Seattle City Council 8/10/2020

All right, thank you so much.

The August 10th, 2020 meeting of the Seattle City Council will come to order.

It is 2.01 PM.

I'm Lorena Gonzalez, president of the council.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Peterson.

Here.

Sawant.

Here.

Strauss.

Present.

Juarez.

I'm, excuse me, no Juarez.

Herbold.

Here.

Lewis.

Present.

Morales.

Mosqueda?

Here.

President Gonzalez?

Here.

Seven present.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Colleagues, as I mentioned just briefly moments ago in the Select Budget Committee, we will need to take a little bit more time before we begin today's meeting in order to provide both our clerk staff, other legislative staff, and our council central staff Um, the time necessary in order to process all of the amendatory work.

That just finished up and concluded close to 130 PM.

So they just need a little bit more time to be able to actually push things out into our legislature system, which is the public facing system that that.

I appreciate the public's and colleagues your patience in being an opportunity to do the administrative and process work necessary in order to make sure that the bills we are voting on this afternoon are reflective of the actions that we just took in our select budget committee.

So they have asked for a need for 45 minutes to be able to do that work.

So if there's no objection, this meeting of the full council will be in recess for 45 minutes.

Okay, colleagues, hearing no objection, this meeting is in recess until 2.45 p.m.

at that time.

I ask that all of you log back in at least five minutes before so we can get the meeting started right at 2.45.

We are in recess.

Thank you.

So let's go ahead and get the meeting started.

Thank you.

I see that we're now recording.

The August 10th, 2020 meeting of the Seattle City Council will come back to order.

It is 2.45 PM.

I'm Lorena Gonzalez, president of the council.

We're going to go ahead and do roll call one more time.

So I will ask the clerk, please call the roll.

Peterson.

Here.

DeWatt.

Here.

Strauss.

Present.

Herbold.

Here.

Lewis.

Present.

Morales.

Here.

Mosqueda.

Here.

President Gonzalez.

Here.

Eight present.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Presentations, I'm not aware of any presentations, so we will move to approval of the minutes.

The minutes of the City Council meetings of July 27th and August 3rd, 2020 have been reviewed.

If there is no objection, the minutes will be signed.

Hearing no objection, the minutes are being signed.

And I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the minutes.

I know that there will be an amendment made by Councilmember Lewis to the introduction and referral calendar.

We will go ahead and go through the process of putting the introduction and referral calendar before us in order for those amendments to occur first.

Thank you.

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

Council Member Lewis, I understand you have an amendment, so I will recognize you in order to allow you to move the amendment.

Thank you, Madam President.

I move that we amend the introduction and referral calendar by introducing Resolution 31962, entitled, A Resolution Relating to Policing and Public Safety.

establishing the council's intent to create a civilian-led department of community safety and violence prevention.

identifying actions in 2020 to remove certain functions from the Seattle Police Department, and provide funding for a community-led process to inform the structure and function of the new department, requesting modifications to policing practices, requesting reporting to the council, providing guidance on layoff decisions, and establishing a work program and timeline for creating a new department.

And by referring it to the city council for introduction and adoption, I would like to call the meeting to order.

I would like to call the meeting to order.

It's been moved and seconded to amend the introduction and referral calendar to introduce resolution 31962 for adoption at today's city council meeting after agenda item 11 and with councilmembers Herbold and Juarez listed as co-sponsors with councilmember Lewis.

Are there any comments on this proposed amendment to the introduction and referral calendar?

Hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the amendment?

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Aye.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

President Gonzalez.

Aye.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries.

The introduction and referral calendar is amended.

Are there any further comments on the amended introduction and referral calendar?

Hearing none, I'd ask that the clerk please call the roll on the amended introduction and referral calendar.

Peterson.

Aye.

DeWant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the introduction and referral calendar is adopted as amended.

We will move on to approval of the agenda.

If there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Colleagues, at this time, we are going to open up the remote public comment period for items on the city council agenda introduction and referral calendar and the council's 2020 work program.

I continue to thank everyone for their ongoing patience as we continue to learn to operate the system.

We are looking for ways to fine-tune this remote process and It remains the strong intent of the City Council to have public comment regularly included on meeting agendas.

However, the City Council reserves the right to end or eliminate these public comment periods at any point if we deem that the system is being abused or is no longer suitable for allowing our meetings to be conducted efficiently and in a manner in which we are able to conduct our necessary business.

I will moderate the public comment period for today in the following manner.

The public comment period for this meeting was scheduled to be 20 minutes.

We have quite a bit more public speakers than that.

So I'm going to go ahead and extend the public meeting in advance.

We have about, I'd say, 40 or so speakers.

So I think we can get through our public comment period in about an hour, but I'm going to go ahead and proactively say that we will hear public comment for up to 75 minutes to allow for transition time between each speaker.

I'll call on each speaker by name and in the order in which they registered on the council's website, each speaker will be given 60 seconds or one minute to provide us with their public comment.

If you have not yet registered to speak but would like to, you can sign up before the end of public comment by going to the council's website at seattle.gov forward slash council.

That's c-o-u-n-c-i-l.

The public comment link is also listed on today's agenda.

Once I call a speaker's name, staff will unmute the appropriate microphone and you will hear a tune that says you've been unmuted.

Each caller, nonetheless, this is new, so I need those who've registered to pay close attention to this direction.

If you are getting the cue of you have been unmuted, you now need to press star six to confirm that you have been unmuted when your name is called.

So I will not be able to hear you.

We will not be able to hear you.

unless and until you hit star six on your ends.

I'll make sure to remind folks periodically as we go through public comment so that folks understand what to do once their name is being called.

That's a change that was just included by the Zoom platform, not instituted by us unilaterally.

So just wanted to make sure folks were aware of that particular change to the Zoom platform.

Okay, please begin speaking by stating your name and the item that you are addressing.

As a reminder, public comment should relate to an item on today's agenda, the introduction referral calendar, or the council's 2020 work program.

Each speaker will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of the allotted time.

Once you hear that chime, I'd ask that you begin to wrap up your comments.

If speakers do not end their comments at the end of the allotted period of time, which is one minute, the speaker's microphone will be muted to allow us to call on the next speaker.

Once you have completed your public comment, I'd ask that you please disconnect from the line, and if you plan to continue following this meeting, please do so via Seattle Channel or the listening options listed on the agenda.

So public comment period is now open, and we will begin with the first speaker on the list.

Okay, the first speaker on today's list is Abby Brockman, followed by Joanna Bitton.

Please remember to hit star six.

Good morning.

My name is Abby Brockman District 4. I'm encouraging you to defund the police through the motions presented today.

The arguments have already been made so instead I want to frame this moment and the task before each of you for what I believe it to be.

That is an existential test.

To use the words of Jewish philosopher Martin Buber.

By this he means a crucial experience that tries not only one one's response to a given challenge but also the entire structure of values and beliefs upon which one's life is based.

In this way, it is self-confrontational and life-evaluating, holding implications for one's total existence by revealing unsuspected reservoirs of strength and courage or uncovering hypocrisy and fear.

A person or a nation can undergo this test, and we are today.

So please pass the amendment supporting defunding the police for the sake of our most marginalized and terrorized communities, as well as your own highest conscience.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Joanna Bitton followed by Andrea Diaz.

Hi, I'm Joanna Bitton and I'm from District 7. I am asking all City Council members to stand on the right side of history and to commit to defunding the police by $3.1 million or more this year and to commit to firing the top 100 officers with the most excessive use of force complaints rather than firing by seniority and removing the horse cops first.

That's an insult to me and everyone in Seattle that has been fighting for this including Charlene Alliles Sean Fierce and Shae Taylor's families.

Additionally I am asking you all to commit to defunding the police by 50 percent in 2021 at least and not just 41 percent.

You are all either lawyers or have access to them.

I believe in your abilities to find loopholes in this FOG contract contract in order to meet our demands.

If Black Lives Matter prove it.

Do the hard work and fight for us.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Andrea Diaz, followed by Brian Clark.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Andrea Diaz and I live in District 4. I'm here to urge council members to defend the police by 50%.

We know that since the 80s, the U.S. has overfunded the criminal punishment system in an effort to combat the increase in crime, despite the fact that in order to combat crime, we must commit to a long-term investment in communities, not in the police, as the Seattle community has been demanding for months now.

We cannot allow SPD to continue to have more funds than education, housing, and health care.

You represent the citizens of Seattle, and this is what we are asking for.

please defund the police by 50% and invest the remainder of that budget to BIPOC community.

Alex Peterson, I am your constituent and I urge you to publicly support defunding, not demilitarizing the police by 50%.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Brian Clark followed by Charlotte Thistle.

Brian.

Hello, my name is Brian Clark.

I live in D6.

I'm calling to express support for defunding SPD and to express my frustration at this council.

While I commend the vast majority of this council for verbally committing to defund SPD by 50%, I'm disappointed that today's vote isn't a more aggressive first cut.

Yes, this is the first step in a long process, but please do not falter in that first step.

For example, it was infuriating to see you walk back some of Carmen Best's salary cuts this morning.

Best to spend the summer tear gassing neighborhoods violently brutalizing the community and making bad faith arguments that invite additional right wing extremist violence.

And yet you hesitate to cut her salary.

I'd also like to express my gratitude for the Daily Morning March and New March.

These organizers have been going to the trouble of visiting you in your own neighborhood.

And I've heard you say you're taking cues from community organizations like King County Equity Now and D-Crim Seattle.

I fully support these organizations and expect that you'll follow through on your commitment to their demand.

Defund SPD by at least 50 percent.

Invest in Black and Indigenous communities and release all protesters.

Black Lives Matter.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up is Charlotte Thistle followed by Mighty Delaney.

Hello can you hear me.

We can hear you.

My name is Charlotte Thistle and I live in the South Precinct.

One night four years ago a barrage of bullets hit my house and entered our living room missing my 4-year-old daughter by a few seconds and a few feet.

Less than a year later, I witnessed the murder of Mai Linh Nguyen, a mom who was shot to death in front of her own home two blocks from us by a mugger who wanted her purse.

Even though the South Precinct has 63% of the shots fired, we have only half the budget of the North Precinct.

If anything, our precinct needs more police funding, not less.

I also urge you to adopt a program called Cure Violence.

This program reduced gun violence in Chicago by 80% and could be included in your new Department of Community Safety and Violence Prevention for less than 1% of the current SPD budget.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Mighty Delaney, followed by Fanesha Zane.

Hello.

Hello, my name is Marty Delaney.

First, I just wanted to point out, Council President, that the last time I called in, you said you would get up with me afterwards, and you never did.

And you also misgendered me, and that's destroying.

And for the rest of y'all, it seems y'all clearly don't understand the meaning of 50% at least.

And just bless y'all's hearts.

I yield my time.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Fanesha Zhang and then Joe Kunzler.

Can you all hear me?

We can hear you now.

Go ahead.

Okay.

Hi everyone.

My name is Tina Khan.

I'm a resident District 6. I work at Solid Ground and I'm a board member of Hunger Prevention Program and I'm calling to urge the council to uphold the Budget Committee decision to defund SPD's remaining 2020 funds in today's vote and specifically keep the shift of police executive pay cuts towards community services.

As I'm seeing in my own roles in the human social service world it's essential that we start acting now.

For example back in April we saw that the online application for rental assistance had to be closed within two hours of opening because of the sheer volume of demand.

We're seeing unprecedented demand for food support with school closures and now we're coming up on the end of the unemployment boost.

So now more than ever our city and our BIPOC communities need resources and support and not costly policing.

So I hope you all put your pledges to action in the amended 2020 2020 budget.

This is our first step.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Joe Kunstler followed by Katie Roberts.

Council President, thank you for having me on today.

I will be a couple of subjects today.

The main thing is the resolution to protect journalists.

I am on friendly terms with some of the independent journalists that signed the letter to your office today.

and it's publishing the urbanist independent journalist urged city to drop media subpoenas aimed at punishing protesters.

I call upon you to demand that Chief Best drop the subpoena.

If that means paying her her full wage, you pay her her full wage.

Drop that subpoena, please.

One last thing.

Is Dan Strauss for sale?

Because I sure saw a Spogs ad that he said one thing last year, and once Heidi Wills stopped the Ironman train and got whacked for it, He's now councilman and what the heck is going on down there in Ballard because this is hurting all of us in the wheelswing really bad.

Please support the cops.

You can support journalists and you can support cops.

And I don't think there should be any difference between the two because I think journalists help keep cops accountable.

And I think we need to reimagine law enforcement in the longterm as well.

Please.

Thank you so much for listening today.

I'm sorry.

Okay next up is Katie Roberts followed by Kelsey Montgomery.

Hi my name is Katie Roberts and I'm calling from District 6. I'm calling on council members today to be accountable to the commitment to defund SPD by 50 percent and uphold the Budget Committee decision.

Our Black and Brown community members are counting on you to listen to the Seattle community.

Furthermore these community groups such as King County Equity Now and Decriminalize Seattle should be at the table for further discussions.

We are a model for the country and right now we need bold leaders.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Kelsey Montgomery followed by Ashley Meyer.

Hi my name is Kelsey Montgomery and I'm a resident of Seattle District 2. Thank you for passing Amendment 47 of Council Bill 119825 to hold SPD accountable for dollars spent.

This amendment is a first step towards accountability and fiscal transparency, especially around the use of overtime hours and equipment purchases in 2020. SPD holds the largest budget of any city department.

Please continue to hold SPD accountable as we move forward in September with the 2021 budget plan.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Ashley Meyer followed by Thomas Moriarty.

Hi, my name is Ashley Meyer and I'm calling to demand City Council not defund SPD by 50%.

Recent polls show that only 32% support your reckless plan to defund SPD by half.

How can you say you are acting in the interest of the majority if polls show otherwise?

You need to put your political agendas aside and act in the best interest of the people and the city.

All Seattle residents and workers deserve to feel safe.

