Housing and Human Services Committee 4/23/25

Everyone, the time is 9.32 and the April 23rd meeting of the Housing and Human Services Committee will now come to order.

I'm Kathy Moore, chair of the committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council President Nelson.

Present.

Council Member Rink.

Present.

Council Member Saka.

Vice Chair Solomon.

Here.

Chair Moore.

Present.

For present.

Thank you, and Council Member Saka is excused today.

So thank you everyone for being here for the April 23rd meeting and the Housing and Human Services Committee.

On today's agenda, first we have one appointment to the Seattle Human Rights Commission.

Next we have an appointment to the Community Roots Housing Public Development Authority Governing Council.

Then we have two appointments to the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority Governing Council.

Then we have five appointments to the Seattle Women's Commission.

All of our appointments today are for possible vote.

Then we will have two informational items.

The first is a status update on health and human services funding, and the second is an update on Seattle food security.

I would like to note for our last agenda item, we did receive an updated slide presentation yesterday evening.

The updated slide deck was emailed out to committee members, staff this morning at 7.05, and there are physical copies here in chambers.

I believe we are losing quorum at 11, so I will aim to move through the first portion of our agenda rather quickly and also ask that all questions be held until after the presentation.

If there are no questions about today's agenda, we will move into public comment.

All right, so no questions, thank you.

We'll now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comments should relate to items on today's agenda or be within the purview of this committee.

Madam Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

Chair, we have no in-person commenters and one online public commenter.

Okay.

Thank you.

Well, we will each speaker, the one speaker we have today will have two minutes.

We will obviously begin with the online speaker.

Madam clerk, can you please read the public comment instructions?

The public comment period will be moderated in the following manner.

The public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

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

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

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

All right.

The public comment period is now open and we'll begin with the first speaker on the list.

The first person on the list is David Haynes.

David, press star six to unmute.

You have two minutes.

All right.

Thank you.

David Haynes.

How much money did the office of housing spend to go on a working vacation to Baltimore, Maryland, to try to figure out how to continue to run interference for criminal repeat offenders that they treasonously and unconstitutionally prioritize for housing and services first while racially discriminating against innocent houses, citizens.

It's a concern.

Um, with the food insecurity, it's time that the Washington state farmers get embraced by the city and the county.

to start direct buying and bringing permanent farmers markets and maybe getting some purchases for the food banks that need to stay open longer instead of making people come in for part-time hours and take the expirated and dated food that was donated the previous week so that the food banks can save money not throwing things away that people should not be eating.

It's not fair that the farmers are allowed to export to China and India, but yet They don't want to bring the food to market here in the state of Washington or in the United States because they're trying to put a supply and demand squeeze and allow for the minimal amount of foods available so that they can inflate the rate.

And it's almost like Cain of Cain and Abel being selfish and greedy and pissing God off and allowing for people to starve with their belly full of junk food here in Seattle.

And I think we need to have permanent farmers markets.

And, you know, maybe the food banks need to stay open a little longer and stop being so abusive sometimes.

I mean, it's a blessed thing, you know, God bless Christian compassion, but don't let it be undermined.

Um, and the thing is, is like with the federal government and all the drama, if you all could just improve the policies instead of treasonously backstabbing and undermining public safety by still running interference for drug pushers, you all could still get a lot of federal money.

But if you're going to like, let me push a bunch of race fading voting blocks All you're going to do is just cause people to unnecessarily suffer some more, which is...

Chair, that concludes our list of speakers from the general public.

All right, thank you very much.

There are no additional registered speakers and we'll now proceed to our item of business.

Members of the public are encouraged to either submit written public comment on the signup cards available on the podium or to email the council at council at seattle.gov.

We will now move on to the first item on our agenda.

Will the clerk please read agenda item one into the record.

Agenda Item 1, Appointment 3141, Appointment of Fatia Abdi to the Seattle Human Rights Commission for a term to January 22, 2026 for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

All right, thank you.

The Human Rights Commission serves in an advisory capacity to the Mayor, the City Council, the City Office for Civil Rights, and other city departments.

Fatia is serving the remaining term of a vacant position.

She has extensive experience in equity and social justice as a DEI program manager with the Community Health Plan Network of Washington, and previously working for the Washington State Department of Health as an equity and social justice strategist.

She looks forward to being a part of making meaningful change for communities most impacted by inequities around systemic racism and oppression.

I want to thank them for their willingness to serve on the Seattle Human Rights Commission.

Are there any comments or questions from committee members before we move for a vote?

All right, seeing no further questions or comments, I now move that the committee recommend confirmation of appointment 3141. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointment.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation?

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Rink?

Aye.

Vice Chair Solomon?

Aye.

Chair Moore?

Aye.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and committee recommendation to confirm the appointment will be sent to the April 29th full city council meeting.

Will the clerk please read item agenda two into the record.

Agenda item two, appointment 3142, appointment of Drew Weber as a member of the Community Roots Housing Public Development Authority for a term to March 31st, 2026 for briefing discussion and possible vote.

All right, thank you.

Community Roots Housing PDA oversees all Community Roots Housing organizational activity, including property management, real estate development, and ongoing operations.

Drew is also serving the remaining term of a vacant position.

She's the Director of Accounting Advisory Services at KPMG.

She brings with her an abundance of experience in advisory roles, technical accounting, and financial report projects, to name a few.

Thank you, Drew, for bringing your experience to the PDA.

Colleagues, are there any questions or comments before I move for a vote?

Seeing none, I now move that the committee recommend confirmation of appointment 3142. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointment.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Rink?

Yes.

Vice Chair Solomon?

Yes.

Chair Moore?

Aye.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation to confirm the appointment will be sent to the April 29th full city council meeting.

The clerk please read into the record agenda items three and four.

Agenda items three and four, appointments 3139 and 3140. Reappointment of Paul Feldman and Doris W. Koo as members of the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority Governing Council for terms to December 31st, 2027 for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Thank you.

The Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority funds efforts to improve health equity in King County.

The governing council helps oversee their body of work.

Paul and Doris currently serve as board members and have been nominated for reappointment by the PHPDA governing council.

Colleagues, are there any comments or questions before I move for a vote?

All right, seeing none, I now move that the committee recommend confirmation of appointments 3139 and 3140. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointments.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Rink?

Aye.

Vice Chair Solomon?

Aye.

Chair Moore?

Aye.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation to confirm the appointment will be sent to the April 29th full city council meeting.

Will the clerk please read agenda items five through nine into the record.

Agenda items 5 through 9. Appointments 3134 through 3138. Appointment of Kate Farrow-Wright to the Seattle Women's Commission for a term to July 1st, 2025. Appointments of Amanda DeFisher, Crystal Guerrero, Vinati Mamadala, and Whitney Nakamura as members to the Seattle Women's Commission for terms to July 1st, 2026. For briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

All right, thank you.

The Seattle Women's Commission serves in an advisory capacity to Mayor, the City Council, the City Office for Civil Rights, and other city departments.

Kate is a new appointee, will be serving out the term of a vacant position.

She's looking forward to bringing her experience in project management, research, and policy advocacy to the Women's Commission to help create lasting positive change for women and girls in Seattle.

Amanda is a new appointee who is also serving the remaining term of a vacant position.

She's deeply committed to advocating for gender equity and social justice.

