Seattle City Council Parks, Public Utilities and Technology Committee 4/9/25

Good afternoon.

The April 9th, 2025 meeting of Parks, Public Utilities and Technology Committee will come to order.

It is 2.04 p.m.

I'm Joy Hollingsworth, chair of the committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Kettle?

Here.

Council Member Rivera?

Council Member Strauss?

Council President Nelson?

Present.

Chair Hollingsworth?

Here.

There are three council members present.

And thank you.

And for the record, Council Member Strauss is excused today.

Last week we heard from Seattle Public Utilities, City Light, and our attorney's office on the environmental cleanup efforts on the Lower Duwamish Waterway Superfund site.

On our agenda, we're gonna take a look at that ordinance that will authorize utilities in Seattle City Light to expend funds for that.

So it's a fun agenda, pretty simple and straightforward.

I know that we have had executive sessions.

We also had a presentation, council members had a briefing, and we will be voting today, and hopefully everyone feels confident about that.

We will now consider the agenda.

If there's no objections, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

And for the record, we are joined by Council Member Rivera is here.

So we have four council members present.

Thank you, Council Member Rivera.

Now we're gonna jump into the hybrid public comment period.

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

Clerk, how many speakers do we have signed up?

We have two in person and one remote.

Awesome.

Thank you to the two in person who came all the way down here at 2 p.m.

on a Wednesday to give public comment.

I appreciate that.

Will you please read the instructions for public comment?

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

I'll call on the speakers by name in the order they are registered, both on council's website or from the signup sheet available here in chambers.

We'll start with the in-person speakers first.

And if you have not registered to speak, but would like to, you can sign up before the end of the public comment period on the council's website or by signing up on the signup sheet near the public comment microphone.

When speaking, please begin by stating your name and the item you were addressing.

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

If speakers do not end their comments at the end of the allotted time provided, the speaker's microphone will be muted to allow us to call on the next person.

And the first speaker for in-person public comment is Tim Price.

Hey, Mr. Tim, welcome.

All right, thank you for taking time.

Give us one second.

We're going to do the clock.

Give us one second.

Each speaker is going to get two minutes.

Apologies.

You're all good.

Just give us one second.

We'll wait till that pops up.

Just give us a quick second.

Awesome.

You're ready to rock and roll.

You're good.

You're good.

All right.

Hope you can hear me clearly.

I thank you guys for allowing me this opportunity to speak with you.

I know normally this is a time frame where you hear grievances and complaints and things of that nature, but I come with a different energy.

My name is Tim Price, and I represent a worldwide company known as ICOM America.

We provide two-way radios for entities worldwide for secure radio communication, and we have a very unique opportunity where we're seeking a partnership with the City of Seattle, where we observe the cause to provide radios for you for events, anything relevant to technology, parks, what, mind you, and hopefully it'll be an opportunity that will help save money from budgets, and also it provides a means for us to understand our products, to know how to market it worldwide.

I want to take advantage of this platform to extend this offer to the city, leave my business card with those who are appropriate, so that way we can talk about it more in detail.

And I'm hoping it could be a beneficial mutual situation that we could take advantage of.

And that's literally all that I'm here to do.

All right.

Thank you so much for your time.

We really appreciate the public comment period and you utilizing it to promote your business.

That's a first, but we appreciate it.

I know that council members, we are not...

We are not, I don't want to say allowed to, but it's not within our purview to direct different departments to who to partner with.

But you're more than welcome to leave your comment or your public comment in the box in your card.

And then my suggestion would be to go online during online during the portal for different contractors to find all those opportunities.

Perfect.

And I was going to clear one thing up and I don't want to transgress the purpose of this.

It's not really for promotion.

It's literally just to get things and hands free to the city.

And we're hoping it could be a help in that partnership.

But I will leave my information in the box.

Please do it.

Thank you so much.

Really appreciate that.

Thank you.

Next up, I'm assuming it's Mr. Alex Zimmerman.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Zechail.

Dirty damn Nazi Gestapo fascist.

My name Alex Zimmerman, Trump, MAGA, 6,000.

day of trespass, and five times you prosecute me.

No analogy in state Washington, maybe a whole human history, I'm not too much sure.

Ma'am, I very respect you.

I think in you like a council, like a woman, like a black, have too many privileges, you know what this means.

And I think they, people cut your privilege at most for 100%, maybe 59, yeah, maybe 60, I'm not too much sure.

And I spoke about this for many years.

People who have meeting two o'clock, different from consul who have meeting nine TORI.

And I talked to your staff before a couple of times.

You need to rotate this probably every two months.

Give equal to everybody.

Because people right now in Seattle and around right now, and almost right now, traffic nine TORI absolutely stupid.

It's a nightmare.

I live this 40 year, I never see like this before.

So people maybe want talking to you, maybe want talking from upstairs, it's okay with me too.

