Committee on Sustainability & Renters' Rights 1/21/22

Good morning, everyone.

This is the first regularly scheduled meeting of the Sustainability Inventors Rights Committee of the Seattle City Council in this year.

Today is Friday, January 21st, 2022, and the time is 9.30 a.m.

I am the chair of the committee, Council Member Kshama Sawant.

Would the clerk, Ted Verdone, from my office please call the roll?

Council Member Sauer?

Present.

Council Member Nelson?

Present.

Council Member Juarez?

Here.

Council Member Lewis.

Present.

Council Member Morales.

Here.

Five present.

Thank you, Ted, and welcome to all members of this committee.

This year, I hope this committee will continue to work developing a Renter's Bill of Rights.

Last year, we passed legislation closing loopholes in the Just Cause Eviction Ordinance, prohibiting evictions during winter months and for school children during the school year, and also for public school workers in the same bill.

We created relocation assistance for renters economically evicted by outrageous rent increases and the law that will go into effect in July this year July 1 this year says that.

Landlords need to pay three months worth of rent if they end up displacing their tenants by rent increases of 10% or more.

We also passed the law requiring six months notice for any rent increases.

Thank you to all the renters, working people, union members, socialists, and also small businesses and small landlords who helped us, you know, progressive small business owners and small landlords who helped organize alongside us to help win these victories.

This year, my office is organizing to pass comprehensive rent control along with several other important components of a renter's Bill of Rights, including prohibiting discriminatory credit checks as part of renter histories, limiting late fees, and strengthening renters' ability to get their landlords to make necessary repairs.

And that last point will be the first agenda item in today's committee meeting, and I will speak more about that when the agenda item begins.

This year, I also hope this committee will continue to push for a Green New Deal to stop climate change.

As working people did during the tax Amazon movement in 2020, we need to continue the fight to tax the biggest businesses in order to be able to fund the Green New Deal to build green infrastructure with good living wage union jobs.

Under capitalism, the commanding heights of the economy and the overarching decisions about the infrastructure of our society are not made democratically by all working people and they're instead in the hands of the billionaires and multinational corporations.

And so it is just impossible to address climate change without inevitably coming into conflict with the big fossil fuel companies and the financial institutions And there's no evidence that they will change their practices.

Fossil fuel usage and financial underwriting for fossil fuel pipelines has actually increased since 2016. And so that is something important for us to keep in mind for those of us who want to build movements to address climate change.

Today, this committee will hear a briefing from climate activists about the demands of the Stop the Money Pipeline movement, which is organizing to put pressure on insurance companies and other financial institutions to end their backing of fossil fuel infrastructure like Pipeline 3. My office is working with Council Central staff to develop this legislation as I mentioned in briefings over the last year.

And they expect that they will be ready for introduction in time, hopefully for our next committee meeting on February 4th, but we'll keep the committee members updated.

And today we're looking forward to having the comments from the climate activists who are here to share their thoughts with us.

Before we begin those items, we of course have public comment.

We have 20 people signed up for public comment.

Some of them are showing as not present.

I'll share the names of those who are showing up as not present.

So if you hear your name and you are called in, then you might need to hang up and call back in.

We also want to make sure that when you hear your name, you will be prompted to unmute yourself.

And when you hear that, please hit star six on your phone to unmute yourself and begin.

And every speaker will have two minutes to share their thoughts.

Our first speaker is Jocene Velasco, and then the next two speakers are Shirley Henderson and Thaddeus Hugg, who is not present.

So go ahead, Jocene.

Hello.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Hi.

My name is Jocene Velasco, and I'm addressing my housing issues.

I'm a renter at Terrace Crest Apartments.

It's an apartment building owned by Briar Sheets Property.

We didn't have hot water and we had minimal heat to no heat for 40 plus days.

My partner and I were filling up a giant metal pot, heating it up on the stove so we could have some warm water to shower for 40 plus days.

We had a neighbor, Fran Love, a senior citizen recovering from a major surgery during this time who needed to dress and sanitize her wounds.

but could not adequately do so because of not having hot water.

She eventually moved out, too tired to fight for consistent hot water and heat in the coldest months during a physically vulnerable time.

At least two other tenants have also moved out.

We contacted Briar Sheets multiple times, wrote complaints to the city multiple times, asked SECI to inspect our apartments to no avail.

We knew that we had a legal right to heat and hot water and that our landlord was breaking the law but we had no way of changing our situation.

Fed up in fearing a lack of heat in the onset of winter a group of us started meeting in our apartment lobby to come up with a plan and we eventually contacted council member Sawant's office.

We found out that our landlord was required by law to fix our lack of heat and hot water within 48 hours.

However there was no legal recourse behind this law that would hold landlords accountable.

Briar Sheets eventually replaced a boiler part only after council member Sawant's office became involved.

We've also sent him a letter demanding reimbursement for the rent that we paid during those 40 plus days.

We feel that since he did not provide us with our basic survival needs he did not hold up his end of the relationship.

If the situation was reversed and we did not hold up our end of the bargain you can bet that we'd all be out on the street right now.

He has not responded to our letter.

Thank you.

Thank you, Justine.

We have Shirley Henderson, and the next speaker, Tadia Sugg, actually sent my office's comment, which I will read later.

So now we have Shirley, and then we have Margo Stewart, followed by Abby Hine.

Go ahead, Shirley.

Yes, thank you for having me here today.

My name is Shuley Henderson.

I'm a renter and a small business owner.

I'm currently actually here at Rainier Court today to stand in solidarity with tenants who are demanding LEED their landlord to publicly promise no rent increases 23-2 and for them to urgently fix the alarming list of housing code violations.

Thank you to Council Member Sawant and the organizers in your office for the support you provided in the fight to end their rent increases in 2021. It's obscene that there's only one council member that's willing to speak out against the deplorable conditions being faced by renters.

I heard that tenants not just at Rainier Court, but also on First Hill went without heat for months through some of our coldest weather.

Not only are so many tenants living in substandard living conditions, But rents in Seattle are back to pre-pandemic levels and higher and yet so many are worse off financially.

This is true of small businesses as well.

You don't have to be a business owner to know that the pandemic has wreaked havoc on so many small businesses who if they are still open for business are exhausted by two years of constant pivots to keep staff and public safe all while trying to stay afloat.

Added to that challenge, commercial rents have not gotten cheaper or leveled off for us.

Corporate landlords who gladly demand their rent due are often complacent when it comes to the needs of small business.

We're left with a tab often for building alterations needed to keep running safely in a pandemic.

By the way, their bottom line hasn't suffered through COVID.

We were in a housing crisis before the pandemic.

Now with no stimulus and cost of living increasing by the day, the situation is dire for so many in our city.

Seattle is one of the most expensive housing markets in the United States, which has less than 15,000 operating affordable housing in 2020. We need affordable housing.

We need rent control to put a stop to the rent gouging of landlords.

To that end, I echo Rainier Court Tenant's two demands from City Council.

They need to increase the Amazon Tax 1 in 2020 to expand funding for affordable housing and vote yes on solemn legislation for citywide commercial and residential rent control with no corporate moot court.

Thank you.

Next, we have Margo Stewart followed by Abby Hine and then Frances Love.

Go ahead, Margo.

Hi, my name is Margo.

I'm a renter in First Hill.

I'm lucky enough that I have decent housing right now, but last year I had to deal with the humiliation of couch surfing and urgently finding housing when I had none while working full time in Seattle's difficult housing market.

And unfortunately for the majority of tenants right now, you know, the pandemic doesn't just end when corporations and big developers decide it should, but whenever they do decide that, the burden falls on working people and renters.

You know, right now our city's testing infrastructure which was allegedly the best in the nation last year, is completely overwhelmed, and that's to say nothing of the situation at schools and hospitals.

But rents are at pre-COVID levels, you know, with the absurd 26% increase we saw last year on average.

And working tenants who contract Omicron, in addition to health risks and long COVID, are in many cases going to be forced to choose between working while still sick and missing critical hours that they need to cover their exorbitant rents as they have no safety net.

So I think in light of all this, it's really inspiring to see the victories that our movement of renters and tenants have been able to win.

Most recently, the over 550 Rainier Court tenants winning a cancellation on rent increases, while urgent maintenance, you know, mold, faulty wiring, broken heating in the winter was still being criminally neglected by their landlord.

But there's so much more that renters need.

I think fighting to make sure landlords address urgent repairs And in many cases, as other speakers mentioned, this is things as basic as warm water and heating during record cold.

This can be a life and death thing.

You know, we saw this with recent building fires in Philly and the Bronx related to heating issues.

But even more than that, you know, we need universal commercial and residential rent control, both to ensure that renters can afford to stay housed during this pandemic and that our local small businesses can avoid going under.

And I think in addition to that, we need to make sure that we fight to extend the eviction moratorium far beyond February 14th for that.

You know, the health emergency of COVID most certainly will not be over by that time.

But winning both these things is going to take a movement as it's taken before.

And I'm looking forward to continuing to be a part of that with Council Member Sawant's office and thousands of other renters and tenants this year.

Next is Abby Hine followed by Frances Love and then Emily MacArthur.

Go ahead, Abby.

Hi, my name is Abby Hein.

I'm a resident of the Terrace Crest Apartments, and I'm obviously echoing the same sentiments as Justine, but we were out of hot water for more than 40 plus days, as well as heat.

During this time, we actually got no, we didn't get communication actually from the landlord at all until probably 30 days after my first complaint, the manager and multiple complaints from other people.

Um, so yeah, I mean, during this time I was boiling water on the stove.

I was using the oven for heat, um, obviously increasing my electric bill during this time because of it.

Um, and I also have several like health conditions, autoimmune stuff that require, yeah, access to hot water and safe living conditions.

So, um, I just feel like there's absolutely no, no way to put pressure on the landlords.

Like clearly they're in breach of the lease.

agreement, they have not provided safe housing, yet there's literally nothing that we can do.

I mean, we've sent letters requesting that they reimburse us for the time that we were without hot water and heat, and we have gotten no response at all.

In fact, we've not even gotten a single apology from them for being out of, you know, hot water at this time, and haven't gotten anything since.

We've also had some intermittent problems still with heat and hot water, so.

Yeah, I guess I'm just on here to reiterate that, yeah, we need to put pressure, have some sort of ability to put pressure on landlords when they're not, like, providing safe living conditions for tenants.

So that's all.

We have Frances Love next, followed by Emily MacArthur, and then Jay Gollihorn.

Go ahead, Frances.

Oh, actually, Frances is showing as not present.

So Frances, if you're listening, we'll call on you when you show up as present.

So next is Emily MacArthur, followed by Jay Gollihorn, and then Patricia Bruce.

Go ahead, Emily.

Hi, my name is Emily MacArthur.

I'm a renter in District 2, and I'm excited to kick off this year talking about the things that tenants need in this city, because there are many.

I know I've struggled as a renter with leaks and many things that landlords would not fix or would fix in some half-hearted way that resulted in black mold and just unsafe living conditions.

It's heartbreaking to hear just how many other renters are sharing those conditions and that demonstrates why we need to build a strong fighting renters movement this year to fight to get these things fixed in our buildings, but also ultimately to build tenant power so that we can win rent control, so that we can afford safe living conditions and also so that we can win high-quality socially-owned housing so that we can have ordinary working-class people continue to live in this city.

That's why I'm proud to be a socialist and I'm proud to stand with Councilmember Seamus Ballard as a socialist.

Rents in this city are already now higher than their pre-pandemic levels.

Thousands of working people are in dire straits.

As we were before the pandemic, we were already talking about the housing emergency in this city, and now we're seeing with lost hours or parents being forced to stay home because of closures at daycares and schools, that things are much, much worse for working-class families.

Despite how landlords in these public hearings consistently play the victim, we know that corporate landlords are continually victimizing working-class families, and we hear it in story after story.

Thank you so much.

Next is Jay Gollyhorn followed by Patricia Bruce and then Ellen Anderson.

Go ahead, Jay.

Okay.

So do I talk now?

Yes.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Yeah, this is Jay Gollyhorn.

I'm a little emotional right now.

I've been a resident here at the Dakota Apartments for the past 10 plus years.

What has occurred within my residency is a lack of communication between management and residents, and very poor work ethic between the maintenance as well.