She's volunteered at a day center on Aurora Avenue.

It is her personal mission to leave everyone and everything in a better place.

Very nice personal mission.

Crystal is a reappointment and serves as co-chair of the Women's Commission and looks forward to continuing the important work around the issues women face in our world.

Benati is a reappointment to the Women's Commission who has been with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation since 2003 and has worked on global policy advocacy for gender equality among many other sectors of the foundation.

She looks forward to her continued work on the commission.

And Whitney is a reappointment, has served as co-chair and was with us in chambers actually last week to receive the Sexual Assault Awareness Month proclamation.

This will be her third term on the Women's Commission.

She looks forward to the work they have planned, and I would also like to thank her and all the other reappointments for their dedication to the commission.

These five appointees are all committed to empowering women and advancing gender equality.

I'm so grateful for their willingness to dedicate their time and talents to this cause.

Are there any comments or questions from the committee members before we move for a vote?

All right, seeing none, will the clerk please call?

Seeing no further questions or comments, I now move that the committee recommend confirmation of appointments 3134 through 3138. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointments.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation?

Council President Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Rink?

Aye.

Vice Chair Solomon?

Aye.

Chair Moore?

Aye.

Four in favor, none opposed.

Thank you.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation to confirm the appointments will be sent to the April 29th full city council meeting.

All right.

So we've now moved through the appointments.

Will the clerk please read agenda item into the record?

Agenda item 10, health and human services funds for briefing and discussion.

All right.

Well, thank you very much.

I want to invite Annie Malheur from our Office of Intergovernment Relations to the committee table today.

Annie is going to walk us through an update for an impact on local health and human services program, and I'll turn it over to you now.

Awesome.

Well, good morning, council members, and thank you, Chair Moore, for having me today.

As mentioned, my name is Anne Maher, and I am the Federal Affairs Director here at the Office of Intergovernmental Relations, and I'm joined by my deputy directors here at Howlett Brown this morning.

So I'm here today to prevent a federal affairs update centered on the health and human services arena.

Gonna start with a landscape update, dive into a little bit of what we're seeing on the health and human services level, both federally and locally, and then dive into some of the local effects we're seeing here at the city of Seattle and across our community.

Before I dive in, just wanted to acknowledge that this presentation is very focused to the health and human services world.

And of course, there's a lot of intersections right now to health.

So of course, I'm happy to answer any questions or follow up on more specific items that may not be included in the presentation.

Thank you.

Would you mind just pulling the microphone a little closer?

Thank you so much.

Of course.

Is that better?

Yes, much better.

Great.

All right.

So I just wanted to begin with providing a little high-level context on what we've seen since inauguration.

You'll likely remember in February that Congress confirmed Robert Kennedy Jr. as our new Secretary of Health and Human Services.

This was a fairly contentious vote at the time, but did signify a win for President Trump and GOP leaders.

HHS houses some key agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration, Center for Disease Control, National Institutes of Health, and Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services.

Over the course of the last few months, we've also seen a handful of executive orders announced, ranging directly related to health and also an intersection on the health sector.

This is ranging from withdrawing from the World Health Organization to enforcing the Hyde Amendment, which prevents federal funding for elective abortions.

We've also seen some executive orders that are not as specific to health and human services, but do have So that's guaranteeing the state protection against invasion, which requires medical information upon arrival at the border.

And then we've seen some more specific ones, such as the establishing the President's Make America Again Commission, and this is focused on preventing childhood chronic disease, which has become a priority of the administration and Secretary Kennedy.

And of course, all of these executive orders may not impact the work of the city directly, but they will be concerns to our citizens and our constituents, and of course, have trickle-down effects across the state and local level.

And we'll also just be monitoring how these play out, some of the effects we may not feel for even a year or years to come.

Another major action the Trump administration has taken was the announcement of major staff cuts and consolidation of Health and Human Services, which we're also referring to as HHS.

And this has major consequences, and I'll dive into that momentarily.

Before that, another key aspect of everything swirling around in the federal level right now is budget reconciliation.

And budget reconciliation is a tool that Congress or a special process that they can use to pass revenue or spending-related bills.

And Republicans are using that right now to pass to pass their spending bill, which is kind of being short termed as the mega bill.

This is really targeted at Trump's 2017 tax cuts along with immigration and the border and energy.

But in order to fund those priorities, Republicans are looking at cutting social services, so things like Medicare and Medicaid.

So we'll be watching as these discussions pan out over the next few weeks.

All of that's really just to say that there's a lot of chaos and uncertainty at the moment.

And if you're feeling that, it's definitely intentional.

And we're really right now just trying to monitor and really understand the impacts of everything happening right now.

And part of that, as mentioned, are the health and human services cuts.

So on April 1st, the administration did begin making cuts at HHS.

They're aiming to consolidate several agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration, the CDC, and NIH.

It's estimated right now that already upwards of 10,000 employees have already left the department.

Overall, they're targeting around 25% of total staff, so quite a significant number of HHS staff.

We've already seen court challenges to this, and so watching what happens on a legal front there, Secretary Kennedy has also admitted that some of these firings were accidental, and so we're monitoring how that will play out, but of course that has resulted in a lot of uncertainty and just general confusion for our constituents.

and especially regarding the future of our regional office.

So unfortunately, Region 10, which does represent Washington, was a part of those initial cuts.

On April 1st, we did see about 200 employees removed from Region 10 Office of Health and Human Services, which is actually just located across the street in the Columbia Tower.

The regional office does a lot of work around public health, so immunization, disease control, health equity.

And so in partnership with HSD, we're really trying to coordinate and understand what these cuts mean for Seattle, and part of this communication has been constant contact with our delegation, especially Senator Murray's team on this front.

She does oversee the help committee, so is particularly attuned to these issues, and you'll see she did release a statement echoing concerns over HHS, and so.

We are especially grateful to have our delegation support behind us.

That's been a crucial aspect of the work OIR has been doing over the last few months.

So I'm gonna pause here.

Of course, there's a lot of things that we could cover in this lens, but just gonna dive into some of the effects we're seeing here in Seattle.

So as mentioned, the effects of these will be pretty widespread.

Right now, I'm sort of thinking about it in three buckets.

So communication, policy, and programmatic concerns.

You know, just at a really high level, if there's no one in the offices, there's no one to do the work, right?

So just generally, we're gonna see even just a lack in responses or potential delays on projects and partnerships that we have with HHS along with our partners.

The good thing is that we're not the only ones in this boat and so we're working with the state and county and our local partners to ensure that we don't lose all those relationships and that the work that we've been doing with HHS does continue.

So along with this, we are seeing significant changes to high-level policy areas.

I do just want to caveat this part by saying that not all of these areas are direct work of the City of Seattle, but I did include them today, just as they may be issues that are concerning to your constituents, and we may see trickle-down effects.

So some of these changes include cuts to Medicaid and Medicare.

As mentioned, we're tracking Congress's spending package, but Trump has mentioned that he wants to use these cuts as a way to balance the budget, so tracking that.

Food security, you know departments like HSD and OSC do a lot of work in the food arena and their work relies greatly on national policy and food has become a priority for Secretary Kennedy and so obviously tracking concerns there and of course happy to have OSC and HSD follow up on specifics there.

Also, just seeing dramatic changes in medical research.