But you possibly be changes, you know what this means?

Make everybody equal, because right now one 9.30 for four year, and another two o'clock for another four year.

So people who have meeting, for example, in two o'clock, lose their privilege.

And I talked to you before, and for many years I've talked, sorry for I speak not exactly about agenda, but I think it's very important because it's got privilege for people who speak only on one level, it's people speaking on other levels.

Stand up America for Donald Trump.

Make everybody common sense.

These are key words we need right now.

Common sense.

Stand up America.

Thank you.

Well, you think me as a black woman is privilege.

Thank you.

It's a gift.

I'm blessed.

If I would come back as a person, it'd be a black woman, honestly.

All right.

Next person online.

We'll now move to the remote public comment.

Once I call the speaker's name, please press star six to begin.

David Haynes.

Press star six, Mr. Haynes, and you're ready to give your public comment.

All right.

Thank you, David Haynes.

You know how council has oversight on the de Wauburn's cleanup?

It would be great if council made a rule or a law within the public-private partnership of that cleanup where it required the contractor to bring two full shifts onto the job site.

to expedite getting the job done and to make sure that one individual operating some piece of equipment doesn't have the proper resource and support to stop what they're dredging from basically escaping back into the river and not being isolated the way it's supposed to be when they're making the efforts to clean it up.

Pay into a fund.

and then let some contractor who's going to pad the cost of the labor and pad the cost of the equipment and then shortchange the effort by not putting enough workers on site because some of the workers were supposed to be the owners who don't show up to do any work.

But sometimes they pad up to 60% to 70% of all the money that's being paid into like a project And nobody in oversight is keeping them honest about their lack of diligent work on the job site that's delaying cleaning up the Duwamish.

If you really cared about it, you would make a rule that said we're paying into this fund.

The contractors have to pony up two full shifts with public works keeping them honest about their efforts.

Instead of just having a couple of dudes moving some equipment around to make it seem like they're working hard for the people.

Well, the whole time they're padding the cost and we don't have anybody in oversight, keeping them honest.

All we got is colors and so please consider double shifts and full shifts on all these projects so we can get some things done around here.

Thank you, Mr. Haynes.

If there are no more speakers signed up, the hybrid public comment period is closed.

Thank you all for who came to speak in public and then also for our online callers.

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

Agenda item one, an ordinance relating to the Lower Duwamish Waterway authorizing Seattle City Light and Seattle Public Utilities to continue expending funds to participate in environmental investigation and remediation of the Lower Duwamish Waterway Superfund site.

For briefing, discussion, possible vote.

Presenting is Brian Goodnight from Council Central Staff.

Thank you, Mr. Goodnight.

Looking sharp as ever today, I might add.

And please introduce yourself for the record and go ahead and explain what we are gonna be voting on today.

Thank you.

Thank you, council members.

Brian Goodnight from your council's social staff.

As you mentioned earlier, at the committee's prior meeting on March 26th, the committee received a presentation from Seattle Public Utilities, Seattle City Light, and the City Attorney's Office on Council Bill 120960, which is related to the Lower Duwamish Waterway Superfund site.

As a brief reminder, the Superfund site is a five-mile stretch of the Duwamish River between Harbor Island in the north and an area known as the Turning Basin in the south.

Since the year 2000, the city has been working with the Environmental Protection Agency, the Washington State Department of Ecology, King County, the Port of Seattle, and Boeing to investigate contamination and explore remediation options for the waterway.

The EPA issued a proposed cleanup plan in 2013 and subsequently selected a cleanup remedy in 2014 in what is known as a record of decision.

In 2023, the EPA issued notice to the city and the other parties requiring entry into consent decree negotiations to fully implement the 2014 record of decisions cleanup provisions.

And then after 18 months of negotiation, the city, the county, and Boeing reached agreements with the EPA and the State Department of Ecology on terms for the consent decree.

So the purpose of Council Bill 120960 is to allow SPU and City Light to continue participating in the cleanup activities, including expending funds for contamination investigation and remediation in the Lower Duwamish Waterway and related sites, accepting funds from other responsible parties to implement the consent decree, and seeking and accepting grant funds from the state for cleanup activities.

The council is not being asked to approve the actual consent decree or the related settlement agreements with other parties, because that authority rests with the city attorney's office.

Rather, the council is just being asked to authorize SPU and City Light to make expenditures consistent with the consent decree and its commitments beyond the current budget cycle.

And this type of authority is allowable under state law for public utilities.

And then lastly, I'll just briefly touch on the estimated cost for the efforts, both for the city and overall.

SPU estimates that over the 30-year project period, the cleanup costs will total about $757 million for all parties, with the city being responsible for 31.5% of those costs, or about $238 million.

One of the benefits for entering into the consent decree for the city is that it will be able to receive settlement funds from other responsible parties.