They say that they will get to the problems that they have been incurring, but have yet to do so.

Having black mold in open garage doors open 24-7, that is Key fob access only is a massive safety concern for me as well as the rest of the residents here, especially for the elderly and the minorities.

People's cars have been stolen due to lack of accountantship, as well as my car that was stolen two weeks ago.

Two days after I sent an email to Kshama Sawant's office in my worrying about the safety of my car.

And this was, I got out of the hospital on Monday.

My car was stolen on Wednesday.

I emailed Schwan's office on Monday.

And then people's cars have been stolen due to the lack of accountants here.

On top of hazards like no heating and freezing temperatures.

I think it's time we hold feed and coast accountable for the pain and suffering they have caused us.

The only ones that have stood up for Our rights, as long as he considers it, is Kshama Sawant, who isn't even our councilman.

And Tammy Morales, who has made a singular appearance at our gatherings.

Patricia Bruce, followed by- I don't know what that buzzer was, but- Hello?

Can I say anything?

Sorry, Jay, your time has expired, so please send your- full written comment, but I should go now to the people who are signed up after you.

We have Patricia Bruce, followed by Ellen Anderson and Daniel Cavanaugh.

Go ahead, Patricia.

My name is Patricia Bruce.

I am a tenant in Columbia Gardens, one of the buildings in Rainier Court, Mount Baker.

I've lived here for nearly eight years.

For years, my Lord's seed has disregarded the conditions of our building, and has ignored our repeated complaints.

We've been organizing since last year, alongside council members, the government's office, for our demands that SEED fix all the horrible problems in our buildings, and against the rent increase last fall.

Over a year ago, I had a complaint that my store was malfunctioning.

I could not get it to turn off and I had to unplug it from the walls every night.

After a month, I had not received any response or acknowledgement of my complaint.

So I submitted a second work order and then the maintenance man and building manager came to look at my stove.

The manager told me that she was going to give me a new stove and I was excited to hear this.

But when maintenance came to remove my stove, they told me that they were actually going to give me an old stove from another apartment, which was infested with roaches.

And I said I couldn't take that stove because I didn't want to bring a station into my home.

The manager said she would not give me a new stove and told me she had never I could get a new stove, which is not true.

Since then, for over 11 months, I have had the same broken stove that I have plugged from the wall every night.

All of this is unacceptable, and it makes it absolutely exhausting to live here as a senior.

We have to constantly put even the most basic repairs and are ignored again and again.

FEED must urgently fix all of these housing code violations that have led to deplorable living conditions.

Why has not one council person joined Kusama in supporting us and publicly demanding CEDD to do the right thing?

CEDD is allowed to get away with this.

How is it that the city council has so many self-described progressive and tens and thousands of renters like me to continue to get exploited by their landlords We demand that the city council makes it illegal for landlords to ignore tenant complaints.

Thank you.

We have Ellen Anderson next and then followed by Daniel Cavanaugh and then Gloria Betten.

Go ahead, Ellen.

Thank you.

Hello, I'm Ellen.

I'm a renter in Beacon Hill.

You know, me and my roommates, we've constantly compared our housing at our current house to an abusive relationship.

You know, we often say, yes, nothing works, but the rent is under $600.

Yeah, there's rats in the walls, but they never come inside of our home.

Yeah, there's mold in the basement, but we're so lucky to be close to public transportation and have a nice yard.

And then the final straw really happened three weeks ago when over five inches of water flooded our basement where three of our bedrooms are located.

We've lost a lot of stuff from that.

And our landlord's solution has been to drill a hole in the foundation for the water to go out and two fans.

And a real refusal to actually treat this and the mold that has already started to grow just in the past three weeks.

City resources are stretched so thin that we have not heard back from the city SDCI, the Seattle Department of Construction and Inspection, to confirm that our housing is safe to live in with cracked foundation and mold.

And I'm currently paying the full cost of rent to sleep on a couch as my room develops black mold.

And unfortunately, the reality is that as we move out, because we have to move out currently, the new tenants that will move in will likely also lose thousands of dollars of their possessions to flooding damage, it's very high chance.

And our landlords have shown over and over again that they will continue to prioritize their personal profit over the safety of their tenants and our ability to even just basic survival live in our home.

We really need citywide rent control for all units in order to halt the crisis of affordability in Seattle.

Us moving now, our rent has increased a massive amount, and the only reason we're really able to afford to stay in the same neighborhood is because one of our roommates is paying almost three times as much as anyone else in our household.

No one can afford to move, and rent control would help tip the balance of power towards renters and put a stop to landlord's rent gouging.

Thank you very much.

Next, we have Daniel Cavanaugh, followed by Gloria Betton, and then David Haynes.

Go ahead, Daniel.

Hey, my name is Dan.

I apologize if there's construction noise in the background.

I'm a renter in First Hill, which is rapidly gentrifying.

Affordable housing keeps getting torn down and replaced by luxury housing.

And the construction workers who are building this housing are increasingly unable to afford to live and raise a family, have a decent life in the city they're building, which is insane.

I was told when moving in to this place That essentially is just a matter of time before our house was torn down and turned into a luxury apartment.

And I share a similar experience with one of the speakers.

In that last year, for about a month, I was homeless.

And it was insanely stressful having to find housing in this city with rents skyrocketing, right?

The rents are increasingly going up.

They are already above pre-pandemic levels, and we are still in a pandemic.

And I cannot count, honestly, the number of people I've met in Seattle, co-workers, roommates, who have had this experience of having to having to live out of their car for a few weeks or a few months because they could not find stable housing that they could afford.

And that's just an insane and untenable position for workers and renters to be put in.

And so, yeah, I fully back the demands of the Iranian court tenants.

And we dramatically, you know, we urgently need citywide rent control free of corporate loopholes.

And we need to expand that Amazon tax.

to pay for permanently affordable social housing.

And yeah, solidarity with Maria for attendance.

Gloria Batten followed by David Haynes and then Mark Cook.

Go ahead, Gloria.

Gloria, you appear to be muted.

If you could hit star six on your phone.

You're still showing up as muted.

There you go.

Oh, can you hear me?

Yes.

OK, this is Gloria Baton.

And I'm a tenant at Rainier Courts in Mont Baker.

I mean, Rainier Courts Apartment.

in Mount Baker.

Our community is majority black and brown, low income, seniors and immigrant families who struggle to make ends meet every month.

Our landlord, please, has ignored the condition and has allowed the building to fall into disrepair.

My toilet was broken And the lights in the vanity, in the bathroom, the sink had a broken part that didn't work for over a year.

And the lights in my refrigerator off for over a year.

And after so many repeated requests, I just gave up.

and stop bothering anyone because there was always a reason or excuse that they were not able to do it.

It was only through the pressure of organizing that the problem in my unit got fixed.

How dare they and anyone who's supposed to be in charge of these apartments to allow them to fall apart and to increase the rent It is so sad and so ridiculous.

How dare they do that to anyone, especially seniors.

We demand seed to publicly promise no rent increases through 2022 and to fix all the code violations at a timely manner, not promise, but fix them.

We also demand City Council to pass rent controls now.

Thank you.

We have David Haynes next, followed by Mark Cook and then Matthew Smith.

Go ahead, David.

Hi, thank you.

David Haynes, Pioneer Square at the Lohman Building.

I'm grateful for Shama Sawant's Renters' Rights Committee and her victory during the tit-for-tat recall election initiated by the previous mayor's supporter.

There are too many abuses renters are subjected to, and this council seems to care more than most.

My landlord at Peak Living, 107 Cherry Street, has threatened to evict me, always intimidating me, always telling me I have to leave, all for pointing out and complaining about all the horrible things that take place inside and in front and around my building.

Yet the property management never once solved the ongoing public safety and public health and living condition crisis that are threatening our lives, our well-being, and the quality of living.

We have had to evacuate at least once a month due to arsonists, twice in the same early morning, late night, psycho-criminal behavior, and faulty wiring that's caused fires.

There have been hundreds of break-ins, drug activity, violence.

Yet the whole time, they are saving money to make money at our expense.

refusing to hire qualified professional security or even have properly secured doors.

There has been numerous property managers changing their jobs multiple times because they live in fear of all the criminal activity that's blocking access to my building.

bothering little kids blowing meth smoke in their eyes and nose, sex harassing their single moms, yet management hides in the office with the doors shut, windows blocked, living in fear while never ever calling the cops.

Or they simply don't bother to show up for like days and days, if not weeks, while telling me they are putting me on the vacate list.

We have 89 apartments here and management tells me they're more busy with the other 2000 apartments.

And since I'm the only one that's complaining, even though everybody else is complaining too, that are too afraid, they're trying to intimidate me.

Anyway, we need a renters revolt.

We need 21st century first world quality housing.

We need laws to protect people who are being oppressed by evil landlords.

Thank you.

We have Mark Cook, followed by Matthew Smith, and then Marjorie Payne.

Go ahead, Mark.

Mark, you appear to be muted.

If you could hit star six.

Hello, this is Mark Cook.

Go ahead.

Go ahead, Mark.

Hit it again?

Yeah.

OK.

Can you hear me?

I'm Mark Cook.

Yes, we can hear you.

OK.

I've been a resident at Columbia gardens for about five years.

This is in Rainier Court.

I'm 85 years old.

I've been hospitalized for mold contamination in the past, not while I've been at this apartment.

But since I've been here, there's mold caused by my bathtub breaking the seal on the wall.

And I've complained about this.

It has never been addressed by management.

Now we are faced with a rent increase and We residents do not think it's fair when our abundant complaints have not been addressed or fixed.

Last year, us tenants got organized and were able to push back the rent increase.

However, this year, SEED is still looking to try and raise rents again, despite the terrible conditions here.

City Council, stand with us and all tenants and hold these landlords accountable for these conditions they are putting us in.

Thank you.

Matthew Smith is next.

After Matthew will be Marjorie Payne and then Melina McCombs.

Go ahead, Matthew.

Hi, my name is Matt Smith.

I'm a renter in District 2. I'm in the process of moving out of my home because of serious flooding in our basement that happened a few weeks ago.

This flooding was the last straw in a long string of maintenance issues, broken appliances, mold in the walls, so on.

This is going to be the third home that I've lived in in the last two and a half years in Seattle.

My roommate has had to move four times in just the last year and a half.

Moving itself comes with huge costs in both money and time that a lot of working people just don't have.

And on top of it all, rents have skyrocketed this year and are back up to pre-pandemic levels.

So we couldn't even find a place for an equivalent price.

We have to pay over $1,000 a month extra in additional rent.

So what would have happened if my roommates and I hadn't been able to afford that extra rent?

What would have happened is we would have had to live in a flooded, moldy basement.

And hearing these stories from Rainier Court Apartments are horrifying, but this isn't an isolated issue.

This is happening to thousands and thousands of people across the city.

Landlords and real estate developers are making record profits.

Rents are back up to pre-pandemic levels, and yet basic maintenance issues aren't even being addressed.

And this constant churn of renters is completely displacing people from the communities.

And how long is it until we have a major disaster like the apartment fires that happened in the Bronx and Philadelphia?

The solution is clear.

We need to increase the Amazon tax to fund affordable housing.

We need a full renter's bill of rights, and we need strong citywide rent control.

It's amazing that Councilmember Sawant is the only Councilmember who's calling for these things.

This should be a no-brainer.

Every Councilmember should publicly commit to voting yes on these things, and if they don't, they have no right to say that they represent us, because it's clear that they only represent the landlords.

Thank you.

We have Marjorie Payne next, then we have Melina McCombs, and then I think our last speaker will be Joan Beamish.

Go ahead, Marjorie.

Hi, my name is Marjorie Payne.

I'm a resident of Rainier Court Apartments in Mount Baker.

Our community is a majority of black and brown, low-income seniors and immigrants, families who struggle to make ends meet.

Our landlords, feed, and tolls have mostly neglected conditions in our building and has ignored our plates.

My oven has been broken since June, and I still haven't got it fixed yet.

I primarily use my oven for cooking, and this means I have not cooked.

I'm not able to bake for my family gatherings this past holiday season.

There are two giant ceilings There are two giant holes in my ceiling.

They're unfinished.

That is drafty.

All the leak and mold in the buildings.

I'm scared it'll ruin my unit.