As you all know, Seattle is a medical research hub, and so we're gonna see impacts to our stakeholders, and especially universities as well, like UW.

We're also seeing cooperation with ICE as a requirement for federal funding.

And so that has levels of concern for us, but the mayor's office and city attorney are tracking what the ramifications of that will be for the city of Seattle.

Also just wanted to flag a few programmatic concerns that could be at risk.

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as SNAP.

It looks like up towards one billion in USDA funding could be cut for SNAP.

And of course, a lot of our Seattle constituents rely on SNAP benefits.

On a similar note, the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, also known as LIHEAP, is administrated through Washington State Commerce, and so we have customers who rely on LIHEAP benefits to pay their utility bills, and so we could see effects trickle down there as well.

The White House has also proposed cuts to Head Start funding.

It's unclear whether Congress would proceed with that, but definitely monitoring the impacts on our young population there.

And then lastly, just seeing freezing of NIH grants, and so, as mentioned, worried about some of our research partners.

So I'm gonna pause there and happy to answer any questions.

And of course, OIR is always happy to follow up on more specific issues.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, questions?

Council Member Nelson.

Council President, sorry.

Thank you very much, Chair.

And thank you very much for this presentation.

I just have to say that these are extremely concerning developments and this sledgehammer approach to what we're seeing across the country and particularly some of our most important programs and work being done is unconscionable.

I know it's not easy being the bearer of bad news, but I know that many people in Seattle are already being affected by some of these cuts, especially in our biotech and medical research industry.

And I learned just how bad it is when I visited the hands-off science table at the hands-off protest a few weeks ago.

So I just want to say that we I will be looking forward to learning more about how we as a city and county are thinking about doing everything we can to protect these services and our hardworking people in public health and in the science community.

And you also are bridging the food security issues as well.

I just want to note that in my first year in office, I put forward a proclamation honoring the Local Food Action Initiative.

So this is also really concerning to me as well, and I'm sure you're going to get into more detail on that.

So I do have a question.

What are...

Are there any actions being taken right now to mitigate some of the causes, some of these funding cuts or impacts that you know of outside of the city of Seattle?

In other places, I'm just asking, best practices that we could be learning from across the country or within our state?

Yeah, of course.

Thank you, Council President.

Appreciate your attentiveness to these issues as well, and I know our constituents do as well.

Yeah, there's a variety of things happening.

We're doing a lot of outreach to our delegation and working with them.

They have been advocating to our Republican Congress as well.

So definitely working with our delegation.

We're in communication with the governor's office and attorney general's office as well on these issues in terms of Funding, we're working to figure out how that pans out.

And so we'll be working in coordination with the mayor's office and of course council on figuring out how to address the funding deficit.

Thank you.

Just one final thing.

Yeah, go ahead.

I also thank you.

You haven't had an opportunity to speak right now, but I just wanted to thank you very much for making our federal team available every single week to talk to all the council offices to keep us up to speed.

So that is invaluable information that you're providing on an ongoing basis.

And I will just reiterate, and thank you, Annie, for that presentation.

The role of OIR in our constant and consistent communication with all of our government partners at every level of government has every level is impacted, obviously, by the actions and even just rhetoric of this administration.

So we are tracking very closely, working very closely with our partners.

I think a lot of people are taking a pretty conservative just stance right now and waiting to see because a lot of this is still, you know, we don't know how things will shake out at the end.

So kind of pulling back a little, waiting to see how if and when we might need to fill some gaps and how we might be able to do that.

And I know we're doing that work at the city internally as well.

But at every level of government that OIR partners with, we're doing that same process.

So happy to keep you up to date.

I'm glad we're here talking federal, but the federal is impacting, as you alluded to, county, tribal, international, state.

So happy to talk on any of those as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Vice Chair Solomon.

Yes.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I don't have a question or any questions for you, just more of a statement.

heard this morning that it was announced that the Women's Health Initiative was being gutted.

So a health initiative serving women from 50 to age 79, close to 162,000 women being served in that.

The program has been around since 1991. It's now cut.

Research being done on hormone therapy, heart disease, cardiovascular disease, vision loss, mental health.

I guess for the record, I just want to say I fail to see why.

Why is this happening?

What's the purpose?

Is it to make America great again or to make America die quicker?

I just don't know what the overall purpose is.

I do want to thank you for being here.

I do want to thank you for providing the information and helping inform us as to what maybe what we can do to take care of our folks, our research institutes.

Like Fred Hutch is definitely impacted by that initiative being gutted, right?

as are many of our institutions locally, our biotech, our universities, because funding is going away.

And again, I don't understand why.

So I just wanted to express my dismay at the Women's Health Initiative being trashed.

And my frustration that the folks on the other coast don't seem to care about what's happening to the people here.

So we need to take care of the people here as best we can.

And thank you for providing the information to help us inform those decisions.

So thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Of course.

Thank you, Vice Chair Solomon.

Yeah, definitely echo your concern there across the board.

Just more unfortunate news today.

Thank you, Council Member Rink.

Thank you, Chair.

Candidly, I don't even know where to begin.

I've spent most of my career working in human services and public health policy.

The system was already fragile as is. was already under-resourced.

People were already struggling.

Service providers were not getting the resources they need to actually support folks into stabilization recovery.

There were already challenges facing the system, and now we've added a complete layer of uncertainty and already a level of harm.

And I'm tremendously beyond concerned.

I'm panicked.

at what this already means for many in our community.

We have an unresolved budget challenge at the state level that also is threatening a number of these same programs.

And we're in the midst of a trade war that is already triggering higher costs for working families.

And so this is absolutely me ringing the alarm that we have to act immediately and likely start moving in new ways to be able to address the critical need for so many in our community.

Otherwise, we're going to be looking at folks going hungry, more folks becoming unhoused, people getting sicker.

This is dire.

And I just wanted to start on that note.

And I have a couple questions for today as I'm digesting all of this.

But I want to bring up something just related to the Health and Human Services Secretary related to the news coming out today about a supposed autism registry and what seems to be a national directive.

And I know this is kind of emerging news, but it certainly is startling and harkens to some really dark history that we know well around what we do when we look at people with developmental disabilities, when we look at any type of registry.

And so what do we know about that as it stands?

Do we project impacts to Washington?

What do we know at this time?

Thank you for the question.

That is not new news to me.

There's a lot flowing around, so I will look into that.

But happy to talk to our lobbyist and get some more information on that front and definitely report back.

That's very unfortunate news, but also new.

So happy to look into that.

But yes, I imagine there will be trickle down consequences of that action.

It's frightening and definitely rings of eugenics ideology.

So deeply concerned.

Some of the other questions I have for today.

Do we have a list of city of Seattle congressional directed spending or congressional project funding earmarked requests that were lost during the final congressional budget negotiations?

And does the city plan to reapply for projects in this fiscal year?

Yes, thank you.

We do have a list.

And yes, we have been moving forward with our earmark process and we are looking at resubmitting the funding for those projects.

We have been updating your council staff, so they should have the information, but I'll definitely forward the list of earmarks that we're submitting.

Fabulous.

Thank you.

And as we've been talking about, there have been a number of layoffs to federal workers across these agencies.

Is there an entity in or outside of Seattle tracking where workers exiting federal government jobs are seeking employment at?

So my understanding is that our congressional offices are doing the best to track that.

