Seattle City Council Select Budget Committee 11/14/2023 Session I

Thank you so much.

Welcome, everybody.

Good morning.

Welcome to the Select Budget Committee of the Seattle City Council.

Today is Tuesday, November 14th, 2023, and I'm Theresa Mosqueda, chair of the committee.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Herbold?

Here.

Council President Juarez?

Here.

Councilmember Lewis?

Present.

Councilmember Morales?

Council Member Nelson.

Present.

Council Member Peterson.

Present.

Council Member Sawant.

Present.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Chair Mosqueda.

Present.

Nine present.

Excellent.

Thank you.

I got my coffee.

I hope everybody else did as well and that people are feeling better today.

We have a long meeting ahead of us.

We will take a break at 1 p.m.

for recess and we will reconvene at 2 p.m.

Thank you in advance for your participation in today's conversation, discussion, respectful but lively debate on some topics I'm assuming coming up here, and for your ultimate vote.

After we complete today's votes, we will have, for the most part, completed all of our work related to 2024's calendar year, second part of our biennial budget.

During today's committee meeting, we will have the opportunity to have budget deliberations and discussion and hear from central staff on various amendments and then vote on the proposed budget legislation and proposed amendments.

We will go in the following order.

Proposed consent calendar, proposed items for individual vote, items 17 through 26, and then proposed consent calendar for amendments to the chair's balancing package.

coupled in Group A, which is amendments to the adoption ordinance in the consent package, and then Group B, which is individual amendments for adoption for the ordinance that will be put up for individual votes.

If there is no objection, today's agenda will be adopted Hearing no objection, today's agenda is adopted.

We do not have public comment this morning because we engaged in four hours of public comment last night to serve as the final public hearing opportunity to provide input to colleagues on how we have received the proposed amendments, the impact potentially on community, and now we are weighing that feedback that we received last night and the feedback we received in the last eight weeks as we consider the amendments in front of us.

So we do not have public comment this morning, and that allows us to get directly into items of business in front of us.

Colleagues, yesterday we had a briefing on the legislation necessary to balance the 2024 biennial budget.

Excuse me, I'll rephrase that.

2024 calendar year budget, the second part of our biennial budget year plan.

That included amendments that come in the form of ordinances.

That includes amendments that come in the form of council budget amendments to the 2024 calendar year.

There's 121 of those amendments.

And those are the bulk of what we will take up today.

As a reminder, tomorrow we will take up any additional legislation that impacts the 2024 calendar year budget that we don't have the ability to get through today.

One of those items specifically relates to the deactivation fee ordinance where amendments are now published, but they have been published and we wanted to give you another day to review those before voting on those tomorrow.

And then tomorrow we'll get into items that do not relate to the 2024 calendar year budget, but do relate to budget business in general.

That includes revenue and fee for future years.

That includes budget transparency legislation that I'm bringing forward and a handful of other policies that our colleagues have come up with for the purpose of briefing tomorrow.

Today, we are going to stay focused on the 2024 calendar year.

We will vote on items that are included in our agenda today, including most of the legislation necessary to balance the budget and the council members' proposed 2024 mid-biannual budget amendment.

Yesterday, we noted that council members will be welcome to provide an opportunity and will be provided an opportunity to comment on any of the amendments they would like to highlight.

And we will provide an opportunity for central staff to go over each of those amendments as well.

With that, I want to thank central staff for being with us throughout this process and your leadership.

And I will take some questions before handing it over and asking the clerk to read item number one into the record.

Council Member Nelson, good morning.

General comment from you or a general question about fraud?

Just a question.

Did you just say that we're going to be voting on the network fee tomorrow, not today?

Yes, I believe so because we have, yeah, we have- That's all right.

I wanted you to confirm.

Thank you for confirming.

And we do have some amendments that have been posted to the agenda.

We will go over those as a briefing today so people can sit with that for the next day and process the information they perceive.

And then we'll be able to vote first thing tomorrow on that specific ordinance.

But all other 2024 related amendments and legislation, we do plan on voting on today.

Got it.

Thanks.

I should say as well, it's important to give central staff a few days after we've voted on all 121 amendments.

So we won't actually be making a final, final vote on all of the amendments incorporated in the base budget bill until next Monday.

But in essence, we have completed our process for 2024 by the end of today.

All right.

With that, Madam Clerk, could you please read the items into the record, please?

Agenda item one, council bill 120700, an ordinance relating to acceptance of funding from non-city sources, authorizing the heads of various departments to accept and authorize the expenditure of specified grants, private funding, subsidized loans to execute, deliver, and perform corresponding agreements, amending ordinance 126725, which adopted the 2023 budget, including the 2023 to 2028 capital improvement program, changing appropriations to various departments and budget control levels and from various funds in the budget, revising project allocations for certain projects in the 2023 to 2028 CIP and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts.

Did you want me to read all 16, Chair?

No, I think that's good to get us started.

And Ali, did you have something you'd like to offer?

Yeah, I just wanted to note there are a couple of intro slides we just just to reiterate the process today that we were going to go through.

And then I'm hoping Linda And the other deputy clerks could connect on the most efficient way to read in items one through 16 for the consent package.

And potentially we could just read in the short title just to save their voice a little bit.

So if I could run through those intro slides and then we can move to putting the items one through 16 in front of the committee that is the first items for consent vote.

Sounds good to me.

Go ahead, Eileen.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, so I'm just going to reiterate some of what the chair already went over.

But again, for today, my hand.

For the record, I'm Allie Panucci of your Council Central staff.

We will take up the items on the agenda in a similar order as of yesterday, but today with voting on items.

So first, items 1 through 16, which are proposed for a consent calendar.

If there are any items in that group that Council members would like to remove for individual consideration, they can signal that once we get there.

after voting on that consent group of budget legislation you would take up any items removed from that package if they are removed then we will move into the agenda item 17 through just 26 which is budget legislation where there is a proposed amendment or that has already been flagged for individual discussion before moving to item 20 agenda item 27 today that is where we will walk through the 121 Council budget actions and statements of legislative intent in two groups, most in Group A as one consent group where items can be removed and then moving on to Group B for individual votes.

We can move to the next slide.

And then tomorrow, will be a briefing and discussion on items on agenda item 28, as well as we will start with voting on amendments and the bill for the network company, network company license and fee ordinance.

So these are the items that will be discussed tomorrow and presentation materials were distributed yesterday and posted to the agenda on these topics.

And next slide.

And then following the committee discussion tomorrow, I share the chair's optimism that we won't need Thursday.

And so we will be working on doing a technical check, making sure all the amendments are lined up and incorporated into attachments A and B to the budget adoption ordinance.

And there'll be a final vote.

on any technical amendments central staff might identify and on the budget adoption ordinance and a few other remaining budget pieces of budget legislation on Monday morning, followed by the final council vote on November 21st.

So that is what I have for process slides.

And so we can move to the first items on the agenda, which are items one through 16 that are proposed as a consent.

calendar and I will turn it back to you chair and the clerks on how to thank you we have we have connected and if central staff is able to provide an overview of these items which you have on the screen here today that is sufficient so there's no need to read the short titles into the record here as you walk through them that will suffice for reading the items 1 through 16 into the record and this is part of the consent calendar legislation that we will then vote on

Great, thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

So these first items, items one through 16, are all budget legislation that was transmitted with the executive's proposed budget, or in a few cases, maybe council-generated legislation.

All of these bills are related to implementing the 2024 budget, so are necessary or related to balancing.

So I will just say for all the pieces of budget legislation, um on the on the agenda today for the most part if anyone gets voted down i may ask the chair to recess so we can um put our heads together on whether or not that puts the 2024 proposed budget package out of balance um and so these items have been presented uh we're summarizing a budget memo first um presented on the agenda in early october the week of october 10th and have been described multiple times in committee.

There are no proposed amendments, and so they are proposed to be voted.

Is there any more detail you'd like me to go into, Chair Mesquita?

I'll just pause here to see if there's any additional questions and remember colleagues that we have had a chance to walk through each of these pieces of legislation already in committee.

So that's why we're not spending a lot of time going through the detail here.

Most of these are technical aspects that are necessary to align with changes in the budget and routine legislation that we received as part of the annual budget process.

Is there any additional questions on these items?

Okay.

I am not seeing any additional questions.

And, of course, if anybody is raising their hand throughout today, please feel free to jump in.

I don't want to miss you.

Oh, I see you, Councilmember Sawant.

Please go ahead.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

I'm not sure if this is where I wanted to ask to remove item number 14, Council Bill 120701 from the consent calendar for an individual vote.

Yes, this is the perfect time to do that.

Thank you so much.

Item number what number?

Fourteen.

Fourteen.

Thank you.

Item number fourteen will be removed from the consent calendar in front of us.

Item number fourteen.

Is there any additional items that should be removed from the consent calendar?

Okay.

I am not seeing any.

So that includes items one through thirteen and then item fifteen and sixteen that is in front of us.

Are there any additional comments or any additional desires to move any item out of the consent calendar.

Hearing none, I move to adopt the consent calendar, excluding item number 17. So the consent calendar, again, includes items 1 through 13, does not include item 14. And it includes items 15 and 16. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you so much.

It's been moved and seconded that we can consider the consent calendar absent item number 14. Is there any additional comments?

Again, I'll just make the comment.

Thanks to central staff.

There's a tremendous amount of work that goes into analyzing each of these pieces of legislation that go with the budget.

Thank you to central staff and the specific analysts that are assigned to each one of these pieces of legislation for your comprehensive overview of whether or not there was any concerns, any issue identification necessary for council, and the work that you've done to confirm assumptions and check questions with the executive.