Since day one, I've paid my rent.

I've sent in my complaints and work orders, along with my rent check.

They know the problems here, and they just don't fix it.

We demand no rent increase in 2022. We demand that the City Council make it illegal for landlords to ignore tenant complaints and increase the Amazon tax.

Finally, City Council must vote yes for Councilman Shawna Kowant to statewide rent control with no corporate loopholes.

Thank you.

And I would also like to say that I am thankful for Shawna Kowant and her team and the Tenants Union for helping us out.

Thank you.

We have Melina McCombs, then...

Go ahead, Melina.

Thank you.

My name is Melina McCombs, and I have more to say than anything else.

But if Charles Dickens, the creator of Poor Little Nora and Starving of a Twist were here this morning, he'd probably be shaking his head and asking, bagels and popcorn, really?

Two Thursdays in a row, the Columbia Garden staff has invited residents to free treats.

On the first Thursday, you're invited to bagels.

And the flyer said, we were giving it to help start our busy day.

And on the second Thursday, we were invited to partake in popcorn, where they said, we like it, so we think you'll like it, too.

And here we are in the midst of being terribly understaffed, with deep cleaning needs screaming to be completed and repair work backlogged for months, if not years.

And here we are with the Columbia Guard staff taking time to celebrate bagels for your busy morning and National Popcorn Day.

How many employee hours are spent dreaming up the idea, sending emails back and forth to corporate to get it approved, preparing flyers, printing them out, delivering them, and then spending time, precious time, packing these 70 individual bagels and 70 individual packets of popcorn, and we didn't even know who was providing the popcorn and all these things.

And in this era of COVID, we didn't know whether to eat this stuff or not.

What was the total cost of those corporate, managerial, and facility-level employee hours?

That total cost, I suspect, could have required a commercial cleaning crew to come in and take care of some of our problems here.

While they were doing bagels and popcorn, we're waiting for the third-floor elevator door to be repaired.

It's broken and popped up by a foot stop.

And while we wait, we're waiting for balconies to be cleaned that are covered in mold and slime.

And we're waiting for windows and walls and boards and everything to be cleaned.

While we're waiting for stairway handles to be secured and tightened.

While we wait, Banditure is spending his time with bagels and popcorn.

It feels a little bit like Charles Dickens, where if he were here, he'd probably tell the corporate landlords and management sitting in their boardrooms to stop thinking about these well-intended treats that they take by all the masses, and we would answer saying, thanks, but no thanks.

Like all of the trips, we want more.

We don't want more bagels and popcorn.

We want focused attention until all the necessary work and repairs are done.

I have two speakers who are showing as not present, Cyril Hilton and Joan Beamish.

I don't know if they are having trouble, but if you want to sign up quickly, I mean, if you want to show up quickly on your phone, you should, but I'll call on the last signed up speaker who is showing us present, and that's Alice L. Go ahead, Alice.

Alice, you appear to be muted, so if you could hit star six.

You still appear to be muted, so star six to unmute.

Sorry, Alice, you still appear to be muted.

There you go.

You got it.

You're now unmuted, but we can't hear you.

Perhaps your phone is muted.

Alice, we can't hear you.

We might have to close public comment.

So right now, Joan Beamish and Alice L., sorry, are both showing us present.

Does one of them, is one of them able to speak?

I just want to check one last time before closing public comment.

Joan, you appear to be muted on Zoom.

If you can try star six.

Well, sorry, we just have, we have to move on.

So Joan and Alice, if you, and then there's another speaker, Shirley Johnson, who's not showing up as present.

Joan, Alice, Shirley, please, and also Cyril.

Oh, I see Shirley as present, Shirley Johnson present now.

Is Shirley going to speak?

Sorry, we should do this soon.

Is Shirley unmuted, Ted?

My name is Shirley Johnson.

I was only in the courtroom.

And I've been having a lot of trouble in my building and like mold in my bedroom.

And I have been in the kitchen.

The water is running and it's all messed up.

And they won't come and fix it.

And in the bathroom, the same thing.

And the tub is all messed up behind where they fixed it and they'll get clean it up.

They won't come and check on anything for me.

And I don't know what to do, you know?

So I need some help with that, you know?

And everything is so messed up over there.

I don't know what to say anymore.

So can you help me, please?

I don't know what to do.

Did it go out?

OK.

Thank you, Shirley.

One last time, Alice, are you able to speak?

You're still showing us present.

Alice, on the Zoom, it shows that you're unmuted, but maybe your phone is muted.

Just the mute button on your phone.

Oh, yeah.

OK.

OK.

Um, you know, the building, my washer is broke, and then I tell them to fix that, um, anything in the building, then they will come and fix it, you know, and when you're trying to go down and let the manager know what is really going on, it's hard for them to, you know, kind of come and, you know, they say I have to pay for everything.

You have to pay for all the, um, even though the, um, appliance that was previously is broken.

There's not, you know, come and repair for you.

So we need them to, you know, repair for us, because that's the, you know, in the beginning when we move in, it's already previous, it's broken.

And the wall was cracked, and then the paint was cracking.

In the kitchen, it's the mold, when I move it in, I told them that, you know, to fix, but they never did.

So it's built up, the mold is built up in the kitchen.

And the washer is broken.

And the, let's see, where is it?

The range.

It's just like, it's not hot enough for us, you know, like, you know, to cook.

But it's the main thing is my washer.

Not my washer, it's the dishwasher's machine.

But the water, each time when I use it, the water splashes all over.

There's something on my unit.

So they need to fix it for us.

That is clearly there when they install it.

It's not proper install.

So they shouldn't fix it for us.

Everything is completely fixed before they, you know, let us sign the paper.

They let us sign it before we move it in.

Then that's not fair for us.

And then we have to pay it.

Everything is broken in the building.

This is not supposed to be.

They need to, you know, complete, like, like the completing inspectors.

I think he's dead.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Alice.

I'm glad we got you.

Great work, Alice.

Thank you.

If you are listening and you weren't able to come in, please send us your written comment.

I know that Cyril is also a tenant, not in Rainier Court, but in another building, a senior tenant who is also having similar issues, and he contacted our office.

Thank you everybody who signed up and spoke in public comment your input as renters in our city is extremely important for this committee.

Our first agenda item is exactly about this issue is about how Seattle renters are living in We want to hear the input from tenants but we don't want to just have a listening session.

We want to use that as input to understand how legislatively the city Council and the city when their landlords don't make the repairs in a timely manner, especially for very serious issues like heating, for hot water not being available, for stoves not working for months on end when tenants are not able to do their cooking, and many other problems.

And I'll mention some other problems as well that we have heard from tenants as we go through the agenda item.

On paper, the current process that we have in the city seems very straightforward.

Seattle has a list of housing codes Landlords are required by law to have their properties inspected to see if the housing codes are being followed.

Renters can request that the Seattle Department of Construction Inspection or SDCI come to inspect a property if they believe there is a housing code violation.

If SDCI inspectors find problems, the landlord is required to fix the problems in a timely manner or face fines.

Unfortunately, as we heard in public comment, as my staff and I have heard from now, easily hundreds of tenants over the last couple of years, and the emails that we have received from countless renters throughout the city over the last years, And as we will hear in more detail from two panelists that we have here, the power imbalance between renters and the landlords results in even egregious housing code violations, languishing, unrepaired, even when the problems render the property virtually uninhabitable, like no heating.

But we also heard about apartments being flooded and so on.

I intend to use today's discussion to begin looking, as I said, into how the current system is failing renters and to understand what kind of legislation we will need to pass to close those loopholes.

My office has also reached out to the Department of Construction and Inspection last week to ask for their data and thoughts on these problems.

The questions we asked were, how frequently does SBCI issue citations and notices of violation for violations of renter's rights or housing court violation in rental housing properties?

How frequently does the SDCI fine property owners for those citations or notices of violation?

How does the SDCI decide whether to use their authority to levy fines versus give warnings?

What would the SDCI recommend in order to improve enforcement?

I apologize if my voice is not fully audible.

I will make sure to speak louder, but please give me feedback if it is not loud enough.

We just received a response from the SDCI, I believe at 10 a.m.

this morning.

I really appreciate SDCI's response.

How frequently does SDCI issue citations and notices of violations?

for violation of renter rights and housing code violation.

The SECI report to us that in 2021, we took in 3,285 landlord-tenant calls and 1,136 housing complaint calls.

Many of those were quickly resolved through informal coaching and warnings, which we call voluntary compliance.

148 housing and 60 renters' rights progressed to formal enforcement cases.

Of those, most were resolved through voluntary compliance.

For the ones we could not resolve, we issued three citations and three notice of violations for renters' rights and 128 for housing court violations.

We were not performing in-person housing inspections from January until August due to COVID.

And there are other responses as well.

Basically, what they say is their goal is to achieve compliance, of course, which we, of course, agree with.

They say that for renters' rights, they find that warnings work most of the time.

When they don't, they take enforcement action that the court provides.

So, I mean, part of the goal also for this committee should be to see if this is actually tracking with renters' experience.

really a lot of appreciation for the work that the staff at the SDCI do.

We have had lots of experience with them.

They're extremely dedicated to their work.

We also invited the SDCI to join today's discussion.

We were told that they were unable to attend today, but they're opening to presenting on this issue in a future committee meeting.

So I definitely look forward to having them in a committee soon.

And I thank the staff at the SDCI for assisting renters and the city council central staff for helping my office get answers to some of these questions.

Renters often reach out to my office when they have trouble with their landlords and our experience is that the staff at the SDCI really, you know, are very responsible and they respond.

So I suspect that as we investigate this problem, we will find that the problems are more systemic.

really the SDCI staff that are falling short, and that we will require updated legislation to address these clearly persistent problems.

These are not isolated or just fringe problems.

This is clearly something that is affecting a large number of renters.

In 2016 my office sponsored the Carl Hagelin law which prohibits rent increases as long as there are unresolved housing code violations, which has been one useful way to push landlords to follow through on their responsibility to complete necessary repairs, but clearly more is needed for today's discussion.

We will first hear from Alison Rao, who is a tenant at the Terrace Trust Apartments on First Hill.

As you all heard, the fellow tenants of Alison already spoke in public comment, so we're happy to have Alison here on the panel.

Then we will hear from Annie Bice Moore, who is a tenant at Columbia Gardens at Rainier Code in Mount Baker.

And last but not least, we will hear from Grayson Van Arsdale, who is a Central District renter and an independent journalist who has been investigating the Rainier Court building conditions.

My office organized extensively with the renters at Rainier Code last fall when they not only had housing code violations, but were also presented with large rent increases.

Through our collective organizing, the renters at Rainier Code succeeded in pushing back the rent increases, which was a huge victory.

And several of the housing code violations were fixed, but several problems remain.

We did ask SDCA for the status of those repairs and they have given us some details But we see clearly that there are many outstanding problems and we need to find a way to I find a systemic way to address these not just this building but the these similar problems that are being faced by other tenants as well So I will call on the panelists now in order.

So Alison Rao, if you wanted to go ahead, please unmute yourself and speak.

And also just for the record, introduce yourself in a one sentence introduction and then go ahead.

Hi there, my name is Alison Rao.

I'm a tenant at Terrace Crest Apartments on First Hill.

I moved to Terrace Crest Apartments in August after a divorce and I needed to restart my life.

I had lived in this building in 2007 briefly back when rent was under $700 and had been happy with it.

So I came back to it out of comfort and it appeared to be really well maintained.

But within the month we lost hot water and then we didn't have hot water for six weeks or longer, 40 plus days.

They didn't even acknowledge that there was a problem or communicate with us as tenants until we brought in external pressure from the Tenants Union, from Councilpersons Wants Office and from SDCI.

After extensive activism, we finally got service restored and there are still questions outstanding about whether or not it was really the urgent repair that they said that they had placed.

But it's still not working properly.

SDCI was here yesterday.

I saw them in the lobby.

I can't take more than a few minutes of a hot shower.

Heat is spotty.

And if they're going to hold up their end of the bargain, they owe me over $1,000 of back rent for days that I was couch surfing.

because I couldn't live in my home because it was 60 degrees in my house or colder at times.

It's unbelievable to me that these kinds of actions are allowed for landlords and that the city is unable to enforce the safe living conditions in our building.

