent any number of spaces we have.
for LA classifications in the organization and LA being a library assistant and they can move from a one to a four.
We have STAs who are our students who can move from a student assistant to an LA one.
So it might look like we have a lot of opportunities for promotions, but sometimes they are in from a student graduating from college or high school and deciding that they wanted to continue working with us.
It does represent some of our movement into our supervisory positions as well.
Looking at our staff turnover, in this case, the left bar is our non-supervisory staff and our right bar is our supervisory staff.
And I think what you're recognizing here is one of two things.
The first one is that many of our staff are of an age or of a position where they are ready to retire or change or transition to another career.
So you're seeing a high incidence of that.
You're also seeing a representation of Many of our newer staff who are also stepping into positions but have opportunities to take jobs elsewhere as well.
We do lose a great number of staff to the out of class program here in the city where a staff member works in one department and then an opportunity.
shows up in another department and they may pay more money than we do and we lose them to that.
Just a quick question and we can dive deeper later on.
So how are you doing the recruitment?
Are you like going to?
So we take a lot of efforts to do recruitment.
We're working with the library well in for two different ways.
For our librarians, we have to work with the library schools because that is where the graduates will come from.
With regard to our efforts to engage our non-MLS degree required positions, we're doing a lot of things.
A lot of them are really focusing on our STA program and asking them to, if they'd want to continue their work as a permanent staff member in the library, so that really gives us a great deal of turnover, especially with the flexible hours that we keep for part-timers, so that helps.
The second thing is we rely on word of mouth.
We really do ask our staff to help carry forward that conversation.
And then the third is we try to advertise in the community's newspapers and media formats that really speak to those communities.
Inevitably, when I go out to do a community conversation, there's always someone who says, how do I get a job here?
So we look at those as advantages and opportunities to speak to that as well.
Always can open to new ideas, so if you have new ideas.
we'd be happy to share them with you.
I know that many of you carry blogs or newsletters, so if you want us to send you information when we have openings, we're happy to do that as well.
But if you have additional ideas, we're happy to use those.
Gender distribution, all of these again are requests that were made to have in our packet.
Our gender distribution in this case, the blue is our female population and in the gray is our male population.
And we also have a percentage of staff who chose not to identify, so that comes at 0.6%.
The other item that we were asked to include in this is our WEMBE purchasing and consulting.
And WEMBE is one of the places where we are always trying to do better, but we certainly struggle.
If you were to look at, you'll see that we are increasing our goals each year, but it always becomes a challenge.
to increase it by a major amount.
But what you'll see in our 2018 targets is that we, for purchasing, we look for a 12% increase and we set a goal of 12% and we made 17%.
And in consulting, we asked for 11% and we reached that goal.
For 2019, we've set a target of 18% and consulting for 12%.
One of the things that I will say that we are working on right now, is that in our Summer of Learning program, a lot of the local programmers and performers that we use are persons of color, and one of the city's procedures and one of our procedures is that there's a 30-day wait to be paid.
We're looking at how we can trim that because many of our performers need or would like to have their payments sooner than 30 days wait, so we're working internally to figure out can we cut the checks in a much sooner process to pay them.
You can't just Venmo them?
No.
But it is something that we are really focusing on because, as you might imagine, sometimes they're having to rent their equipment and so they have to make that payment.
They're using some others that need to be paid.
So anything that we can do to address that we think will go a long way to having them qualify and participate in this more.
And then the key initiatives moving forward.
And I'm going to turn this over to Helen, because as in their introductions, Andrew mentioned that he was the past chair, along with Ludie, who's in the audience, the past chair of the Race and Social Justice Committee, and we transitioned to a new sponsor this year, and Helen is in that role, and she's going to talk with you a bit about what is coming forward in 2019 and beyond.
Thank you, Marcellus.
So one of the things that we did in January, we had a equity work at the library full-day conference for attendees of the ALA, the American Library Association, that was held in Seattle.
And so staff at the library talked about their programs, services, collections, marketing across the board, and did a full day.
And in addition to that, rather than just doing it for a small group of library employees, We also created a print piece and a webpage on our website so that we could be transparent to our patrons about the work that we're doing and also to keep us accountable to the work that we're doing and that webpage is also being updated with all the new projects that we're doing as we go through the year.