I think, unfortunately, due to the process of going about it, there's been a lot of confusion and uncertainty.

For example, trying to bring back employees who have been fired that may not even have access to their emails to know that.

And so I do believe there's been difficulties in understanding the specific numbers.

However, I believe the...

HHS has posted on their website the number of cut employees.

Thank you for that, and I want to thank you again for coming here today to present this information.

As was stated, I know it's not easy being the bearer of bad news, but it's important information, and we know that the City of Seattle can't tackle this alone.

Colleagues, we're going to need to find ways to work with our county and state partners, again, to weather this, because what is being presented here and It's very uncertain about what's coming before us, but it is looking very grim for our community.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member, and do appreciate, again, having all of your support.

Thank you, yeah, thank you for the presentation.

This is just, as Council Member Wink said, I don't know where to begin.

I do have a couple of questions.

There are so many lawsuits out there, it's hard for me to keep track.

So is Seattle or Washington engaged in any lawsuit around the cuts to health and human services that we know of?

There have been lawsuits against the health and human services.

My understanding is

I believe that we've joined one around the NIH funding, but we can get you a list of kind of an audit of that as well.

We're still working on trying to determine all of that too.

Yeah, and I would also just encourage direct communication with the CAO office as well on the legal front as well.

Okay, yeah, that would be helpful.

I mean, it seems like we should be joining a lawsuit to challenge these cuts to health and human services, which are actually services that are vital to everyone's survival.

So this is just the most basic level of need that we're addressing.

Two points that have been made here as well.

and I'm sure that you're in conversation with the county and the state, but I think we're at the point now where it really is a five alarm of fire, and we're still, I feel, too siloed, and I'm just wondering, and again, we've got the whole OPMA and Open Meetings Act, which clearly we need to comply with, but I'm just wondering, is there some way that we can, is there talk in the mayor's office, executive's office, about basically convening all of the electeds across the jurisdictions from local through state to talk about really just to do a deep dive and how do we rethink because I think I mean there are certainly resources we're losing a tremendous amount but how do we better utilize the resources that we have how do we get creative how do we even continue to know where the assaults are coming from and perhaps anticipate them so I That's my question.

Yeah, of course.

Happy to talk further about how to convene certain groups.

I think to your point, people are talking in a bunch of different ways.

I do know that Puget Sound Regional Council has been overseeing a lot of the regional work.

I know the mayor is a part of the US Conference of Mayors along with some of our national organizations like League of Cities as well have been great resources for advocacy.

So happy to talk about convening across jurisdictions.

I had one thing.

There have been several just kind of intergovernmental work groups that have popped up around various issues that we are a part of, that folks in the city are a part of.

But as Annie alluded to, the issues are so widespread.

A lot of these are very niche issues.

There's groups that are just looking at immigration.

There are groups that are just looking at childcare funding.

So all across the board.

And to your point, is there a need for kind of a broader scope?

That would be a pretty broad list of or engaging folks.

So that's something we're interested in looking at too and partnering with you all and happy to chat more about that.

Okay, that would be great.

Yeah, I recognize that.

I mean, it's a systematic dismantling, right?

And the intent is intentional chaos and intentional fire, too many fires.

But it seems like if we could create a broad overview and then we could divide into, you know, topics specific for people who are experts in those areas to come together to reinform.

So thank you.

I appreciate the willingness to engage in that.

I did have a specific question about the future of Section 8 housing.

Do we know if we have an update on that?

I know that the emergency housing vouchers, I believe, were cut for transitional housing, which is really just cutting your nose off to spite your face, but wondering about the Section 8 voucher program.

Yeah, I do know that Section 8 housing is being targeted.

I'm not sure the specific status of where we're at, but I had been hearing that that was another area of concern.

So again, happy to check with our lobbyist on where we're at specifically for Section 8. That'd be great.

I appreciate that.

And also, of course, I understand the intersection of housing here as well.

So understand we didn't dive into that, but happy to follow up with OH and HSD as well.

All right.

Thank you.

Appreciate that.

I'm also curious.

I know now that KCRHA has now been asked to receive the sort of mandate, comply or to get the money.

I'm wondering how much we're seeing that specifically for Seattle grants with having to comply with ICE.

Are we seeing that across the board?

Is it more specific?

It's seeming like it's not widespread but more specific, and so it appears that certain departments have seen sort of check-the-box requirements on their grants.

I don't know where KCRAJ is in terms of their agreements, but that is something that we're starting to see.

And has there been a decision at the executive level about how to deal with that?

We've been in constant communication regarding this issue.

And so I would probably defer to them to speak on that issue.

But yes, we are definitely thinking through how to go about it.

Okay.

Yeah, that's a tricky one to navigate for sure.

Yeah, yeah.

And I'll just say, I think that it's still something that they're looking at, the legal aspect of it, and we have not been given further guidance, so it's still in the legal realm.

OK.

Thank you.

Yeah, well, thank you for that.

Do you have any additional questions?

No.

Well, I know it's not always fun to be the bearer of bad news, distressing news, so I do very much appreciate the presentation today, appreciate the willingness to keep us apprised, to engage, continue to engage in Dialogue and conversation about how we can best respond to all of this And yeah, I'll look forward to some of the follow-up.

So thank you very much for being here today Thank you chair more and council members looking forward to continued partnership.

Thank you.

Thank you All right And I'm sure Council Member Rink will have additional questions in her federal affairs committee.

So this is just the beginning of this conversation.

All right.

Will the clerk please read the final agenda item into the record.

Agenda item 11, Seattle food security for briefing and discussion.

All right, thank you very much.

So I have invited Darcy, Marcia, and Erin to the committee table to provide the committee with an update on food security and food access here in Seattle.

If you would please introduce yourselves, the organizations you represent, and then begin your presentation.

Hello, my name is Darcy Buendia.

I am co-executive director at Hunger Intervention Program, a North Seattle meal program, as well as a member of the Meals Partnership Coalition.

Hi, Chair Moore and everyone else.

I'm Marcia Wright-Soyke.

I use she, her pronouns, and I'm the executive director of Family Works, which is an organization that focuses on food insecurity and family support in District 4. I'm also here as the co-chair of the Seattle Food Committee, which represents a coalition of 28 food banks that are spread across all of your districts.

Good morning, Chair Moore, members of the council.

I'm Aaron Chazesky.

I'm the director of advocacy and public policy at Food Lifeline.

Food Lifeline is a Feeding America partner.

We serve Western Washington.

I do government relations and advocacy, day-to-day lobbying, and I'm also part of the state's food policy forum.

Welcome.

Okay, we're going to jump right in.

And there is an awful lot of the previous presentation that is resonant in what we'll describe in terms of the experience that the hunger relief community is having with the new leadership from the Trump administration, newly controlled Congress, and new leadership within federal agencies that impact or support hunger relief.

And so for our presentation today, when we just started at a high level and mentioned some of the federal programs most closely operative in hunger relief work, many you'll be familiar with and most organized under the United States Department of Agriculture.

I'll note that within USDA, most of these programs are organized under FNS, or Food and Nutrition Services, which operates about 15 different programs.

I think this is important to note because we know of some certain cuts that are happening in some specific areas, but as you'll see, there seems to be still a lot of opportunity within USDA and food nutrition services for further cuts or impacts.