I mean, clearly they're under resourced for the amount of complaints that they're receiving and the amount of problems that are in the community.

between rent increases and failing infrastructure citywide.

I really fear that this city is gonna become a place where slumlords are allowed to charge what they choose and tenants remain powerless.

I don't know where I would go if I lose this place because nothing's affordable.

So I think it's really time to shift the power and address the imbalance in the relationship between tenants and their landlords.

because the direction of housing in the city is unmanageable.

It's making the rich richer, and it's hurting the working renter who's trying to call Seattle home.

Thank you, Allison.

I really appreciate you being here as a panelist and speaking from your experience and from the experience of your fellow tenants.

We stay on because we want to, once we finish the presentation, we want to open it up for questions or comments from council members.

Next, we have Annie Bicemore.

Welcome, Annie.

Go ahead and introduce yourself in one sentence for the record and then go ahead.

Good morning everybody.

My name is Annie by s'more and I live in Columbia gardens, which is a senior building that is part of rainier court in the Mount Baker area.

I've lived here for nearly eight years and over the past year, we have tried again and again to get our landlord, which is the Southeast effective development.

Sure.

short is form is seed to address the many maintenance problems we've had in our building.

We have been routinely ignored and our issues have gone unaddressed.

The breaking point was when we were all handed a rent increase last year.

I live in one of the townhouses and my front door is so drafty that I had to add my own weather stripping and also use the draft stopper at the bottom, which makes the door unusable in the wintertime.

And the gap is so large that I literally had a worm that wiggled underneath it.

And so therefore I've got to have a draft stopper stopper there and I've made several complaints.

But because I've done my own draft stopper and the weather's changing, they felt like that mitigated the problem and they weren't going to fix my door.

My back door is another total different story.

The door was so misaligned that I couldn't even close it.

I couldn't fully close it and I could barely lock it.

I had to lean with my full body against it to lock it and I was scared that I was going to break the glass because it's a glass door.

The gap was so large that the cold air would blow in and I made an initial request for repair on June 9th.

At that time, it was ignored.

I made a second request on June 29th.

And what I did was people had told me that they make the repairs, well, they put in the repair requests, and what happens is it gets ignored.

So I decided, okay, so my second request that I would enclose it in the same envelope that I put my rent check in, because I figured if they cashed my check, then they definitely would have received my work order.

So that one also got ignored.

And then the third request was made September 1st.

And at that time they came over and looked at it and said basically they could do nothing because the building had settled and there wasn't much that they could do with the door.

So anyhow, I was stuck with the door and I had to stuff it with towels and that type of thing to try to keep the cold air from coming in.

So in October and November, once council members, SWAT staff began filing complaints on our behalf with the city department of construction and inspections, the city came to look at my door and they took a lot of pictures.

And after the inspection, suddenly the building maintenance people said, well, you know, maybe we could do something.

They came up with some suggestions.

But because of the SDCI's inspection, the landlord finally was forced to call a professional door company.

And my door finally got fixed this past week.

So on Wednesday, the 19th, it finally got fixed.

And it took the specialist probably about five minutes to really kind of assess the problem.

And then it took them probably about another 25 minutes to actually fix the door.

And I, and they said it had nothing to do with the settling what it was was the door was actually installed incorrectly in the first place.

And so all I could think was why did it take like six months for my door to get fixed, when all the required was a 30 minute repair job.

And why do we have to fight so hard to get basic repairs made.

My walk-in closet, there's a wire shelving where all of my clothes hang, and that fell three times.

So the first time they came and they repaired it.

The second time, again, it was repaired by a maintenance person, it fell again.

The third time, and I told them, I said, if this thing falls the third time, I am going to go ahead and get my own person to come and fix the closet and then take it out of my rent.

And because I did that, they called me and said, listen, this third time we promise we're going to have our supervisor come in and they'll fix it for you and they did and he told me that he said you know what if I hadn't come in here and if they had just kept repairing it the closet would have kept falling because the clips were installed backwards they were upside down so You know, but the thing is, it's okay now.

The shoving is okay.

But from that, I mean, it's amazing how people, I ended up with PTSD.

I mean, for a few weeks, because every time I would fall asleep and I would hear something, I would just be like, oh, it's in my closet again.

And it was awful.

And I had to endure that for a few weeks.

And I shouldn't have to live like this.

At 72 years old, I should not have to endure any of that kind of stuff.

And I'm also very concerned about the safety of our electrical wiring in our units.

We were told a long time ago that our apartment building and the townhouses weren't wired correctly.

And we always wondered like, how did it pass the electrical inspection when the building was still under construction?

How did that happen?

Because now we are now the recipients of faulty wiring.

So because my front door and the back door is so drafty, I have to use a space heater constantly to keep warm.

So one time, I had the space heater on, the dishwasher on, and it tripped the...

the breaker tripped and so I had to reset it again.

There was another time when I turned on the bathroom light and the bathroom fan and it also tripped.

So if you have too many things on in the apartment, it trips.

And one time I was actually in the shower.

I don't take showers anymore in the evenings because I was actually in the shower when it tripped.

And I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden it was just dark.

And thank goodness I always keep my cell phone really close by on the window shelving just in case something happens.

And so, you know, I had to use the light for that.

But I'm a senior.

I shouldn't have to live like this.

And from what I've heard from other people in the building, the same thing.

Other townhouses have the same problem in the building as well.

And I'm really, really concerned about that.

And of course, with the horrific fires now that occurred, as a result of substandard housing conditions.

I'm kind of fearful now for my safety and my neighbor's safety.

The horrific fire in the Bronx building resulted in part because the landlord ignored repeated complaints from the tenants about the heating not working.

And the tenants were forced to use space heaters during the winter.

And of course, I have to use a space heater.

My neighbors have also told me about ongoing issues in their apartments that the landlord has also refused to fix.

One tenant had told me about a leaking faucet.

And instead of fixing it, the landlord just told them not to open the faucet all the way.

So, you know, you don't have the pressure then to really, you know, do anything with it.

So another tenant had leaking toilet that has caused wet moldy walls and they have spent months trying to get it fixed.

Another unit heard sparks when she turned on her lights, and when the electrician came, they found out that there was a live wire behind the light switch.

Nearly every unit in Columbia Gardens has had pest control issues for months and sometimes years, and it's been an enormous struggle getting them to come spray the units.

And when they finally come and spray the unit, they give you very short notice.

And we have to vacate for hours at a time.

And also in preparation, you have to remove all of the things from the cabinets, which is a lot for seniors.

And we have a lot of disabled people here and they're required to do it.

Management will not give you any type of help.

One of the tenants, one of our tenants here, it was a union pipe fitter, and she talked about how the toilets in our units are always constantly backing up.

So, I mean, you almost have to, like, use the toilet, if you, you know, the other stuff, you have to flush it, and then you have to sit there again, and it's awful.

And what she told us was that when they installed the pipes, they were much smaller than what should be for code.

And also last year, the elevator was broken for over a month, which is egregious in a building that's for seniors, many of whom have disabilities and can't take the stairs.

The other recent incident was when we had a recent snowstorm.

Coast, who is our property manager, and all of all the Rainier Court failed to remove the snow and ice from our sidewalks, our courtyard walkways, and the townhouse parking lot.

They were made aware of Seattle's ordinance code, but they chose to ignore it.

They waited until the rain washed away all the snow, which is horrible.

I can't even talk about it.

It makes me so mad when I think of that.

And they basically told us we should have stayed indoors.

That would have solved our problem.

We live in a constant state of anxiety about what's going to break next, if the closet shelving is going to fall again, and mine isn't the only closet.

There's been various people that have had problems with their closet.

If the electrical issues are going to start a fire, or what the next pest infestation will be.

I have to tell you, I am exhausted living here because we have spent so much time chasing down management for even basic repairs over months and years.

We're seniors.

I've got to tell you, you know, we're your mothers, we're your fathers, we're your grandfathers, your grandmothers, we're your aunts and uncles, your sisters and brothers.

We shouldn't have to live like this.

So we're no longer even being polite.

We started being polite and sending letters and all of that, but we're not being polite anymore.

We are demanding now that CDC publicly promise no rent increases in 2022, and that they need to urgently fix all housing code violations that have led to our deplorable living conditions.

The experience of the last month, having your house seat is allowed to get away with this.

How can it be legal for landlords to to exploit renters like this, especially seniors.

We pay our rent every single month on time.

I am so thankful that we tenants have gotten organized along with council members' office.

I urge every council members to also hold landlords accountable.

We shouldn't have to live like this.

We demand that the city council make it illegal for landlords to ignore tenants' complaints.

I'm sorry, I get so emotional about this.

We need the city council members to increase the Amazon tax to expand funding for affordable housing, and not just affordable housing, but making quality built sustainable affordable housing, because we're the recipients of when people make the little shortcuts.

We are the recipients of that.

And we have to deal with this.

And as a senior, I have worked my entire life trying to make a good living for myself.

And I do have good wages, and I'm able to afford a lot of the things.

But I see my brothers and sisters here that can't.

They're not able to afford it.

They're struggling.

And nothing's being done, we're not being heard.

And so this is why we're here, we're protesting, we're rallying, we're doing whatever we can.

If we have to get the citywide, we wanna do it all.

Because we're saying enough is enough, enough is enough.

Finally, the city council must vote yes on council members to watch legislation for citywide rent control.

with no corporate loopholes, which would help seniors like us who are living on fixed incomes.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much, Annie.

I really appreciate you sharing the story from you and your fellow tenants.

Thank you for speaking on on yourselves behalf and their behalf.

And don't don't apologize for feeling, you know, if you didn't feel passionate about this, there would be something wrong.

And I really share share the feeling that you feel.

I feel the same way when I see the pain of all the, all our renters and working people in our city.

And as you said, especially seniors on fixed income, seniors, especially of color.

So thank you so much.

And also, I should mention, there are many seniors who are living in Rainier Court also who are facing disabilities.

We also have seniors living in Terrace Crest, and Terrace Crest is also important to mention because we have a whole range of ages of people living there who are all together pushing back against this kind of treatment from their landlord.

We will, of course, open it up for comments and questions from council members on this committee, but let's go ahead and hear from Grayson Van Arsdale.

Grayson, go ahead and introduce yourself in one sentence and then go ahead.

Thank you.

Yes, thank you.

My name is Grayson Van Arsdale.

I'm a transgender renter in the Central District, and I'm also an independent reporter.

As a renter and as a working person, I really appreciate Council Member Sawant organizing this discussion around living conditions.

Thank you, Annie, as well for speaking.

I'd say that my own experience as a renter is really very typical in the sense that I have most often had corporate landlords and when something breaks in my building, I put in a request to get it fixed but I start planning my life around that thing being broken because I know that my landlord isn't going to repair it anytime soon.

My current building has had broken washers and dryers for several months.

We also had a leak in our bathroom ceiling three months ago.

A contractor came to open the ceiling up but hasn't come back to finish that job, so now there's just a giant hole in our bathroom ceiling.

All things considered, I'm really lucky to have reliable heating and appliances, and that should show you how dire the situation is for a lot of renters in worse positions than me.

I started paying attention to the tenants at Rainier Court last year when they organized with Council Member Salwan's office and succeeded in getting their 2021 rent increases rescinded, which is a pretty monumental victory.

Recently, I started interviewing the tenants at Rainier Court and taking a look at the buildings and I'm working on publishing an article about it now.

Part of the reason I felt it was important to report on the Rainier tenants at this point is because of the recent fires that killed dozens of tenants in Philadelphia and the Bronx.

Each of these fires was only deadly because of the building conditions.

So in Philadelphia, the building was severely overcrowded and lacked external fire escapes.

And in the Bronx, tenants had made repeated complaints about heating not working for months.

And apartment doors that were supposed to close automatically, were legally required to close automatically, didn't.

When we talk about building conditions, we are not just talking about working people living in a squalid state.

We are talking about being at risk of injury or death because of landlord negligence.

So it's important to note that in all of these instances, whether it's Rainier Court in Seattle or the Bronx or in Philly, these situations involve working class tenants and disproportionately tenants of color.

And a particular concern to me in Rainier Court is the pervasive mold in the building.

I took a photo there of a hole in the entranceway ceiling of the Dakota building.

which leaks onto the floor and is surrounded by very dark black mold.