Not seeing any concern on these items myself.

That's why they are included in the consent calendar.

It has been moved and seconded to include all of the items except for item number 14. Hearing no additional comments, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of the consent calendar minus item 14?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Aye.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The consent calendar excluding item 14 is adopted and the committee recommendation will be sent to the full Seattle City Council.

Moving on to items for individual vote, that includes item number 14. I'll go ahead and move this.

I move the committee recommends passage of item number 14, that's SDOT paid parking rate changes in 2024. The ordinance is Council Bill 120701. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded.

Council Member Sawant, you are the person who offered to remove this from the consent calendar.

Would you like to go ahead and speak first?

And then we'll see if there's additional comments that would like to be made to support the ordinance.

Thank you.

I will be voting no on increasing the parking meter fees for Seattle street parking.

Parking meters are essentially an extremely regressive tax because you pay the same regardless of how much income, you know, what income you have, how much money you make.

This bill doubles the minimum rate from 50 cents to a dollar and the maximum rate from $5 to $8.

So I'll be voting no.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Is there anybody who would like to offer a comment?

Thank you.

Our Chair of Transportation, Council Member Peterson, would you like to offer some comments on this as well?

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

I appreciate Council Member Sawant's remarks.

I think it's always helpful to remind us when we are imposing regressive taxes and fees and so that we're sort of going in to the decision.

eyes wide open on such decisions.

I did want to note that I didn't know I was the sponsor of this bill until recently, but I think it's just because that's just traditionally assigned to the transportation chair, so that's fine.

I know SDOT works very hard to calculate these um looking at uh parking capacity and demand and and they they do try to um surgically look at where to um increase and lower the the parking rates um so um i just wanted to get that on that information out there but i do appreciate councilman shawar raising the fact that these are regressive thank you

Okay, thank you very much.

Is there any additional comments?

Hearing none, it has been moved and seconded that the committee recommend passage of item number 14, ESCOT paid parking rate changes for 2024 in Council Bill 120701. Seeing no additional comments, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on item number 14?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Yes, Councilmember Lewis.

Yes, Councilmember Morales.

Yes, Councilmember Nelson.

Hi Councilmember Peterson.

Abstain.

Councilmember Sawant.

No.

Councilmember Strauss, yes.

Chair Moschetta.

Seven in favor, one opposed, and one abstention.

Thank you very much.

The motion passes, and item number 14 is adopted, and the committee recommendation will be sent to the Seattle City Council full council for final consideration.

I believe that moves us on to items number 17 through 27, if I'm correct, Allie?

Item number 17. The items per individual vote.

Great.

Are you going to brief each item?

Yeah.

So we can do this two ways.

One, I can briefly describe the individual item, then you can move it, and then we can take up the amendments, or you can move it first.

It's your prerogative.

I think if you describe it, I will consider moving it, and then we'll see what happens from there.

Okay.

Okay.

Patty, if we could move to the next slide.

So for item 17 through 26, we have one or two slides that briefly describes the legislation and then describes the amendments.

And so I think moving forward, central staff, or me in this case, will briefly describe the legislation.

The chair or the sponsor, if different than the chair, will move the bill and then we can take up the um the amendments and if you are the sponsor of the amendment and you are not the chair you will be asked to move your amendment um so i agenda item 17 is resolution 32114 this resolution memorializes that the city will fund THE CONTRIBUTION TO THE EMPLOYEES RETIREMENT FUND AT 15.82% IN 2024. THIS IS BASED ON THE RECOMMENDATION BY THE SEATTLE CITY EMPLOYEE RETIREMENT SYSTEMS BOARD OF ADMINISTRATION AND SUPPORTS THE ASSUMPTION INCLUDED IN BALANCING THE CHAIR'S BALANCING PACKAGE.

THANK YOU SO MUCH.

TO PUT THIS ITEM IN FRONT OF US, I MOVE THE COMMITTEE ADOPT RESOLUTION 321 Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded.

I understand that there is an amendment in front of us.

Before we consider the amendment, is there any additional comment?

Seeing none, Council Member Peterson, I believe you have amendment.

Would you like to move your amendment?

Thank you, Chair.

I move to amend Resolution 32114 as presented on Amendment 1.

Second.

It has been moved and seconded.

that the resolution be amended as presented on amendment number one.

Central staff, could I ask you to describe the amendment in front of us for the purposes of the viewing public and our colleagues?

Yes.

So Amendment 1 would establish a different rate than in the base legislation.

This would use a rate of 15.17, which is what is actuarially required for a contribution.

So this is the minimum required contribution by the city in 2024. This change would align Council's intent regarding the contribution with the proposed changes and spending in SDOT 101A.

And so essentially adopting this lower rate would free up resources to support the investments in SDOT 101A.

And that builds upon the assumptions in the chairs balancing package.

So it's not in conflict.

It would be spending the difference between the 15.82 rate and 15.17 rate.

If you support this rate, you could support this spending in S.101A, which is related to funding bridge contributions to bridge maintenance and school zone camera investments in 2024.

Thank you so much, Council Member Peterson.

Please go ahead.

Thank you, Chair Muscata.

Back when we were doing a budget issue ID and trying to find different revenue options, this idea was put forward in the central staff memo that it could be a possibility to use what the actuarial expert recommended, which is the 15.17%, and that's what this amendment does.

And so colleagues that then freeze up the funding needed for later CBA that I know many of us support, which is to support bridge maintenance and school zone safety cameras as the council had supported last year and sort of pushing that forward to make sure that that gets done.

In the memo from central staff dedicated to this issue of the employer contribution rate, It did note that using this 15.17 percent would still enable the fund to be sustainable in the future as required.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Lewis.

Please go ahead.

Uh, thank you Madam chair.

I appreciate councilman Peterson being creative and finding a way to continue our progress toward.

Moving forward on the work that was identified by the city auditor that is necessary to increase the resources available to repair and replace aging bridges in the city of Seattle.

Um, this amendment, as I understand it from reviewing the materials is essential to advance that funding source.

Given that the amendment maintains.

The actuarial recommended contribution to the Seattle city employees retirement system.

I am comfortable voting for this amendment.

given the resources that are unlocked for bridge infrastructure as a result.

So for that reason, I will be supporting this amendment this morning.

Thank you so much.

I don't see any additional comments.

I'll offer some comments, colleagues.

Number one, I think it's important to remember in the context of this budget that there has been no reductions to the transportation and infrastructure budget, despite receiving news about our mid-October revenue forecast being significantly down for transportation and major infrastructure projects.

Many of those revenue lines resulted in about a $10 million loss for things that are typically invested in transportation and infrastructure.

We worked very hard to rebuild every single penny so that there would not be a reduction in transportation and infrastructure relative to the mayor's proposed budget and built back that gap that was going to be present due to the October revenue forecast.

Secondly, I have long been a supporter of making sure that there's investments in bridges and have worked with the chair of transportation to try to build that back and and higher rates and previous budget.

Here I will not be supporting this amendment and I encourage our colleagues to vote no on this amendment.

I want to flag that this is the actuarial act using the actuarial rate below the service board recommendation is not something that the service board recommends and for the stability and SECURITY OF CURRENT RETIREES AND FUTURE RETIREES OF OUR CITY, I THINK IT'S IMPORTANT TO CONTINUE TO MAINTAIN THE HIGHER INVESTMENT RATE OF 15.82% THAT CAME FROM THE SERVICE BOARD ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION ABOUT WHAT RANGE SHOULD BE INVESTED IN.

AS BUDGET CHAIR, I WEAR THE HAT OF SERVICE BOARD CHAIR AND THE BOARD HAS GONE THROUGH AN EXTENSIVE PROCESS TO LOOK AT THE OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE INVESTMENTS.

The fact that the mayor sent down a proposed budget that included a higher rate would have been wonderful, but also I think our rate at 15.82 recognizes that it's important to make investments at the recommended rate while also still investing in other priorities that are immediate in our budget.

If we reduce it even further, it's the same as if you put minimum investments into your bank account every year, every month versus the amount that could help you create more stability and sustainability.

And I just want to ensure that we look at history as well.

Historically, most of the city council votes have gone with the board recommendation.

The actuary doesn't take into account the fluctuations in economic conditions and the future, but the board and CEO often go with a rate that helps ensure that they're smoothing.

If there is future fluctuations in economic shifts, the amount of 15.82 helps to reduce any cliffs and jumps in funding that could be necessary to ensure stability for our retirees currently and future retirees.

Vice Chair Herber.

Thank you so much.

And because I'm not sure if I'll have another chance to speak to this item, I want to get my comments out now.

As the representative of the district that has suffered greatly from the need for bridge infrastructure investment, I just I think We are looking at the recommendations of different experts for different investments.

The actuarial expert is recommending an investment that allows us to listen to our auditor's recommendation for the bare minimum of bridge infrastructure investment.

The 2020 bridge audit came on the request of this council from our city auditor.

Their job is to identify deficiencies and help us, support us in correcting them.

Just quoting a D1 constituent, referencing our experience with the West Seattle Bridge, demanding that the council open our eyes to the reality of more bridges breaking without appropriate bridge maintenance funding.

We can't play roulette by ignoring bridge maintenance funding allocations, which in turn puts more communities in jeopardy when the next bridge fails.

Two and a half year closure of the West Seattle Bridge had economic impacts.

And I think what we're doing here is we're weighing the economic impacts associated with recommendations in two policy areas from experts that we work with.

to ensure that we're making good policy choices.