I mentioned 15 programs and some we'll get into very specifically, but just to give you the broadest of overview, think about SNAP, WIC, the National School and Breakfast Lunch Program, Child Nutrition Programs, Senior Farmer Market Nutrition Programs, Sun Bucks, fruit and vegetable incentives, and on and on.

Today, though, some of the known cuts that we'll talk about happen in the space of TFAP, the Emergency Food Assistance Program, which is foundational in terms of support for food banking.

A lot of government commodity arrives in the state through this program.

And then specifically within that, There's funding from what is called the Commodity Credit Corporation.

And this is essentially a corporation that allows USDA to have additional funds for a variety of purposes.

Oftentimes, or at least in past, this has been a source of additional funding for hunger relief.

I'll note there's also USDA has opportunity through what they call bonus commodities.

And there's also funding that arrives through a program called TFAP Storage and Distribution.

Also, then you've probably heard the news about cuts to local food purchasing agreements and local foods for schools, two important programs.

And then the potential for the anticipated cuts to SNAP, and you've heard the $230 billion figure associated with that.

I do want to note that with regard to the local food purchasing agreements, these are funding that allows for local contracts to happen between food banks and local growers.

Similarly, local foods for schools, a program operated by OSPI allows for similarly sourcing of local produce for schools.

And I think what's most noteworthy about these programs is that they were largely inspired out of the pandemic experience and that they provided an opportunity to encourage food system resilience.

So now we have the ability for local organizations to connect with local growers to source food locally.

I think we can go to the next slide.

And then here, just to illustrate some of the known cuts impacting the state within TFAP, almost immediately $500 million was cut from the Commodity Credit Corporation .

$17 million is the amount that Washington State immediately lost in terms of funding for food commodities.

And then within LFPA, you see $500 million.

which is an impact in our state, $8.5 million.

And then local food for schools, that was a really big cut, $600 million, $660 million.

To my knowledge, the state impact of that is about $30 million in lost food.

So one of the programs that we are really concerned about, obviously, is SNAP.

Just for context, there were about 1.2 million people in Washington state who received SNAP for at least a month in 2024 and just over 200,000 in King County that received SNAP in 2024 with an annual value of just over $400,000 that was used to purchase critical food supplies for their households.

The House has directed the Agricultural Committee to reduce the USDA budget by about $400 billion.

The anticipated amount of that to come from SNAP is $230 billion, so just over half.

And so when we think about trying to achieve that number, what we really anticipate is that there's going to likely be reduced benefits, but also a recalculation of who is eligible.

So that means fewer households across Washington state and also within city limits will be eligible for SNAP benefits.

We are weighing that with the reality of food insecurity and hunger being at crisis levels in Washington state.

There has been a 26% increase in the number of visits to food banks over the last year.

And in Seattle food banks specifically, where we see about a million visits on an annual basis, there were at least 22,000 more visits to Seattle food banks among Seattle food committee members than in 2023.

And I would just like to add to that some of the meal program impacts we're seeing, which very closely mirror what our food bank partners are seeing.

Calculations from the meals partnership, which are primarily programs in Seattle from 2000 2023 to 2024 saw a 24% increase in participation in meal programs, which makes a lot of sense because when SNAP is less available, people will default to depending more on meal program and food bank services.

Anecdotally, I'll add that programs in my own organization and programs in our partner organizations are seeing participation that is at the level that we were also experiencing in the COVID era.

But of course, a big difference is that we are no longer doing that with COVID era funding, which greatly inhibits our ability to serve our community in the best way possible and provide the public safety benefits.

That is one of the things that we hope to accomplish in our missions.

You use the term chair more about systematic dismantling And I think when we think about the downhill impacts of SNAP cuts, we are also weighing the fact that SNAP is often used as a direct certification or making someone categorically eligible for a lot of other benefits that serve low-income households.

So in thinking about reduced eligibility and SNAP being more restrictive, we see potential for downhill impacts on fewer schools reaching the community eligibility provision, which allows for school-wide free and reduced lunch participation in Washington State.

There will be fewer families who receive summer EBT benefits, which help to fight things like summer hunger and increased food insecurity.

programs.

We anticipate a smaller TFAP allocation for the state, as well as fewer families receiving benefits that are automatically triggered by EBT participation.

One of the things to also note is that Washington State will be disproportionately affected because we are pretty sophisticated in our state in linkages and maximizing waivers processes in order to make it easier for folks to access benefits and to qualify.

And so the undoing of the number of people who can even be eligible for SNAP will make some of those programs more difficult to access.

Madam Chair.

Thank you very much.

Before we leave SNAP, I had a question.

You interact with lawmakers from across the state, right?

So my question is, what are Republican legislators saying and what are they hearing from their constituents?

We often hear that sometimes it's rural areas that rely sometimes more on some of these programs.

I know we're talking about Seattle, but I'm just wondering what you're hearing elsewhere.

I could maybe address this.

So we're fortunate in Washington State to have a member on the House Agriculture Committee.

That's Congressman Dan Newhouse.

I think mostly what we're hearing now from Republicans in Congress is a focus on work requirements.

and also their concern for fraud or misuse of funds within the program.

So their view would be to look for more stringent work requirements in SNAP and reforms that would achieve a purpose of limiting any misuse of SNAP dollars by beneficiaries.

Right now, I think that there has been pretty adequate pressure about protecting SNAP, but we're actually concerned that Congress may, in a similar fashion with Medicaid, look to shift more financial burden on the SNAP program to the state.

So it's kind of the lay of the land there.

Well, it's up to our legislative districts, I would imagine, to just Carry the voices upstream so that we can deliver the message.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

And that's a consistent response across all of the hunger relief spectrum.

We need to lift up the stories, the concerns, and ask a request or urge Congress to protect these important safety net programs.

Thank you.

I did say we would hold questions to the end, but we're actually a little bit ahead of schedule.

So if people have questions now about SNAP that you'd like to ask or anything.

No, that's okay.

Or anything about the presentation up to this point, we can take them.

Thank you.

And thank you all for the work you continue to do to keep our communities fed and healthy.

And I know we're moving into some really frightening times when it comes to being able to fulfill that mission.

My question is related to SNAP specifically.

Of the proposed $230 billion in cuts to SNAP in the state budget, do we know the impact on Seattle specifically yet?

I think I have an answer to you, but I lost the last part of your question.

Just the impact to Seattle specifically yet, based on the cuts.

So the proposed cuts, the $230 billion proposed cut to SNAP, significant.

I'd like to add that SNAP is the nation's first line of defense against hunger.

For every one meal that the entire Feeding America network provides, across the country, and that's 200 food bank distribution centers like Food Lifeline and 60,000 food pantries.

For every one meal, the Charitable Hunger Relief System provides, SNAP provides nine.

Any degradation in the level of support from SNAP, as pointed out earlier, would severely harm our ability to meet our community's needs.

We don't know exactly how those cuts will be manifest, but I can use the recent experience of the SNAP emergency allotments that were in effect during the pandemic.

And those emergency allotments essentially took someone from whatever benefit level they qualified for to the maximum that a person would be eligible for.

When that program sunsetted, Washington state lost about $93 million a month in food benefit just from that adjustment.

So whatever that number may end up being in terms of how those cuts are manifest in Washington state and in Seattle, it will be significant.

Thank you for laying that out.