He sent all those photos to council member Solon's office.

The odds that this mold is localized to the one spot in the building is infinitesimally small and a moldy building will deteriorate the health of anybody living in it.

But it's especially risky to seniors.

That's the front of the Dakota building, which is the photo, what I took those in.

And that's the broken garage door.

And that's the mold that we're talking about.

So the tenant that I spoke to, which is a 65 year old man, was in excellent respiratory health when he moved into the building and after 10 years of living there he can no longer walk to the bathroom without severe wheezing.

And as someone who has chronic respiratory problems myself, I was only able to be in the building for a short time before feeling effects on my breathing as well.

And of course, mold is only the beginning of those problems.

Many units are also without heat and have been for weeks or months.

As you saw, the garage door in the Dakota building is broken and permanently open, which is causing residents to have their car stolen.

That's Jay, you actually heard him speak in public comment earlier.

In an eerie reflection of the deadly fires on the East Coast, Rainier Court tenants showed me several doors connecting hallways to stairwells that have broken automatic hinges, meaning those doors are supposed to close on their own for fire safety.

Open doors like that together with non-functioning central heating are the primary cause of building fires getting out of control.

It is why 17 people died in the Bronx fire this month.

These are the kinds of repairs that Rainier Court tenants are being told are non-essential.

So after seeing all of that I cannot tell you how infuriating it is to go to the Southeast effective development website that is seeds website the landlord's website and read their tagline which is quote, everyone deserves a safe affordable dignified place to live.

In reality, SEED has clearly made a business model out of keeping working class senior tenants in undignified and frankly dangerous living conditions.

I pulled their most recent available tax documents and I found that in 2019, not only did SEED receive more than $4,000 in government grants, its top three officers also made six figure salaries.

It ended the year with more than $3 million in total assets.

And we know for a fact that these serious issues have existed in their buildings for years.

I really hope there's other media that's watching this today and is willing to report on this deeply and hold these landlords to account.

I want to thank Council Member Sawant and the tenants themselves for fighting for better conditions and against the rent increases.

It's really important that many other working people and union members have also vocally supported the Rainier Court tenants.

And I hope that the city council would take immediate and serious action both to investigate seed and to enact legislation that holds landlords to make their repairs urgently.

And lastly, the status quo just cannot be maintained.

There are no shortcuts to ending the housing crisis.

We need strong rent control policy in our city, and I strongly support increasing the Amazon tax to massively expand high quality social housing.

That is the only way that, you know, working class black and brown seniors like those at Rainier Court won't continue to get trapped in dangerous housing that's hazardous to their health.

And it's the only way that renters like me can afford to stay in the city as costs continue to rise.

Thank you, Grayson.

Can we go back to the panelists?

I mean, the screen, please take the PowerPoint.

Thanks.

I know we're going to come back to it because we have some other slides to show.

But thank you very much, Grayson, for sharing that with us.

And thank you so much, Annie and Allison, for sharing your experiences and what you and your fellow tenants have been doing in order to hold your landlords accountable.

Council members, I have other points to add as well, but I wanted to open it up for council members to ask their questions or comments.

Go ahead, Council President Juarez, you need to unmute.

Oh, no, I'm sorry.

I just said I was saying I'm good.

Thank you.

Thank you, Grayson.

Thank you.

Just one thing I was going to share, and I saw Council Member Morales has raised a Zoom and I will call on you in just a second.

I was going to say, you know, Grayson and also others in public comment mentioned mold, the problems of mold.

We, in my office, we solicited responses from renters throughout the city to ask them, you know, because we wanted to get a sense of How many renters throughout the city are facing this problem?

Obviously, we're not doing a Statistical survey yet.

Although I think that is a really worthy statistical project, but we Send out a request for renters to to tell us their stories and I just wanted to share one of them right now this tenant said renter says I have informed my landlord that I have black mold in the laundry room and The wall is literally coming off because of the mold.

We have been here for five years.

He has not fixed that.

We have a leak under the house.

He has not fixed that.

We don't have good insulation.

He has not fixed that.

There is mold growing all over the place, and it's black mold.

And we have let him know, and he has not fixed that.

That's just a very short email.

I will share a couple of other emails when I have a chance during this committee.

But it's our sense is that this is quite a widespread issue.

Go ahead, Council Member Morales.

Thank you.

I don't really have any questions, but I did want to just comment on some of the things that we heard from.

from tenants, and I want to thank all of you for being here and sharing your stories.

I do think it's clear that SEED isn't holding up their end of the contract here by making repairs in the timeline that they're supposed to be, and it is, you know, one leverage that we have as a city is restricting the funding that these kinds of organizations receive if they're not meeting basic So, you know, clearly developers and contractors should also be held accountable for unsafe living conditions and and the landlords should be should be held accountable as well.

I do want to say that, you know, we contract as a city.

We also contract with tenants union and be Seattle.

to organize tenants, to help them understand how to meet with landlords and make the kinds of demands that we're having here.

So I think it's important, for example, the Tenants Union can refer people to the King County Bar Association, to the neighborhood legal clinics where people can learn to talk with lawyers for free and help them understand their rights.

especially, for example, if SDCI isn't responding to the questions that they have.

So I think it's important that we let these organizations who we're paying to help organized tenants do that work so that we can build capacity of people who are living in these conditions to understand their rights and the process to get things addressed.

I will also say it's true that Seattle's tenant rights laws don't provide enough protection for people.

especially since the landlord violations are civil violations.

And we learned the last year, you know, when we were passing eviction defense for people who couldn't pay rent during COVID, you know, we granted the just cause protections to tenants by closing that end of lease loophole.

There are a lot of limitations of what the city can do that come from the state.

So, I am eager to figure out how we make those changes at the state level.

And these are examples of why we need to fight at the state level so that we can strengthen the rental protections that we have at the city level as well.

So I'm, again, just want to thank tenants for being here and sharing their stories and look forward to the work this year to try to make sure that we're strengthening protections and keeping people accountable for safe, healthy living conditions for our neighbors.

Thank you, Council Member Morales.

Did any other Council Members want to speak?

I don't see any Zoom hands going up.

I wanted to call on Bia Lacombe from my office.

because I believe we have some more slides that we can look at.

And also, Bia, you as a staff member in my office, you and other staff members, Nick Jones, Alvin Muragori, and formerly Jonathan Rosenblum, and also Adam Zimkowski, I have been at Rainier Court for many months and talking to tenants personally.

I've also done that, but you've been there a lot.

So I was wondering if you could share with the committee what you've observed, you know, overall, in addition to the photos.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

And please introduce yourself for the record.

Hi, my name is Bia Lacombe.

I work in Councilmember Sawant's office and I'm here with Annie and the tenants.

We're here at Rainier Court and, you know, we've got tenants outside gathered to, you know, we helped them give public comment and, you know, really powerful testimony today.

And, you know, I think Annie's testimony really demonstrates just how, you know, how much tenants here are at their wit's end with you know months and years of fighting to get basic repairs made and then you know frankly not even it's really not just limited to basic repairs it's really dangerous conditions that ultimately like Grayson explained can lead to you know hazardous life-threatening conditions for seniors and folks with disabilities.

You know I spoke with one tenant who Annie mentioned that the elevator in the Columbia Gardens building was broken for a month What that means in reality for seniors and folks with disabilities is that they can't leave their apartments if they live, you know, on the second, third, fourth floor.

I talked to a tenant who she had to cancel her doctor's appointments, her physical therapy appointments for a month because she couldn't leave her apartment while the elevator was broken.

And so, you know, that's a dangerous condition.

You know, it's toilets that are broken for weeks, you know, stoves and other, you know, really necessary appliances.

And then the mold.

You know, Mark was one of the tenants who gave public comment this morning who said that, you know, he has been hospitalized for, you know, mold issues and respiratory issues.

So, you know, these are real, you know, it's a crisis over here and it's widespread.

All four buildings at Rainier Court, to varying degrees, are dilapidated, falling apart, and I think there's a couple of photos that we were going to also show.

One tenant had leak in two of her bathrooms.

And she lives in a townhouse in the Dakota building.

And her, so this is her ceiling in one of her bathrooms after the landlord came to fix the leak.

And then this was in December, they left her ceiling like this.

And then the next photo is her other bathroom.

It's even worse than they left the ceiling like that too.

It's still like that.

It's been like that since December.

And this is just- Sorry, if I can interrupt you.

Yeah.

This both these sort of holes that happened in our ceiling happened in December.

Yeah, so I'm not sure how long the leak had been going on, but the it was finally they came to repair it in December, early December and then have left her ceilings like this since then and now you know we're.

late into January, and she has no sense of when they're going to come fix her ceiling.

And I mean, it's horrifying looking at those photos.

It's, it's, it's fully, it's completely unacceptable.

And so yeah, this is, you know, and then the next slide, I think has two videos.

So the, the Cortlandt Place building.

So that's a shop so the the Columbia or the Cortland Place building has on the first floor some businesses that are it's like a you know, they rent a small space for business or property and this is one this is a convenience store run by a woman named Bella and multiple of the stores in that building have had persistent leaks from the roof.

And I mean, that's the water is just pouring out of the roof.

And how are you going to run business?

And that's happening every day, every day, every day.

And that's Bella.

And then the other voice you heard there is Nick, one of the other community organizers in our office.

And so tenants in that building reported not only are these leaks constant in the first floor, but also, you know, multiple times over the last months when repairs have been made.

They will give very little notice that they're shutting off water for the entire building and then have no sense of when the water is going to come back on.

So I talked to a tenant yesterday as they were repairing these leaks who said the water was turned off at 9 30 in the morning.

It was I think 2 or 3 p.m when I talked to her and she said the water is still off.

We have no idea when it's going to come back on.

And so this you know regular total lack of communication when they do actually go and repair some things.

Meanwhile you know so much remains unrepaired.

And so that's just sort of a sense of, you know, as we've worked with these tenants, it's heartbreaking and horrifying, you know, of course, much worse to have to actually live in these conditions.

And to see it is, you know, it's infuriating.

And it's also really, I think, inspiring how tenants, you know, are at their wits end.

But, you know, rather than trying to move out or leave, which is understandable if some folks do that, but I think the far more effective you know, response clearly as we're seeing how widespread this is, is to stay and fight back because this is nonprofit housing.

So if this is the conditions for, you know, affordable housing for seniors and folks with disabilities and immigrant families, some of the most vulnerable people in our society, if this is the kind of standards they're living in, you can only imagine what's going on for, you know, the thousands and thousands of renters living in for-profit housing.

And so, yeah, we also wanted to share Councilmember Sawant, I don't know if you wanted to do that now.

Some of the other reports we've gotten from tenants across the city.

Yeah, you should go ahead, definitely.

Before that, can you, I don't know if you already mentioned or rather mentioned, We're talking about a lot of tenants at Rainier Court, so can you tell us a sense of how many tenants there are so that committee members are fully aware of it?

And just to explain that this is not affecting just one or two tenants, even that would be a problem, but the scale is much bigger than that.

Yeah, absolutely.

So there's four buildings in the Rainier Court of the Rainier Court property.

And overall, I think we've calculated it's something over 550 units, I want to say.

And so that's, you know, hundreds of tenants.

Some units are, you know, families.

And so I think we're looking at you know, at least over, you know, 700 probably tenants who live in these buildings and every single tenant we've spoken to has had some kind of issue.

And we haven't even spoken to, you know, the majority of tenants.

We've spoken to, you know, we've gotten hundreds of petition signatures over the months we've been organizing here.

It's there's you know, we haven't met a single tenant who hasn't said I Living here is a nightmare.

It's horrible.

I've never you know, I Would love to leave leave as soon as I can, you know, what can I sign?

How can I get involved because this is horrific?

So yeah, that's really the scale.

And we also get emails.

Just wanted to note Council Member Sawant has received emails from tenants.

COAST is the property manager that seed contracts this building.

We've gotten emails from other tenants who've heard about the work we're doing here and said COAST actually manages my building and it's also terrible.

And so I think to get a sense of this is happening across the city, you know, thousands and thousands of tenants.

Thank you.

Thank you, Bia.

That was really helpful, and I think it helps to see the visuals.

I also wanted to allow other panelists, if they wanted to come in and speak on anything, that should definitely, you know, that's very welcome.