And I think we can listen to the recommendations of both experts, the actuarial as it relates to the city and retirement system and the bridge audit and our auditor as it relates to investments in bridges and in doing so make good sound investments for the city.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Seeing no additional hands, I would just offer the following again.

We cannot play roulette as well with the retirement of our existing employees and our existing retirees.

I think that the reason that the CSRS Board recommendation came in at 15.82% is in anticipation that due to the losses that the portfolio experienced in 2022, the city's required rate will increase next year as those losses are recognized.

This comes directly from Director Jeff Davis of the CSRS committee or the CSRS board.

And he notes that the city's contributions rates are lowered to the minimum contribution rate, the actuarial required contribution.

Then as part of this year's budget process, there will be ongoing concerns that this will make the anticipated contribution rate in the next year's budget process even larger.

The serves board recommended keeping the city's contribution rate at 15.82% in anticipation that these losses were going to have to be addressed next year.

So again, I don't want a vote to protect the servers investment, the retiree contribution rate to be completed with not supporting bridges.

That's not what's at hand here.

It's a matter of where the dollars come from.

And in recognition that we have a bipartisan infrastructure bill at the federal level, other opportunities to continue to partner with the state, a long history over the last three years that I've been budget chair of trying to increase our investments into the bridge and maintenance portfolio in partnership with the chair of transportation, that I'm encouraging folks to vote no on this because of the fund source, again, coming from the retiree contributions.

And with that, Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on the adoption of amendment number one to resolution 32114.

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Council President Juarez.

No.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Sawant.

No.

Council Member Strauss.

No.

Chair Mosqueda.

Chair Mosqueda.

No.

Five in favor and four, five in favor.

And four opposed.

OK.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries with five in favor and four opposed.

The amendment is adopted.

Is there any additional comments on the resolution as amended?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the committee's recommendation to pass resolution 32114 as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

No.

Council Member Lewis.

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Sawant.

Abstain.

Council Member Strauss.

No.

Chair Mosqueda.

Abstain.

Five in favor, two opposed, and two abstentions.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries, and the recommendation to pass resolution 32114 as amended will be sent to the Seattle City Council.

All right, that moves us on to item number 18 on the agenda.

You want me to describe it?

Yes, please.

Agenda item 18 is ordinance 120683. This legislation would provide authorization to issue up to $84.2 million of limited tax general obligation bonds as assumed in the 2024 budget and the 2024 to 2029 capital improvement program.

Thank you so much.

Colleagues, as we mentioned yesterday, there is a handful of things that I know council members may have flagged after the amendment date has passed.

This is one of those bills that I had a concern with, but did not have the amendment submitted on time.

So I am going to be raising concerns about this item for one specific reason.

But before we do that, is there someone who wants to move that the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 120683?

Right, we'll talk to the committee.

Okay.

Is there anybody who would like to move recommendation of ordinance 120683?

Council Member Peterson.

Council Member Mesquita, could we get more of an explanation from central staff on this item?

Yeah.

Thank you.

As member Peterson, I'm not like, there is a lot of detail in this bill.

This supports all of the items in the proposed budget and plan that are proposed to be funded with debt financing.

So, the city's issuance of bonds in 2024 that supports many of the capital programs in the proposed budget and program.

And so if this.

bill does not pass, there is $84.2 million of items in the proposed budget that couldn't proceed as planned or on the planned schedule.

And so this, you know, I can pull up the legislation if you want, and we can look at it, but there are many items that relate to this.

And so if this doesn't pass, I'll ask for a recess so we can figure out what would be necessary to put the 20-court budget back in balance.

Is that sufficient?

Yes, and Chair Muscata, I would move this item.

Thank you, Council Member Peterson.

Council Member Peterson has moved item number 18. Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, I'll second it.

Second, and for the purpose of discussion, I thank you very much, and I think I heard Council Member Herbold as well.

um i will uh go ahead and explain my concern perhaps first um because we have not had a chance to discuss this in detail colleagues in october on october 13th central staff was providing an overview of this item as you've heard there's a number of very important projects that are funded in the CIP list.

It is important to me, however, that we use this as an opportunity to again reframe and push back on the narrative that additional bond issuance and debt issuance is required related to the concrete labor dispute that happened last fall.

As I noted in my comments on October 13th, I am very concerned about the practice of these corporations and the express or the purported express strategy of these corporations to not negotiate in good faith and to simply hold out and eke out from the workers more and more concessions with the purportedly expressed intent to then pass along the cost to public payers.

The city, the county, the state are now in the process of trying to cover the additional costs associated with the strike that occurred, and that should not be something that taxpayers or the city itself should have to cover through the issuance of additional debt.

The framing on this is a very important one.

Members of the Teamsters and individuals who took to the strike line for multiple weeks and months noted that they were very concerned about the employer's purported position that they had expressly said that they were going to just pass along the costs on public projects to public entities.

Additional costs to employers that often occur as a result of labor disputes are one way to ensure that there is leverage to ensure that employers and corporations and CEOs and those companies come to the table and bargain in good faith.

In public projects like the ones that the concrete corporations provide, the concern is that they will continue to engage in this type of behavior year over year if we don't have a way to ensure that these corporations and executives negotiate in good faith next time, and ensure that there is a financial cost to them for not coming to the table in good faith.

I've had conversations with many people in the building and construction trades, folks who are very concerned about this being framed in a way that is somehow related to workers not coming to work when the reality was they were ready to bargain in good faith.

I have an idea that I hope that the council will continue to work on.

We have included in this budget, through a statement of legislative intent, the desire to create a responsible contracting process or a responsible bidder policy.

That is already part of the policies that we are advancing in this budget.

And the hope is that through the ongoing conversations that the department has with various stakeholders and the future council, that there will be an ability to update our city's responsible contracting policy, much like I hear about the county's responsible contracting policy being better than the city's.

In my past life working at the Washington State Labor Council, we worked on responsible bidding and contracting policies at the state legislative level.

there needs to be an enhancement to our contracting policies that require some sort of financial obligation for employers who are not coming to the table and bargaining in good faith.

especially for large public projects like this.

I urge us to look at the language that is included in the sanitation worker contract.

For sanitation workers, when there is a labor dispute, if it is not resolved in a timely way, then those companies actually have to pay for the financial costs.

So I'm hopeful that this is an opportunity for us to raise that issue.

That is why I have objections to the issuance of additional debt, knowing that these corporations expressed, purportedly expressed, that this was the strategy that they would be using, and here we are being asked to encumber additional debt to cover that.

I want to send a strong message of support for all of those who did take to the strike line, as we talked about last fall as well, in some very heavy rain and cold nights and windy nights, and to see then that their hard work doesn't not result in applying the pressure necessary to corporations means to me that I think we need to enhance our policies.

So I wanted to use this as an opportunity to express that concern.

And I also recognize this is one component of a very large piece of legislation.

And overall, I will be voting to abstain on this item with the hope that it raises the concern and awareness sufficiently for future councils to potentially act upon and, again, folks to look at the sanitation worker language that could be helpful for future policy development.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you Madam Chair.

Just wondering of the eighty four point two million in debt that this legislation would authorize issuance of what what number of dollars is related to the concrete strike.

If we have that information.

I believe it's 20, Vice Chair, but I'll look to central staff to confirm.

For State Accounts Member Herbold, this bill supports debt financing of $25.7 million for the Alaskan Way Main Corridor project.

And if it's helpful, I can describe the other projects that are funded.

I now have the full list in front of me.

That'd be fine.

Please go ahead.

Please go ahead.

Okay, so 25.7 would go to the Alaskan way main corridor and just for the view in public.

I'm reading from exhibit a to the fiscal note.

Um.

So, fire station 31 would receive about 26Million Seattle municipal tower elevator rehab about 6.3Million, the human capital management system, 4Million electrical infrastructure upgrades 1Million.

Um, computer service architecture, about 4Million data and telephone infrastructure, 6.9Million criminal justice information system projects, 4.7Million.

The overlook walk and East West connections project 3Million, and then there's additional funding for the estimated issuance costs and pricing adjustments of 2.4Million built in.

So this would authorize the, that.

That maximum amount of debt that issuance that would be determined by our.

bond experts next year.

Thank you.

May I have a follow-up?

Absolutely, Vice Chair Herbel.

So for the $25 million that is for the bridge, is all of that associated with additional costs associated with the concrete strike?

I'm going to ask if my colleague Cal is on the line, if he can speak to what is driving that $25.7 million for the project.

Thank you members with council, central staff, the 25Million dollars in additional cost is not.

Specifically for concrete materials, it is essentially the delay on the project.

That required scheduling changes, additional design work, having to sort of.

redo all your construction schedules for the duration of the labor dispute.

And there's also some risk mitigation in there as well.

So it doesn't change the amount spent for concrete.

It's largely the scheduling changes and risks to the project.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Okay.

Well, I hope I have sufficiently teed up a future conversation around the concerns here.

And as we look at responsible bidding contracts and opportunity to ensure that situations like this also yield appropriate responsibility to pay for delays and changes in the timeframe, which we're discussing today, I'm also hopeful that the future responsible bidding policy will look at entities who have experience and have been charged with wage theft in the past as some of these corporations have.

Okay.

Let's go ahead and take a vote on this.

Madam Clerk, we are on agenda item number 18. Will you please call the roll on the committee recommendation of acceptance of agenda item number 18?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council Member Juarez?

Yes.

Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Sawant?

Abstain.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Abstain.

Seven in favor, two abstentions.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries, and the committee recommendation to pass Council Bill 120683, item number 18 on our agenda, will be sent to the Seattle City Council for consideration.