By decreasing our already understaffed department, you are putting people at risk.

Cutting 100 to 800 of our newest police officers also gets rid of our most diverse and best trained officers.

As much as Herbold likes to say you can make cuts based on race, that is illegal and cannot happen.

Chief Best is trusted by your residents, while restricted by your officers and mayor, and a knowledgeable resource for you to rely on while re-envisioning the police department's role in Seattle public safety.

Please include her in your meetings and examinations, not just her, quote, voice.

As Council Member Mosqueda likes to say, defend, not defund SPD.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Thomas, followed by Gina Bourgeois.

Thomas, are you on?

Can you hear me now?

We can hear you.

There you go.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

My name is Thomas Moriarty and I'm in District Number One.

I'm calling referring to Resolution Number 31962 introduced and sponsored by Council Member Lewis.

I'm proud to be a resident of Seattle where we're leading the way towards new approaches to ensure public safety and accomplish police reform.

Reinventing public safety is a daunting task that will require research data and creative approaches including two million dollars of research funding Amendment 32 For decriminalized Seattle to lay the groundwork for sensible structural changes to reduce racial disparities will improve the safety of all Seattle residents.

While not perfect the 2020 budget revisions proposed by the City Council are a major step forward toward improved safety and prosperity for all residents.

I plan to reward the progressive members of the council with my vote campaign contributions and grassroots support in future elections.

Thank you and I yield back my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Gina, followed by Lauren Peterson.

My name is Gina Bourgeois.

Can you hear me?

We can hear you.

Oh, Gina, there you go.

Now we can hear you.

We started your time over.

My name is Gina Bourgeois.

I'm a Ballard resident in District 6, and I'm speaking only for myself.

With regard to the budgeting for community safety and SPD, I personally am not interested in a slogan, a number, or an ideology.

I'm heartened by some of your recent steps, but what I really want to see and I think what Seattle needs is a concrete, comprehensive plan with defined outcomes for community safety, health, and vibrancy.

What does it mean for a community to be safe, healthy, and vibrant?

What's the needed infrastructure and resources?

What's the timeline specifics?

What are the quantifiable measures for progress What are the risks and mitigation strategies for the plan?

Who's going to be responsible for decision making and accountable?

And however well-meaning nibbling around the edges with incremental fragmented steps with some money here and some money there isn't a plan.

I want you to collaborate with the mayor, the police chief, and the most effective communities.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in Gina.

Next up is Lauren Peterson followed by Tobin Holliday.

Hello my name is Lauren Peterson and I have lived in the Seattle area my entire life.

Due to the systematic abuse of the BIPOC communities I demand the City Council to fund SPD by at least 50 percent for both the 2020 and 2021 budget.

That those funds taken from SPD be invested directly into BIPOC communities.

That all protesters are released without charges and harassment.

The immediate shutdown of the youth jail not in five years.

And finally Mayor Jenny Durkin and Police Chief Best resign and are held accountable for using illegal war tactics on peaceful protesters.

Black Lives Matter, thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Tobin followed by Sarah Geiger.

Hello, my name is Tobin and I am a resident of District 3. I am calling to urge the City Council to follow through with their commitment to defund SPD by 50%.

Thank you to Kshama Sawant for being the only council member to listen to the demands of Seattle citizens.

I'm calling in support of defunding SPD's budget by 50 percent now for the rest of the year and 50 percent for the entirety of next year.

To invest that money in Black and Indigenous communities to actually end the sweeps and house the peeps.

No nudity jail right now.

Not in five years.

Drop the lawsuits and drop all charges against protesters.

Abolish SPD.

Cut ties with — cut SPD's ties with the Israeli military, demilitarize SPD, and to hold Chief Best accountable for using her platform to spread lies and fear about the everyday Marching Sonja Homish, the CHOPs, SACHAs, and the SBOG contracts.

Her blatant lies and propaganda directly resulted in drawing national attention and drew in white supremacists to a Seattle who attacked BIPOC women and LGBT —

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Sarah followed by Howard Gail.

Hi my name is Sarah and I live in District 3. I believe defunding SPD and reinvesting in our Black community is necessary because time and time again the citizens of Seattle have seen a pattern of escalation police brutality and negligence from the Seattle Police Department and the shirking of any responsibility relating to these criminal acts.

So please meet the demands put forward by Decriminalize Seattle and King County Equity Now to defund SPD by 50 percent by voting to reinvest in community-based solutions to health and safety.

Eliminate and transfer SPD functions and reduce SPD's budget across the board.

Divest from SPD.

Reinvest into Black communities.

Release all the protesters.

No new youth jail.

Recall Jenny Durkin.

Black Lives Matter.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you so much.

Next up is Howard Gale followed by Catherine Campbell.

Hi this is Howard Gale from Lower Queen Anne District 7 speaking on defunding the SPD.

Last Friday the Seattle Times reported on a protester with epilepsy who was subjected to ridicule and severe abuse by the Seattle police including her being denied her necessary medication while suffering repeated seizures.

I counted at least 13 police officers who participated or witnessed in this abuse, all of whom should, of course, be fired.

This further highlights the abject failure of seven years of supposed police reform, including our supposed reform system.

So yes, we need to defund SPD by 50%, but we also need to recognize the failure of our Community Police Commission, along with the Office of Police Accountability and the Office of Inspector General.

We need to reallocate the over $9 million spent on these failed reform entities and create a real system for public accountability for police.

We need a truly public accountability system.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Catherine Campbell, followed by Christina Nylander.

Hi my name is Catherine Campbell and I am a resident of District 6. I am commenting today to echo others here in support of Decriminalize Seattle's proposal to defund SPD by at least 50 percent.

I want to emphasize that this is not 4 percent not 41 percent at least 50 percent.

The well-researched proposal is not a suggestion but an evidence-backed plan.

Police reforms consistently fail to protect Black lives as evidenced here in Seattle and policing directly puts BIPOC lives at risk.

The current proposal being discussed and the many walkbacks by many of the council members represent a commitment to protecting the institutions that enable and support racist policing.

The time is now, particularly to you, Dan Strauss, to vote to defund SPD by at least 50%, to reallocate those funds to community-led health and safety systems, and to release protesters arrested during these uprisings without charges.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Christina.

followed by Catherine Dawson.

Hi, my name is Christina Neelander and I'm with the Working Families Party here in King County and we've endorsed King County Equity Now's four-point plan.

Thank you so much for your progress so far, but we need you to go much farther, including moving forward with executive pay cuts.

SPD has not demonstrated any interest in community accountability and the evidence of their brutality is so abundant at this point that it's sick.

There still has been no inquest in Charlena Lyle's murder that happened over three years ago because of the strategic lawsuits that stalled any opportunity for justice.

Her killers are still on the force.

People are chanting her name wearing swimming goggles and using umbrellas as makeshift shields against the violence of cops in full riot gear.

Some I've seen carrying AK-47s openly.

When Seattle residents call for help, we need to fund better ways to help them, not the violent institution that is SPD.

They are not reformable.

Please follow the lead of King County Equity Now and Decrim Seattle to implement a public safety model that centers Black and Brown working-class communities' needs first.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you for calling.

Next up is Catherine Dawson, followed by Cassandra Leung.

Hi, my name is Catherine Dawson, District 3 renter, calling to support defunding SPD by at least 50% and investing that money in black communities.

Thank you for voting to cap executive police pay, please keep that, and eliminate the navigation team.

Thank you, Councilmember Sawant, for proposing a real 50% defund amendment and protester amnesty.

Many Councilmembers assert they agree in principle with defunding SPD, but they defensively point to the challenges when proposing watered-down legislation.

Of course, it's hard.

We need you to fight.

The defund amendments put forward by members Mosqueda, Morales, Gonzalez, and Strauss do not meet the movement's demands.

Last week, many of you backtracked on cutting officers to defund SPD.

We've always known defunding involves laying off officers, and we've always known Scott would fight.

If you've spent this process agreeing in principle, but vote no, then you better fight like hell to defund by 50%, not 41% in 2021. We need actions, not words.

Defund the police by 50%, working towards abolition, no new youth jail now, and stop the sweep, also protect Jumpstart.

Thank you, bye.

Next up is Cassandra Leon, followed by Davida Briscoe.

Hi this is Cassandra Leon calling from District 6. Good afternoon everyone.

Like someone in this morning's public stated public comment stated if you don't vote for this budget I don't know who you're representing.

You need to stop giving SPD the equivalent of a blank check and hold them to a higher standard of accountability if they're expected to protect and serve the people of this city.

This budget vote isn't about people's about just money.

It's about people's lives and Seattle doesn't have a healthy future ahead of it if SPD continues to operate the way that it does.

So follow decriminalize Seattle's lead.

Cut the budget by at least 50 percent.

Invest in the community and drop all charges against the protesters and free them immediately.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Next up is Devita followed by Joshua Ryder.

Go ahead Devita.

Hello.

Hi my name is Devita Briscoe.

I'm the assistant director for Not This Time.

No one in this city has been harmed by SPD more than me.

SPD is directly responsible for perjured testimony that sent my twin brother Devon Dorsey to prison to serve a 48 year sentence as well as the shooting death of my brother Shay Taylor.

Since my brother's death I have worked tirelessly to push initiative 940 that would hold officers accountable and improve police community dynamics.

I'm a mother that is not only concerned about police violence but I'm also concerned about Black children being gunned down in our neighborhoods.

I agree SPD has committed historical harms against Black and Brown communities but I must also emphasize that for me SPD has been both an oppressor and a protector.

I had access to immediate safety through SPD in 2004 when I was strangled raped and kidnapped by my own husband.

As we critique the police budget, we must do so without increasing harm to Black women and children who are most at risk of being sexually exploited, trafficked, and victims of senseless gun violence.

Data from King County Prosecutor's Office reports that 44% of child trafficking victims are Black girls.

Thank you for calling in, Davida.

I'm sorry we weren't able to hear the rest of your comments.

Joshua Ryder, followed by Sean Riccio.

Hey my name is Josh Ryder.

I'm a Seattle resident living in District 6. I want to encourage the council to continue to move forward in the direction of defunding SPD by 50 percent and allocating those funds to BIPOC communities.

I'm aware that 2020 has some challenges like SPA contracts and a consent decree but the council should work towards coming as close to that 50 percent mark as possible this year.

In 2020 I demand and fully expect the council to defund SPD the full 50 percent to roughly 200 million dollars.

Throughout this process, I urge the council to heed the advice and direction of Black-led community organizations like King County Equity Now, Decriminalize Seattle, Trans Women of Color Solidarity Network, Creative Justice as well.

All of those funds that are freed up from cuts need to be allocated to serving BIPOC communities through education, housing, and health services.

I think the direction of defunding the navigation team and capping salaries are a good start.

I want to remind the council that the average teacher's salary is $64,000 and requires a master's degree.

I yield my time.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Sean followed by Ashok Chandwani.

Hello, my name is Sean Richie.

Oh, I'm a resident in District four.

I believe that passing the four point plan provided by King County equity now is really only the beginning.

The world, the nation, our city are facing unprecedented crises in terms of public health, our economy, and frankly, paying for that.

The money has to come from somewhere.

The city can decide now whether or not they will answer these problems with an open hand or closed fists.

Continue the work of defunding the police so that we can create a civilized, livable city and country for everyone.

Thank you.

I yield my time.

Next up is Ashok, followed by Eric Salinger.

Do we have Ashok on the line?

Ashok is on the line, but he's still muted himself.

Okay, just callers, remember to hit star six.

Ashok, go ahead and hit star six on your phone, and I think we'll then be able to hear you.

Okay, am I coming through now?

We can hear you now, go for it.

Thank you so much.

My name is Ashok Chandwani.

I'm a homeowner in District 2 and a member of the 37th Legislative District Democrats.

Both myself and the 37th Legislative District Democrats would like to see the city defund SPD by 50% because, I mean, to me, reducing the number of people running around the city with illegal chemical weapons, guns, and qualified immunity sounds like a pretty big public safety win.

But further, I think it's very important that we invest that money in community, and specifically BIPOC community, because those are the people who the cops have historically harmed in the city.

Please, please follow through on implementing the decriminalized Seattle and King County Equity Now plan, rather than the more watered-down approach that is on the table now.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Eric Salinger, followed by Star Wiley.

Hi.

Can you guys hear me?

We can hear you, go ahead.

Yes, we can hear you.

Hi, my name is Eric Salinger.

I'm a resident in District 7 and I'm here to ask you to defund the SPD.

A lot of folks in power have been talking about oversight and accountability when officers do something wrong.

So last Wednesday, I called the SPD Public Information Office and asked what happened to the officer who pepper sprayed a 7-year-old child on May 30th.

I was informed that the officer who pepper sprayed someone actually sprayed someone near the child, and the child had a, quote, negative reaction, unquote, to the pepper spray that was, quote, in the air, unquote.

As a result, the officer in question would not be held responsible for the consequences of their actions.

If this is the kind of logic that the OPA uses, it'll be pretty hard to hold any police officer accountable for their actions against journalists, protesters, or even tear-gassing residents in their own homes, minding their own business.

So if the systems we set up won't hold police officers accountable for the consequences of their actions, then I'm asking the City Council to step up and defund the police.

If the police want a better relationship with the community, they need to own the consequences of their actions.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Star followed by Jazz English.

Hello, my name is I'm Star Willie and I live in District 7. I'm calling today in support of defunding the police by 50% in 2020 and 2021 and in support of the People's Budget Movement.

Please reinvest the money into Black communities and follow the four-point plan put forth by Decriminalize Seattle and King County at the now.

The safest communities don't have the most cops, they have the most resources, and reforms have proven not to work.

I yield my time.

Next up is Jazz English followed by Kelsey McGrath.

Go ahead Jazz.

You'll need to hit star six unmute yourself and then we'll be able to hear your voice.

Hello.

I hear you.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

My name is Jazz English.