We, this isn't on there, but I just wanted to mention this because Marcellus talked about this year of Summer of Learning being the 100 years, so these are some of the action guides for this year that are in different languages and they're translated into eight languages including English, so I just want to pass those around as well.
And the artist that is featured on this early learning guide, activity guide, is a female, a local artist and a person of color.
So one of the things we're trying to do is use more inclusive imagery in these activity guides too.
And then one thing that we did with the race and social justice team itself was iterate slightly on the structure of it.
We identified that we could do better of encouraging more staff across different classifications that Marcel has talked about, so different levels of the organization, as well as geographically, and then also including people from across departments within the organization.
So administration as well as public services.
So we have a more representative group of people in the current RSGI team.
And we also changed the structure and the timing of meetings a little bit so that there was less barriers for people to participate.
As you know, we have 27 locations.
So we changed the scheduling a little bit to allow for time for people to meet but also time for people to actually do work related to RSGI work.
So we have changed the framework a little bit.
We have also currently we're working on setting our strategic goals and we're looking at the Office of Civil Rights strategic plan for three years for the RSGI work to map back to that and we're working through goals and setting goals for the library based on those strategic goals.
And we are looking forward to also employing strategies such as working with a committee advisory group to also help make sure that we are having outside perspective from patrons and partners that we work with to make sure that our equity work is evolving as well throughout the year.
Helen, I want to thank you.
I think this is the first time I've ever seen in print a territorial acknowledgment of indigenous people ever, except for in Indian country.
Wow, OK.
But this is really probably, it may seem like a small thing to some people, but I don't believe any of our other city departments lead or end with this territorial acknowledgment of Salish folks.
So I want to thank you for that.
This is very special.
Yeah, we'll post it.
Or do we?
I do when I chair.
Yes, but it's not on our printed materials.
No, well, I'm going to put it on, and I'm going to steal this, just so you know.
I'm sorry, Gonzales is stealing it, too.
Well, I want it done.
This isn't in print because we iterate on all this work.
This is the first version.
The next print piece you see, it will also be translated into Lusutji, is that how you pronounce it?
Lusutji.
Which we actually have on our website.
If you go to the website page of that, you'll see it, and we lead with that language.
So we're evolving even the work that we're thinking about now.
Yeah, there was a student at UW that took the Lesotho language.
And did you see where they took all the metro buses, and they put the actual Lesotho word for the location of where they were going?
Like, alakai.
They, they, they, what do you call that?
When you, you know, alter stuff on the internet.
What is that called?
Like photoshopping it.
Yeah, photoshopped it.
Yes.
And it was really cool.
I'll look that up.
So.
What's that?
Can you see that?
On the back?
No, I can't see everything.
Oh, OK.
Oh, at the Burke.
Pardon me, reaching over you.
It's all right.
I'm just here.
I'm just here.
Oh, that's the transfer.
Yes, on the sum of learning.
That's also the language.
It's just referring to language.
Oh.
It's just language.
Oh, OK.
You could read it for us.
I'm Blackfeet, but.
Yeah, if you like asking me to read Portuguese.
So the other thing I wanted to mention is also the training that we've been doing.
We have lots of opportunities at the library, even though it's quite complex with so many people in different locations.
So we take advantage of using our annual staff day to do trainings and at the last year training we did several trainings including a transgender patron training, understanding implicit bias, and sectionally 101 institutional racism.
And so we continue to do those kind of trainings at our all staff day opportunity.
And throughout the year we have a series called Our Way, which is curated and created by staff.
And so we've done recently an Our Way staff training.
It's usually at Central and then one of other other branch locations.
So more staff can join Asian American experiences at the library.
And then the RSGI change team curates a training as well.
And this year we're doing it in September.
And we're working on that right now.
And then as an organization, we are committed to doing anti-harassment training.
And so the bystander training currently is being planned to roll out in September.
And at the moment, there's focus groups going on to make sure that we represent all the perspectives from the library.
So the HR department is moving forward with that too.
Thank you.
Do you have anything to add?
I think with that, that is the end of our presentation.
Andrew didn't say anything.
We realized we needed him to run the show at the last minute.