Moving on to item number 19, central staff.

Item number 19 is ordinance 120679, which would authorize city department directors to accept grants and enter into revenue back service contracts anticipated as part of the 2024. And while I'm here, I'll just briefly describe the technical amendment because it is very technical.

This bill included blanks for us to fill in because it references itself and the 2020 Court Budget Adoption Ordinance.

And we failed to insert those council bill numbers prior to introducing the bill.

So this is really just a technical amendment to insert the references to the Budget Adoption Ordinance and the Annual Grant Acceptance Ordinance.

Thank you so much.

I move the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120679, item number 19 on our agenda.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Vice Chair.

It's been moved and seconded.

Is there any additional comments on this?

I do not have any comments on this, and I recommend a yes vote.

Council Member Peterson, I see off you.

Did you have something you'd like to say?

No.

Okay.

All right, I think we're good on this one, Council.

Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll?

Excuse me, Madam Clerk, I'm going to go ahead and for the purposes of getting the amendment in front of us now, I'm going to move that amendment.

I move to amend Council Bill 120679 as presented on Amendment Number 1. Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded.

Amendment number one has been described by central staff, Allie Panucci.

Is there any additional comments?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on the adoption of amendment number one?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Oras?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and amendment number one is adopted.

Are there any other further comments on the underlying ordinance in front of us?

This is item number 19, the annual grant acceptance ordinance, also 120679. Hearing none, Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on the adoption of the bill as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Council Member Nelson?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson?

Aye.

Thank you.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Salant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the recommendation to pass Council Bill 120679 as amended will be sent to the Seattle City Council.

Moving right along to item number 20, I'll turn over to central staff to cover the OCF Municipal Light and Power Omnibus Bond.

Thank you.

Agenda item 20, Council Bill 120685 would authorize issuance of up to $400 million of bonds in 2024. This would fund $250 million of capital expenditures For Seattle city, like system outlined in the proposed 2024 to 2029 capital improvement program, and would fund up to 150Million dollars of borrowing for potential debt optimization and hold off on describing the amendment though.

If we can.

No problem.

Okay, the bill has been described.

I move the committee recommend passage of council bill 120679 on agenda number 19. is there a 2nd.

Okay, I'm sorry.

Okay, thank you very much.

I said the wrong agenda number.

Can I do that again, Vice Chair?

Apologies.

I move the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 120685, agenda number 20. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded, and I don't see any comments.

Allie, I'm going to turn it back to you for a summary of the amendment.

There is one proposed technical amendment similar to the previous bill.

This is a technical amendment to update a date that was not known when the executive transmitted the legislation and fill in a blank on the original PAR amount.

And this is shown in version two of exhibit A as attached to the agenda.

Thank you so much.

I move the committee amend Council Bill 120685 as presented on Amendment Number 1 and described by Allie.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you so much.

If the move is seconded, is there any additional comments?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on adoption of Amendment Number 1 to Item 20?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Aye.

Council Member Sawant.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

Amendment number one is adopted.

Are there any additional comments on the bill as amended?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, could you now please call the roll on the adoption of the Council Bill 120685 as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Thank you.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Aye.

Council Member Sawant.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries in the recommendation to pass Council Bill 120685, as amended, will be sent to the Seattle City Council for full consideration.

Before we go on to item number 21, hour in, Council President, we got this, got this.

Item number 21, central staff.

Item 21 is Council Bill 120690. This legislation would amend the interlocal agreement between the City and the Seattle Park District.

This changes the formula used to calculate the inflationary increase for the general fund appropriation to the Parks Department in 2024 only to be set at 3%.

For all future years, the formula reverts back to the existing policy.

And that last part is just a typo.

It was originally written as it reverts back in 2025 and beyond.

Um, so not to distract you all with our type.

Great well, before we consider hearing about the amendment, let's get the legislation in front of us and move the committee recommend passage of council 1, 2, 06, 9, 0, amendment item number 21. is there a 2nd.

2nd, thank you so much.

It has been moved in 2nd it.

Uh, before we hear from central staff on the amendment, is there any additional comments or questions?

HEARING NONE, ALI, DO YOU MIND DESCRIBING AMENDMENT NUMBER ONE FOR US?

AMENDMENT NUMBER ONE, AGAIN, IS A TECHNICAL AMENDMENT.

SOMEONE WILL DRAW THE SHORT STRAW NEXT YEAR IN ORDER TO CHECK ALL THE BILLS FOR THESE BLANKS TO AVOID THESE TECHNICAL AMENDMENTS.

BUT THIS ONE WOULD ADD THE COUNCIL BILL NUMBER AND THE RESOLUTION NUMBER THAT IS RELATED TO THE COMPANION PARK DISTRICT RESOLUTION THAT IS REFERENCED IN THE ATTACHMENT.

Thank you so much, Deputy Director Panucci.

I move to amend Council Bill 120690 as presented on Amendment Number 1. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded.

Are there any additional comments on Amendment Number 1?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment Number 1?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Member Morales.

Yes.

Council member Nelson.

Aye.

Council member Peterson.

Aye.

Council member Sawant.

Yes.

Council member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and amendment number one is adopted.

Are there any additional comments on the underlying bill as amended?

Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of Council Bill 120690 as amended.

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the recommendation to pass Council Bill 120690 as amended will be sent to the Seattle City Council for final consideration.

Okay, we are going to move on to item number 22. And before we do, I want to remind folks, this is just a briefing on this item.

This is our first opportunity to get in depth.

Again, there has been an initial briefing on the bill, I think at least once, maybe twice.

But at least once, there's been an overview of this.

Thanks to Karina Bull from Central Staff for being here.

You'll have a chance to hear about the underlying bill.

You'll have a chance to hear about the potential amendments.

and ask central staff any questions of course ask the ask your colleagues questions and then again as a reminder we're going to hold votes on this item for tomorrow morning first thing in the morning we'll vote on this tomorrow morning so with that um thank you to our um central staff for providing an overview of this and i would just ask i believe council member herbal this is your you're the prime sponsor on agenda item number 22. If we want to change to the next slide, that'd be great, or Karina might have her own deck.

But as we do that, Council Member Herbold, would you like to offer some opening comments before we turn to central staff?

Ms.

Absolutely.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I want to thank the advocates who have been so helpful in helping us drive this policy, as well as the platform stakeholders.

We've had several months' worth of engagement, and that engagement is reflected in the legislation and the amendments before us today.

The importance of this legislation is to expand enforcement capacity for two ordinances, one of them being the app-based worker minimum compensation ordinance and the deactivation ordinance.

This is a 10 cent transaction fee to provide dedicated revenue for this ongoing enforcement as estimated to be necessary by the Office of Labor Standards.

And the investment in enforcement tools including Outreach and education supports our community partners in ensuring that we have broad and equitable access to education about Seattle's workplace protections for this particular sector of the workforce.

These are very critical in giving Seattle workers the full benefit of the laws that the council has passed over the last two years.

Thank you.

Great.

And welcome, Corinna Bull from Central Staff.

Thanks for being here.

I think we're going to do an overview of the base legislation and then describe each of the eight amendments.

Council members, you will have a chance to speak to your amendment as well after Corinna does a short summary of these items.

And again, this is for briefing before we move on to the other items, which will include a vote on these other items.

So we will plan to spend a little bit of time on this.

But just as a reminder, this is one of many items of the agenda today.

So Looking forward to getting all of your questions answered.

Welcome, Karina.

And I know you've been very busy working on this.

I don't know, Al, if you had anything else you'd like to add.

MS. Chair Mesquita, I just wanted to note that we were planning to just very briefly describe the underlying bill.

Happy to answer questions if there are follow-up from the briefing that Karina provided on the 27th on the underlying bill, and then would walk through each amendment.

But we don't have a full sort of slide deck prepared on the underlying bill, if that's okay.

I WILL JUST REMIND FOR THE VIEWING PUBLIC, THE 1027 AGENDA FOR THE SELECT BUDGET COMMITTEE DOES INCLUDE A PRESENTATION ON THE BASE BILL.

AND I'LL TURN IT OVER TO KARINA.

THANK YOU.

GOOD MORNING, EVERYONE.

KARINA BULL WITH COUNCIL CENTRAL STAFF.

YES, SO THERE'S ALREADY BEEN A BRIEFING ON THIS LEGISLATION, AND TO QUICKLY SUMMARIZE, What it would do, it would require network companies to obtain an annual network company license to operate in Seattle and pay a license fee.

And this is intended to generate an additional source of revenue to recover the cost of specific network company regulations.

And those are implementation of the app-based worker deactivation rights ordinance and also the app-based worker minimum payment ordinance.

There are eight amendments proposed for this legislation.

None of these amendments are mutually exclusive.

So all of these amendments can be layered on top of each other, interwoven into the legislation.

I thought that might be helpful to know before we discuss all of them.

And just as a reminder, amendments can be reordered, I guess, with a request to the chair if there is an interest in that.

The first amendment is sponsored by Councilmember Herbold and it would require the Department of Finance and Administrative Services Director to recommend a fee for Marketplace Network companies after assessing initial fee revenue and no later than July 1st of 2026. By July 1st of 2026, There would have been time for the city to have already collected fees from the 2025 calendar year and also the first quarter of 2026. So the director would have an initial understanding of how much money the fee was generating.

The FAS director's recommendation to reduce the fee for marketplace network companies would be intended to inform the city council's development of legislation that would establish a reduced fee for marketplace network companies.

Just as a reminder, there is one fee for all of the network companies that are subject to this legislation.