I'm calling to demand that SPD be defunded by 50% and that everybody gets behind this vote.

We need this as a community.

I am tired of us being terrorized by essentially a militarized force using chemical weapons on us.

This is absolutely ridiculous.

Defund.

I yield my time.

Next up is Kelsey McGrath, followed by Sally Kincaid.

Hi, I'm Kelsey McGrath, renter in District 3. Council members, with the exception of Salant, these watered-down amendments are an insult to the people who have been brutalized, beaten, and wrongfully arrested by STD, both prior to and during this uprising.

Entire neighborhoods and families have been torn apart by SPD, not because of bad apples, but because the police function exactly as they were intended.

Protect the elite and maintain white supremacy.

Tens of thousands of Seattleites have taken to the streets demanding radical divestment from white supremacy.

Thousands have been brutalized in the process.

Have you forgotten the tear gas?

Have you forgotten how SPD threw bodies on the ground, dragged people across gravel, and put their knees on people's necks?

Have you forgotten Summer Taylor?

While people are on the streets putting everything on the line, you are wringing your hands and saying there's nothing you can do.

I'm horrified by your sudden lack of political will.

If unionized bus drivers can be let go with 25 days notice, the police officers can also be laid off.

The people are clear and the demands remain the same.

They defund SPD by 50%, invest in BIPOC communities, free the protesters.

Okay, next up is Sally Kincaid followed by James Donaldson.

Uh, are you up for, am I up Sally Kincaid?

Yep.

I can hear you.

Go ahead.

Okay.

Um, uh, I have heard when I've, uh, tuned into the city council time after time, after time, defund the police, you know, sweep it over to black programs.

That's all.

That's pretty much all I'm hearing.

So I just want to lend my voice to the other, the other side, you know, um, there's, There is actual criminal activity going on during those protests.

Did you know that?

Did you know there was more crime last night, that Starbucks was hit again, Amazon was hit again?

Did you know that if you don't pay attention to the fact that police have little power as it is, and you want to take more power away, there will be more lawlessness?

You're not paying attention to the reality of the situation in Seattle.

The reality is the fact that our city is boarded up, looks like Armageddon.

I have a whole lot more to say, but it's a little too frustrating to try to cram it in 45 seconds.

But there's a bigger majority out there that I hope

Thank you for calling in, Sally.

Feel free to send in your comments to the council at council at Seattle.gov.

That goes to all of the council members.

Happy to read through the remaining of your public comment.

Next up is James Donaldson, followed by Sarah Moran.

Yes.

Hey, my name is James Donaldson.

I am a longtime Seattle resident, African-American.

who has lived in Seattle for 40 years.

I am against defunding the police.

I think that the problems that we are having are really pertaining to the pent-up frustrations and emotions of the pandemic that's been going on the last six months, of course, capped off by the George Floyd murder, which was unjustified in any way you look at it.

But by defending the police, we are essentially giving a license to other bad elements of the society and communities to move in and stake out portions of the neighborhood that they will then try to control by intimidation or force.

Gangs will emerge and move in where the police are not present.

I think it's a slippery slope that we'll be getting on, and people will take handling.

It was into their own hands at that point.

So I yield my place.

Seattle needs more police officers, not less.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Sarah Moran, followed by Robert Troulette.

Hi, can you hear me?

We can hear you.

Go for it.

Hi, my name is Sarah Moran.

I'm from District 7. I'm asking you to commit to defunding the police by 50% at the very least by 2021. Chief Best and Mayor Durbin's performance and attempt to control the situation has been unacceptable.

Defending, defunding the police and investing in the community is the first step towards dismantling a racist system.

I also ask that when you begin layoffs for law enforcement officers, that you do so based on their prior and current performance and professional reputation and not by their seniority, which would be an ill-advised and retaliatory tactic.

We need to fundamentally change the way we take care of our BIPOC communities and all of our communities, but we also need to ensure that the officers that are left are the first and foremost community allies.

I appreciate the work of King County Equity Now, Kshama Savant, and Decriminalize Seattle, and I urge you to follow them.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in.

Next up is Robert Brouillette, followed by Mark Taylor Canfield.

Good afternoon.

Please let the voters of Seattle make these critical decisions regarding public safety.

The citizens should have a vote on how they are protected and the special interest groups should not be the ones forcing these changes by putting pressure on you to meet their demands.

Please take more time and design several options for change and present them to the public for a vote.

You'll then have the true representation of what the citizens want.

Be rational and not irresponsible, please.

Thank you.

Black lives do matter, and go Hawks.

Thank you so much.

Next up is Mark Taylor Canfield, followed by Susan Rubstello.

This is Mark Taylor Canfield.

I'm executive director and editor for Press Freedom for Democracy Watch News, a non-profit news organization covering democracy movements around the world.

I applaud the decision of the city to abide by the court order prohibiting the indiscriminate use of crowd control munitions on protests.

As a member of the media, I witnessed several very brutal arrests of protesters on Capitol Hill on July 25th.

I and other members of the media suffered from the blasphemy that chemical agents use.

I have always been interested in supporting a Seattle City Council resolution declaring Seattle a sanctuary city for journalists.

The U.S. is currently ranked 45th in the world in terms of press freedom by Reporters Without Borders.

On the 25th of July, I witnessed a militarized police force and a mayor and police chief who do not address the thousands of complaints versus the police department.

We've got to stop this scenario to assure public safety, freedom of assembly, and freedom of the press.

The scenario is this.

Heavily armed, militarized police used to face off with unarmed, mostly peaceful protesters.

It's got to stop.

People have a right to protest racism and police brutality.

Thank you.

Thank you for calling in today.

Next up is Susan Robstello.

Hello.

Are you there?

Go ahead, Susan.

We can hear you.

Good afternoon.

I am against the defunding of the police.

And I want to start with that.

What you're really talking about is the handling of the police department.

And it's an irresponsible proposal in Seattle where I am a resident.

It is nothing more than politicalization of current social events and to receive BIPOC votes.

You guys are giving in to mob rule and you have no plan.

This is unacceptable.

Thank you, Susan, for calling in.

That is our last speaker signed up for public comment.

I'm looking through the public comment pre-registration list one last time to confirm that.

And it does appear that that is our last speaker for today.

So I'm gonna go ahead and close out the public comment period.

And we will go ahead and move into items of business on today's agenda.

Okay, so give me just a minute, folks.

Pulling my script back up here.

Thank you so much for your patience.

Okay.

All right, payment of the bills.

Will the clerk please read the title into the record?

Council Bill 119843, appropriate in mind to paste audited claims for the week of July 27th, 2020 through July 31st, 2020, and ordering payment thorough.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I move to pass Council Bill 119843. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded that the bill pass.

Are there any comments on the bill?

Hearing and seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Mosqueda?

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Committee reports first up is the Select Budget Committee.

Will the clerk please read the short title of agenda item one into the record?

I reported the select budget committee agenda item one, Council Bill 119818, amending ordinance 26000, which adopted the 2020 budget, including the 2020 through 2025 capital improvement program.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

Council Members Mosqueda, Herbold, Gonzalez, Lewis, Morales, Peterson, Strauss in favor with Council Member Sawant opposed.

Thank you, Clerk.

Okay, folks, I am going to recognize Councilmember Mosqueda as Chair of the Select Budget Committee in order to provide the committee report.

Please.

Thank you, Madam President.

And if it pleases the President, may I make a quick statement to encompass all of the bills that are in front of us regarding the budget?

We have only read the first agenda item into the record related to the capital improvement programs, so we would need to read all of the budget.

I'll hold it.

Okay.

Thank you, Madam President.

That was not reflected.

Your intent to do that was not reflected in my script, so I think I would prefer if we go through it bill by bill.

And the first one is related strictly to capital improvement program budget actions for 2020.

Thank you, Madam President.

I don't have any additional comments on this.

Just to say this is one of many bills in front of us to rebalance our 2020 budget so that we are recognizing the restricted reserves that are in our hands and to do so with the values that this council has put forward over the last few months as we've taken on this budget.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda for those comments.

Are there any other comments on the first bill, which again is Council Bill 119818, related to the 2020 budget, including the 2020-25 Capital Improvement Program?

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you.

This is the first of several votes the City Council will take today to adopt the city's new budget as a whole.

The People's Budget Summer 2020 campaign, my office, Socialist Alternative, and certainly the hundreds of Black Lives Matter activists who have courageously marched on the streets and braved police violence have fought for and won many of the progressive amendments.

including a very small reduction to the Seattle Police Department.

And I will speak to that more on agenda item number 10 when those issues come up for a vote.

Unfortunately, as a whole, this city budget does not meet the needs of working class people or the communities specifically who have experienced disproportionately the violence from the police department.

On balance, the budget cuts tens of millions of dollars from the essential work of the city across departments like parks, roads and libraries rather than increase the Amazon tax on the wealthiest in our city in order to eliminate the need for austerity.

On balance, this budget continues to spend more of the city's discretionary funds on the police than on any other department.

In fact, this bill in item one includes $3 million in increases to the police budget as a result of grants from the United States Department of Homeland Security.

That is more than all the so-called defunding of the police budget department agreed to by the majority of the council combined.

I will reserve most of my comments about the budget for agenda item 10. Before that, I will be voting yes on the budget bills that simply accept grants or do other things unrelated to austerity, but I will be voting no on this bill and several other bills coming up that implement the austerity budget.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you very much.

I just wanted to make note that this bill includes attachment B.

Attachment B is the creation of a new capital improvement page for the Seattle Department of Transportation's West Seattle Bridge immediate response.

I just thank you to my colleagues for supporting me in bringing this forward.

It will be very useful to us as we discuss the Interfund loan that's proposed for some of the 2021 and 2020 costs for the West Seattle Bridge that we'll be hearing in Councilmember Peterson's committee very soon, as well as our upcoming September through November budget discussions.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold, and thank you so much for your ongoing advocacy related to that important infrastructure project for District 1 and the entire region.

Really appreciate it.

Colleagues, anyone else have any comments or questions on the bill?

Looks like no one else does, so I will let Councilmember Mosqueda, as the prime sponsor, have, and the chair of the committee, have the last word here, and then we'll go ahead and call the roll on this first bill.

Thank you very much, Madam President, and I recognize it's a long day, so I'll save my comments for the last bill as well.

Look, I just want to set the record straight about what we're doing today.

We have, as a council, come together as a collective to identify ways in which we can put our priorities, our values forward, and do so in a way that lifts up our commitment to being anti-austerity, anti-austerity in how we're responding to COVID.

in terms of caring for our most vulnerable and anti-austerity in terms of our commitment to raise progressive revenue.

That's what we've done over the last few months with this entire council coming together.

It's been a marathon.

It has been an incredibly long few months as we've worked together to identify ways that we could reflect community priorities from spearheading conversations about new taxes and new strategies to right size up our upside down tax system.

So thank you, Council Members Morales and Swatt.

To talking about making sure that there's additional funding for transportation, thank you much Council Member Peterson.

To making sure that there's economic recovery for businesses, Council Member Strauss, you've been leading on that.

To ensuring meaningful disinvestment from police, Council Member Herbold, thank you for helping to lead and get pen to paper on these amendments, and that we've effectively transferred those dollars to the right places.

Councilmember Lewis, you've been helping to ensure that we've been following through on where those dollars are going to making sure, finally, that we are doing the right thing and we are taking our time.

Councilmember Juarez has been critical in lifting up that voice, and guiding us in each and every step of the way has been Council President Gonzalez.

So I am proud of the package that's in front of us today.

We have not been asked often over the last few decades in this city to come together for a mid-year 2020 rebalancing package.

And as we've done so, we've tried to pull in your ideas to make sure that we're reflecting community priorities, but recognizing in just seven weeks, our fall budget process starts.

With that, thank you for all of the work that you've done, colleagues.

There is a series of amendments in front of us, but I just want to set the record straight.

On balance, we've rolled up our sleeves.

On balance, we've done some hard work.

And on balance, we're not just wringing our hands.

We're committing to actions here today.

So thank you, Council President.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda, for that framing.

Really appreciate it.

With that being said, colleagues, I'm going to ask the clerk to please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Peterson.

Aye.

DeWatts.

No.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Seven in favor, one opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it and I would ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, item number two.

Will the clerk please read the short title of agenda item two into the record?

Agenda item two, Council Bill 119819, authorizing in 2020 acceptance of funding from non-city sources.

The committee recommends that the bill pass.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Mosqueda, again, as sponsor of the bill and chair of the Budget Committee, you are recognized in order to address this item.

Thank you very much, Madam President.

Nothing much to add besides the robust conversations that we had during the committee.

I want to thank central staff for the robust analysis of where we could identify each and every dollar to help in this moment of crisis, both through the public health crisis and the economic crisis that's in front of them.

I appreciate all the work that they have put into it in addition to all of our council colleagues.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Mosqueda.

Any other comments on this bill?

Hearing none, I'd ask that the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Peterson.

Aye.

DeWant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Item number three.

Will the clerk please read agenda item three into the record?

agenda item three, Council Bill 119820, amending ordinance 12600, which adopted the 2020 budget, including the 2025 through 2025 capital improvement program.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Okay, Council Member Mosqueda, once again, as sponsor of the bill and chair of the committee, you are recognized in order to address agenda item three.

Thank you very much, Madam President.

As with a number of these bills, this is another attempt for us to look at carried forward The 2019 carry forward ordinance and appropriate the unexpended non-capital appropriations.

This is prudent for us to do in the time of crisis.

Appreciate the work of central staff and our teams.

Thank you so much.

Are there any other comments on the bill?

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

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

H in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Item number four.

Will the clerk please read agenda item four into the record?

agenda item 4, Council Bill 119821, which adopted the 2019 budget including 2019 through 2024 capital improvement program.

Can we recommend that the bill pass?

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Mosqueda, sponsor of the bill and chair of the committee, you are recognized in order to address this bill as well.