And I know we've been having a lot of discussion about SNAP, but wondering a little bit about the WIC program and if we have concerns about cuts that are being made to WIC right now.

We do, and SNAP, interestingly, is both utilization is not optimized within WIC, so there's still work to do to ensure that women who qualify are accessing the benefit.

But I don't know, I haven't heard specifically of any significant cuts coming this way.

We basically have caseload issues with WIC.

Understood, thank you.

And thank you also for laying out just the piece around how much, again, in many ways, SNAP is kind of that first point and often a connector to so many other social services.

And I know we have a number of pieces of state legislation that have tied their eligibility to, or trying to really make that connection between enrollment in SNAP and eligibility in connection to or auto enrollment into other programs within the state level.

I don't know if a full crosswalk of that has been done, but it certainly seems worthwhile to make sure we're not losing folks along the way as there are impacts to SNAP.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And just wanted to reiterate, we don't know how they're going to get to that 230 billion.

And it essentially could remake the program across the country and that that will have downhill effects to folks in Washington state and in the city.

May I ask a question?

So what is the eligibility?

What is the income a family of four?

Let's say what income makes one eligible for SNAP?

It's 150% of the federal poverty level.

150% of the federal poverty level.

And do we know what the federal poverty level is for a family of four?

We could double check those numbers and get back to you.

It's somewhat of a rhetorical question because it's pretty much subsistence.

And far below the area median income of our county.

Way below the median, yeah.

So we're not talking about people who have any excess money resources.

These are people who are at the very bottom of our economic system and ladder.

I can, if I may, can confirm that in this way, in that the Washington State WSDA, Washington State Department of Agriculture, with regard to the TFAP program applied for and USDA previously accepted a waiver that allows for TFAP foods to be distributed to households up to a 400% federal poverty level.

And that was established because of the need.

So it is true that at 150% federal poverty level, that's not reaching everyone who has need.

Chair Moore?

Yes.

Just for the purposes of discussion and because you asked and for, again, our discussion, the federal poverty level for a family of four is about 32,000 for this year.

32,000 for a family of four is the federal poverty level.

So 150% of that.

And I'm just curious, what is the...

imagined abuse of the SNAP program.

It's my words to say imagine.

What is put out there as somehow, where's the fraud, waste, and abuse that supposedly exists in the SNAP program that feeds people?

That's been persistent rhetoric from conservative lawmakers over many, many decades.

And I think in terms of what Darcy sees and what I see when folks are walking into the food bank, they're using that as a way to make what are very limited benefits really stretch.

There are a lot of foods that are excluded that you cannot use SNAP benefits even to purchase in our local grocery stores and other food entities.

So...

the perceived abuse does not line up with what the actual benefit offers someone in terms of purchasing power.

Thank you.

And I think, too, that we're noting that with the crackdown on ICE, that now people who are even eligible for these programs aren't even participating in them.

Is that correct?

Because of the concern about being identified or just miscommunication about still remaining eligible.

I'd like free and reduced school lunch.

Yes, there's definitely a chilling effect that that has on people, regardless of the actual regulations.

Yeah.

Okay, thank you.

Any more questions about SNAP?

Okay, go on.

I think we're moving over to tariffs.

Okay, so certainly we have the concern of the direct impacts of funding cuts, but now the tariffs present another interesting potential impact in food banking.

Certainly the food security The rate increase that we're experiencing now is largely driven by, now that the pandemic is over, the increasing cost of food.

And it's certain we experienced this before during the first Trump administration in the trade wars at that time.

tariffs caused upheaval in the agricultural marketplace.

And so when those costs are passed on to consumers, that creates hardship for families with tight budgets and increases their reliance on food banks for support.

We'll add one other consequence during that period of time is that the federal government then was required to purchase commodities from growers in the US.

And a lot of that product was pushed into the hunger relief system.

It was referred to as trade mitigation products.

So we did see some upside in that the trade wars, cutting off access to markets outside of the country caused a lot of that food to be pushed into hunger relief system.

We talked about SNAP in a lot of ways being part of a web of benefits that low-income households are connected to.

And so in alluding to the presentation earlier the leaked HHS budget that came out last week.

We are seeing that there are proposed cuts to LIHEAP for 2026, but also we anticipate that many users of the LIHEAP program could see the program run out of funds as soon as October.

And in Washington state, LIHEAP is connected to SNAP eligibility.

So if you are eligible for SNAP, you become categorically eligible for LIHEAP.

It's one of the ways that we make that program and income verification and enrollment more efficient and to get assistance in the hands of folks faster.

So again, as we continue to evaluate the potential undoing of SNAP eligibility, there's also really significant downhill impacts when it comes to energy assistance as well.

And I also wanted to point out a recent and very concerning cut to the AmeriCorps program.

The reason I wanted to point out this cut in this presentation specifically is because AmeriCorps members do so often work in and support anti-hunger organizations like food banks and meal programs.

there were some rather large and very careless cuts recently in which one of the major branches of AmeriCorps, which is the National Civilian Conservation Corps, was completely dismantled and every single member was just terminated immediately.

In addition to that, 75% of their national administrative office has been let go.

So we don't currently have the number of what that has reduced us to in Washington state, but we did have 5,300 serving AmeriCorps members prior to that cut.

And if I can kind of describe the impact that AmeriCorps members do have in Seattle, if you think of all the different branches of this tree, one in relative terms, very small outcropping of AmeriCorps members is hosted by United Way of King County.

And United Way of King County alone distributes 15 year long AmeriCorps members and 45 summer serving AmeriCorps members to anti-hunger organizations only.

Those members serve 35,000 hours every year and connect with and serve at least 7,000 Seattle specifically residents.

So that program is still intact and moving forward, but after such chaotic and recent cuts, I just point that out as something that would be very scary to lose.

We're going to spend a little bit of time talking about reduced capacity for our local food safety net.

But I did also just want to mention that, you know, the organizations that are represented here are already immersed in trying to meet the moment in terms of the food insecurity crisis that we're seeing play out across the city and across the state.

And we have had to divert a lot of energy to keep up with the deluge of executive orders, things that really harm the ability for us to do our work, to try to even quantify what the local impact is now and could be.

And so this is what we know right now, and we could all walk away from this meeting and learn something completely new that we would then have to go through the same exercise.

In 2024, Seattle Food Banks distributed 1.25 million pounds from the TFAP CCC program.

That's about 5% of all of the food that was distributed in the city at that time.

And so with the cancellation of that funding program, we are already looking at a significant reduction from just that one area.

With the local food purchasing agreements, for Seattle Food Bank specifically, members of the Seattle Food Committee, It provided about $300,000 of purchasing capacity with our local farmers and growers, which provides locally grown produce and other goods, which really actually comes at a premium in food banks.

So while $300,000 might not seem like a lot, it certainly is in terms of the locally grown food that's provided.

And just drawing an example for Family Works specifically, 24% of the locally grown produce that we distributed in our food bank last year was funded by the LFPA and that has also been, that program has been canceled.

Also wanted to just point out some of the downhill impacts.

There are 11 local farms that were supported just from that $300,000 LFPA utilization from the Seattle food banks.

And I also wanted to point out that there are numerous other organizations that utilize LFPA to provide supplies in their organizations.

many cultural hubs and organizations around the city, such as the Center for Multicultural Health and the Eritrean Association.

Oh, still me.