Marketplace network companies are covered by one of the two at-based worker labor standards that would incur regulatory cost that OLS would recoup through this fee.

BEFORE WE TURN TO QUESTIONS, COUNCILMEMBER HERBAL, DID YOU HAVE ANYTHING YOU'D LIKE TO OFFER AS A SPONSOR OF THIS ITEM?

SURE.

I JUST WANTED TO NOTE THAT I HAD BEEN INTERESTED IN LOOKING different fee schedule for the marketplace networks early on in the process.

We did discover from FAS that their ability to implement a tiered fee for the marketplace companies would, be very difficult and incur additional costs.

It is important that the fees reflect the actual costs to enforce the ordinance and so that's the intent here is that If, in fact, there are fewer costs associated with enforcing one ordinance over two, this gives the FAS director the opportunity to assess that, assess the fees coming in, and make the necessary adjustments.

Thank you.

Thank you.

A question from Council Member Nelson?

Thank you.

Is there any, do we have an idea?

I agree with the spirit of this.

I think that marketplace companies shouldn't have been covered anyway, but do we know how much this could then impact the companies that are left remaining to pay the fee?

Is there any possible way to do that analysis?

We don't have the city does not have that information, right now, right now, the city is extraordinarily limited data on the number of online orders and the type of services.

That are provided in the city to quantify how much the fee would generate that's why throughout this legislation, there was a analog number of TNC trips to try to estimate the amount of fee revenue.

that would happen as a result of this legislation.

So this amendment is predicated on the fact that right now the city doesn't know, but after about a year and a half of collecting the fee, the city would have more information to know how much marketplace network companies are contributing.

to the regulatory cost and the impact of reducing the fee for marketplace network companies and also the financial impact of how much it would cost to develop software that would enable two different fees based on what type of network company was paying and so that's something to consider as well.

It's it's not like a flip of a switch.

It would actually cost the city money to develop software to charge the marketplace network companies a reduced fee and it would take some time to develop that software.

So that could all be wrapped up into the FAS director's recommendation.

DIRECTOR HAMPSON- Thank you.

DIRECTOR HAMPSON- Councilmember Herbal.

DIRECTOR HERBAL.

And thank you Karina and thank you Councilmember Nelson for the question.

And just to put a finer finer point on it this the information is knowable.

It's just not knowable to the city because it is not information that the platforms have provided us.

And I think it'll be great when the city has that information and we'll have that information because of this regulatory structure.

But there has been an opportunity to provide additional data to the city in helping us make these decisions around the size of the fee.

So just wanna clarify that we're gonna get that number right, but it might take a year of collecting data to do so.

Thank you.

Any additional comments or questions on amendment number one?

Okay, let's go to number two.

Amendment number two is sponsored by council member Peterson.

This amendment would exempt Marketplace Network companies from the legislation.

As already mentioned, Marketplace Network companies are only covered by the app-based worker deactivation rights ordinance, and it is one of two app-based labor standards incurring regulatory costs for Office of Labor Standards.

And this amendment would prevent any charges for Marketplace Network companies.

They would be completely not covered by the legislation.

Thank you so much, Councilmember.

Peterson, would you like to describe your amendment any further?

Thank you, Chair Muscata.

I believe central staff explained it well and I really do appreciate their hard work on trying to craft some of these amendments for us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any additional questions for central staff or the sponsor of amendment number two?

Okay, seeing none, let's go on to number three.

amendment number three is sponsored by Councilmember Nelson.

This amendment would restrict the Office of Labor Standards use of fee revenue to implementation of the app based worker deactivation rights ordinance.

As a result of the amendment, OLS would be prohibited from using fee revenue for implementation of the app based worker minimum payment ordinance.

Any funding for implementation of that ordinance would come from other sources of revenue in the OLS fund.

For example, the business license tax revenue and any resources of the city's general fund.

Member Nelson, would you like to describe it further?

Chair, I just want to confirm that we save our speechifying and our persuasive argument for tomorrow, correct?

Yeah, that'd be great.

If you want to provide any additional context though today, that's welcome too.

I will wait.

Thank you.

Oh, you're going to wait?

Okay, great.

Yeah.

I think today is really just to help describe the context of the amendment.

So if you feel that's sufficient, that's fantastic.

We will hold off for tomorrow then.

Okay.

I don't see any questions for the sponsor of amendment number three.

So I believe we're on amendment number four.

Amendment number four, also sponsored by Councilmember Nelson.

This amendment would reduce the fee for network companies from 10 cents per online order to 5 cents per online order.

The fee, just as background, would become effective on January 1st of 2025. Changing the fee to 5 cents per online order would reduce the estimated fee revenue to 1 million to 1.5 million per year.

anticipated cost for 2025 through 2027 range from $2.7 million to $3.2 million, depending on the year.

Again, these are estimates because the City has received limited data, but this is the estimated impact of the amendment and then the FAS Director would be able to, and OLS would know further as the City collected fee revenue.

Ms. Nelson, anything you'd like to add?

Not at this point, thank you.

Any additional questions for central staff or the sponsor?

There are none.

Let's go on to amendment number five.

Amendment number five is sponsored by Councilmember Peterson.

This amendment would change the procedure for adjusting the network company fee, which currently in the proposed legislation can be changed by the FAS director by rule.

This amendment would change that procedure by requiring the Department of Finance and Administrative Services director in consultation with the Office of Labor Standards director to make a recommendation to increase the fee every two years to city council.

Currently, the legislation allows the FAS director to adjust the fee at least annually and otherwise as needed.

This amendment would limit that to a recommendation to city council to increase the fee every two years, the council would consider this recommendation to establish any necessary fee increase by ordinance.

And then the FAS director would always have the authority to reduce the fee at any time necessary by rule.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Peterson, would you like to describe it further?

Thank you, Chair Muscata.

No further comment.

Any additional questions or comments for the sponsor or subject staff?

Okay, hearing none, let's move on to item number six.

Amendment number six is sponsored by Councilmember Herbold.

This amendment would make six changes to the legislation, all geared to increase transparency or streamline provisions.

the amendment would clarify the regulatory cost and the scope and purpose section to make it 100% crystal clear that the regulatory costs only are for FAS's licensing and fee operations and the Office of Labor Standards implementation of the deactivation rights and minimum payment ordinances.

The amendment would also remove the FAS director's authority to assign network companies to a monthly or annual payment schedule, which would mean that the only payment schedule for network companies would be on a quarterly basis.

The third change would be to require Office of Labor Standards to publicly announce which contracts with community organizations to implement the AppBaseworker deactivation rights and minimum payment ordinances are funded by fee revenue.

The fourth change would require Office of Labor Standards to create policies and procedures for awarding and monitoring contracts with community organizations that are funded by fee revenue to ensure that such contracts are solely for the purposes allowed by the ordinance, which would mean that OLS would need to create systems to ensure that fee revenue used for contracts was only being spent to implement the two ordinances identified in this legislation.

The fifth change would require the FAS director to include fee revenues in the quarterly reporting that is made to council so that the council would have information on how much the fee was generating in revenue four times a year.

And then last, the amendment would clarify that penalties do not accrue if the network company achieves compliance before the date that such compliance is required in the notice of violation of the FAS director.

Little bit of background on this last amendment.

It's not changing anything in the underlying ordinance.

Anything that is marked clarify is just attempting to make it more clear.

Currently, if a network company does not provide the fee or otherwise violates the ordinance, they have to comply, but there's no penalties imposed on the network company as long as they get into compliance by the date on the notice of violation that the FAS director issues after finding that a violation happened.

Thank you.

Councilmember Herbold, would you like to add anything?

Sure.

Just very briefly, appreciate Karina's creativity in combining these six elements in a single amendment.

All of these individual elements were crafted in the spirit of trying to address concerns that the platforms had.

Specifically, concerns around transparency and accountability of both FAS and the Office of Labor Standards, specifically reducing the burden of potential uh, monthly, uh, payment schedules, um, as well as, um, the, the transparency and accountability around, uh, contracting with community organizations, um, and also the clarification around, around, um, penalty, uh, accrual as, as Karina, Karina described.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And was there a council member who had a question or no longer?

Okay.

No questions on this one.

I think we can move on to number seven.

Amendment number seven is sponsored by Councilmember Peterson.

And this amendment would clarify the FAS director's authority to establish additional requirements by clarifying that the FAS director might only require additional administrative information for the license application and clarify that the FAS director may adjust fees by rule, but is otherwise prohibited from adjusting obligations for network companies that are already established by this legislation.

Again, these are clarifications.

It's not changing the substantive requirements of the legislation.

Great.

Ms. Mello-Peterson, anything else you'd like to add?

No, thank you, Chair.

Okay, thanks.

I'm not seeing anything else.

Let's go to the last one.

Okay, Amendment Number 8 is also sponsored by Councilmember Peterson.

This amendment would establish requirements for OLS's administration of contracts funded by fee revenue by prohibiting the office from using fee revenue to contract with community organizations for community-based enforcement and also requiring Office of Labor Standards to conduct a competitive solicitation and selection process for all contracts funded by fee revenue regardless of the value of such contracts.

A competitive solicitation process would require a competitive invitation to bid or request for proposal issued by the OLS director.

Currently under city code, these types of processes are required for contracts valued at $373,000 or more.

But for the purposes of this amendment, those processes would be required for contracts of any value if they are funded by fee revenue.

Thank you.

And Councilmember Peterson, anything else on this one?

No, thank you.

Okay.

All right.

Well, Karina, I think that gets us to the end of the amendment summary.

Correct?

Is there anything else you'd like to add?

No.

I think I covered it.