Thank you, Madam President.

Nothing to add in addition to the comments just I made on the previous bill as well.

Thank you so much.

Are there any other comments on the bill?

All right, hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

8 in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

And as of the clerk, please affix my signature to the legislation.

Item number five, will the clerk please read agenda item five into the record?

Agenda item five, resolution 31951, authorizing the exception to the level of general fund support to Seattle Park and Recreation due to exigent economic circumstances.

By three-fourths vote of the city council, the committee recommends that the resolution be adopted.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Mosqueda, as sponsor of the resolution, you are recognized in order to address this item.

Thank you, Madam President.

Nothing else to add to this one.

Thank you so much.

Are there any other comments on the resolution?

Did I see your hand, Council Member Salant?

Council Member Salant, please.

Sorry, this is agenda item five.

This one and the next one, agenda item six, lift the legally required minimum investment in the parks department and the Department of Transportation.

If this was being done purely as an accounting measure to swap different types of funds in order to allow the city to fund the best priorities, of course, I would be supporting this.

However, that is not the reality of this austerity budget.

The reality is this year the mayor has chosen to cut parks and roads rather than supporting the Amazon tax, let alone urging that the Amazon tax be increased so that austerity is averted.

When we were voting on the Amazon tax earlier this month, my office proposed an amendment to increase those big business taxes in a very small way to cover all budget shortfalls so that no austerity would be needed.

As I said, this could have been done with a very small increase in the Amazon tax paid for by the wealthiest who have been enjoying a tax haven in our city for years.

I will be voting no on this resolution which allows austerity in parks and the next council bill which allows austerity in the Department of majority of council members agreed with me and instead wanted to avoid austerity by increasing the taxes on big business, then of course I would be open to that at any time and would be happy to bring that forward at any time.

But at this moment, I will be voting no on austerity.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Any other comments on resolution 31951, agenda item number five?

Hearing and seeing none, I'd ask that the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the resolution.

Peterson.

Aye.

DeWant.

No.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Seven in favor, one opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The resolution is adopted and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf.

Okay, agenda item number six.

Will the clerk please read item six into the record?

Item 6, Council Bill 119822 relating to the 2020 budget, suspending the minimal annual general fund appropriation to the South Department of Transportation budget as required in Ordinance 124796, the levy to move Seattle and ratifying confirming search and prior acts, all by 3-4's vote of the City Council.

The committee recommends that the bill pass with Councilmembers Mosqueda, Herbold, Gonzalez, Juarez, Lewis, Morales, Peterson, and Strauss in favor, and Councilmember Sawant opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Mosqueda, as sponsor of the bill and chair of the committee, you are recognized in order to address agenda item number six.

Thank you, Madam President.

No comment, no additional comments on this, thank you.

Okay, thank you so much.

Any other comments, colleagues, on this particular bill?

Council Member Peterson, please.

It's just for the benefit of the viewing public.

If it looks like we're moving through these budget items really fast, it's because we talked about them at length this morning, last Wednesday.

And so I just want to take this moment to commend our budget chair, Teresa Mosqueda, for her leadership in shepherding this massive legislative package through the budget committee.

There was a lot of work.

from lots of people in city government, from the executive, city budget office, city council central staff.

And I just, it seems like we're moving fast, but there's lots of work that's been done.

So if folks want to see prior statements, they can look back to Wednesday or this morning, but right now we're ready to vote.

So thank you.

I assure the viewing public that there will be many words shared by probably every single council member towards the end of this committee hearing.

So we're, We're saving up our energy for the final big vote, consistent with what Council Member Peterson said.

These are non-controversial bills, relatively non-controversial bills that we have had almost 60 days worth of conversation about in the Select Budget Committee process.

But thank you for that flag, Council Member Peterson.

Okay, so we are now on agenda item six and seeing no additional comments from colleagues, I will ask the clerk call the roll on the passage.

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

No.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Sorry, aye.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Seven in favor, one opposed.

Thank you so much.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it and I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, agenda item seven.

Will the clerk please read agenda item number seven into the record?

Agenda item seven, Council Bill 119823 relating to the 2018 Families Education Preschool and Promise Levy, amending the levy implementation and evaluation plan adopted by Ordinance 125807 and ratifying confirming search and repair acts.

The committee recommends the bill pass.

Thank you so much, Madam Clerk.

I will now recognize Councilmember Mosqueda as sponsor of the bill and chair of the committee to address the item if necessary.

Thank you very much, Madam President.

Nothing to add at this point.

Thank you, Councilmember Mosqueda.

Are there any other comments on this bill?

Seeing and hearing none, I'd ask that the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Peterson?

Aye.

So what.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbal.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you madam clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf.

Okay folks, agenda item eight.

Will the clerk please read agenda item eight into the record?

resolution 31952 adopting revised financial policies for the cumulative reserve sub fund of the general fund and receiving attachment B to resolution 31848. The committee recommends that the resolution be adopted as amended.

That is quite all right.

Councilmember Herbold, please.

Well, thank you.

I just wanted to lift up another important element related to the West Seattle Bridge of our budget actions today, specifically in this resolution.

This particular resolution, among other things, adopts financial policies for the use of REIT, a real estate excise tax, and specifies that REIT can be used to fund debt associated with repair or replacing the West Seattle Bridge.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold.

Any other comments or questions about the resolution, colleagues?

Okay, hearing and seeing none, we will go ahead and ask the clerk to call the roll on the adoption of the resolution.

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The resolution is adopted and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Agenda item nine.

Will the clerk please read agenda item nine into the record?

agenda item 9, Council Bill 119824 relating to the city's response to the 2020 COVID-19 crisis, amending ordinance 12600, which adopted the 2020 budget.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Esqueda, as chair of the committee, you are recognized in order to address this item.

Thank you, Madam President.

Again, I'll be brief due to the time.

I just want to thank our central staff and all of our council colleagues for their tremendous amount of work to make sure that the federal dollars were going appropriately to care for those in our community.

We want to be good partners with the state and the feds as we try to collectively respond and provide not just good governance, but proactive governance, making sure that we're addressing the crisis that is presenting itself, helping prevent folks from falling into homelessness due to economic crisis, but also making sure that people have the appropriate housing and public health services.

Appreciate our congressional delegation for all of their advocacy to make federal dollars available.

much, much more is needed.

That is part of the reason that we've stepped up at the city level and are trying to offer relief for COVID, but appreciate the dollars that have been made available, trying to stretch those as far as possible.

And our colleagues today with your amendments, these dollars will make a tremendous impact.

So thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda.

Are there any other comments on the bill?

Seeing and hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the.

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

OK, agenda item 10. Will the clerk please read agenda item 10 into the record?

Agenda Item 10, Council Bill 119825, relating to the city's response to the 2020 COVID-19 crisis, amending Ordinance 226-000, which adopted the 2020 budget.

The committee recommends the bill pass as amended.

With council members Mosqueda, Herbold, Gonzalez, Lewis, Morales, Peterson, Strauss in favor.

With council members Solange, opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I will go ahead and recognize Council Member Mosqueda as the chair of the committee to address agenda item number 10.

Thank you very much, Madam President.

The bill in front of us is multi-dimensional in that we take attempts in many places to try to provide investments into community priorities, such as making sure that those who are living unsheltered have the housing and support that they need, making sure that fewer people fall into homelessness, and that there's truly support for working families that are most vulnerable in this city.

And also that we take a significant step forward to trying to address the call from community to divest in our policing system and to reinvest in the community.

I'll just say a few comments here and then I'll save some comments for the closing portion.

I wanna thank folks for all of their tremendous work, especially our central staff and our teams on each of our offices.

It's been a very long budget session and it's only August.

I want to thank the folks in IT and clerks for your work to helping make sure that we can get through each of these meetings and that we had robust public comment from communications and our IT folks.

I want to thank our council colleagues for their staff and their tremendous hours.

It's important to note that many of you, like the organizers in the streets, have been pulled from your families, have had to spend long hours, day and night, working as we try to deliberately address the call for action in this civil rights uprising.

While we can't do everything in this summer rebalancing package, we have set the path forward for tremendous work in front of us as a council and as a city.

And I think that all of that work should be really called out and appreciated because a lot of this work is happening around the clock.

And that's true, again, for the folks in the street and the folks who have been working around the clock to provide the budget documents in front of us today.

We started the SPD budget inquest in the first week of June and have had two sessions a week at the minimum.

Sometimes we've had more than one meeting with two sessions each week.

We've had hearings, we've heard from central staff, we've heard from the Seattle Police Department, we've heard from elected leaders in other cities and national research entities, and importantly, we've heard from community coalitions who have been calling for change and who have been doing the research in this area for years.

This inquest process has been helpful in us finally acknowledging and recognizing that there is massive changes that are needed, structural changes, and continued investment in community for us to realize the changes that are being called for from community.

This process and our deep analysis focused on a racial justice lens, centering our work by lifting up and including the voice of folks who've been most affected is how we aim to make policy decisions.

We aim to center policy decisions based on those who've had the lived experience, and that is exactly what we've done in this SPD budget inquest.

Over the last few months, and honestly, over the last few years, we have been aware that there have been many people who've been calling for structural change.

And today, council colleagues, we are beginning to put ourselves on the path to righting those historic wrongs.

Structural change, institutional change is really the only option as we look at individuals who've been killed year after year, month after month, unarmed individuals in our community, black and brown community members who've been killed at the hands of the current status quo policing system.

And we can make changes.

We can make changes to make sure that folks who are showing up are those who are adequately trained, who are from our community, who have trusted partnerships, and who are not showing up with arms.

That is the conversation that we set ourselves on, the path that we are charting for this conversation that is coming up.

And we're taking important, critical first steps today.

I'll save the rest of my comments for closing comments, but just wanted to say how important it is that we have centered the policy changes and the budget decisions that are included in this bill, not just on NSPD, but also as it relates to caring for our most vulnerable community partners based on what community has told us that they wanted.

That's a critical change as we think about inclusive budgeting and policymaking.

So thank you to everybody who has made this process possible, and I'll save some comments for later.

Madam President.

Thank you, Councilmember Mosqueda for those introductory remarks.

I'm going to go ahead and call on Councilmembers who are interested in speaking on this bill before we pass it.

I see that Councilmember Herbold has her hand up, and as others become inspired to also speak on this council bill, I'd ask that you raise your hand accordingly, and I will jot you down in the order that you raise your hand.

Councilmember Herbold, please.

You're on mute.

And whoever's playing bingo probably just got a square because I reminded somebody that they were on mute.

So, before I move to the SPD-related budget amendment, I do want to just flag my appreciation for some other important elements in this next bill.

The pilot project funding, the Stay Connected program for seniors is included in here, the proviso to remove The police department as the gatekeeper for co-lead referrals is included in here.

The funding for the race inequity toolkit on expansion of Choose 180 to begin to serve defendants over the age of 24. The pre-filing diversion program is included in here.

and I'm sorry that this is somebody else's, somebody else led on this, but I feel like it was maybe Council Member Juarez, and I don't want to miss it.

The restoration of funds for the AIDS Memorial Pathway is included in here as well.

This package also, of course, I want to start by saying that this includes much of the work that this Council has been doing since June in the Seattle Police Department budget inquest led by Councilmember Mosqueda.

includes 38 full-time employment reductions starting in November with suggestions from specific units, including mounted patrol, school resource officers, the navigation team, Harbor Patrol, public affairs, and a SWAT team.

It includes capturing the savings from an additional 30 FTEs from expected attrition through officers voluntarily leaving or retiring from the police department.

And it also includes an additional 32 FTEs, suggested general reduction in sworn officers.

It's really important to understand that ultimately, Chief Best holds the authority to make decisions about how and where these reductions may occur.

The council may determine the overall appropriate size of the police force and suggest specific specialty units where layoffs may be made.

It's the chief of police who will make the determination as to where layoffs occur.

In addition, all of the reductions take a very specific format in order to set the city up for the most positive labor bargaining outcomes.

Instead of making cuts of positions, the amendments put a proviso on two months worth of salary for each position that is targeted for reduction.

We have received expert advice that it may take between two to four months for each reduction to be bargained.

If it takes longer than that, so that officers can continue to be paid as the bargaining finishes up.

But the proviso format means that the city will have those dollars on hand.

just in case they are needed.

The actions approved by the council and bargained as described below will result in a reduction of SPD's police force by about 100 officers from the current level of about 1,400 officers.

That's about a 7% reduction in the sworn force.

And also a result in savings of about $2.9 million.

The package also includes modest cuts to the Seattle Police Department's travel, training, and recruitment budgets, which seemed appropriate given the current travel restrictions and the mayor's hiring freeze.

Those cuts total less than $1 million.

Finally, the budget actions, which we'll talk about later in the resolution, commits to a number of transfers of functions out of the police department.

The other point I think is really important to make as we are about to take this vote is that, you know, I think that we as a council and the mayor's office are in a really unique position to seize upon a moment in this city and in this country.

And I am hopeful that we are more aligned in our desire to do that than has appeared in the last few weeks.

The mayor has been saying that we should be realistic and that we've been irresponsible for committing to a goal before we had the details.

And I really believe that big change like this, shaking things up, accomplished by limiting to action to what seems realistic has never been realized.

We always have to think beyond what is that are normally considered realistic and possible.

through agreeing to try to work towards a 50% reduction.

I hope we've begun a partnership with community that has brought us to this place where we're at now and has created a pathway and a plan for reductions in 2021. I think there was, you know, over the weekend, there was an editorial that we took a swing and we missed.

And I think I think it's really important to look at what we've accomplished for the next four and a half months of the budget and understand that that's our starting point for deliberations for a whole year's worth of budget.

So it's really important to annualize the value of these four months of costs.

And I think when you do that and you take paper and pencil up to do that math.

Our actions now are significant and noteworthy and also express a commitment to not disregard public safety, but to recognize that public safety means public safety for everyone in our community.