So the slide that we have in front of you, it says solutions.

I would soften the language and really call them more so recommendations.

But the city of Seattle actually did something that was pretty prescient last year, with the passing and release of the local food action plan.

And many of the things, many of the strategies that we need to meet the moment and to insulate us from what we are already seeing in terms of federal impacts on our food security programs, there are numerous priorities within this food action plan that if, adequately resourced and deployed by the city could really walk alongside us in meeting some of these critical challenges that we will see play out this year and next year and in the future.

One is to prioritize culturally relevant and equitably purchased foods in city programs.

Another priority is to really strengthen the capacity of meal programs and food banks.

to strengthen out-of-school food programs, to sustain and strengthen food and meal programming for older adults, and to prioritize food access for unsheltered populations.

And so I think that one of our recommendations is really to urge council as you are deliberating the budget later this year to think about really deploying this to meet its full promise.

which I think could help us meet a lot of the priorities that we are concerned will get dropped off with some of the federal cuts coming down at the local level.

May I just endorse Marsha's comments here?

This is an extraordinary plan, and we fully support everything she said.

And our second slide on this topic builds on what Marsha said and also builds on the good work of our presenters that were just prior to us.

This builds on the conversation that I heard all of you having about what ways do we build conversations with different levels at this point to start solving these crises.

So just adding to that conversation, we would suggest collaborating with members of the Washington congressional delegation, including of course, Senator Murray and Representative Jayapal to strengthen local government food security by collaborating with the mayor's office, members of the King County Council, the US Conference on Mayors and the National League of Cities.

And those of us here and many of us in our coalitions are strong supporters of increasing funding and investment in the food security system, including progressive revenue.

That is something that we are willing to advocate and willing to rally our constituents to advocate for along with you all.

So that is the end of the, oh, no, please go ahead.

Just want to maybe add underscore one point in the previous slide in terms of partnership.

I want to offer that especially now at the state level, I see great opportunity for the city of Seattle to partner with state lawmakers in this area.

Again, we, in this period of time, will need to be more self-reliant.

I'll point out that State Representative, for instance, Christine Reeves, who's now the Chair of the House Agriculture Committee, introduced a bill this session that calls for a statewide coordinated strategy for food security.

I see this as an opportunity for the city to come with its food action plan to help influence the development of a statewide strategy.

And I think that that partnership would serve the state well.

And then also at this time, again, we will have to pivot in many ways and figure out where we can leverage things that exist now.

I'll note that recent developments at the state level have built up new infrastructure within the department, Washington State Department of Ecology.

They've stood up a Washington Center for Sustainable Food Management that is providing A purview over implementation of a plan is called Use Food Well Washington.

This is a plan that was called for in previous legislation, which directs the state to achieve a 50% reduction in wasted food by the year 2030. that's a little complicated but the point is is that we have opportunity um using wasted food reduction as a platform to encourage food donation which is an you know another stream of of food that is should you know is available should we be able to have the capacity to bring it into communities Um, this program, uh, recently a Washington commodity donation program, for instance, was created at the state level.

And what it does is sources unsold produce that's available from Washington growers and moves it into hunger relief.

It offers the opportunity for, uh, local growers to be compensated for the harvesting and transportation costs they occur when making those donations.

And tens of millions of pounds of produce are available in this way.

Also, the same Washington Center for Sustainable Food Management has stood up a statewide food donation work group, which is as we speak, finalizing recommendations for business and retail sectors that encourage food donation, essentially helping to share best practices and build up capacity to move food, again, otherwise unsold, into hunger relief.

So there's an awful lot of opportunity and work to be done in all areas to help guard against some of the loss that we'll see from federal support.

In no way we'll make up for the ability, the scope, the size of what the federal government is able to do, but certainly it does push us further into areas where we can become more self-reliant, create more local, sustainable, more equitable food systems.

And I just wanna thank so much every employee, volunteer, community member doing the direct service that stands metaphorically in this room with us.

I also wanna thank so sincerely everyone on the council here today for your very clear interest in the topic and also the abundance of time that you've offered us today, the good questions that you've asked.

We really appreciate the partnership

Thank you.

Uh, council member Solomon.

Uh, thank you very much.

Madam chair.

Are you, I'm going to keep my, uh, questions brief, uh, with regard to, um, like cafeterias, restaurants, Starbucks, you've got a lot of prepared foods that at the end of the day, what happens with that?

Are those foods currently being, can they be currently donated to shelters or are they, or are there current restrictions to say, well, for health considerations, we're not gonna give the, you know, send this bagel that was baked yesterday to a food bank or, I'm thinking about the cafeteria that's in the federal building that always has excess food at the end of the day.

And my thought is, what do they do with that food?

Does it just go in the trash or can it go to some place that's serving meals for those who are unsheltered.

So can you speak to that real quick, and then I'll have a follow-up question for you.

Go ahead, you start.

The short answer is it depends.

It sometimes does find its way into the emergency food system, sometimes through Food Lifeline, which has a more major program that deploys food rescue in many different ways, and sometimes through direct relationships that meal programs and food banks have.

There are always concerns around that, food safety, transferring the food properly, making sure it meets the needs of the organization that it goes to.

So there are many hiccups on the way, but the short answer is it does happen.

It could potentially happen more.

I don't think it is the...

golden ticket out of the problem.

But it is an important part of the solution.

And not looking for necessarily the golden ticket, but something.

And is there something that that this body can do to ease up the, to basically open up the pipeline a little bit more for those foods from the organizations I'm talking about, from the grocery stores, Starbucks, you name the entity that has those prepared foods.

Is there something that we can do to open up that pipeline to make it easier for those foods to get to people who actually need them as opposed to winding up in the compost bin?

I can think of two things.

This is an issue.

When I mentioned the food donation work group coming up with recommendations, they'll speak to this subject matter.

I think it would probably be compelling for the city to receive those recommendations and consider how it can elevate them within the city.

An awful lot of opportunity in this area can be realized through more promotion and awareness of opportunities for donation to happen safely and where there is capacity.

We found nearly universally people do not like to waste food, and they would be happy to donate it, but sometimes just don't know how to do that.

And so that's where the promotion of opportunity would be really helpful.

But I think these recommendations will solve a lot of the issues that might be limiting donation that could be happening now.

Thank you for that, because when I look at the numbers that you're talking about in terms of the cuts, my feeling is that there's nothing that's off the table.

We got to look at everything, um, for food security.

Last question I have for you is I always try to wrap my brain around, um, what is progressive revenue, right?

And so when you're talking about food insecurity and how do we combat food insecurity, uh, in face of cuts from the federal level, what does progressive revenue look like to you?

I would just say that the city convened a revenue stabilization task force, I think a couple years ago, that had a number of ideas for potentially progressive revenue options.

And it can include everything from really looking at income, taxes on business, a bunch of different recommendations that were made that we hope council continues to review and deliberate as well as the mayor's office.

I can think of maybe three things that to me most immediately looks like a wealth tax.

Washington State has the second most regressive tax code in the country, so working poor families are paying anywhere from four to six times the amount of their share of income for state and local taxes.

I got a thumbs up from someone out there.

So it also looks like the working families tax credit.

And so maybe it's possible that the city looks at something to further extend the benefit of helping folks who are paying more into the system than is their fair share.