I would also say that we have two of our colleagues here, Jay Donahue, who runs the WEMBI program for us, as well as Ludie Morris, who is our employee relations director and was the co-chair with Andrew of the race and social justice team.
Great.
Sir, anything from my colleagues?
Okay.
Great work.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Good job.
Okay.
Good luck.
Thank you much.
Thank you.
What do you mean by that?
Good luck?
What are you trying to say?
Good luck to them.
So let's get our folks up here for the Discovery Park outfall easement.
I will have Nageen read that into the record, and then we'll start.
We also have an amendment on this, which I'm affectionately calling the earthquake amendment, because that's what it is.
But I'm going to let you guys introduce yourselves, do what you do, and then we'll get to it.
Item three, Council Bill 119569, an ordinance granting a utility easement of surface and subsurface rights to King County through its Department of Natural Resources and Parks Wastewater Treatment Division to maintain an underground overflow pipeline and channel for the King County-owned reservoir within Discovery Park, which serves the regional wastewater facility to meet federal guidelines for potable water supply separation in the event of an emergency shutdown and backup of the incoming water supply.
Thank you.
Good morning or good afternoon Tracy Ratzliff, Council of Central Staff.
Chip Navin, Seattle Parks and Recreation.
Richard Gulagoon, Seattle Parks and Recreation.
JR McSavon, King County Wastewater Treatment Division.
My name is Elton Gaskill.
I'm with the King County Wastewater Treatment Division, Real Property Services.
Oh, you're from the county?
Yes.
Okay.
Why don't I start things off here?
I'm going to introduce the legislation on behalf of Jesus Aguirre, who couldn't make it today.
So I'm going to hand off shortly to Richard, who's going to give the background and the details.
So just a couple of key points.
Obviously, we all know that we have our major wastewater facility in Discovery Park, and with that comes associated equipment.
And this, what we're here to talk about is we have existing equipment.
It's been on the South Bluff for years.
It actually predates ownership by the city.
And as an update of utility regulations, it needs to be updated.
As part of that update, you know, we do work with our utility partners.
We try to minimize impact to parks, but if something needs to happen, especially underground utilities are an acceptable exception to our non-park use policy.
So we've had a great partnership with King County here.
This will necessitate a new easement to accommodate some of the underground pipes.
But we want to thank our partners.
King County's been great on the public outreach aspect of this and partnership with us on developing the agreement.
And I will hand it off to Richard.
Okay.
Thank you.
So first off, I wanted to point out what is the project.
As Chip mentioned, the project is to update and to meet code for an existing reservoir.
and also to add this overflow channel, which is also required by state code and also SPU requirements.
The plan is to install a 460-foot pipeline within this easement area that roughly runs southeast from the reservoir.
And again, this pipeline is going to be for the emergency discharge of fresh water that The pipeline will be roughly 15 feet below the surface in most cases, and again, it will keep overflows from happening within a treatment plant or flooding other areas.
You can see a picture there, and it sort of shows the pipeline alignment.
Again, it's going southeast from the reservoir, which sits up on a bluff.
This is a location of the reservoir.
It's basically in the western quadrant of Discovery Park.
It's a little red star.
Can I ask you a quick question?
Sure.
Go back to the map.
Where's Daybreak Star on that map?
Okay, so Daybreak Star, I believe, is up, and I may be wrong.
Is it in the east?
It's northwest.
It's northwest.
It's northwest.
Right.
Oh, okay.
I'm all disoriented.
Okay.
I see it now.
So how will this easement work?
Most of the pipeline is subterranean.
It's basically invisible.
It does not create a barrier to park users.
It does not interfere with the natural look of the park.
King County is also going to restore the property impacted by the pipeline restoration.
They anticipate having to remove some trees, and I'll get into that later, but those will be replaced two for one.
The subsurface presence of the pipeline, again, will not inhibit park use nor vegetation planting.
So we can plant vegetation over it.
It doesn't have any, I guess, restrictions that way.
And if King County needs to access this pipeline, since it is an easement, and they do it by foot, they don't need to get a permit from Parks.
But if they need to drive equipment to the pipeline for maintenance, or in any way impact property outside the easement area, they will have to get a permit from the Parks Department before doing so.
The easement was also appraised.