And public safety must be, we must recognize that by asking police officers to do too much, there are two things that go wrong.

One, you send an armed response in some cases to a situation that doesn't require an armed response, which is an unsafe situation, and two, you're reducing the capacity for officers to respond to core law enforcement efforts.

And so I'm really encouraged by the work that we've done, and I'm really hopeful for our efforts in implementing the council's interest in working together with the mayor's office and the chief to realize this pathway for reimagined public safety for our city.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Herbold.

Appreciate hearing from you as our public safety chair on this issue.

Colleagues, I apologize to Councilmember Morales and to all of you.

I didn't realize that I had an updated script in my inbox reflecting Councilmember Morales did not mean to.

I understand that Councilmember Valdez has two proposed amendments to this bill that we are currently discussing that were distributed after 12 noon.

And in order for the council to be able to consider these amendments, the council rules will need to be suspended.

So if there is no objection, the council rule relating to circulation of amendments by 12 noon will be suspended to allow consideration of two amendments.

Hearing no objection, the council rule is suspended and the council will proceed with consideration of these two amendments.

Council Member Morales, you are recognized in order to move version two of amendment 59.

Thank you, Council President, and no need to apologize.

There was a lot happening this morning.

So I want to thank you for letting me bring these and beg all of your indulgence.

As I mentioned this morning, we did have a couple of provisos ready to go last week.

We learned over the weekend that we had to change them around a little, so we were just waiting to hear back from law.

So you have received The new versions in your inbox, amendments 59 and 60. As Council Member Peterson said, there has been a lot of work happening over several weeks now, and these reflect the intent of amendments 33 and 34 that we passed last week.

And those amendments were committing us to investing in organizations that are, the intent of them was to commit us to invest in organizations that are led by people of color for communities of color.

for organizations that work to improve community safety through restorative justice, mental health and wellness, youth mentoring programs.

These are the kinds of organizations we want to invest in so that as we build up community safety infrastructure, we can do that while we are trying to dismantle our over reliance on policing.

So the provisos that we have today are intended to hold HSD to that standard in a way that as closely as possible to the preference for BIPOC organizations.

And as I said earlier, the issue is that because of I-200, we cannot directly express intent to contract with BIPOC communities.

But that doesn't mean that we can't exercise our express, express our intent to our departments that our contracting process should be more inclusive in its criteria and selection process.

So this amendment, Amendment 59, amends the $4 million investment and clarifies that receiving organizations should have culturally relevant experience with holistic community safety efforts.

And the amendment requests that the chair of the Community Economic Development Committee who oversees civil rights receive a report identifying the selected organizations.

Thank you so much, Council Member Morales.

Are there any questions or comments on proposed amendment 59?

Okay, hearing none, I'm gonna go ahead and, actually, I think, I'm not sure we've had a formal motion and second.

Yeah, so can you go ahead and move it, and then we'll see if there's a second.

Yes, I move Amendment 59.

Second.

Okay, it's been moved and seconded to adopt a version two of Amendment 59. Council Member Morales has already addressed the proposed amendment.

Are there any other comments on the amendment?

Hearing none, I will ask that the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of version two of amendment 59.

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries and the amendment is adopted.

Council Member Morales, you have a second amendment.

So I am going to recognize you to move version two of amendment 60.

I move version two of amendment 60.

Excellent.

Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to adopt version two of Amendment 60. Council Member Morales, the floor is yours to describe this proposed amendment.

Thank you.

Colleagues, I'll be brief.

This amendment places a proviso on the $10 million investments that we made last week to require that HSD submit a spending plan to the committee overseeing civil rights issues and that the plan be approved by ordinance.

Thank you for that description, Council Member Morales.

Any other comments on the proposed amendment?

Hearing no additional comments on proposed amendment 60, I will ask that the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of version two of amendment 60.

Peterson?

Aye.

DeWant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

I mean, yes.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries and the amendment is adopted.

All right, so that concludes all of the amendments that I'm aware of.

So I will now open it back up to general comments about the bill as amended.

So colleagues, any other comments on the council bill as amended?

This will be your last shot to talk about this bill.

Okay, Councilmember Strauss, and then Councilmember Sawant, and then Councilmember Lewis and Peterson.

Okay.

Thank you, Council President.

As we all know, there's much more work to be done regarding improving our public safety, to provide public safety that works for everyone in Seattle.

so that when you call 9-1-1, you get the right response right away.

We already know that 56% of SPD's 9-1-1 calls are non-criminal calls.

These are parking violations, noise complaints, mental health crises, and welfare checks.

And for these types of calls, we don't need a police officer with a gun to respond.

And we absolutely need the appropriate first responder to respond quickly with the resources they need to be successful to resolve the reason for the call.

And this means greater responsiveness across the board.

We currently already have programs in place that we can scale up to meet these needs, such as HealthONE, Mobile Crisis Unit, Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, and our Community Service Officer Program.

These are the same models that are already in place in Eugene, Oregon, and their program is called CAHOOTS.

The biggest difference between CAHOOTS and our programs is that CAHOOTS is hardwired into 911, responding to 20% of their 911 calls, while Seattle's programs require an officer to respond to make a referral.

If these programs were hardwired into 911, patrol officers would have more time to respond to and complete traditional police work.

The results of this historic transition that we are in right now will enable us to deploy the proper professionals to respond quickly with the appropriate resources needed, whether it be crisis intervention, special victims assistance, medical care, social services, or with an armed response when necessary.

Through this transition, you'll always be able to call 911 and receive a response.

And at the end of this transition, if you have to call 911, you'll get the right response right away.

Every day of this work, we have found additional ways and additional improvements that can be made to the Seattle Police Department's budget and how we deliver public safety.

It is important for us to ensure that we are delivering the priorities of government in an efficient manner.

And this 2020 rebalance is just the first step in this work.

I look forward to receiving the real-time SPD reports about their spending every other week and the robust reporting ahead of creating the 2021 budget.

In the next six weeks, we'll have the opportunity to make additional improvements to make meaningful and lasting change.

And again, throughout this transition, you'll always be able to call 911 and receive a response.

And at the conclusion of this transition, if you have to call 911, you'll get the right response right away.

And if your call merits the response of an armed officer, you'll receive that response.

And for every other call, you'll receive the first, the right first responder who will respond right away.

There's much more to be said about this council bill.

And I know that I wanted to focus my comments specifically on the Seattle Police Department's aspects and I'll reserve comments for another time on the rest.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you Councilmember Strauss.

Next up is Councilmember Sawant and then after Councilmember Sawant will be Councilmember Lewis.

Thank you.

This is the vote today to adopt the city's new budget as a whole.

It is euphemistically called balancing package, but that is only because the political establishment does not want to call it what it is, an austerity package.

There is nothing balanced about this budget.

It completely fails to defund the police by 50% as six of the eight other council members had promised to support.

and it carries out a major austerity program on behalf of big business, cutting tens of millions from the essential work of the city across departments like parks, roads, and libraries.

It is mind-boggling to me how council members can claim they are anti-austerity when they are voting yes on an austerity budget.

Where is the balance when Amazon reported profits in the second quarter of 2020 of over $5 billion, double their profits from a year earlier?

Since January 1st of this year, Jeff Bezos' net worth has skyrocketed by $72 billion, that's billion with a B, to an astounding $188 billion today.

At the same time, tens of thousands of Seattleites have lost their jobs and incomes, cannot pay rent, and are struggling to put food on the table.

Where is the balance when the Seattle Police Department continues to be funded more of the city's discretionary funds than any other department?

My office fully supports and voted yes on, and in fact, the People's Budget Campaign and Black Lives Matter activists and Socialist Alternative have fought for every progressive budget amendment won by our movements.

We won the funding for the Green New Deal Oversight Board, the end of funding for the euphemistically named Navigation Team, which carries out the inhumane and ineffective sweeps of homeless encampments.

Of course, I would caution that there are other ways that Mayor Durkin could allow sweeps, and we need to continue organizing to completely end them.

We won a small reduction in the police department.

We won millions in funding for community programs, funding research into alternatives to repressive policing, youth programming, and restorative justice.

Our movement succeeded in reducing the salaries of most of the top executives in the police department who tear gassed peaceful protesters and then lied about it, saying that the protests were riots.

We want a proviso to end the hiring freeze in the Office of Labor Standards.

We want a proviso to protect the North Lake tiny house village from being swept this year.

But as I said, on balance, this budget does not prioritize or meet the needs of ordinary people.

It is not a moral document.

Seattle Times conservative columnist Danny Westnede is, as opposed to my socialist politics, as you might imagine, but he looked at the budget committee's action last week and came to the same conclusion that we did.

Quote, for all the heated rhetoric about Seattle defunding the police, both from activists demanding it and the police union decrying it, the key takeaway right now is this.

Seattle is not defunding the police, not by half, not by a quarter, not even clear whether this first phase of proposed cuts to the city's police force would reduce the current number of officers out on the street at all.

That's the headline.

The city isn't defunding the police," unquote. A month ago, the city council voted on the Amazon tax, a historic victory for working people and the oppressed, and a victory for the Black Lives Matter movement. At that time, my office and the tax Amazon movement proposed an amendment to increase the Amazon tax by $293 million per year to eliminate the need for austerity, which no other council members supported. Now the political establishment insults the intelligence of working people in acting like there is no alternative to budget cuts, as if our memory cannot stretch back a few weeks. City Council Democrats had an alternative. They had a choice, and they decided to side with Jeff Bezos. Many activists in the movement will be outraged at council members for reversing their pledges to defund the police by 50%, and they should be. This vote is going to reduce the police budget by less than 2%, that's not a defunding, less than $3 million out of $170 million remaining in the SPD's budget this year, instead of the 50% demanded by the movement and promised by six of the eight Democratic council members. It represents a total abdication of responsibility. An abdication of responsibility in the context of the historic movement for Black lives, the brutal attacks on protesters, the Seattle Police's long record of racist and violent policing, and eight years of failed attempts at police reform. Our people's budget movement gave councilmembers every opportunity to follow through on their promises. We proposed defunding the police by 50% now, but every other councilmember voted no, falsely claiming that the budget cuts could not be done until November. In response to that, on Wednesday, my office proposed defunding the police by 50% starting on November 1st, even though I don't accept that logic, but still, okay, let's have it by November 1st, and no other councilmember would even second that proposal. We just received a powerful letter signed by 25 rank-and-file leaders of UAW 4121, the Union of Student Employees and Postdocs at UW. As they wrote, quote, we are deeply disappointed that many of the same council members have tried to delay the 50% defunding by claiming it would interfere with the Seattle Police Officers Guild contract. As a public sector union, we recognize this tactic for what it is. management grasping for justification to maintain the status quo. These issues are not new and we have too long seen both the city and the Police Officers Guild use collective bargaining as political cover to evade responsibility rather than, as it should be, as any of the strongest tools available to fight for progressive change. We know that defunding SPD is possible, possible now, and we reject any attempts to prop up collective bargaining as a politically convenient way to evade responsibility. This hollow excuse is an insult to the labor movement as our union wields our position at the bargaining table to protect workers and people of color, not our oppressors. We urge other council members to vote for Council Member Sawant's proposed cuts to SPD in the 2020 budget." That was just an extract of their letter.

If our movement does not win defunding the police this summer, that does not mean that we cannot win.

It means that we need to learn the lessons of the struggle, recognize that what we win is a function of the strength of our movement and the balance of social and political forces.

We will continue to organize and fight for defunding and demilitarization of the police.

We should learn the lessons from the Amazon tax fight, where in 2018 we saw the repeal of the tax and betrayal by Democrats on the council.

We learned that we can win if we build a stronger movement and never give up.

We learned that our movement needed to be democratically organized.

by the hundreds who attended each of the tax Amazon action conferences, made key decisions democratically after public debate, and that the leadership of the movement was not going to make alliances with the democratic establishment, but instead relied on independently organizing ordinary people, including the thousands upon thousands who eagerly signed our petitions at the George Floyd protests.

How would today's Budget Committee discussions be different if there was a credible ballot initiative to cut $100 million or $200 million or $300 million from the police budget?

That's a question our movement should ask ourselves.

Throughout history, progressive change has come from mass movements, not from friendly politicians in the political establishment.

The history of our recent struggles also shows once again Working people need our own party, not one beholden to big business.

Socialist Alternative and I celebrate the victories we have won, but stand against this austerity budget and failure to address the ongoing epidemic of racist and violent policing.

With my no vote today, I affirm our movement's unchanging demands.

Defund police by at least 50%, tax big business and the rich, and not have austerity on working people because we can't pay and we won't pay for this crisis, this crisis of the racist and bankrupt system of capitalism.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up is Councilmember Lewis.

I really just want to say, you know, I didn't know when we were starting this out exactly what type of plan we would able to be able to create and to finally start taking shape and to lay the groundwork for much bigger things coming up this fall in 2021 where we get to, well, for the 2021 budget.

where we're really going to be able to make final decisions on a lot of the things we're laying the groundwork for right now, given the limitations of the summer budget session.

And I just really think it stands as a testament to the leadership of Councilmember Muscata, Councilmember Herbold, and you, Madam President, in assembling a package that has united a lot of the factions on this council from the far left to the far center left.

I think that we've really been able to reach a pretty good initial package that lays the groundwork for much bigger transformative change to come.

in short order.

I don't know if this counts as an obscure metaphor or an analogy, but I'll throw it out there.

And hopefully, the judges in the bingo competition will let it ride.

But if you want to go fast, go alone.

But if you want to go far, go together.

And I think that's really what we've been able to put together here through the process, not just at this budget, but at the accompanying resolution later.

to make these final reforms and transformative changes that Councilmember Strauss alluded to earlier, too, in terms of the different types of first response.

You know, I remain a very big advocate of building a community-based, low-acuity first response modeled on the Crisis Assistance Helping Out in the Streets program, the hoods from Eugene, Oregon, following the lead of other cities from Denver to Oakland to Portland who have been doing the same thing and engaging in the same process.