Thank you and thanks for all your work on this.

I think it's been a long process, so thank you.

Speaking of long process, Council Member Herbal, you've been working on this for a very long time.

Is there anything you'd like to add in conclusion before we table this discussion until tomorrow?

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I thanked the workers and their advocates as well as the platforms for their engagement.

I also wanted to thank Karina Bull for her efforts on developing the base legislation as well as these amendments.

Appreciate your efforts.

Well, deserve a round of thank you and appreciation for central staff.

okay well i don't think that there's any procedural thing i need to do this is going to be listed on the agenda tomorrow again first thing at the top of the agenda so we will continue this discussion tomorrow seeing no additional comments on this thanks again for your time and let's keep going with our amendment discussion and deliberation that was item number 22 so we're going to move on to item number 23. uh this is the jumpstart payroll tax deduction um i'm going to turn it over to central

Item 23 on the agenda is Council Bill 120689. This legislation would extend an existing deduction from the payroll expense tax for three years that applies to compensation between $150,000 and $400,000 at nonprofit healthcare entities.

And it gives the director authority to adjust that range based on inflation.

And I'll just note here that the balancing package and the mayor's proposed budget all the assumed that this deduction would be extended.

So the the amendments in group a assume that this passes and would reduce the assumed revenue from jumpstart tax accordingly.

And it was also, I think our intent that this was included in the 1st round of consent agenda items, but there is a technical amendment that's necessary.

So that's why it's pulled out today.

So.

I will go ahead and move it.

I move the committee recommend passage of council bill 120689 item number 23 on our agenda.

Is there a 2nd 2nd.

BEEN MOVED AND SECONDED.

I'LL DESCRIBE BRIEFLY SORT OF THE INTENT BEHIND THIS AND THEN WE'LL DESCRIBE THE AMENDMENT HERE.

AS WE ALL MAY REMEMBER, WHEN JUMP START WAS ORIGINALLY PASSED IN 2020, THERE WAS ONGOING CONVERSATIONS WITH MANY WHO ARE CATEGORIZED Health sciences sector, so whether that's at Hutchinson or Seattle children's or other entities in the middle of the discussion and deliberation on jumpstart, it was decided that given the uncertainty of that sector, there would be a 3 year exemption for this assessment.

And what we've offered here after discussing with the mayor's office and with some in the sector as well as our jumpstart steering committee members, the continuation of another three year exemption for this specific sector for health sciences.

There's obviously a lot that's still going on related to COVID and the healthcare crisis, but just simply given that there was not enough time to have a discussion about how to expand this and incorporate the payors of this new category, the desire here to continue to the consistency.

And also, I think this is along the lines of where there's some exemptions that are embedded in state Code as well.

So a simple three year extension and then up to the future Council to decide if that is going to be continued in the future.

Ali, would you like to describe the amendment that's technical in nature?

So, this technical amendment would make a correction to the new language in this bill that allows the director to adjust this range for inflation, making clear that that adjustment applies prospectively.

All other thresholds related to the payroll tax are adjusted annually for inflation, so this would bring this deduction in line with the other

thresholds in the payroll tax but we inadvertently wrote it in a way that could be interpreted to apply retroactively which is not the intent okay thank you so much i move the committee amend council 120689 as presented on amendment number one and described by ali is there a second second it's been moved and seconded that the committee consider amendment number one is there any additional comments Hearing none, I'll be encouraging a yes vote.

Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on the adoption of amendment number one?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Sawant?

Aye.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

I will note that the committee, that the motion carries and amendment number one is adopted.

Are there any further comments on this?

Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of Council Bill 120689 as amended.

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Yes.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

The motion carries and the recommendation to pass Council Bill 120689 as amended will be sent to the Seattle City Council for final vote.

OK.

Moving on, we are on item number 24.

Item 24, Council Bill 120707. This legislation renames the Community Safety and Communication Center to the Community Assisted Response and Engagement Department, or renaming from CSCC to CARE Department, and clarifies the duties of the department and its leaders.

Thank you so much.

I'll go ahead and move this to get it in front of us though.

I think that there's other Council members that have been working much longer on this, but I'll get it in front of us.

I move the committee recommend passage of Council Bill 120707. Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to recommend passage of Item number 24, before we move to possible amendments, I wanted to offer, I believe the sponsor is Council Member Herbold, the opportunity to speak on this item before we get into amendment and discussion.

Sure, thank you.

This ordinance works to...

enact a vision that the council has long held for a third public safety department.

The vision was to have a third public safety department that would civilianize response to some 911 calls and other emergency responses that have been traditionally acted upon by sworn and armed police officers.

I'm really pleased that after several years of advocacy and engagement with the executive and hearing from the public that this ordinance takes a really important step in moving us in that direction.

I appreciate, Madam Chair, your amendment.

I think there's a particular element of the amendment that we'll be debating a little bit, but I want to lift up a couple of pieces within that amendment that are not controversial, and that's the clarification that this is not going to be a public health department.

It does recognize that a lot of the behavioral health issues that these responders will help deal with does dovetail into health, but not traditional public health as we think of with the King County Public Health Department and the Board of Health.

And then in addition, to that change, it makes reference to the fact that we do have an interlocal agreement with King County around the provision of agreed upon enhanced public health services, which the city of Seattle pays for.

So the understanding being that if the care department were to go beyond the current vision, that it would do so only in collaboration with King County.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

And I'm going to ask central staff to describe the amendment, amendment number one, and as Council Member Herbal noted, there is anticipated that there might be an amendment to this amendment.

So let's get the amendment in front of us, and then we'll have some discussion and see how that conversation plays out.

Um, Ali Panoushi, would you like to describe amendment number one?

As Councilmember Herbert began to describe that, that was very helpful.

And any additional context that you have, that would be great.

Thank you, Chair Mesquita.

So, amendment One, as Councilmember Herbold described, would amend references to the care department's purview in the Seattle Municipal Code with respect to public health, making it explicit that the city's roles and responsibilities with respect to the development and implementation of public health policies are governed by the interlocal agreement with King County.

This amendment also would retain the director title for the head of the care as currently in code for this for CSCC, the mayor's proposal would change that title from director to chief.

Thank you so much.

I'm going to go ahead and move that amendment so it's in front of us for the purpose of further discussion.

I move to amend Council Bill 120707 as presented on amendment number one.

Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded to amend the bill as presented in Amendment Number 1. And thank you to Chair Herbold of Public Safety for describing the underlying bill and portions of the amendment.

I also want to say that this is a joint effort that we have appreciated being able to work on with the broader community.

And Councilmember Herbold, before I describe the amendment in further detail, would you like to add anything else?

I think I alluded to this in the description of the bill and the vision, which is a civilianized department that looks and feels and interacts with the community.

in a different way than our sworn departments.

And I think the idea of having the leader of that department be a director is important to the community.

I understand that there is this desire to ensure that the third department is elevated to the same level as the police department and the fire department.

I, for one, do not believe that a title of chief is necessary to do so.

There has been legislation introduced in the state legislature to treat 911 operators as first responders.

And so a first responder is the title that we give to police officers and firefighters.

And I do agree that it's a title that we should give 911 operators as well and other people who are responding to 911 calls, whether or not they're call takers or people who are going out on the scene.

And I think...

Calling these workers first responders is the very best way to make sure that they are on the same level as fire and police while still maintaining the civilianization of the department.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

I agree, and I would also note in conversation with other first responders, specifically IAFF 27, which is our firefighters local union, THEY AGREED WITH THE IMPORTANCE OF USING THE TERM CHIEF WHERE THERE IS HIERARCHY AND ENSURING THAT WE CONTINUE WITH THE AMENDMENT THAT'S IN FRONT OF US IS SOMETHING THAT THEY SUPPORTED.

COUNCILMEMBER STRAUSS, PLEASE GO AHEAD.

THANK YOU, CHAIR MOSQUEDA, AND THANK YOU, COUNCILMEMBER HERBOLD, FOR ALL OF YOUR WORK ON THIS.

I AGREE WITH EVERYTHING YOU SAY AND HAVE a different opinion about the title which we heard in committee where the person in charge of the cares department even mentioned that as they are working with other leaders of departments public safety departments throughout the country there is a differentiation of understanding what a director is rather than chief and if we want to establish co-equal departments in public safety We, we do want to have 3 chiefs and so I would like to amend your amendment.

Only as it pertains to the title.

Because I like everything else that you've done and so.

Would you like me to move that now or.

Let's have a little bit more discussion council member struggles and then I think we can turn back to you because you've teed up the desire for making a motion and that way.

folks have it all maybe in one spot.

So thank you, Councilmember Strauss, and thank you as well, procedurally, for going this route and for trying to bring a lock-on amendment, as that is not something that would be seen as favorable.

It does sound like you are interested in an oral amendment, and we will have a chance to circle back to you.

I do want to offer some points of clarification, however.

Yesterday and again today, we've heard that it is would be unique or out of line with colleagues across the country to have a director title.

However, we've done some additional research and I want to thank central staff as well who's also on the line with us if there's additional questions or clarification needed.

We heard that the director is unique amongst other alternative public safety department leaders nationwide in being called a director rather than a chief.

However, I'm encouraging our colleagues to continue to maintain the director title.

Some of the data from Central Staff has found that other cities seem to show the vast majority of existing programs actually use the title director, not chief.

This includes Albuquerque Community Safety Director, the city care department is modeled after Albuquerque.

So I think that this is an important connection to our existing care department that the city that was notably referenced as the model for creating our department uses the title director.

Durham Community Safety Department uses the title director.

The executive has also cited this department as an example of how our city's department should grow.