It was appraised in 2018, and the market value is $156,000.
The need for the easement, there's a brief history.
Again, it's per state code, and the WAC is 246-290, and again, Seattle Public Utilities.
And just to also explain, the easement is for an overfull pipeline, but there's also going to be modifications made to the reservoir itself to again meet state and SPU code and improvements that way.
The overflow easement is within an area that was identified by the county as sort of a natural bowl.
It also has quick-draining soil, so in the event of a discharge, we don't anticipate an accumulation of water.
It would quickly dissipate.
And also, they would be able to shut off the water supply before it became detrimental.
Just to give you a bit more history, the treatment plant and reservoir were built in 1966, which predates city ownership of that section of the park, and it currently serves more than 700,000 people, so it's definitely a vital utility.
The reservoir is sited on property that was conveyed to the city in 1973 from federal ownership.
I know, I was there.
I was.
I was 12. We took over Daybreak Star.
Yeah, I was there.
Those were my activist days.
Okay, right on.
Yeah.
I want to be 60 Monday, so I think those days are over.
They're never over.
Barely beginning.
So King County will restore the site.
There'll be trail improvements.
Again, they're going to remove 26 trees.
We'll get 52.
Yes, Councilor Baxter has a question.
Richard, can you talk a little bit about the arborist involvement in this?
What kind of trees, size?
We know that if you take out 26 mature trees and you plant seedlings, we're behind.
what we're trying to accomplish.
Can you just talk a little bit about what the agreement is?
Right, so our requirements are the replacement trees are at least two inches in caliper, so they're not exactly seedlings.
They're, you know, good-sized trees in that sense.
As far as the species go, that would be something that our arborists would choose, because there may be too many trees to go back into the easement area, so some of those trees could be moved to another part of the park, and that might be, you know, a different species than what was there before.
J.R., did you have something you were going to add?
You were leaning towards the microphone.
No, we actually have a plant palette that we've been working with Seattle Parks and Recreation on.
We would choose from that palette itself.
Great.
Richard, one of the points you just made I think is a good one, which is we may not plant exactly at the easement if there's a pipe underneath.
It may be a root issue.
It would give us a chance to reforest other areas at the point.
Great.
when you've got the final plan, maybe you could come back to the committee or just send us a note and provide us what it's going to look like.
Okay.
We'll want to see pictures.
Okay, we'll get you some pictures.
Fine.
Thank you.
So again, the new planting vegetation will be all native plants as Discovery Park is a natural park and it is being restored with natural planting.
The appraisal of the pipeline again was completed December 2018. And it's just been a great coordinated effort between King County and ourselves to get to this point.
Thank you.
So now we have some pictures.
So we have the existing structure and on the very left is the actual portal to the existing reservoir and to the right of that is what is going to be the new structure, and I would, you know, say that it's an improvement if nothing else.
Below we have the existing conditions for pre-construction.
And to the right of that is the post-construction and planting.
So, again, the pipeline is shown, but it will be buried, and so will the hatches.
There is a terminus.
It's a diffuser at the very end, and that will be covered with some type of either rock or whatever.
And, you know, hopefully most park users won't even see it or know it exists.
I think Council Member Gonzalez has a question.
I do not.
She liked the deer.
The deer?
She's noticing a little shadow image.
They'll love the pipeline.
So King County was really rigorous in her public notification.
I mean, I'm not going to even go through all of the things they did.
No, don't.
We remember.
Don't.
But one of the main things.
Just know that we did it.
Let the world know.
We did it.
Yeah, they did reach out to Daybreak Star as well, and also Friends of Discovery Park and so forth.
So there was quite an outreach with this.
Right, and Daybreak Star has been, in the last decade, replanting indigenous plants there, which has been phenomenal.
Actually, longer than that, after we lost Bernie White Bear, that was one of the things that he asked us to do that we did.
So thank you.
Yeah.
Okay.
So we had some key questions that were asked at a community meeting that was held at the Discovery Park Community Center.
First of all, they asked how deep would this overflow pipeline be, and again, it's 15 feet in places.
How is the pipe's alignment selected?
So that was based on a technical study and survey.
And they were careful to avoid as many big trees as possible.
And also, of course, to follow, you know, what would be a natural alignment topographically so you would get a good flow.