I wanted to ask Ted Burden, who's the policy analyst from my office, So, Ted, one of the questions that I think, and of course, as we wrap up this agenda item, we have to sort of have a summary of what we are going, what our next steps are, and I'll do that.

But before that, one of the things that has come up in the points from both Pia and from Shirley Henderson, who was a small business owner, spoke in public comment, is that small businesses who are tenants of landlords, often corporate landlords, are also facing problems.

Can you shed some light on what laws are currently in place?

And I assume that they're different than what residential renters have in place.

They are different, and I'll have to research that and get back to you, because overwhelmingly the constituent concerns that I've had to answer in the past have been from residential tenants, but that's all under the housing codes, and I'm sure that there will be different codes, as you mentioned, for small businesses, but I will definitely get back to you on that.

Thank you, Ted.

Yeah, that will be very much appreciated if you can have those some of those answers by the next committee.

And also, I'm sure city council central staff are listening.

They have always been extremely helpful and informative.

So I'm sure we will have more clarity on that.

Allison, you have your hand raised.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

I just wanted to speak to the comment earlier about utilizing the existing resources for tenants and going through the proper channels.

I think that that is a great recommendation, but even when you do that as a tenant, you don't get anywhere because what ends up happening is the landlord has all the power to just say, no, thank you.

I don't really want to do that.

So I don't understand why the city isn't really able to enforce its housing codes.

We have these laws, I mean, and they just fall on deaf ears.

So I don't know who needs to be listening more, but we have a crisis, and if I lose this home, I have no idea where I'll go.

And I'm one of thousands of people in this same situation.

It's hard for me to hear, go through the proper channels because we did and we do and it doesn't work.

Thank you, Allison.

Go ahead Council Member Nelson.

Sorry about that.

So Council Member Sawant, you brought up, you said something that brought up a question, which was that, and I'm new to this topic.

You said that the units that we're talking, some of them that we're focusing on or that we've gotten testimony from, have received City of Seattle funding, is that correct?

is, well, I'll just, I'll let you answer that.

This one project or, I mean, I guess my point is that I think that where we have leverage would be the easiest way to start.

And you mentioned something like, you know, withholding funding or something like that.

So I was just trying to get a sense of these violations are a large number of them in, in housing, you know, projects that we have, that we have some skin in the game in.

Thank you Council Member Nelson for that question.

Yeah, just to clarify first of all, and Ted you should add if I'm missing anything, does SEED, which is the landlord of the Rainier Court Apartments, and as Bia said that's over 550 tenants and probably 600 tenants if you include all family members.

They are, they do receive city funding and absolutely we should be using, we as a city council should be using whatever leverage we can immediately to hold organizations like SEED accountable.

And I want to talk about other landlords that are not covered on that because most, most tenants most renters in our city are tenants of corporate landlords so I'll come to that point in a second, but I'm really glad you raised this point, because to be honest with you.

city Council members last year did not actually join me in pushing for this.

From my office, I sent a public letter to CEDE demanding that they change this.

As you have heard from multiple tenants at Rainier Court now, they've been protesting.

And as Annie said, and as Allison from Terrace Crest, which is not a nonprofit entity, the landlord is not a nonprofit entity, but you can see the common threat that's running here that the whether it's non-profit like a big non-profit landlord like Seattle Housing Authority or SEED or it's corporate landlords or you know private landlords like Breyer Crest of Terrace Breyer sorry Breyer Schiff I think of that Terrace Crest the the common thread running here is that the landlords are not being held accountable but specifically on the non-profit issue Yes, I could not agree more.

If there is city funding, absolutely the city council has the minimum obligation to hold those organizations accountable.

But that hasn't happened yet.

So if you are interested in making that happen alongside my office, I really welcome your support on that.

I'm just telling you that hasn't happened.

And no other council member has really done that.

And we need that.

We did have, I should mention, we did have a labor union, UAW 4121, which represents graduate student workers at the University of Washington, send a letter, a public letter to SEED saying that they should change their practices, they should withdraw their rent increases, they should treat their tenants at Rainier Court with dignity and respect.

I really appreciate that letter.

We need more progressive labor unions to do that.

But they really stand out as the exception to the rule.

And again, we need more council members to speak up about this.

But as far as the vast majority of renters in our city, they don't get city funding in a direct way.

Obviously, city politics mostly supports them, but they don't get direct city funding.

So it's not like a direct legal leverage.

And so we do need citywide strong housing code enforcement.

And so I think both the questions are valid.

One is what does the city need to do to hold non-profit city funding landlords accountable?

And what do we need to do in order to hold corporate landlords accountable?

I really appreciate Alison's response the points about the contracts that the city has with the tenants union.

The tenants union does excellent work, but as Allison said, we also need strong enforcement from the city.

A lot of people mentioned rent control.

That is a crucial part of shifting the balance of power between landlords and renters.

If we had citywide land control, then renters will have other affordable options to move to, which automatically will I promise you will make the landlords fix the problems because then they won't have tenants who are forced to stay in those units because they have nowhere else to move.

I think, Allison, you made that point really well.

Did Grayson or Annie or Allison want to speak again?

Also, if other council members want to come in, please let me know.

Go ahead, Allison.

Just one more comment.

I would love to see a situation where renters had the ability to legally withhold rent when the landlord does not fulfill their end of the lease.

I mean, we continue to pay and pay and pay, and they get to do whatever they want.

And the minute we'd stop paying, we're out.

And I really wish that there was some way to balance that power.

Thank you, Allison.

Go ahead, Grayson.

Yeah, I just wanted to add.

I filed a public disclosure request with the Seattle Police Department, specifically for all incident reports and follow ups at the Rainier Court buildings for the week of the Seattle heat wave.

So between July 25 and July 8 of last year.

That's because I heard multiple tenants say that during the heat wave their apartments were over 110 degrees.

And one tenant that I spoke to went to the hospital as a result.

This is senior housing.

Extreme heat is very dangerous.

I filed the public disclosure report to see if anyone was seriously hurt from the heat that week, and I intend to report on that as well.

We've heard rumors that tenants died as a result of this heat wave, and I'm trying to confirm whether or not that's true.

I also want to echo what Allison said and say that the city has housing codes for a reason, and those codes need to be enforced proactively rather than reactively.

It's impossible for the city to know about every single violation in the city, but when complaints are filed, I think the city needs to act swiftly to investigate and find landlords for unsafe conditions.

Only a few years ago, it was legal for landlords to continue to charge rents despite failure to fix serious housing codes violations.

I think it's a real victory that, you know, of Council Member Sawant's office and the tenants of landlord Carl Hagelin that they won legislation outlawing that.

But that massive power imbalance still exists and functionally as Allison said short of withholding rent there is nothing a renter can do to make sure a landlord holds up their end of the lease and that's a huge problem.

This is really straightforward in my opinion.

I think if a landlord can't agree that legislation should exist to ensure renters get their units repaired in a timely fashion, then as a journalist, I'd want to investigate the conditions that renters are living in immediately.

I also want to thank Council Member Morales for your comments, but I would respectfully offer that whether or not the state takes up renters' rights issues, which I agree they should, I think it's the responsibility of this body to look out for Seattle renters.

The state has had a ban on rent control for 41 years.

We know where they stand.

As a Seattle renter, I'm not asking what the state can do, I'm asking what you can do.

And it can't be overstated that rent control is long overdue in this city.

It's really simple calculation that if rents keep rising like they have been, as it's been pointed out, they're back to pre-pandemic levels, then people like me cannot afford to stay in the city for much longer.

Rent control would put a stop to landlord price gouging and help renters have stability rather than be buffeted around by the winds of the market.

And we need a massive expansion in permanently affordable social housing.

So tenants like those at Rainier Court have options rather than having to stay in hazardous apartments for years or even decades.

And the way to get that expansion is by increasing the Amazon tax, which has already proven to be absolutely vital funding as we saw during the budget discussions last year.

So that's all I have.

Thank you for having me.

Thank you, Grayson, and thank you, Allison.

And we do need to close this agenda point soon.

We have people waiting.

Thank you so much for the next agenda item.

I really appreciate your patience, but I'm sure you are engaged in the discussion as well.

But before we close, I wanted to make a few points.

But Bia, can you share very quickly what we have heard, what our office has heard from tenants throughout the city?

Yeah, just briefly, I think it's really clear that, you know, to reiterate also what Allison and Grayson are saying, tenants are doing everything right and continuing to pay rent.

And in response, what they get is, you know, a tenant who told us that their kitchen sink and dishwasher overflowed, which caused the landlord to find asbestos in the drywall.

This was in July of last year.

And then everything had to be ripped out of the kitchen.

And that tenant, as of this month, still has no kitchen, but has been paying rent, has been charged the same rent the entire ordeal.

has reported anxiety and depression as a result.

You know, other tenants have like gas ovens that are booming, causing, having booming sounds that cause the oven door to pop open.

It's clearly dangerous.

Took four months for the landlord to get this tenant a new stove.

You know, tenants have reported, we got dozens of emails from tenants, you know, saying that they had black mold, that the landlord never fixed.

You know, most tenants will say, where do I start?

You know, landlords never making repairs unless the city threatens them with fines.

constantly attempting to overcharge for rent, tenants going days every single month without hot water, weeks without working plumbing.

One tenant who got a $500 rent increase and then had to move out, the apartment was inspected and signed off in good condition.

And then the tenant gets a letter from their property management, Windermere.

demanding over $7,000 for repairs, including $1,000 for light bulbs and $1,000 for blinds.

So, you know, I think it's really clear that the system is broken.

Tenants are using the proper channels as much as they can, trying to report individual incidents, but they, you know, can't possibly keep up with, you know, landlords abusing the massive amounts of power they have every step of the way.

It's clear that, you know, all of these, you know, channels, the proper channels are broken.

You know, tenants are getting organized and fighting back.

And, you know, this, I do agree that, you know, council members, you know, really urgently, you know, that there's a lot that really needs to be done really urgently to, you know, support these tenants and really make sure that the laws that do exist are enforced.

Thank you, all of our panelists.

Thank you, everybody who spoke in public comment.

Just to summarize quickly, the next steps, we will, of course, be in touch with the SDCI to get more clarity on what kind of complaints they're getting, what scale of complaints they're getting, and how long landlords are taking to fix them.

But I wholeheartedly agree with Allison and Annie and Grayson that we need to shore up the legislation that exists right now in the city.

And the bottom line has to be that the landlord cannot charge the full rent, continue charging the full rent when these conditions go ignored for weeks, months, even years.

And so I appreciate everybody giving us their input on what changes we need to make to those legislation.

And we will come back to that discussion very soon.

Thank you all again.

We have our final agenda item, which is a discussion with climate activists about the Stop the Money pipeline movement that demands that financial institutions like insurance companies and banks end their backing of fossil fuel companies and the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure, such as Pipeline 3. Without cheap credit from banks or the backing of insurers, it is far more difficult for fossil fuel companies to create new pipelines and other projects that will result in decades of new carbon emissions.

One part of the international movement to stop these expansions of fossil fuel infrastructure is for cities like Seattle and other governments and public institutions to refuse to do business with financial institutions that fail to agree to these demands.

My office, with the help of Council Central staff, has developed legislation that empowers the Green New Deal Oversight Board that this committee did a lot of work last year to appoint to rate insurance companies and other financial institutions who are bidding on City of Seattle contracts.

If the Green New Deal Oversight Board chooses to rate these companies, the city, which is the Department of Finance and Administrative Services, to be more specific, is required to give that rating a weight of 20% in their selection of companies to win contracts.

I expect that the Green New Deal Oversight Board will only occasionally use this authority.

The real power of this legislation is when Seattle can join with the movement around the world to pressure a company to cut their ties to the fossil fuel infrastructure.

When they can support this movement, rating bidders can have an impact beyond the businesses of just one city because of the example it's set.

And when there's not that movement, I expect that the board will spend the bulk of their time on other climate organizing work and I'm really looking forward to their work as a whole.

Presenting today are Matt Remley and Rachel Heaton from the Green New Deal Oversight Board and Mazaska Talks and Chris Wilkie from Water Keepers.

Again, I appreciate your patience.

I apologize for any delays and I would urge you to introduce yourselves and begin.