So again, a direct tie to another jurisdiction that uses the title director.

Cambridge Community Safety Department uses the term director.

Sacramento Department of Community Response uses the title director.

West Hollywood Department of Community Safety uses the title director.

Rochester Crisis Intervention uses the title manager.

Chicago CARE is a subunit of the public health department.

The fire chief of special projects has oversight there.

And that is why chief is used because it's directly tied to the fire department.

Washington DC's community response team uses the title director.

The director of behavioral health has oversight in that area.

Harris County's holistic assistance response team uses the term director because it's the director of public health that has oversight there.

Tucson's alternative community emergency response which is the mental health support team and the co-response and community health and acute response team both are part of the community safety health and wellness program which is in the office of city manager and Portland streets response uses the title director because It is a director that is overseen by Portland Fire and Rescue.

So I think that it is important just to make sure that that information is corrected.

There's many other jurisdictions, especially the two that are constantly referenced when creating our care department.

Those two specifically use the term director.

And as we get into the potential for an amendment here, I would also just note, I would like to circle back to whether or not there's a fiscal impact as we teed that up in yesterday's discussion as well.

Are there any additional comments before considering Council Member Strauss's potential motion that he was going to make?

Yes, Madam Chair, may I?

Please go ahead, Council President.

Madam Chair, thank you for listing all the times where Seattle likes to pride itself on not being like everyone else.

So I appreciate that you gave us a list where we should be like everybody else.

We like to pride ourselves on being unique and that's never stopped us with at least in the eight years that I've been here of doing things differently.

I'm guessing that there's some kind of a little bit mystified about what the underlying concerns are about such a robust discussion between director and chief.

I know that we had talked about this back in August and had an opportunity presentation from Amy Smith, Director Amy Smith.

I tend to agree with the word chief and I'll tell you why.

I don't think it has to do with falling in line with what everyone else is doing.

I don't think it has to do with hierarchical or sounding more militaristic, if you will.

I think it has to do with something that I said in the chat box a while back, and I don't know if anyone else picked it up, but I did have a chance to leave a message for Amy Smith as well.

That language is culture and culture is behavior, and if you change the language, you change the behavior.

And that is something that I've learned from an elder, Darrell Kipp.

And that is about language in that it does matter.

If this person believes that this is gonna make their job with their peers important, locally, national, regionally, and give us the cache we need to stand up this very important department, thank you, Council Member Lewis and Council Member Herbert for working so hard on this, then I think that it isn't really giving a lot to give that person the title that they're asking.

And I can't help but think that there's some underlying, well, there always is, politics.

But I think that this just doesn't rise to the level where we have to have a huge debate in statistics about whether or not and what city uses chief or director.

I think we should talk and get to know the person that's doing this in the context and their experience of what they're doing with their peers.

And so I don't have a problem calling Amy Smith Chief Smith.

So for that reason, I'm going to support Council Member Strauss' amendment.

Thank you very much, Council President.

I am going to turn it to Council Member Strauss now.

As you have indicated, you have a potential verbal amendment to the amendment number one that's in front of us.

Yes.

Thank you, Chair.

And I appreciate, I was just Google searching populations of all the cities that you were sharing just now.

So what I noticed is that we are the largest city of population from a Kirk Street Google search here, where Albuquerque has 562,000 people approximately.

Durham has approximately 285,000.

Cambridge, 117,000.

Sacramento, 525,000.

West Hollywood has 34,000.

Washington DC is the closest runner up, which is 712,000 approximately in 2020. Um, and they are 1. There are so many different levels of of police enforcement in that city that it's not a very good comparison.

Tucson has 540,000.

Portland has about 640,000 and Seattle.

As of 2021 had about 733,000 again, all of these numbers are just cursory Google search from our conversation just now.

But I do think that it, you know.

Rising up raising up what council president just said is.

The underlying reason why I bring it to you today.

And so I would like to move to amend amendment 1 to council bill 1 to 07 07.

2nd, let's let's hear council members.

Strauss's verbal amendment and if we have a visual of that, that would be helpful.

Thank you to.

Retain the language in the underlying council as introduced that would change the head of the care department's title to chief.

Amendment one as presented on the agenda would not change the title.

My version would include both the portion of Amendment one as it relates to the care department's purview of municipal code with respect to public health and simply change the title from director to chief.

It has been moved and seconded.

The verbal amendment is now before us and is presented on the screen.

Thank you, Patty, and to central staff and to Council Member Strauss' team, who I believe had to write this themselves, given that there was no walk-on amendments that were permitted.

So appreciate the work that went into this.

Colleagues, now is the time for discussion and debate.

We've already discussed the concept a little bit.

Is there any additional questions and comments?

I will ask a question of central staff.

And, again, the important part of where we're at in the budget is ensuring that there's no fiscal impact to the balancing package in front of us.

Yesterday we discussed the potential general fund impact, and we wanted to offer additional opportunity to clarify here.

Striking in the language is clearly not something that has a direct fiscal impact to 2024, but I am interested in any analysis about how using the term director versus chief could create a fiscal impact in the near future.

I want to ask central staff if there is any downstream indirect fiscal impact and my understanding Is that director Smith had mentioned as part of the argument in favor of using chief and rather than director is that there's pay parity.

For this position with that title as chief.

Would this necessitate a salary increase.

And have an impact on the general fund in future years.

IF THE TITLE CHIEF WERE INSERTED INSTEAD OF DIRECTOR GIVEN ANY ASSOCIATED SALARY CHANGES THAT WOULD HAVE TO ACCOMPANY THIS TITLE?

DOES CENTRAL STAFF HAPPEN TO KNOW THE ANSWER TO THAT?

I THINK IT WILL TURN IT OVER TO ANN GORMAN TO RESPOND TO THAT QUESTION.

Good morning, Ann Gorman, Council Central staff.

The fiscal note accompanying this bill did not detail any fiscal impacts of the change, the proposed change from director to chief.

But Chair Muscata, you are correct that when current director Smith was in committee, I believe on September 13th, she stated that it would be paid that pay parity across the police fire and care department chiefs would be an outcome of um the the change within the department to to chief and something else that we sometimes see in the city is that when there is a pay adjustment at the at the top of the organization um people in the broadband lower down for instance um finance directors and uh assistance department directors also see a proportional pay bump.

That's just what tends to happen.

It might not happen here.

And again, the fiscal note itself said that there would be no impact from the change.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Nelson, please go ahead.

I really appreciate the attention to fiscal impacts in 2025 and beyond.

there are i think well i asked central staff for a list of amendments that do add to our ongoing operating deficit and there are about 10 of them here are some of the amounts 40 000 council member nelson i'm going to ask you to keep your comments directly on this policy concept if you'd like to talk about okay impact on other items you're welcome to do that do you have any other comments my point is My point is that we are adding to our operating deficit, but this, I believe, is warranted because it was the original intention of the mayor's office when creating this department to assign the title chief.

I understand both sides of the argument, and I certainly don't want to get crosswise with Local 27. However, we heard directly from Um, the head of this department and, uh, express a preference for the, you know, the title of chief.

And so that's what I'm going to be supporting.

Thank you.

Council member Nelson.

I don't see any additional hands.

Would you like to offer any closing comments on this?

John Potter, yeah Thank you chair just understanding from sale department human resources it's my understanding that they have shared with us that the.

John Potter, Change to chief of care would not be changes to duties and responsibilities of the role warranting and change in classification or pay and that.

uh pay comparable to the salaries of the chief of police and fire would not be appropriate as the chief of care does not require the same or comparable uh credentials for those two departments as well as the care department is about 145 employees compared to 1500 and 1100 respectively thank you chair and just thank you and councilmember herbold for making this happen really good work

Thank you for that.

Council Member Herbal, anything else before we take a vote on the oral amendment?

No, thank you.

Okay.

I would just say thank you, colleagues, for engaging in this conversation.

I think the overall creation of the Care Department is really the underlying issue that we are all hopeful that this legislation ultimately accomplishes.

This has been a work in progress over at least three years.

Is that correct, Council Member Herbal?

Yes.

And to see it come to fruition and to know that there's much more that we want this department to be able to do, but for some of the obstructions that we've seen from other entities, I am hopeful that the creation of this department is successful.

I do think that there is concerns that we've heard from frontline first responders about the term chief.

I think that we've provided ample information about other comparable cities.

And when I say comparable, Cities of over 500,000 are comparable to Seattle.

I think that's a pretty apple-to-apple opportunity to see those other cities, especially with the city size that have been noted, and also would note that the city of Chicago is significantly larger than Seattle.

But the point still stands that the two cities that we've looked at, both Albuquerque and Durham, have been constantly referenced as either models or departments of how our department should grow, and those two explicit Example, use the term director, so.

I will be continuing to encourage folks to.

But against the verbal amendment in front of us and retain the title director.

Uh, rather than chief and with that, the motion has been put in front of us, the verbal motion from council member.

Trout moves to amend the bill to retain the language and the underlying council bill.

As introduced to ensure that the care department title, um.

is retained at chief rather than director.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of the verbal amendment as presented by Council Member Stroup.

Council Member Herbold?

No.

Council President Juarez?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Abstain.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Sawant.

No.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

No.

Five in favor, three opposed, and one abstention.

Thank you very much.

The verbal amendment carries, and the amendment is amended.

Now we have the amended amendment number one in front of us.

Is there any further discussion?

Councilmember Herbold, would you like to bring us back to any other points that you made about health and delivery of services?

I think we've adequately covered it.

I just want to celebrate the creation of the care department.

Excellent.