And then how will construction impact the loop trail and the newly established Capehart Trail?
King County is going to keep both trails open, they'll have flaggers, and park users will be able to continue enjoying the park.
Questions?
One thing I do have to mention is that there is a proposed amendment to one of the attachments, and it's to the easement agreement itself.
I think Tracy is going to speak to that.
The earthquake amendment, the liability act of God amendment.
Exactly.
That was something that I had agreed and our attorney had looked at and we agreed to remove that.
But for some reason that version got into the system and I take responsibility for that.
So the amendment would be section 4. We're taking out, if you look at Section 4, so we're taking out or impacted by an act of nature, including seismic events, fire, acts of vandalism, or civil unrest, obsolescence, or change in code specific herein.
We do have some of that still in this, but as far as acts of God and seismic events.
Yeah, they don't say acts of God anymore.
They say acts of nature.
Us lawyers know that was in every act of God.
And the other change, and it's a very minor one, would be on the following page.
So it's under number five, and we had to correct the exhibits from A to B and from B to C.
Okay well we have the amendments in front of us and I'll let Tracy speak to them when you're done and then we'll move forward.
Okay thank you.
I think he's done.
The only other change is there was a an accuracy on one of the exhibits that had it as a exhibit B and it was really exhibit C so we've corrected that as well on exhibit C.
So in addition to what he just talked about that's the only other change.
Okay.
Is there any questions from my colleagues?
No.
Is this even the county?
No?
You're good?
Okay, so what we'll do then is we'll vote on the amendment first.
We have to move version 2a of the attachment.
Okay, so yeah, so does the, Nagin does that?
No, you do that.
Well, that's what I was just going to do.
I'm so sorry.
I was speaking ahead of you.
Yeah, so yeah, I move for Go for it to amend the v2a correct.
Yes.
Okay.
That's what's getting ready.
Thank you Yeah, I was trying to do that Okay, got out all those in favor of you Okay.
Well, there you go.
It the amendment now passes.
So now we will as amended Now we will I will move the committee pass council bill one one nine five six nine as amended All those in favor say aye.
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You're the man.
This is our favorite one.
Been working a long time on this one.
Okay, so we did RSJI, we did Discovery.
Why don't I have a sheet for this one?
Oh, we do.
Okay, go ahead, Nikki.
Read this one into the record.
Item four, Council Bill 119570, an ordinance relating to Seattle Parks and Recreation authorizing the acquisition of real property commonly known as 2318 Northeast 125th Street, authorizing acceptance and recording of the deed for open space, park, and recreation purposes, and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts.
Okay, so this is what we're very excited about so I'm gonna let you guys introduce yourselves and we'll move forward I'm Dave Leclerc.
I work.
I'm a planner for drainage and wastewater within SPU Chip Nevins, Seattle Parks and Recreation.
Oh Thank you.
We are also very excited about this and you gave such a great introduction about it I'm not sure I have to do much more you do Anyway, this is this is an awesome project in many levels that I'm excited to tell you about and It's about a one-acre property.
It's on the north branch of Thornton Creek.
It's located at Northeast 125th and 23rd Avenue Northeast.
And it's been owned by the same owners for about 45 years.
The north branch goes right through the property.
Most of the property is actually in the floodplain.
And it looks like a park.
It looks like a pastoral park.
And a matter of fact, when we were talking to the owners, they remember when they bought it, and they were a young couple, that all the neighbors would come over and picnic alongside the creek.
And so they are super excited about it being protected for the public.
I mean, as you know and said earlier, Thornton Creek is a wonderful resource.
It's a priority for the City of Seattle, for the Parks Department, for SPU.
It's got the highest fish diversity in the city, and we have spent decades protecting the stream.
Most of our protection has been on the South Branch.
where we actually, the city has over 50% of the stream in public ownership, which is awesome.
This is a great opportunity because it allows us to start protecting more on the north branch.
And I will let David speak a little bit about what's so great about the north branch.
But we have on one end, we have Jackson Golf Course, which has Storm Creek, the north branch, going through it.
And then we have a little piece of property at the intersection of Lake City Way and the North Branch.
And other than that, there's a lot of large ownerships not dissimilar to this one with the creek running through there.