Thank you.

And I believe we have a PowerPoint.

We do, thank you.

And I'm looking for Chris.

Is Chris still...

It's okay.

Well, thank you for having us and no apologies needed.

I mean, there's a obvious indirect connection between the presentation that we just heard and the issue of the climate crisis.

And it looks like...

Chris says he's here, but we don't see him on the chat.

Ted, is there anyone to bring Chris in?

I found him.

His Zoom account was AdvocacyZoom.

Gotcha.

He's there now.

All right.

Well, thank you, Council Member Sawant and to the rest of the council members on the subcommittee.

Very happy to be here today to talk about steps the city can be taking to address the financial sector and their role and the climate crisis.

My name is Matt Remley.

I am on the steering committee for the Green New Deal Oversight Board, but not here in the capacity today speaking on behalf of the board, but also a steering committee member for the Stop the Money Pipeline, which is an international group of coalition really folks from around the world who are have taken to addressing the financial sector, the banks, asset managers, insurance companies in their role of financing, funding, and profiting off the climate crisis, as well as co-founder of Mazda Scott Talks, alongside Rachel Heaton here.

I'm a resident of Beacon Hill, and I'll pass off to Rachel and Chris to introduce themselves, and we'll go ahead and jump into the presentation.

Good morning, everybody.

My name is Rachel Heaton.

I am a member of the Muckleshoot tribe, and I'm also a descendant of the Duwamish people.

You know, I just first want to say, you know, hearing the presentations this morning, you know, it ties, it really ties in exactly with what we're talking about when we talk about marginalized groups are, you know, the first ones affected by climate change.

And then when we hear stories like this, you know, you hear it's alive and well.

Thank you for having us today.

I'm also part of the steering committee for the Green New Deal, but I'm not here in that capacity today.

I'm here also as a, I'm here as a co-founder of Mazaska Talks with Matt Rimley.

And, you know, it's, again, it's an honor to be able to, you know, have this time to, you know, speak about these, you know, these issues and moving our city forward.

So thank you and I'll go ahead and I'll let Chris introduce himself.

Thank you so much, Matt and Rachel and to the council members here today.

This is a really great opportunity for us.

My name is Chris Wilkie.

I'm currently the global advocacy manager with Waterkeeper Alliance, which is a global nonprofit with over 350 watershed groups around the world.

But I started here With the local chapter, which is Puget Sound Keeper, I managed that organization for nine years and actually worked for the organization for a total of 17 years.

which is defending clean water in the Seattle area and working on Duwamish cleanup and holding polluters accountable and a number of topics like that.

Currently, I'm fortunate enough to work around the world in Nepal, Kenya, Bahamas, Senegal, Canada, and this is my one project here in my home area, so I'm really happy to have this opportunity.

And I was at the Global Climate Conference in Glasgow in November, and there's a real need for strong action.

There's so much talk going on, but there really is a need for action.

So I'm grateful to be able to be here today.

Thank you.

We should mention that one member of our team, Selectiona from Rainforest Action Network couldn't be here today and sends her apologies for that.

All right, we'll hand back to Rachel.

Rachel, you're on mute.

Sorry, I was reading away.

So to start off, Purpose, global leadership is needed to accelerate a just transition from extractive fossil fuel system to a clean energy economy that respects indigenous rights.

The problem, the climate crisis is intensifying and we are not moving quickly enough to prevent the worst impacts.

Unprecedented drought in Western US, reservoirs running at all time lows in 2021, intensified super storms, Hurricane Duran, in 2019. Sea level rise may displace millions of people.

Wildlife destruction in American, West Australia, B.C., Alaska.

Ocean acidification and changing precipitation patterns unravel the Pacific Northwest ecosystem, and endangered Pacific Northwest salmon and orca continue to be further imperiled.

Still business as usual for fossil fuel companies.

Canada and US are leading exporters of fossil fuels and petrochemicals.

New infrastructure continues to be proposed and under construction to expand global oil and gas production.

And indigenous peoples and frontline communities pay the highest price.

Currently, if you've been paying attention to Wet'suwet'en, up north, that's one of the current ones that are going on at this time, you know, and you can actually today see, you know, that impact taking place right now.

And losing opportunity to hold the climate change to 1.5 degrees Celsius, according to the Paris report.

Local connections.

I've had to evacuate two blocks of tribal citizens from our homes and our jail, our courthouse, our community center, and the only store in town.

This season, our fisheries are declining and we can point this to climate change.

This is a quote from Fawn Sharp and president and CEO of Quinault Nation.

And she is a huge advocate as a tribal leader for addressing the climate change.

And you can also, she's someone that you can check out on her work that she's doing.

to address this issue as well for globally, but also for our communities.

Locally, Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion in Alberta and Vancouver, BC.

It's larger than Keystone XL.

Tar sands are the dirtiest oil on earth.

There's no cleanup technology for marine spills.

There's a 700% increase in oil tankers through the Salish Seas and stub pipelines to Puget Sound refineries.

You know, as a native from here, we we see these issues in our fishing abilities are declining.

We actually have access to the waters that the city of Seattle is on, the Puget Sound right out here, where my people are allowed to fish.

But every year we see these numbers declining.

And as a result of these barges and things that come through, we visibly see these issues in our community.

Local impacts of TMX and climate change.

There is destruction of unceded First Nation territories, BC.

Treaty fishing rights are at risk.

Orca and salmon recovery efforts are in question and continue to be.

Local shellfish industry is threatened by ocean acidification and destruction of sea level properties and infrastructure.

The Zillow report brings that number in at 13 billion.

Climate leadership opportunity.

The insurance industry is a key linchpin in the fight against fossil fuels.

Fossil fuel projects like pipelines, coal mines, and et cetera need insurance to build and to operate.

Insurance companies provide both direct investment and underwriting.

So divesting from climate damaging projects is the best way to stop fossil fuel expansion, short of federal limits.

Global coalition to ensure our future.

There are currently 35 companies with coal policies.

There are 14 companies with tar sands policies.

There's a major risk to coal and tar sand to the major risk to coal and tar sands industries and leadership from municipalities in Paris, France, San Francisco, California, Boulder County, Colorado, Los Angeles, California, Summersville and Cambridge, Massachusetts.

So this just goes to show that this is a not just a need locally but this is a need nationally and globally.

And I will go ahead and pass it on to Matt.

Thank you, Rachel.

And those municipalities that Rachel just listed, those are all places that have passed similar legislation to what one of the things we're looking to do here today that we'll talk about towards the end of the presentation.

Continuing on with some of the key demands of the insurance companies, and this is again coming not just from places like those cities and counties just listed, but from climate justice activists, and more specifically from indigenous communities globally.

And one of those key demands is that insurance companies ensure that free prior informed consent, that there is documented free prior informed consent with impacted tribal nations.

What this basically would look like, and thank you for the city of Seattle and your support back in 2016, the pipeline fight against code access pipeline.

Free Pirate Forum consent would essentially ensure that that project wouldn't have happened because the company would had to have gone to not only Standing Rock, but the governments of Standing Rock, but other impacted tribal government nations to engage in a process of consultation.

and ultimately receive their consent for the projects to move forward.

How that plays into insurance companies as well as banks is what we're saying to the insurance companies and banks is that if you're going to either underwrite or insure or give loans to companies, in that case, energy transfer partners, then you need to obtain documented proof that you have obtained FPIC from impacted tribal nations.

We have had Here I had opportunity to work with Puyallup Tribal Council and specifically Anna Bean down there in crafting a resolution for the National Congress of American Indians.

This was a couple years back.

and what it was calling for, and it was passed unanimously, is calling on the U.S. insurance company, U.S. insurance industry to adopt policies to ensure that projects they insure have obtained free, prior informed consent of impacted nations.

We continue that work here locally with Washington State's Office of Insurance Commissioner, And last year, he came out calling on insurance companies that work here, Washington State, to develop FPIC policies with tribal nations.

Further, he supports state legislation to enforce, to determine what risk an insurer may underwrite.

We're hoping to see legislation on that in 2023. Go ahead, Ted, next slide.

The UN has even taken up the call for divestment, and this comes from UN Secretary General Antonio Gutierrez.

As insurers and investors, the insurance sector has a key role to play.

Every county, city, and financial institution and company needs to adopt plans to transition to net zero emissions by 2050. A lot of us climate justice folks would like to see that 2050 number much lower than that, you know, more 2030. But that means we need to take action now.

Go ahead, next slide, Ted.

Seattle has been a leader in the forefront of addressing the climate crisis.

This is from an action that was taking place last year down at Liberty Mutual.

It was a solidarity action with the First Nations communities in Alberta and British Columbia, calling on folks to take action against the Trans Mountain Pipeline.

One of the unique things we see with that particular pipeline is the company Enbridge was losing so much money from trying to build that pipeline due to indigenous resistance as well as divestment efforts that they actually sold it to the Canadian government where putting the taxpayers on the hook for fronting the bill.

And so the strategy has shifted to really addressing the insurance companies to not underwrite the project.

And today, several major insurance companies have come out stating that they will not underwrite the Trans Mountain Pipeline.

That one in particular has very significant impact, potential impacts for us here in Seattle, all those of us who live along the Salish Sea, Puget Sound because like Rachel mentioned, we would see a massive increase in oil tankers coming through our waters.

to export terminals in both British Columbia, as well as in Anacortes.

Washington State's governor, as well as 20 plus tribes, have all come out opposing the construction of that particular pipeline.

Go ahead.

Next slide, Ted, and I'll pass to Chris.

Thanks, Matt and Rachel.

We have a couple of slides here about Seattle's connection to the fossil fuel industry through its insurance purchasing.

So what you see here are the companies that are listed in Seattle's insurers.

Cities buy a lot of insurance, and in their insurance procurement policies, they can send a really strong message not only to these insurers and encouraging them to divest, but to other insurers around the world, and eventually the fossil fuel companies that we need to move forward with the transition.

So you can see those companies there.

Some of them are well-known names.

Go ahead with the next slide.

This is the annual insuring our future 2021 scorecard on insurance companies with ties to fossil fuels.

And what you can see here that the companies with the highest ranking are the ones that have the most progressive policies and the companies with the lowest ranking are lagging.

So these are the leaders and laggards.

The link to this report is in the previous slide.

So if we wanna provide that for the council members later, that would be great.

The biggest takeaway here is you can notice that the U.S. insurers are all groups towards the bottom.

So Europe is leading the way.

Asia insurers are begrudgingly moving in this direction and the U.S. insurers are barely budging at all.

So, this is where insurance policies within the U.S. can really make a difference.

And go ahead with the next slide.

And then there's also Wall Street investment banks and their role.

So, when people think of divestment, they often think of banking roles.

whether banks are investing in fossil fuel projects.

The thing about banking is there's almost always another bank.

But with insurance companies, there's a limited number of them.

And there's even a smaller number of reinsurance companies.

So what happens often when insurance companies sell a insurance policy, they then get part of that policy insured through a reinsurer.

And so this Insure Our Future movement is not only looking at the primary insurance companies, but also the reinsurers.

And as Rachel indicated in one of her slides, there are 35 institutions around the world that have policies on divesting from coal projects and 14 already that have tar sands.

But sadly, many of them are not located in the U.S.

We'll continue to pressure the banks and the asset managers and institutional investors.

It's also important to realize that insurance companies are not just underwriting fossil fuels, they are investing in them as well.

In fact, Liberty Mutual Insurance, which we all see every time we turn on our TV, we can't get away from them.

They actually own a coal mine in Australia.

So they are straight up a fossil fuel company.

So this is our opportunity really to send them a message.

Go ahead with the next slide.

This is a report on the banking aspects of the fossil fuel.

This is another report, which you can download off the internet.

That's the link right there.

And these are the top in banking companies that are investing in the climate crisis.

And you can see JPMorgan Chase not only leads, but they actually lead the field by 33 percent.

So they are far and away the biggest banking company that is investing in the fossil fuel crisis.

All told, I think the top companies are Top 10 companies are a total of 3.8 trillion invested in fossil fuels in the time period of 2016 to 2020. There's also a lot of talk about net zero and banks that have net zero policies.

There's a net zero insurance alliance.

The problem with net zero is they just adopt these pledges, they put a target date of 2050, and then they don't do anything.