The city expects to receive about $88 million in settlement funds, and also the EPA will waive about $11 million in oversight costs.

So that brings the city's responsibility down to around $140 million over 30 years, and the executive is hopeful that the city could also receive funding from state grant sources covering about half of those costs.

Ultimately, any cost to cover cleanup activities will come from SPU and City Light funds, and both of the departments have been including those costs in their current forecast and into their rate structures.

That concludes my brief summary of the bill, and of course, as you can see behind me, we have SPU, City Light, and the Attorney's Office.

If there are any questions, thank you.

Awesome.

Thank you, Mr. Goodnight.

And I know that, and I had said this before, I know that we've had some briefings and some executive sessions and some information.

So I want to pause here to see if any of my colleagues have any questions potentially at all.

I'm looking to the right.

Council President Nelson.

Brian, I heard you say 30-year project.

So it's really gonna take that long, 30 years to completion.

And it's my understanding that there has already been some work related to the cleanup.

So could you also just remind me what that was?

Yeah, that's correct.

The city and its partners have been performing cleanup costs for the last five or so years, I believe.

I'd have to bring up staff if you'd like me to answer further questions.

I think the 30-year project, that's the estimate.

I think this will require remediation for the long term and monitoring.

But I think we needed some reasonable timeframe to estimate the cost period.

Okay.

Thank you.

That makes sense that there's monitoring that is continuous.

So thank you.

Would you like any staff, council president?

No, that was my answer.

Okay.

Okay.

I got you.

I just wanted to make sure.

I don't know if council member Kettle or council member Rivera, I don't want to put you on the spot, but if you have any questions, just let me know.

No.

Okay.

Awesome.

Yeah, I think, well, first of all, thank you, Mr. Bryan Goodnight, for the overview and also preparing all the information for us to get to this point.

And then also Seattle Public Utilities for all the work that you all are doing on the Lower Duwamish waterway, but also having just a very thoughtful approach to this and wanting to be good stewards of our land to make sure that we are protecting it, obviously for future generations as well.

And most importantly, the people that live along the Lower Duwamish and understanding some of the challenges and difficulties that they're experiencing right now with you know, with some of the environmental situations that are going on.

So I just want to thank you all as well.

Council Member Kettle.

Thank you, Chair Hollingsworth.

Just a question, nothing related to the agenda item, but...

I think it would be very helpful to maybe have a committee meeting underway where we tour, you know, Waterside from Harbor Island down to the Turning Basin and back and just get a sense of this area.

I'm not sure if that's possible.

I'm not sure if SPU has periodic, you know, underway boat launch kind of review or something along those lines.

But it would be helpful just to put eyes on and get a sense of the entirety of the project and understand the different pieces of it too.

And there's other pieces that come into this as well in terms of You know, the CSOs and the like.

I think it would just be helpful to see it from the water as opposed to driving over it, driving by it, and those kinds of look angles.

So I just wanted to ask if that would be something that would be possible, maybe through coordination with the SPU.

Thank you.

I see heads nodding with Bob, my favorite Hennessy, Bob Hennessy, nodding.

So yeah, I think that's something that we can be able to do.

Thank you for that suggestion, Council Member Kettle.

Okay, great.

I'm gonna go ahead and move that the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120960. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, a second and third.

It has been moved in second and third to recommend fourth, the passage of this council bill.

Okay, will the clerk please call the roll on the committee recommendation of council bill 120960.

Council member Kettle?

Aye.

Council member Rivera?

Aye.

Council president Nelson?

Aye.

Chair Hollingsworth?

Yes.

There are four in favor, none opposed.

Wonderful, the motion carries in the committee recommendation to confirm this appointment, or this, not this appointment, my apologies, this bill, Council Bill 120960 will be sent to the Tuesday, April 15th City Council meeting.

If there is not, if there's any more, well, first of all, let me thank everyone for that.

I know this is a long process, so really appreciate us getting to this point.

And if there's no other items on the agenda today, if there's no further business, I see Council President Nelson, your hand is up.

I just wanted to echo your gratitude, Chair, to SPU staff, because I do know, and I've noted before that...

My involvement with it goes way, way back to the early 2000s, and I know yours precedes that as even before that.

And so thank you very much for your hard and diligent work getting us to this point.

And it's not over.

So thank you.

It's only the beginning.

Thank you, Council President.

If there's no further business for the committee, I will say that this is breaking the record for our fastest committee meeting for our parks, utilities, and technology, which is not usually what Council Member Kettle does in his public safety committee meeting.

Shots fired at you.

Get shots fired, public safety.

Okay, this concludes the April 9th Meeting of the Parks, Public Utilities, Technology.

Our next meeting is gonna be scheduled for Wednesday, April 23rd at 2 p.m.

The current time right now is 2.23 p.m.

This meeting is adjourned.

Thank you.