We are not alone as a progressive city looking to finally right size our first response.

And I know many others will join based on the example.

So I won't take up any more of our time here and I look forward to voting for this package.

Thank you, Councilmember Lewis for those comments.

Next up is Councilmember Peterson followed by Councilmember.

Thank you, Council President.

So in the middle of a persistent pandemic and ballooning budget deficits, and even the cracking of our West Seattle Bridge, stranding 100,000 of our residents, in the middle of these crises, your elected officials are striving to seize this historic moment in the wake of the brutal and wrongful killing of George Floyd and countless other black, indigenous, and people of color, so that we address systemic racism by rethinking policing and revitalizing community health and safety.

It's not an easy process.

It's messy, it's difficult, it's uncomfortable, but it's necessary.

Even as I speak now, I'm getting emails and phone calls from constituents who want us to do more now and other constituents who want us to slow down and think it through more.

Of course, we were elected not only to synthesize these various viewpoints and address the concerns of our constituents, but also to craft thoughtful plans on how to do things better.

We need to apply our own critical thinking and plan ahead rather than just reacting.

I'm cautiously optimistic that the legislation today is a prudent mix of all these goals.

It leverages the few tools in the tool belt of this city council to make a down payment toward a bigger, broader discussion, bigger, bolder changes as part of the long, more thoughtful fall budget process.

I thank my colleagues for incorporating my amendment earlier today to answer some basic questions.

With the reasonable initial reductions approved today, what will the impact be on the ground in every neighborhood?

How will the chief of police choose to redeploy her resources, and what will the impact be on response times?

According to the most recent data, only 71% of the time spent by police officers is for priority one and priority two calls.

That means 29% of the time is spent on non-priority calls.

There is an opportunity there for community-led solutions.

These reports will also make sure we do not recklessly jettison the good work done by our Harbor Patrol throughout Lake Union.

The reports we're asking for as part of this legislative package can be combined with the planning efforts of our mayor and our police chief as they craft their budget proposal for next year.

These reports and planning documents are an opportunity, a second chance for the city council to work authentically and proactively with our mayor and our chief of police to rethink and revamp public safety and healthy communities.

With the reductions we're making for 2020 that will likely carry on to 2021, I believe adjustments can be made so that response times do not get worse.

As I talked about earlier today, the remaining officers could respond to fewer types of criminal calls.

We also need to recognize that we cannot do it all through the budget.

This complex contract needs to be redone to encourage the good police officers to stay in Seattle, to reduce excessive salaries and costs, to fix their disciplinary system so that it no longer impedes justice.

We need a good contract more than good slogans.

Even as the city council partially defunds our police department, we still have a police department.

We will still have a police department as part of a broader public safety strategy that involves more community-led solutions.

Are the police reforms implemented since the Federal Consent Decree enough?

No.

Reforms are not enough when there's systemic and institutional racism.

But should we toss aside the progress made by the Community Police Commission, the Office of Police Accountability, the Office of Inspector General?

No.

We need both reforms, real reforms, and reinvestment.

And as we invest tens of millions of dollars, we need more Black-led organizations at the table From the everyday marchers to the urban league, they all deserve a seat at the table.

We need to make sure those investments are smart and effective, and that we measure results to show the general public whether we are achieving the positive outcomes we all want.

Now today's legislative package is not perfect.

I do not support ending the navigation team.

That was a team created that had coordinated response, a team of dedicated city government employees, public servants from our human services department and parks department who have been engaging those experiencing homelessness and who work for the public health of all city residents.

By a narrow five to four vote, a majority of this council took what I believe to be a hasty action without a full replacement plan.

Business improvement areas across the city that represent hundreds of small businesses that employ thousands of our residents are disappointed and concerned.

Even if the navigation team goes away, the challenges of homelessness will not.

So I look forward to working with our chair of the committee on homelessness strategies to piece together a reasonable and responsive replacement strategy.

I also do not support suddenly and with little to no analysis cutting the salary of the first black police chief in Seattle's history and the diverse team that she handpicked.

Yes, we should take a hard look at excess pay throughout our city government, but I believe it should be more thoughtful and methodical.

But we're here today facing a massive deficit.

We must rebalance the budget.

We're required by law to do this.

Just like all appropriation bills at all levels of government, there are items in the bill that each of us might not prefer.

but the big picture is we need to row together both the executive and the legislative branches to give the general public confidence that we can function and move forward for their benefit.

Let's approve the budget package today and resolve to work collaboratively with our mayor and police chiefs to solve problems and make progress for Seattle.

Thank you.

Thank you Councilmember Peterson for those remarks.

Next up is Councilmember Morales.

I think is still with us.

There she is.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

I will be brief.

I really just want to take an opportunity to thank a few folks.

I want to start with the central staff.

who, as we all know, have responded tremendously over the last several weeks.

From my perspective, they've responded with grace and wisdom to every single inquiry coming from this freshman office, and there have been a lot of them.

So I want to thank Kirsten and Dan, each of your members, for the work that you do.

I also want to thank advocates for community safety or Black Lives.

for our homeless neighbors, young people, immigrants, and workers.

And I wanna thank my staff, Lakeisha Farmer and Darazel Tutu led the effort with King County Equity Now and with Decriminalize Seattle and all of the other community safety advocates that we've been working with over the last several weeks.

Devin Silverman, who worked closely with homeless advocates and service providers, and Alexis Chirla, who knows how to ask the right budget questions to get greater transparency in the information that we get, particularly the way it's transmitted from the executive branch.

This team has worked countless hours to serve the people of District 2 and the people of Seattle, and I am very thankful to have them on.

And that's all I have.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Morales for those comments.

Really appreciate it.

Okay, folks, so I think we are coming close to an end here.

I will just really quickly before I give the last word over to Councilmember Mosqueda as the chair of our Select Budget Committee, just say that I also, like Councilmember Morales, really want to express my appreciation for all of the legislative department staff, our council central staff, our legislative department, IT, and clerk's office, and of course, every single member of our individual offices staff who've been working tirelessly on staffing all of us on these really important issues and engaging in thousands of hours of community engagement and conversations across the city as we look at how to rise to the occasion of this historic moment that really calls upon us to take a hard look at how we can reevaluate how we deliver public safety services.

And over the last in a few months, many of us have had an opportunity to engage in conversations across the spectrum.

I think Council Member Peterson did a really fine job of describing where that spectrum is.

Obviously, there are folks who believe, and we heard it in public testimony even today, who believe fundamentally that we need to continue to expanding and growing law enforcement, armed law enforcement approaches.

And then there are people on the opposite end of the spectrum who believe we need to abolish the police department.

As council members, and particularly as a citywide council member, I believe it's my responsibility to listen to a variety of different opinions in this space and to weigh what the balanced approach might be in moving forward.

And I recognize that the proposal that we're voting on today isn't perfect, but it does put us on a pathway towards having additional community engagement to have conversations about how we can truly capture savings and additional investments that we can allocate towards communities who are negatively impacted by over-policing and criminalization in our city.

And I think that that's an important endeavor for us to undertake.

I think it's going to become harder before it becomes easier.

It is clear to me that folks who are nervous about having the council and the city undergo this effort, many of those folks I think are worried about what impact this will have on their public safety day in and day out.

Of course, there are also individuals who believe that continuing to invest in law enforcement also carries with it dangers for their public safety in terms of police violence against black community members in particular.

And so our job here today is to, and always is to take as much input as we can to synthesize that information and to evaluate strategies and options that lay before us that we feel represent the broader will of the people that we represent.

And I guess what folks are seeing now is their democracy at work.

And I hope that we will be able to in the coming weeks and months continue to engage each other.

in these important conversations and that we are able to really develop a broad table of stakeholders who will come together to help us identify clear solutions and strategies for how to meet the public safety needs of the people of Seattle without the need to resort always the need to resort first to an armed response with a gun, even in those instances in which the activity that is at hand is a non-violent, non-criminal offense.

And so I am hopeful that we will be able to have this conversation.

I think this is an opportunity for us to continue to engage positively with people across the city and with the chief and with Mayor Durkan around those potential solutions.

And I look forward to doing that work in collaboration with all of you colleagues in this really important moment in time in our history.

I will go ahead and leave it there and just say thank you to my own staff, Cody Reiter, Brianna Thomas, Vy Nguyen, and to all of the staff and all of your offices.

As Council President, we get to serve in the unique role of having to be able to have the opportunity to engage with each and every one of your offices on all of these issues and really have appreciated the opportunity to learn with you and to work with each of you.

And I have a tremendous amount of respect for all of our staff who have been working really hard at serving the people of Seattle.

They do that in the background and they do it extraordinarily well.

And I just want to thank all of them, especially my staff for all of the work that they've been doing.

to help me balance home life with the work life.

So with that being said, I am gonna conclude my remarks and I'm gonna hand it over to Council Member Mosqueda to close debate out on this bill and we will then take a vote.

Thank you very much, Madam President, and thanks to all of our colleagues for all of your comments.

This council has done something truly extraordinary, something that hasn't been done at least in recent memory.

We have passed, and we are on the verge of passing, a mid-year budget revision while working remotely during overlapping health and homelessness and housing crises.

It would have been easy for us to, instead of going through this robust process that we engaged in, it would have been easier for us to just rubber stamp the mayor's proposed budget.

And conversely, it would have been easy to vote no and not do the work.

But instead, we're rolling up our sleeves.

We've committed to doing the hard work and we've put forward a comprehensive and robust proposal.

We didn't do this over the series of a few hours or a few meetings.

Instead, we worked over the past few months on several budget measures that centered equity, anti-austerity, transparency, and collaboration at the heart of what we put forward as a comprehensive package to address the crises that are in front of us.

And it started with passing Jumpstart Seattle.

$214 million a year in payroll tax coming in the form of immediate relief for COVID and long-term economic stability.

We are replenishing the rainy day and emergency funds with a payroll tax on our largest companies and the highest income earners.

We're doing this with the knowledge that this is a smart fiscal policy, a way to jumpstart our local economy, prevent flatlining our local economy and support our community and family members.

This is how we help stand up and respond to the crisis in front of us.

This week, we're directing $14 million in community investments, including youth-focused diversion programs and community-led public safety programs.

We'll be allocating $3 million for a participatory budgeting process so that community can better engage with the city.

Specifically, the Black and Brown community can engage with the city in a directed way to make sure that our future efforts will craft the 2021-2022 budget investments and divestments.

We've done this on the heels of adding tens of millions of dollars to the Seattle Transportation Benefit District package to focus on frequency and transit trips, recognizing that we want essential workers to be able to get to their jobs and that we provide essential services across our city.

We have done all of these things in a way to help center our families and community members who've been calling in and asking us for an anti-austerity approach.

We have been trying to invest back into the community to respond to this crisis.

So to be very clear, all of the steps we have taken have been in alignment with community, our most vulnerable, and working families.

No one is siding with Jeff Bezos.

We are increasing funding for our community members where possible and recognizing that we will do much, much more when Jumpstart Progressive Revenue comes into play in just two years.

At this moment, our city is identifying ways to fight back austerity budgeting.

We have committed as a council that we will not succumb to an austerity budget and we will not allow programs to be pitted against each other.

We knew that there was going to be tough choices, but ultimately we crafted a budget that addresses the economic impacts of the COVID crisis.

We've made new investments in our social safety net programs.

We've invested in homeless services and COVID relief for families.

We've made meaningful down payments to following community's call to defund SPD by raising investments in community safety programs and scaling down our current SPD budget.

We came together collectively and put Seattle residents and workers' priorities and their values at the forefront of our discussions.

We crafted a mid-year budget that lifts up anti-austerity efforts as we respond to COVID and caring for our most vulnerable.

As I mentioned at the beginning of today's budget deliberations, the SPD inquest that we started in June has been very helpful in finally reckoning that we have much more work to do to invest in community and divest from an over-invested and expanded police budget.

But this process and our deep analysis has always been centered on the fact that we cannot do it all in a summer budgeting process.

We are using a deep racial equity analysis, and we are bringing folks to the table who are from community to help us look at the years upon years of community strategies and priorities and calls for action to put those into place, a path to be put into place to really lift up BIPOC communities.

Local governments have continued to double down on the disproportionate investments in police and jails and courts and prisons.

And that is what the status quo has always been.

The Black Lives Matter movement is not new, but what's new is the way in which we're responding to their calls for action.

This is our beginning, this is our effort to show that we're taking first and important steps to right historic wrongs, to begin building that trust back with community and to make it clear that today is only the first step in that process.

We have to be real about what is possible in this summer 2020 rebalancing process.

And our teams and our community members that we've been working with around the clock have helped to provide much of the package, much of the input on the package in front of us.

to do what is possible this cycle and to tee us up for what must be done in the upcoming months and years.

The SPD package voted on today is one step of a larger plan that encompasses the 2021 budget cycle, which starts again in just a few weeks.

We are ensuring that funding for community organizations is actually being allocated, dollars out the door so that organizations can scale up and engage in the participatory budgeting process and community-led research projects that we know we need in order to make sure that our community remains safe and that especially black and brown communities are safer when we demilitarize and reduce the police presence in communities, especially communities of color around Seattle.

We need time to scale up to make sure that those larger volumes of work that community organizations are going to take on occurs.

And this is our process.

This is our commitment to scaling it up by investing the money that we will pass on Wednesday.

It is our effort to scale up the organizations that have been calling for community organizations to really be at the forefront of responding to what communities need to be safe.

That's housing, food assistance, child care assistance.

and other strategies that have been led by black and brown communities that actually invest and create safety.

So today, again, is one step in the process.

It sets us up for the continuation in the 2021 process, which, again, just starts in just a few weeks.

And we will truly be led by the community-led research project to help undo centuries of harmful systems that have continued to be funded over years, over years.