And then it also looks like, you know, relief and one of the revenue proposals for the Washington State Legislature right now is a reduction in sales tax.

And so that is, you know, we need to find, we need to, our upside down tax code needs to be balanced.

you know, move toward greater equity in the tax code.

And so also looking at the sheer number of different revenue proposals that are before the legislature now, it can look a lot of different ways.

I feel like this is an area where there's lots of opportunity and need for creative thinking because right now there's too much burden put on low-income working families and poverty is, you know, this is a root cause of hunger.

So I appreciate the interest in your question.

And we know we can't food bank our way out of food security, so we do have to make sure that families are in situations where they can meet their own needs.

And thank you for that, because I also recognize that the state tax system in Washington is upside down.

Absolutely makes sense.

Again, there are many things that frustrate me, and this is one of them.

And without action on the state level to actually do an income tax, that really does limit what we're able to do.

And continuing to go after wealth or employers, high earners, you know, we saw that the forecast came in, you know, much lower than we were anticipating.

So, you know, we've got that deficit to deal with in the city, the state deficit that we have to deal with, and the cut off of funding from the feds.

And so, again, I'm trying to wrap my brain around what can we do given all those realities.

So for me, nothing's off the table.

But I also realize that there's things that, really do rely on the state legislature to enact.

And how much we may be able to do here is not going to make up that shortfall, I don't believe, without causing further damage, further harm.

Again, something I struggle with.

I thank you for indulging me with my questions and providing me your feedback because, again, I am looking for a way forward in solutions.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Councilman Rink.

Thank you, Chair Moore.

I don't have any questions for the panel.

I think they've thoroughly given us a clear look about what we know at this time, even in the wake of so much uncertainty.

And I thank you for being so directive with us about what a path forward can look like.

And what I'd like to comment on with my time here is just to contextualize a little bit more of what we're talking about.

Since we were talking about the federal poverty line, just by doing a little bit of quick math, when we're looking at 150% federal FPL, we're talking about for a family of four, that is 48,000 a year.

That is a family that is within 30% AMI for a Seattle household.

That is considered an extremely low-income household.

And households at this level that are extremely low-income In King County, 23 units out of every 100 are actually affordable and available for these families.

We have a huge deficit of housing that is actually affordable to folks.

So we're talking about 84% of these households are cost burdened.

They are paying more than 30% of their monthly incomes towards their housing.

And now we're talking about reality where they need to be paying more for food as well.

I understand there's some discussion by Republicans in Congress who talk about fraud and abuse of these programs, but these are tired narratives.

They're insulting, obscene narratives.

And everything that we're seeing happening right now, this is an all-out assault on poor people.

And I think we need to be crystal clear on that.

We have to do work in the city to make sure that we can say with confidence, we're gonna do the work to make sure nobody goes hungry in this community.

And I appreciate Council Member Solomon raising the points about our budget deficit and about also the discussion we've had about our state tax system.

We're looking at 60% of Seattle, pardon me, of Washingtonians, the bottom 60% are paying 13.8% their incomes in taxes.

whereas the top 1% paying 4.1%.

That kind of inequity is unsustainable.

And we're seeing that play out right now.

It is unsustainable.

And with our own budget deficit, $240 million, over $240 million.

And that's just right now.

That is not factoring in our upcoming forecast.

We have to pursue something.

We have to pursue progressive revenue.

There is no other choice.

The alternative is too heinous to even think about for what it means in our community.

And we're gonna need an all-hands-on-deck approach.

I know our office has been watching to see how things hash out in the state legislature.

Ideally, as we're pursuing and looking at tax options, we'd like it to be complimentary to whatever they're pursuing.

We are mindful of that, and we have been looking at exactly the revenue stabilization task force report, which does outline some options.

We've been in conversation with a number of partners around how we can be pursuing some of those as well.

And we are going to need to just work closely with our county partners as well on this.

Council Member Moore, I know you made a really fantastic point earlier around connecting on multiple levels of government.

And I know for the federal committee, we're actually working on a joint session with King County Council with the federal committee.

So that's a little bit of some news.

We're still working on a date for that.

but I think that's a great first step of having Seattle City Council and King County Council together in a committee meeting talking about these issues.

Still working on a date on that point, but I think it's worth noting in this moment because we are gonna need an all hands on deck approach.

And you certainly have my commitment to be working on this with you.

Again, appreciate you all for coming here today and laying this out for us.

And colleagues, this is going to be a really tough road ahead, but I look forward to working with you, Chair, on any upcoming presentations of this matter.

I thank you for bringing this topic today.

This is a really fruitful discussion, and it certainly has catalyzed me even more, if I was not already catalyzed to be doing work in this area, certainly committed to making sure no one in this community goes hungry.

So thank you, Chair.

Thank you so much.

I'm running a little bit over, so I'll keep my remarks short.

Thank you very, very much for this presentation.

Thank you so much for the work that you're doing.

Thank you for this solutions page, providing us a roadmap.

I will definitely, it's so helpful to have these kinds of from the people who are doing the work, some concrete steps that we can take.

So definitely we'll be looking at that, ways that we can implement that.

Thank you for the advice about reaching out to Representative Reeves to work on that.

I just do want to note on the request for progressive revenue, I did bring a bill last budget session last fall for capital gains which would have been set aside for rental assistance and food assistance as well as home ownership assistance.

We have been in food crisis for a very long time.

It's been a silent crisis.

Now it's not going to be quite so silent, unfortunately.

Well, it's unfortunate that we're in crisis at all.

But I remain committed to bringing forth the capital gains proposal directed at rental assistance and food assistance.

I know lots of people want to have a bite at it, but it is our fundamental obligation as representatives of this community I gotta stop there.

To ensure that the basic needs of people to be fed are met.

And there's enough money to go around to do that.

And I also think that when we come to the budget, that we need to be really prepared to have some hard discussions about where we need to potentially reprioritize.

We absolutely need to pursue progressive revenue.

Capital gains is tried and true.

It takes a while for the money to accumulate, so we need to have money more immediately.

But we also need to think about, we are in a crisis, a food crisis.

It's only going to get worse.

We are in a crisis of rental assistance.

It's only going to get worse.

We need to perhaps be prepared to reprioritize for these basic necessities that are required of us as elective representatives of this community to ensure are provided.

So I'm just putting that out there for now, food for thought, basically.

But again, thank you so very much for this presentation.

I wish Council Member Hollingsworth had been here.

I know she's also a huge advocate and very knowledgeable.

And we had talked about last year working together, and now we have more people to work together on this issue.

So I think we have a, what's the word I'm looking for the critical mass to maybe bring more concrete work forward this year so thank you again and please continue to be in touch with my office other council member offices if you have any sort of suggestions about how just local residents can continue to support the work you do I do all of us have newsletters very happy to put out suggestions or requests in the newsletter about how, because people in the community are always asking how can we help, right?

So we put out a call for diapers when North Hep line, when that was cut, thanks to the imminent wisdom of the Trump administration.

So happy to put something out like that for donations or volunteers or whatever it is that could help on the more day-to-day level.

So again, thank you all for being here, for the work you do.

All right, we have run over.

So hopefully there are no further questions.

Seeing no further questions or comments, this concludes the April 23rd meeting of the Housing and Human Services Committee.

Next meeting is scheduled for May 14th, 2025. The time is 11.10 and we are adjourned.