So there's lots of opportunities on the North Branch.
And this is an obvious place to start for a lot of reasons.
I just want to share one thing, though.
Two things.
Like I said, I've been driving by that property for over 30 years.
It's about seven blocks from my house.
But second of all, you guys have done a great job, as well as Parks, and I'll do the thank yous again, not only for the North Fork, but for the South Fork.
And the South Fork is what got daylighted by the Thornton Creek Alliance folks, which is great.
That's where Thornton Creek and Northgate and all that density is happening there.
Phenomenally protecting that.
SPDU has done a great job.
with the beaver pond and putting in those, I don't know what they're called, swells, you know what I'm talking about?
Beers, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
And so this, but the north fork of Thornton Creek is still very pristine, and it's still salmon bearing.
And I don't think people realize that.
And it's a major watershed that comes out of the, up by the golf course.
And so everybody, this is like a really big deal for everybody.
Everybody's been, because we went and looked at the property like three times.
So I know Council Member Baxhaw wants to say something.
I just want to get a location, 125th to 323rd.
Is that close to the library?
It's west of the library.
So it's a couple, it's about, it's about three or four blocks west of the library.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Thanks.
So, we've, I mean, this project's been going on for quite a while.
I think, actually, it started last summer when Councilmember Dabrowski was interested, and the community was interested, and, you know, went back and forth.
And ultimately, it made the best sense as a partnership, and that's why we're really excited, because we didn't have any other ownership around here.
But we had done projects in the South Branch in partnership with SPU that were very successful.
The Kingfisher is the one that comes to mind.
And so that ability to do another project like that was exciting.
And so that's really when we finally realized that it met both of our goals and got the go-ahead from both departments, that's where it really seemed to move forward.
I have a signed purchase and sell agreement for $1,050,000.
It's 0.9 acres.
It's got two structures on it, one main house and one carport slash apartment.
Both of those will be demolished after after we acquire the property, and then I'll let David speak a little bit about SPU's plans.
We are scheduled to close sometime before September 15th.
They have been, I think I mentioned this earlier in discussions with you all, they're in their mid-90s, and so they are eager to get this closed just to make sure they can see it happen.
We'll try to accommodate that.
And we are right now with SPU working on the MOA that will kind of define roles and responsibilities both now and moving into the future.
When do you think the MOA will come about?
When will it?
or just you don't have to give me exact date.
So we are actually hoping to get it mostly finished before the closing.
So I think we've got a pretty good draft.
I can let David speak to where it is in SPUs.
Let's let him do his thing.
This is a little bit about going down.
But a number of years ago, when we were looking at Magnuson Park and the Seattle Conservation Service, there had been some questions raised about when we buy a piece of property like this that actually has a house on it that's habitable, whether or not it could remain as sort of a caretaker's house, a manager's house.
Has there been any conversation around that, just preserving four more units of places for people to live?
We actually we've had we had quite a number of discussions both with the community and with Nonprofits like dirt core and plan amnesty about reuse of that building Because it's would take so much to upgrade it code wise for city use it really financially doesn't make sense in addition As you probably know this parks is not great at managing auxiliary buildings and so our preference would be to to manage it as a natural area and
And thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you.
That's a good question, because we did examine that.
And that house was built in the 50s.
And there's asbestos.
I mean, there's just not.
What you could build in the 50s with no EPA, no SEPA, none of that stuff, EISs, that would never have gotten built today.
It's directly in the floodplain, too.
So I mean, the idea of investing a lot of money and rehabbing something that's- I'm convinced.
Thank you.
OK.
I'll let you go ahead and do your puzzle.
You could.
You could.
We'll come see you.
I don't know if you want to.
Why don't you go ahead?
Sure, so again, Dave LeClerc, SPU.
I manage a program that's focused on green infrastructure in urban villages, and really an emphasis of this is upgrading drainage and wastewater systems in and around our densest neighborhoods, and in particular doing it in a way that provides additional community benefits, and ideally through partnerships.
So this really, this is an ideal project for us in many ways.
In terms of near-term SPU interests in this site, I think because it is such a large site with the creek channel moving through it, it really creates a great opportunity for us to do floodplain restoration.