It will take time for us to get there, but we are acting with urgency today and setting us on the right path to correct these historic wrongs.

I hope folks continue to work with us as we are intentional in our efforts to build trust, to be honest about what is possible here today, and to build that process for a truly re-envisioned community safety program and services going forward.

What's important today is that we haven't just said no.

What's important is that we have said, we will walk with you.

We will walk with you in community to recreate a truly community-led public safety model.

What's important is that we have not just stood in the way or blocked the road.

We are walking with community.

We are identifying barriers together.

We are pointing to those barriers or blockades and collectively putting the blocks together to get around them, to get around what has previously been insurmountable by working collaboratively with community and with a sense of urgency.

On Wednesday, you will see us take action on some final votes, including an inter-fund loan bill, amending efforts to get out the $3 million to community-led research project, to disaggregate SPD precincts from patrol operations, to pass the COVID relief bill that is jumpstart and to amend our efforts to make sure that there is community relief that is being provided and not just a veto that stands in our way.

That will happen on Wednesday.

Again, this is just the first step in a very long process that has been long overdue.

So I want to thank the community organizations who've been working with us to really come up with the strategies and the individuals.

Obviously, we've talked a lot about King County Equity Now and Decriminalize Seattle, Everyday March, but I want to call out some specific names.

Angelica Chisato, Jackie Vang, Sean Flads, Isaac Joy, Nikita Oliver, Andrea Ritchie.

From across the country, we have Councilmember Jeremiah Eliasson from Minneapolis, New York Councilmember Brad Lander, Austin City Councilmember Greg Casar.

We have folks from San Francisco who provided us with ideas and strategies, supervisors, Shasom, Walden.

We have organizations within the city that have been working to lift up how we can identify non-sworn individuals and really invest in making sure that community and the city servants have supports that they need that are not embedded within SPD.

So I want to thank individuals like Allison Isinger, Chloe Gale, and Lisa Dugard, who've been working with us on how to de-police or de-militarize our homelessness response system.

We have Katie Garrow and Nicole Grant from MLK Labor, along with Sean Van Eyck and Kenny Stewart, who work with the Coalition for City Unions, who constantly said that they would be willing to help think through these next steps and have provided tremendous feedback.

And especially want to thank the folks who've been shouldering much of this work.

A lot of our colleagues have already commented on this, but thank you to the people who've been working day and night shouldering this work.

And I mean, physically, their shoulders probably hurt from the amount of work that they have been doing over the last few months.

our central staff, the clerk's office, council communications, our legislative staff, and all of our council members.

But I want to specifically call out our central staff team by name because we appreciate you so.

Allie Panucci, Tom Mikesell, Lisa Kay, Asha Venkantram, Brian Goodnight, Calvin Chow, Karina Bull, Greg Doss, Amy Gore, Jeff Sims, Tracy Radscliffe, Yolanda Ho, Liz Schwitzen, Eric McConaughey, Carlos Lugo, Ketel Freeman, Patti Worgen, Deputy Director Dan Eder, and Director Kirsten Ehrstad, we appreciate you.

We know that this was a ton of work, and I will be looking forward to hearing your feedback along with all of our council colleagues' feedback about how we can continually improve our process going into the fall budget.

And with that, just a huge amount of appreciation for our teams.

Some of you have already mentioned all of your incredible staff, but I also want to say thank you to the folks that have constantly reached out as well, not just to My staff, but directly to me, thanks to Cody Reiter and Brianna Thomas and Councilmember Gonzalez's office, Christina and Alex and Councilmember Herbold's office, Lakeisha and Alexis and Councilmember Morales' office, Peter and Councilmember Strauss' office, and Jonathan and Councilmember Sumon's office was reaching out as well.

And especially want to thank Aretha Basu in our office.

She has been part of the organizing efforts in the past years and Deep Roots and Community with King County Equity Now and Decriminalize Seattle, and was on the forefront of inviting community partners to our table so we could hear directly from those most impacted.

Thank you for your leadership in this effort, along with Sejal Parikh.

I want to say thank you to all of our council members.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I want to say thank you to our staff.

And I

and we have set a package budget in front of us that truly reflects our council values, centered again on anti-austerity, equity, transparency, and collaboration.

While there's two more votes to come, just wanted to get those last thank yous in and I will be short going forward.

Thank you very much.

As I mentioned previously, I promised the public that there would be Many, many words and thoughts shared with them publicly and I have fulfilled that promise.

So with that being said, I want to thank you all for your ongoing patience and engagement on these important issues.

I do think it's an important thing that the council is moving forward in a unified fashion on this issue.

I think it gives us a clear place to start the conversation in the coming weeks and over the next several months and really do appreciate that opportunity to be unified in this approach.

we will be back at it in about seven weeks.

So here we go.

Without further ado, folks, let's go ahead and take a vote.

I'm going to go ahead and close out debate on this particular bill.

So I am now going to ask that the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill as amended.

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

No.

Strauss.

Aye.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Aye.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Seven in favor, one opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes as amended and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, will the clerk please read agenda item 11 into the record?

agenda item 11, resolution 31954 relating to the city's annual budget process stating intent that the city will consider a one-year budget proposal for 2021 only.

And proceeding resolution 28885 to the extent inconsistent.

Committee recommends the resolution be adopted as amended.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Mosqueda, you are the sponsor of this resolution and are recognized to address this item.

Thank you, Madam President.

This resolution moves us towards a goal that I have been asking for since becoming budget chair.

And I think it's really important that we look at the details in the proposal that was sent down.

I want to thank Council Member Herbold for flagging this in our earlier conversations as well.

One really important thing that you will see here is the amendments that we have made to Resolution 31954. Each year the council goes through a budget process and in even years like this one, we endorse a budget for the odd year.

This provides some guidance, but no concrete stability to departments.

I'm really looking forward to making sure that we provide concrete, transparent, accountable information that can go between branches of government and can be shared with the public.

to flesh out a process in the next few months here that I hope will work for long-term planning and long-term stability as we seek greater out-year forecasting to allow for the council to deliberate on items in front of us so that we can make sound financing decisions.

In particular, during this economic downturn that we're in, moving towards a shorter budgeting process makes sense.

to be able to do a truly reflective economic, sorry, to truly reflect economic conditions, but we also must continue to have biannual budgets and seek further analysis for out-year conversations around our budgeting to ensure stability and transparency with the public.

Those are the amendments that we've included today.

I appreciate all of your support on that and look forward to working with you as we finalize details on what that process will look like.

Thank you so much, Councilmember Mosqueda, for that description of this particular resolution.

Are there any other comments on the resolution?

Councilmember Herbold, please.

Thank you.

I really appreciate Chair Mosqueda for bringing forward her amendment.

This amendment addressed my concerns about the aversion proposed by the mayor to not just establish a one-year process for 2021, but also repeal the resolution that was adopted back in 1994 to establish a two-year budget process.

A two-year budget process provides Council and the public greater transparency, as well as a better opportunity to plan for out years.

So keeping that as the default process makes a lot of sense.

I appreciate the focus in Councilmember I want to give a shout out to He wrote a budget issue paper on this, and I definitely appreciated the analysis that he did that made me think twice about the mayor's resolution.

And I lost track of the good work that he had done in that budget issue paper.

And again, really appreciate Chair Mosqueda bringing it back before us.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Are there any other comments on the resolution?

All right, hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the resolution?

Peterson?

Aye.

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Yes.

President Gonzales?

Yes.

Agents in favor?

None opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The resolution is adopted and the Chair will sign it.

I ask that the Clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, Committee Reports of the City Council, we are going to continue now with new item 12. So I will move to adopt Resolution 31962. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to adopt resolution 31962. Councilmember Lewis, you are the prime sponsor and are recognized in order to address this item.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Having discussed this extensively during briefing and a little bit during the budget committee meeting, I'll just say that this is a critical part of the next actions this council will take on the additive portion of our process of right-sizing our first response.

This Department of Public Safety, which is envisioned to be created by this resolution and a lot of the other attendant parts of this resolution, are critical to really laying out a roadmap to show what a successor system can look like and how we can put some of these things that are currently done by sworn officers into the responsibility of different types of first responders.

I look forward to continuing this work next year and getting a department like this underway.

I really think it's at the crux of showing to the people of the city who we've been working with throughout this process really what the future could look like and really challenging the imagination of people in the city.

to think about the impact of the successor system.

So, you know, I want to thank Camilla Brown in my office for all the work that she's done in putting this together.

I want to thank Lish on central staff for really doing a lot of work cobbling this together over the last couple of days and particularly over the weekend.

I want to thank councilmember Lewis and councilmember Warren for co-sponsoring and providing a lot of the content of this.

with that, I will leave it there.

Thank you.

agenda item 12. Resolution 31962 a resolution relating to policing and public safety establishing the Council's intent to create a civilian led department of community safety and violence prevention.

Identifying actions in 2020 to remove certain functions from the Seattle Police Department and provide funding for a community led process to inform the structure and function of the new department requesting modifications to policing practices requesting reporting to the council, providing guidance on layoff decisions, and establishing a work program and timeline for creating a new department.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Apologize for that procedural oversight.

Okay, so this motion has been moved and seconded.

This resolution has been moved and seconded, and it is now subject to additional debate.

Council Member Lewis, thank you so much for doing the initial comments and description of the resolution.

Colleagues, are there any other comments on the resolution?

Council Member Herbold, please.

Thank you.

So we've talked a lot about this resolution over the last several weeks.

I really appreciate Council Member Lewis's leadership in proposing it and his willingness to work collaboratively on crafting a resolution that expresses Council's intent around community safety, and also appreciate the contributions by Councilmember Juarez, who is also a co-sponsor, and Councilmember Peterson.

We've taken a large number of votes around the 2020 budget and the SPD budget in particular in the last week or so.

We've spent a lot of time hashing out the important details with the help of our central staff and our legislative staff.

Sometimes it's easy to lose the forest for the trees, which is why this resolution is so important.

This is our opportunity to begin to lay out council's vision for what true community safety can look like in Seattle.

With this resolution, council is starting to define our ideas informed by our constituents, by community, by advocates and activists, and yes, even the mayor's office and the police department.

This resolution itself does not transfer services to a civilian led department, but it says it's our goal and that really matters.

It gives community members a way to hold us accountable for that continued progress that they are insisting on.

And it invites the executive into further conversation with the council on the best path forward to realize this vision.

The resolution contains specific actionable changes.

We've talked twice about the content of those changes already today.

I'm not going to go over them again.

But I'm going to say that they are profound changes.

And that's not about congratulating ourselves that we've accomplished a mission.

That is still way far off.

And there are many votes ahead of us.

But to mark the moment at which the council begins the journey.

A poll that was taken between July 22nd and July 27th found that 53% of likely voters supported the general idea of a plan that would permanently cut the police department's budget by 50% and shift that money to social services and community-based programs.

32% expressed support for what was described as the council's approach.

Ostensibly that meant an immediate 50% cut.

43% expressed support for what was described as the mayor's approach, which was a cut with a plan.

We have before us today a budget and a resolution that when SPD cuts are annualized and transfers accomplished in 2021 represent a plan forward.

for our future decisions for a goal that a majority of Seattle residents support.

again, this is a starting point, and of course, there's much more work to be done to realize this vision, starting in just a handful of weeks when the council begins its fall budget process, looking at the 2021 budget.

Our work is far from done, but with our vote today, we start the journey.

I want to thank the incredibly detailed and thoughtful work of Decriminalize Seattle and King County Equity Now, whose ideas have informed this resolution, and much of my work on the 2020 and I want to thank the tens of thousands of people who have written, called, provided comment, and marched tirelessly, and at times, at great personal risk, to keep the pressure on us.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Hurd-Boltz, for those remarks.

Are there any other comments on the resolution?

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you.

As I mentioned earlier today in the budget committee, I will be voting yes on this resolution stating the council's intent and hopes to defund the police in the future.

However, our movement has to be clear that a non-binding resolution stating the intent to hope to study the defunding the police in the future is simply not a substitute for actually defunding the police.

Our movement is clearly expected to accept these nice words about the future intentions as an accomplished fact, but unfortunately, I believe that would be a serious mistake as we have seen over and over again.

In Minneapolis, the Democratic Party-led city council promised to change the city charter to totally reorganize their police department.

And as Socialist Alternative in Minnesota had predicted, rather than take any action as the city's highest legislative body, the Minneapolis City Council punted that question to the Charter Commission.

And again, as Socialist Alternative had predicted, the Charter Commission has said this is not possible.

So after all the pomp and circumstance of defunding promises, the Minneapolis Democrats are not defunding the police.

And here in Seattle three weeks ago, After my office had pledged to fight to defund the police by at least 50%, six Democrats on the council also promised 50% defund, but today have voted to reduce the police budget by less than $3 million, and then have added $3 million to the police budget through the second quarter supplemental budget.

Last Wednesday, I proposed defunding the police by 50% now.

Every other council member voted no. saying the budget cuts could not be done until November.

And then I proposed defunding the police by 50% starting on November 1st, and no other council member would even second that proposal.

To be clear, defunding the police cannot be an accounting trick.

Moving traffic and parking enforcement out of the Seattle Police Department, but keeping its operations unchanged is not what our movement meant by defunding the police.

By defunding the police, we mean ending the repression of our communities.

I want to point out that the resolution states, and I quote, quote, section seven, the city council will not support any budget amendments to increase the SPD's budget to offset overtime expenditures above the funds budgeted in 2020 or 2021, end quote.

But in practice today, the same day this council is making this promise through this resolution, the majority, which is seven of the eight council members present, also voted to pass agenda item number one, The second quarter supplemental budget which adds in line 1.11, $1.3 million to the police department for among other things over time.

This is a small thing in a large bill that includes many other budget changes that are not objectionable, but it is also the only way that these fine words can be violated.

I think it is also not the only way these fine words can be violated.