Nobody should be taken seriously on a net zero pledge by 2050 unless they've got policies in place in 2022. And as Matt pointed out, we really need to be net zero 2050 is where the planet needs to be.

in order to hold climate change to as close as possible to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

It is not a target for individual companies.

Individual companies should be far ahead of those.

The only way this is going to work is if we can get the entire planet to net zero by 2050. And really what's at stake here, these reports are coming out, we're looking at two, we're on a track right now for two to three feet of sea level rise by the end of the century.

If we talk, if we think about what that means for Seattle, What does the West Point sewage treatment plant look like with three feet of sea level rise?

What does the entrance to the Highway 99 tunnel look like?

What do the neighborhoods along the Duwamish River look like with three feet of sea level rise?

And that is really the average of what's predicted.

We are still increasing fossil fuel use every year.

And there was a brief dip in 2020 because of the pandemic, but it's already back up.

And we need to reduce fossil fuels, and particularly methane, drastically.

And those reductions need to begin in this decade.

Once we trigger sea level rise of four to six feet, which is possible, it can't be reversed.

It will happen.

And many food systems and housing systems will just be inundated in the lifetime of people that are alive today.

So this is a very serious issue.

Let's go ahead and move to the next slide.

So, local efforts for divestment really do work.

Over 40 trillion has been divested from fossil fuels.

And this actually makes renewables much more competitive.

And it also, it's a way to show leadership and connect people with the global climate fight.

There's a quote from Yes magazine.

So 40 trillion has been divested from fossil fuels.

This movement is growing, and it is a way that we can let the financial firms know that these projects that are literally destroying the earth, and in particular, frontline communities, indigenous communities, are no longer worthy of investment.

Go ahead, next slide.

So I think this is going back to Rachel.

Stay tuned.

Sorry, me and the mute button today.

Thank you, Chris and Matt.

You know, and speaking on, you know, the local divestment, you know, divestment efforts, you know, Seattle being the first city to, you know, break ties with a bank that was funding the Dakota Access Pipeline is where a lot of this started for some of us.

And then later, the city, you guys, thank you, have also passed a resolution that the city wouldn't bank with any bank that is funding the Keystone XL Pipeline.

And we've seen the success with this.

Like Chris was saying, there is always another bank that is backing up the funding of the fossil fuel industry.

And so by addressing insurance companies, and there being limited numbers, this is just another tactic that we're able to use to address the climate crisis, amongst other issues when we talk about indigenous rights as well.

So leadership from the city of Seattle will do more than vote with our dollars.

Will the city build on the momentum from previous announcements from other cities that are doing similar work, San Francisco and Los Angeles?

The city of Seattle has the opportunity to show the industry and other municipalities what a strong procurement policy looks like.

Drives climate action, protects our city interest, and stands in solidarity with First Nations and frontline communities.

Thank you, Rachel.

So with all that background, what can the city leadership do?

What we are hoping for and what Council Member Sawant alluded to in the crafting of an ordinance is to pass an ordinance relating to financial services contracts.

That would include screener questions and the request for proposal process for fossil fuel investments and their adherence to free prior and informed consent.

further within the ordinance to empower the Green New Deal Oversight Board to rate bidders for such services.

Go ahead, next slide.

Chris.

So the other thing about this is we don't want this to be too onerous on the city.

We want the city to be able to conduct its business.

So we feel like we have this constructed in a way that is flexible for the city, that does create accountability for investors in the fossil fuel sphere, but it also protects the city's interests.

It would essentially require a preference to do business with companies that are not investing in or providing underwriting for fossil fuel projects.

A lot of that information is very easily obtained.

But there's also due diligence for procurement policies to verify this divestment.

And it does allow flexibility for the city when no other options exist.

Obviously, the city needs to protect its interests, it needs to have insurance.

So this is all about applying this pressure, but it should not be too onerous for the city.

And it will also allow to prioritize contracts with companies with a strong fossil fuel phase-out and FPIC policies in place.

And we also pledge to help the city as they develop policies and work with you.

And there's lots of information out there as far as the divestment movement is growing, so it shouldn't be too onerous requiring the city to do tons of homework for each contract that they write.

Thank you all.

Thank you, Matt, Rachel, and Chris for that presentation.

Very, very important.

Of course, I welcome questions or comments from all committee members, but just to get started, Matt and Rachel, you're both on the Green New Deal Oversight Board.

My understanding is the board will be meeting on the 24th and you will be discussing this legislation.

One question I have is, What have you heard from other Green New Deal oversight board members about what they think the potential of this legislation is?

As you explained really well on your slides, this is not just about the city voting with its dollars.

Its impact is much more because it's also the question of the dynamic it creates by successfully letting a corporation know that, well, no, we're not going to let you do this.

So that's if you could share that, that would be great.

And also, I believe you also in your slides, you talked about San Francisco and Los Angeles.

I'm not clear.

Are they in the process of pushing for legislation like this or have they passed it?

What's the experience been like there?

If any of you feel free to answer.

Thank you.

They, they have passed ordinance already.

Paris, France was the first municipality, followed by San Francisco, Los Angeles, Somerset, Massachusetts and Boulder County, Colorado.

I think I'm forgetting one.

But you know those those at least some of those I think most of those are fairly aspirational.

They're resolutions that did not have the weight of an ordinance.

So while it's too late, Paris is also a resolution, not an ordinance.

I'm not intimately familiar with all of them, but I believe so because Paris was the first.

So it certainly gives opportunity for leadership of these municipalities to move forward with rigorous verification processes, but they don't necessarily require them to.

And as one thing that I've been learning is that Regulations are not really regulations unless there is some sort of accountability built in.

So I think that not only is this an opportunity for like, well, Seattle can't be first with this, but we can be the strongest and we can also set the bar for what future policies will need to be like from other municipalities.

Thank you, Chris, and I'll take the first question.

And again, reiterating, you know, Rachel and I are on our board, our Green New Deal Oversight Board, but not speaking on behalf of the board.

That said, we have heard quite a bit of feedback from our fellow colleagues who sit on the board.

And what we're repeatedly hearing is that this is needed and essential in that it aligns the city's goals that when you all pass the Green New Deal, resolution and ordinance a couple years back to put the city on a path to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that we're in total alignment that we can kind of sort of pick and choose the areas of addressing the climate crisis without looking at essentially all pieces to that, and with the financial sector being the largest.

And so this is, like Chris was mentioning, this is a great opportunity for Seattle to really put out the strongest and to utilize the Green New Deal Oversight Board and really empowering them to rate bidders.

But like you mentioned, it will go to this coming Monday, be introduced and further conversations from there.

Great.

Rachel, did you want to add anything?

I just wanted to say that it just goes to show, you know, how many of these issues are intersectional, just as we were listening to the presentations this morning.

you know, very much, you know, along the lines of what we're talking about, you know, isn't just, you know, it's policy and its financial impact as well.

So I think in understanding how intersectional each piece of this is and being able to capture these different areas is super important.

So I think Chris and Matt both captured, you know, that very well.

But yeah, so I think that, you know, recognizing how imperative that this is in the different topics that we have all been listening to, you know, that this is very much in line, you know, with with those concerns.

And so I think this is just another avenue for us, you know, to like Matt was saying with the Green New Deal and everything, you know, we have to cover, you know, all of our basis.

And, you know, just focusing on banks isn't going to solve the divestment issue, we also have these other, you know, avenues.

And so the insurance company and policy is huge, while addressing Indigenous rights and things as well, because I know that's work that, you know, we've been doing for years.

Right, I really appreciate you bringing that sort of global lens on that.

That's extremely important.

I appreciate also Rachel specifically you connecting this discussion on climate change to the previous discussion we had on the Justine incredible struggle that communities are having with their landlords.

And as you said, it's the same low income people of color communities are some of the most affected in all these areas.

And of course, climate change, we all should be invested in addressing it because it's going to get all of us.

And frontline communities are obviously ringing the alarm bells because they're facing it already.

They're facing some of the worst effects already.

Just a quick couple of questions while I wait to see if other council members have any questions.

One, Chris, you mentioned the example of Liberty Mutual, how it's really a straight-up fossil fuel company.

They're not just underwriting but investing.

Can you just give a layperson's quick definition of what's the difference between underwriting and investing, and why is this so much of a bigger indicator that these financial corporations are just every bit as culpable as straight up fossil fuel companies for the damage that is being done?

Thank you for that question.

The interesting origin of the word underwriting, it started with Lloyd's of London, which was a cafe in London, and these voyages were going across the sea, and they needed insurance, and they would pass these things around the cafe.

And whoever wanted to insure it signed their name underneath the ship's name and then they were the underwriter.

And that's how the origin of that name came about.

So underwriting basically means insuring, providing insurance should there be loss to the company.

Whereas investing means actually proactively giving dollars to allow the project to proceed.

And so insurance companies, they are really financial institutions and they take the insurance premiums and they hold on to those against future losses.

And then while they're holding on to that, they invest those.

And they have a lot of money at their control, and so it really is two-fold.

essentially underwriting these fossil fuel projects and then simultaneously investing in them as well.

And then the Ensure Our Future scorecard also, so it rates both of those, but then it also has a rating for climate leadership, which includes things like respecting the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People and Free, Prior and Informed Consent and other forms of climate leadership.

Thank you for that.

I'm not seeing any Zoom hands go up for council members, but I should also share with members of the public that Council Member Morales had some connection problems.

So she said she had to log off and will try to log back on.

So I just wanted to mention that.

Just one last question, if there are no other questions, then before you all go, Chris, you mentioned attending last year's climate summit.

What is what is all of yours assessment of the result of that summit, which essentially that summit represents the response from all of the powers of the capitalist world from my standpoint, you know, they not only failed to.

make any concrete changes.

They also failed to even see any useful – set up any useful goals.

And in the last day, they walked back the goal of phasing out coal.

So I just wanted to hear your standpoint on that.

Yeah.

Well, it was – believe it or not, even though it's very easy to consider it a failure, it was the first international agreement that even mentioned phasing down fossil fuels.

So it was something that came out of Glasgow.

It wasn't nearly enough.

And it was really tragic to see just in the final days how phasing out coal got changed to phasing down unabated coal power and unsustainable fossil fuel investment, as if there is a sustainable fossil fuel investment.

So that was how the writing got put on there.

But essentially, countries are are required to adopt fossil fuel reduction policies under the Paris Agreement and to make those real.

And last year in Glasgow was their first opportunity to really make those real.

And it just became evident that there's so much further to go.

But the biggest point, and I think you kind of touched on it, is the disconnect from the street to the people inside the COP.

And we were going back and forth between People in the street wanted to see concrete action.

They wanted to see it now.

And the people inside were talking about carbon trading and ways to profit off the climate crisis.

And in many cases, selling indigenous lands to biofuel farms and things like that so they can continue to make money off of the fossil fuel crisis.

So it's really tragic to see some of the things the way they were unfolding.

Right.

Thank you for explaining that.

I think there's also it just really underscores the fact that we are going to need grassroots resistance if we're going to get anything done.

As you said, the chasm between the protests on the streets of Glasgow and what the powers that we were discussing just really it's really stunning.

Just given the statistics, I mean, can't be that they're not looking at the same statistics we are looking at.

Obviously, they're capable of doing that.

So I really appreciate all the work, not only that you're doing on this legislation, but also all the work that you all have done for years.

It's extremely, it's just indispensable for us to have anything to be done for activists like yourselves to be pushing this forward.

I don't see any questions coming up from council members.

So I am about to close the meeting unless there are any final comments.

And of course we will be following up on this legislation soon.

I also wanted to urge committee members, council members, if you have any questions or feedback on the legislation, whatever it is, please let my office know, let's make sure we're in touch about that.

And we will, of course, from our office be in touch with you in preparation for the next committee meeting.

And I really appreciate everyone's patience.

It was kind of a long meeting, but really appreciate everybody being here because I think we heard some really important input here between both the agenda items.

Well, I'm hearing no further comments.

Matt, did you want to say something?

I'll just thank all of you.

Thank you, council members.

Yes, thank you, council members.

Yes, thank you.

Thank you all.

Thank you, committee members.

Thank you, presenters.

And we will be in touch soon.

Take care.

Meeting adjourned.

Bye-bye.

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