It's not a terribly degraded site, but the channel is definitely cut down below the floodplain, and so this project gives us the opportunity to widen the creek channel.
restore some of that natural floodplain function, and that decreases downstream flood risks.
It also really produces some good water quality benefits downstream.
So that's, in the next couple of years, that's what we're excited about pursuing here.
Longer term, it puts us in a good position to do culvert work.
The culvert that goes under 125th Street is undersized.
It presents a fish passage barrier.
Eventually we're going to need to repair that culvert.
That's a much bigger, more expensive project.
But it's much you're gonna have to repair what the the culvert where the creek passes underneath 125th Street Okay down down the road It's not it's not in the on the top short list of culverts that need to be replaced but it will need to happen eventually and by If we have control of this site and manage this site makes it a lot easier for us to do that culvert work in the future We're also excited about this.
I'm really echoing a lot of what Chip said already, but we're excited about this as an opportunity to partner with Parks.
We see a lot of potential going forward for projects co-acquiring, co-developing sites between Parks and SPU.
And this is a nice, relatively straightforward project that has clear win-win benefits for both of our departments.
Finally, as a community-centered utility, we're really interested in how all of our projects line up with priorities that we already have heard from the community.
We know that from past planning work in Lake City, people are very proud of the creek.
People want more visibility of the creek and more access to the creek.
So we know that this lines up with things that neighbors have already said that they want.
And we also know that this could present a really good opportunity for partnering with different local organizations, including Little Brook Youth Corps or Midsound Fishery Enhancement Group.
There are a number of partners that we hope that we can bring into the process of restoring this site.
We're also talking to FutureWise.
Were we talking to them about that?
No, I haven't spoken to FutureWise.
I have spoken with DirtCorps who would really like to use it as a training ground for some of their interns.
Right, because the access points for the North Fork are pretty limited.
Yeah.
Okay.
Anything else?
Do we envision a partial transfer of jurisdiction on this one and eventually give it a name?
Thank you for bringing that up.
So the MOA, so right now this is going to parks jurisdiction because we are putting in all, we're putting in the funding right now.
The expectation is that through the MOU that SPU will be providing their share of funding down the line.
And depending upon what type of funding they use and whether they need to actually have property rights or not, we may come back and do a partial transfer of jurisdiction of the stream bed.
of the up to the high watermark for them.
We just don't know what that looks like right now.
But it is the intention so that if we come back, we should not have to deal with I-42 or anything because we bought this with the explicit intention of potentially transferring some of the rights to SPU.
It will maintain its use and function?
Correct.
Did we get clarity on where the money is coming from?
Right now the money is 50% conservation futures funding, King County conservation futures and 50% park district funding.
I will say that when I took the Oversight Committee for the Conservation Futures out on a safe visit, they loved this property.
They just couldn't believe that we still had properties like this, and so it was kind of reaffirming that this is worth protecting.
So with that, I just want to share quickly, and then we'll close out here, thanking SPU, thanking you guys, and Parks, and a really big shout out to Councilmember Dabowski, our council president now, who helped secure the funds and worked with us in our office, and Parks, and SPU, and the county.
That was, and I, we texted today, and I told him I wanted to give him a big thank you.
This is a good example where when we work with the county on preserving these type of lands, it really makes a difference in our 46 state delegation.
Senator Frock and Senator, I was going to say Senator Javier, Representative Valdez and Representative Paulette were all involved as well.
So I want to make sure we thank those folks as well.
And of course the Thornton Clicker Alliance, they've been around for about 30 years.
I could be wrong on that because they did the daylighting of the South Fork, which was a big deal.
And so anyway, I'm excited to take the vote on this.
Is there anything else for my colleagues?
Thank you.
Okay.
All right.
I move the committee pass Council Bill 119570. Second.
The motion has been made and seconded.
All those in favor, say aye.
Aye.
Those opposed, say no.
The ayes have it.
This will go in front of the full council on Monday.
So thank you very much.
Congratulations, and thank you for all your hard work.
Thank you very much.
OK.
So before you run off, let me get ready to do my little adjournment speech.
OK.
The next meeting of the Civic Development, Public Assets, and Native Communities Committee will be a special meeting scheduled for Wednesday, July 31 at 12 PM.
With that, we stand adjourned.
Thank you.