I raised this example to illustrate the main point that the city Council needs to be held accountable for what they actually do, not for the promises they make.

Today what the Council has done is fail to defund the police.

But at the end of the day, genuinely winning defunding of the police and an end to police violence will require a sustained movement that is democratically organized and is independently organized of the political establishment.

Thank you.

Thank you, colleagues.

Any other question – excuse me, any other comments on the resolution?

Hearing no additional comments, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the resolution?

Peterson.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herboldt.

Yes.

Lewis.

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Mosqueda.

Yes.

President Gonzalez.

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The resolution is adopted and the chair will sign it.

I ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf.

Okay, colleagues, we're gonna move along to other items of business here.

We are now gonna take up item number, I think it's item number 13.

Item number 12 in the regular agenda.

I'm sorry, you're correct.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The previous item was new item 12. We are now at old item 12. So will the clerk please read item 12 into the record?

Agenda item 12, Council Bill 119839 relating to appropriations for the Office for Civil Rights amending Ordinance 126000, which adopted the 2020 budget and lifting provisos.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I will move to pass Council Bill 119839. Is there a second?

It's been moved and seconded to pass the bill.

Council Member Morales, as the prime sponsor of this bill, you are recognized in order to address the item.

Thank you, Council President.

This bill is lifting a proviso for $170,000 to the Office of Civil Rights for work that's being done around the criminal legal system.

The idea here is that we need much better coordination and alignment of efforts across various work groups and initiatives and different structures that have been set up over time by the city.

As I mentioned this morning, the goal here is to eliminate some of the duplicative work that is happening as these different initiatives seek to engage community, to get input from community.

There is certainly a lot of interest from community members in participating in engagement in surveys and sharing their expertise and knowledge about what community wants as it relates to how our criminal legal system works or doesn't work.

But because there are so many different things happening, it is really burdensome on community to be asked to repeatedly participate in these.

So that's part of the goal, is to ensure that these multiple requests for engagement and surveying are better aligned and better coordinated, and just to move the work forward in a much more coordinated way as we think about how to make investments in our city and in the work that the Office of Civil Rights and other parts of the city are doing for community safety.

Thank you, Council Member Morales.

Are there any other comments on item 12?

Council Member Herbold, please.

Thank you.

So this is a body of work that had been hosted in my former committee last year related to the civil rights work in my committee.

I really appreciate that Council Member Morales has allowed my co-sponsorship of the bill.

As a little bit of background, in the 2020 budget, The council voted to allocate $170,000 from a proposed probation pilot program for high barrier individuals and to use those funds differently.

The proposal was to use $140,000 for partnership outreach and engagement related to the criminal legal system.

and 30,000 for community engagement sessions related to the criminal legal system realignment.

And I just, I want to lift up the history around this because on a weekly call that I and some other council members have had with decriminalize Seattle and King County equity now, the question came up, what happened to those funds that we worked to get cut from the probation pilot program?

And serendipitously, we are talking about releasing them to the community now.

Given the heightened attention to the criminal justice system in the context of COVID, Office of Civil Rights is proposing this use of the $170,000, which central staff has assessed to meet the proviso language.

The goal is $60 million for community mitigation of COVID-19 impacts on houseless communities that are part of the population.

identified by the High Barrier Work Group.

$80,000 is for expanding economic opportunities for formerly incarcerated communities working group in collaboration with the Office of Economic Development.

And $30,000 will be for community engagement with regards to COVID-19 related changes in the criminal legal system.

in collaboration with city Council central staff.

In order to move forward with this plan, SOCR is requesting that Council lift the proviso.

That's what this legislation does.

And again, this is, I think, really the beginning of I think that is a really important piece of what we are doing, bringing community in to lead us as policy makers around criminal justice reform and the creation of a high barrier working group to make sure that those voices are centered.

Thank you.

Okay, hearing none, I will ask the clerk to please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Peterson?

Aye.

DeWant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Thank you, sorry for the delay, aye.

And President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The, sorry, excuse me just a minute here.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Item number 13, will the clerk please read agenda item 13 into the record?

I move to pass the bill.

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to pass the bill.

Council Member Herbold, I believe you are going to speak to this bill.

So if that's the case, I'm going to hand it over to you to address it.

Or is it going to be Council Member Lewis?

Yeah, I'm going to hand it over to Council Member Lewis.

Thank you so much.

Okay.

Yep.

Council Member Lewis, floor is yours.

Thank you so much.

I don't know, we've discussed this so much, I don't really have anything else to add, quite honestly, in the interest of time, given how late it is.

I honestly just want to rest on my earlier comments, if that's okay.

That's perfectly fine.

We have been having conversations about this in council briefings, so I totally appreciate that.

Are there any other comments on the bill?

Okay, hearing and seeing none, I'd ask that the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill.

Peterson?

Aye.

DeWant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

And I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, agenda item number 14. Will the clerk please read agenda item 14 into the record?

agenda item 14, council bill 119842 related to gig workers in Seattle establishing labor standards requirements for paid sick and paid safe time for gig workers working in Seattle and amending sections 100.015 and .080 of ordinance 126091 to make technical corrections.

Thank you, madam clerk.

I move to pass council bill 119842. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to pass the bill.

Council Member Mosqueda, I believe you're going to take the lead on speaking on this bill, so I'm going to hand it over to you.

Thank you, Madam President.

Colleagues, this is a technical amendment that clarifies that this ordinance only applies to independent contractors and not individuals who are already covered by Seattle's Paid Sick and Safe Time Ordinance.

This should be pretty self-explanatory, but we were told by Office of Labor Standards it would be helpful to have this in code, so that is what we are doing today.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda.

Are there any other comments on the bill?

Okay, seeing and hearing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill?

Peterson?

Aye.

Sawant?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosqueda?

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The bill passes and the chair will sign it.

I'd ask the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation.

Okay, agenda item 15. Will the clerk please read agenda item 15 into the record?

Agenda item 15, resolution 31961, affirming the rights of members of the press, legal observers, and medical personnel covering the protests against police brutality.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

I will move to adopt resolution 31961. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to adopt the resolution.

Council Member Mosqueda, you are the prime sponsor of this resolution.

I understand that you have a substitute version, so I'd like to suggest that before we make general comments, that we get the substitute before us, and then we can open up comments on the substitute version of Resolution 31961.

Thank you, Madam President.

I move to amend Resolution 31961 by substituting Version 4 for Version 2A.

Second.

Is there a second?

Okay, it's been moved and seconded.

Thank you, to substitute the resolution.

Council Member Mosqueda, would you like us to just go ahead and take a vote on the substitute and then we can make comments about the substitute version?

Great.

Thank you.

Yeah, and unless our colleagues is there, we did have a conversation about the contents of what is in the substitute version.

Is there any need for additional description by the prime sponsor about what is in the substitute?

Okay, hearing none, we'll go ahead and ask the clerk to please call the roll on the adoption of the substitute.

Peterson?

Aye.

Zawad?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales?

Yes.

Mosquena?

OK.

Yes.

Yes.

President Gonzalez?

Yes.

Eight in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries.

The substitute is adopted and version three of the resolution is before the council.

I'm going to hand it back over to Council Member Mosqueda to provide us with her remarks about the resolution as amended.

And then I will open it up for general comment and debate.

And we will then take a final roll call on it.

Council Member Mosqueda, please.

Thank you, Madam President.

And just for the record, I believe we have version four in front of us, given the amendment that was circulated.

Just want to double check that that's what we voted on.

Yes, correct.

That was an error on my part of the script.

I apologize.

Okay.

Thank you.

Just wanted to make sure, Council President.

I know it's been a long day, so I just thought I'd chime in there.

Council colleagues, the resolution in front of us affirms that the free press have the right to cover protests in our community.

We know that during the last few months of the protests that we've seen here in Seattle and across the country, journalists have been subject to tactics that serve to intimidate or discourage reporters from performing their jobs their responsibilities to observe these events and report them to the public.

Local media outlets have said that the ruling that we have seen from the local court that would require them to turn over photos and videos taken at protests threatens journalists' role and prevents them from being seen as neutral observers, could further erode trust between the public and the local media.

This is a concern that we on city council want to make sure that we address head on.

We wanna make sure that those who are reporting in our streets are free from intimidation when covering protests.

Increasingly, as we saw covered in Crosscut recently, journalists have reason to fear for their physical safety.

I'm quoting from Crosscut right now when they say that covering events like protests, journalists have given, I'm sorry, When covering events like protests, journalists have reason to fear for their physical safety.

Forcing journalists to give their work to police would make them less welcome and increase those risks.

Protests have constantly been some of the most dangerous on-the-site jobs for journalists working in the United States, and that has increased over the past three years.

Saying much of the violence comes, sorry, much of the violence comes from police committing acts of violence against journalists, but sometimes protesters also lash out.

This amendment addresses these issues.

No matter what our political opinions are, it's important that journalists have the ability to cover protests safely, to be safe, to feel safe, and that their right to cover the protests is protected.

And that's especially true when it comes to our police force.

These are members who work for the city.

We want to make sure that those who are covering these protests are not subject to the issues that we've seen repeatedly here in the city of Seattle, where reporters have been hit with flashbangs, experienced tear gas, and have also been arrested in our city and incarcerated for hours as they awaited release.

This resolution also applies to legal observers and medics who are at the protests to ensure that their legal rights and their safety is also protected at protests.

These legal observers and medics have also been subject to gassing, flashbangs, arrests, and intimidation.

Reports from them past month include legal observers who have been targeted by the police and medics who've been trying to aid protesters being pepper sprayed and hit in the face and also experienced flashbangs hitting their bodies.

It is embarrassing that the city of Seattle is highlighted in a more recent Amnesty International report.

The report is entitled, The World is Watching, Mass Violations by U.S.

Police of Black Lives Matter Protesters.

It covers atrocities committed right here in Seattle in the chapter that is titled, Human Rights Violations in the Policing of Protests.

And Seattle is the first story that is highlighted in this report on page 22. And if I might briefly call your attention to one of the stories that is highlighted, many of you know the story of Aubreyana Indah, a 26-year-old student who was struck in the chest by a flash grenade as she was kneeling down approximately 20 feet in front of the Seattle Police line.

She and her friends had been distributing food that evening at protests.

She moved to the front to talk with police to deescalate the tension.

Shortly after talking with the officers, Indah was hit with a flash grenade.

An intensive care nurse who was standing at the aid station behind the protesters said that she could smell the pepper spray and hear what it sounded like when the bombs exploded everywhere as people started rushing toward the aid station.

She was treating four different people at the time, flushing chemical irritants from their eyes and treating welts on their arms and legs from being hit with flash grenades.

As she was treating them, someone started screaming, she's been hit in the chest, she's been hit in the chest.

Yet even as the medic and other medics scrambled to treat Inda, police continued to fire tear gas, flash grenades and rubber bullets at them and the aid station.

Police then advanced on the aid station, firing flash grenades and pepper balls inside.

The station was clearly marked with identifying signs and red crosses and filled with tables stacked with water bottles and first aid supplies.

This is why this resolution is important, both for members of the press, for legal observers who we've seen on camera repeatedly being sprayed with pepper spray, and for medics who are trying to care for those who've experienced this type of trauma in our streets.

We do have some positive news this morning, and that is why the resolution is amended in front of you to include a new Section 5. The positive news is that according to a stipulated injunction from the Western District of Washington, SPD will be enjoined from using chemical irritants or projectiles against certain protesters.

And the ruling says the federal judge in Oregon also stated that although the First Amendment does not enumerate special rights for observing government entities, the Supreme Court has recognized that news gathering is an activity protected by the First Amendment.

Without some protection for seeking out the news, freedom of the press could be eviscerated.

This is incredibly important that these decisions were made today.

We want to make sure that we're doing everything we can to not only separate members of the press from being seen as an arm of the government or an extension of the police, but that we're constantly thinking about how we protect them in the moments that they're covering folks expressing their First Amendment rights, in addition to making sure that legal observers and medics are protected as well.

Appreciate all of your work, council colleagues, as we raise up this resolution and recognize that this follows on the heels of the unanimous votes that we've taken to prevent these types of weapons from being used in our street.

Obviously, much more work to be done, and I know this council's committed to that.

But I think that this resolution's an important step in reaffirming our commitment to protecting members of the press, legal observers, and medics during this time.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda for those remarks.

The resolution looks like we have a couple more folks who are interested in speaking.

So I'm going to head over to Council Member Peterson first as one of the co-sponsors and then we'll hear from Council Member Herbold.

Thank you Council President and thank you Council Member Mosqueda for introducing Resolution 31961 and for welcoming me as a co-sponsor.

This resolution is very important to me because I'm passionate about the crucial role that a free press plays in a healthy democracy.

We must always protect journalists, including those who cover protests and demonstrations, so they can shine a light on the truth by providing accurate and independent reports.

Social media posts and government-issued reports are not a substitute for professional journalists.

As a highly respected journalist, Walter Cronkite said, freedom of the press is not just important to democracy, it is democracy.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Peterson.

Councilmember Herbold?

Thank you.

I want to thank Council Member Mosqueda for bringing this forward.

Back on July 10th, I guess that is a month ago today, I wrote to the Mayor-in-Chief regarding the arrest of a journalist, Andrew Buncombe of The Independent.

and the threat of arrest of other journalists.

I've not yet received a reply.

And as a reminder, it's really important to recognize that the municipal code and the police department's policies as it relates to orders to disperse specifically exempts journalists.

Nevertheless, since then, journalists are still reporting having chemical irritants or projectiles used on them.

And not just reporting it, I've viewed it on live stream, including Omari Salisbury of Converge Media.

And his threat of arrest was one of the reasons for the letter earlier.

using these devices on journalists has, in effect, the same impact as threat of arrest and arrest.

It results in journalists being unable to cover the events that they are there to report on and thereby inform the public.

The operation of the free press is a linchpin of American democracy.