Thank you, Council Member Lewis.

I believe that you are a co-sponsor on this as well, if my memory serves me correct.

Apologies.

And we are welcome to go back to the original slide if we don't, if you don't mind, Patty.

Thank you.

Council Member Lewis, did you have any additional comments that you'd like to make on the bill or the amendments?

No, Madam Chair.

Thank you so much.

Really, really great to get this over the finish line and really appreciate the work of all the parties involved.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Amendment number one as amended is in front of us.

Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment 1 as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Aye.

Council Member Sawant.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much.

Amendment number one carries.

And now we have the final passage of the legislation.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of Council 120701 as amended?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Oras?

Yay.

I mean, yes.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Yes.

Council Member Sawant.

Yes.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the Council Bill 120707 as amended will be sent to the full Seattle City Council for final vote.

Okay, let's go on looking at the time here.

We have about another hour left.

Item number 25.

Item 25 is Council Bill 120705. This legislation is the third comprehensive supplemental budget legislation transmitted by the Executive in 2023. This makes changes to the 2023 adopted budget, changing appropriations and positions, et cetera.

There are eight proposed amendments, and most are necessary to balance Councilmember proposed amendments to

Thank you so very much.

And I believe that all eight amendments we are hoping to take as one consent package.

Is that correct?

Okay.

So before we get into the amendments, to get the bill in front of us for item number 25, Council Bill 120705, I move the committee recommends passes of the bill.

Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded.

I don't have anything else to add to what central staff added.

Is there any questions or comments on the underlying bill?

Hearing none, I'm going to turn it to central staff to describe amendments one through eight.

And with your permission, colleagues, we would consider all of these amendments as one consent package.

Of course, if you want to remove any of these items, you are welcome to do so.

Let's turn it to central staff to hear the amendments in full.

So, I will just briefly describe this group amendments 1 through 5 and amendment number 7 in this list are all freeing up resources that are not expected to be spent in 2023 to be used to balance items in.

And so, if those did not pass, there would have to be adjustments to other Councilmember proposed spending in 2024. Amendment number 6, which is sponsored by Councilmember Herbold, is related to a 2024 action.

This provides resources to OIG for external independent investigations.

This is an ongoing need in that AND SO THIS WOULD PROVIDE FUNDING IN 2023 AND THEN THERE'S A SEPARATE BUDGET ACTION THAT MAKES THIS AN ONGOING INVESTMENT IN 2024 AND BEYOND.

AND THEN AGENDA, EXCUSE ME, AMENDMENT NUMBER 8 IS A TECHNICAL AMENDMENT THAT THE EXECUTIVE REQUESTED THAT IS NECESSARY TO ADDRESS A TRANSACTION IN 2023. IT'S CREATING A NEW BUDGET CONTROL LEVEL AND INCREASES APPROPRIATION RELATED TO THE NEW UNLIMITED TAX GENERAL obligation bond control level.

Thank you so much.

I don't see any additional questions on these amendments.

Just double checking here.

Okay.

Colleagues, I move to amend Council Bill 120705 to include amendments one through eight as presented by central staff.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded.

Central staff, do you have any additional context you'd like to offer?

None.

Colleagues, do you have any questions or comments you'd like to offer?

None.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of amendments one through eight?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Peterson.

Aye.

Council Member Sawant.

Abstain.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Eight in favor, one abstention.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the amendments are adopted.

Now we have Council Bill 120705 as amended with items one through eight.

Are there any further comments on the bill as amended?

Hearing and seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll?

on the, will you please call the roll on the passage of Council Bill 120705 as amended.

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council Member, Council President Juarez?

Aye.

Council Member Lewis?

Yes.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

Aye.

Council Member Peterson?

Aye.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you so much.

The motion carries and the recommendation to pass Council Bill 120705 as amended will be sent to the full Seattle City Council for final votes.

Moving right along to item number 26.

Item 26, Council Bill 119950. This bill would increase the rates for all businesses currently subject to the jumpstart payroll expense tax as provided in Section 5.38 of the Seattle Municipal Code.

Originally introduced in 2020, the base bill as introduced would increase the projected revenue from the payroll expense tax by $195,000 annually.

And there are three proposed amendments to this bill.

Thank you very much.

Councilmember Sawant would you like to move your legislation.

Yes thank you.

I move item 26 council bill 1 1 9 9 5 0. Second.

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded to consider item number 26 council bill 1 1 9 9 5 0. Councilmember Sawant would you like to address your legislation.

Yes.

Can I move Yes.

Amendment one.

Absolutely.

And just as a reminder for the viewing public, as central staff described yesterday, we are using legislation that Council Member Sawant has introduced previously to adjust the payroll tax.

And this is the vehicle for the following three amendments that will be sponsored by Council Member Sawant.

We also described those yesterday.

So Council Member Sawant, maybe before you move it, I'll ask central staff, as we've done before, to just describe it first, and then we'll have You move it to describe amendment number 1, please.

Or amendment 1 to council bill 119950 would increase the rates for the payroll expense tax to increase annual revenues by at least 60Million dollars.

This funding in 2024 would be used to support the spending proposed in the council budget actions that will be discussed as part of item 27 on the agenda deal 1 a, and 501 a.

Thank you.

Council Member Swant, would you like to move Amendment Number 1?

Yes, I would like to move Amendment Number 1 as listed on today's agenda.

Second.

Thank you.

It has been moved and seconded.

Council Member Swant, you are recognized if you'd like to speak to Amendment Number 1.

Thank you, Chair Muscata.

This budget amendment increases the tax rate of the big business uh amazon tax or payroll expense tax by a tiny fraction to raise an additional uh 60 million dollars to fund two important budget amendments 40 million dollars will fund increasing the city's reserves to make funding available for the city to negotiate a new contract with the coalition of city unions and the remaining 20 million dollars will fund increasing mental health counselors and social workers in seattle's public schools So these are two distinct budget amendments, but they're both funded by increasing taxes on big business.

So they are added together into one amendment here.

And if this vote fails, the council will have the opportunity to vote on each part separately.

But since we're voting on both now, I'll describe each budget amendment now, if that's okay.

That sounds fine.

They're both rolled up into this package.

I think that makes sense.

Thank you.

The budget amendment listed as Amendment 2 on the agenda increases the tax rate of the big business payroll expense tax by a tiny fraction to raise an additional $40 million to increase the city's reserves to make funding available for the city, negotiating a new contract with the coalition of city unions.

My office has discussed with city workers who have been offered, frankly, outrageous contracts by Mayor Harrell's negotiators.

Offers like 1% or 2.5% raises that have been reported in the news fall far, far short of keeping up with the rate of inflation, which means the city is asking city workers, the public sector workers, essentially to accept a massive wage cut in real terms.

And this is only one issue.

There are also many essential vacant positions in departments across the city.

My office has spoken with workers in parks and recreation about the services they are unable to provide because of many positions not being filled because of budget constraints.

I am not on the city's labor committee which does the negotiations with the coalition of city unions, so there's no danger of this budget amendment breaking any confidentiality rules.

Everything in this amendment is based on publicly available information.

I do not believe there is any excuse for asking essential city workers to accept a wage cut with or without this budget amendment.

However, making these funds available will make it crystal clear that the city has the funds to offer a wage increase that, at the very least, is not a wage cut in real terms.

Additionally, we have heard many presentations about future budget shortfalls largely projected because of inflation, and these additional revenues would help prevent future austerity.

Council members may remember back in 2020 The Amazon tax was first voted on.

I proposed an amendment to increase the tax rate to make funding available to prevent austerity without dipping into the funding intended for housing and the Green New Deal.

That amendment did not pass, and every year since then, including this year, funding intended for housing and the Green New Deal has been diverted to close budget shortfalls elsewhere in the budget.

So this budget amendment will also help close part of that gap.

Council members have a choice who will pay for future recessions and economic turmoil, big business or workers.

Will the city ask workers to take a wage cut or will the city tax the biggest and the most profitable businesses?

And let's keep in mind that we're discussing this amendment at a time when Amazon has just tripled its profits in the third quarter of this year.

Meta has doubled its profits and other big corporations, including Google, are also reporting record profits.

And this is in the wake of the pandemic and all kinds of hardship that is being visited on working people, not to mention the unprecedented cost of living crisis.

And as far as big business, big corporations are concerned, this amendment is actually a very small increase in taxes on them.

The smallest tax increase, sorry, tax rate for businesses with a payroll between seven and $100 million would increase from 0.7% to 0.79%.

And just so there is no confusion that is 0.75% percentage point difference as in less than one percentage point.

The largest tax rate for businesses with a payroll of over $1 billion would increase from 2.4% to 2.71%.

Again, a very, very small increase The other portion of the budget amendment, and which is, this is amendment three on the agenda, which increases the tax rate of the big business Amazon tax by a tiny fraction to raise an additional $20 million to support Seattle public schools.

Council members heard overwhelming testimony both last night and also during the first budget public hearing from school counselors and dozens of Seattle public school students about the dire situation that is facing the students where they have, I think, one counselor per 1,300 students in the district.

That is just absolutely outrageous given the statistics that we know from the Centers for Disease Control where suicide is the highest, you know, the leading cause of death for students of high school and, you know, around that age.

And again, the unprecedented numbers of students in high schools who are facing mental health crisis.

Last year, after the tragedy at Ingraham High School, this issue was heavily featured in the news, but the lack of mental health social workers in Seattle Public Schools has never been fixed.

I mean, that problem has never gone away.

And so as the placards carried by the students said, we need to fund student health, not Amazon wealth.

Washington State has legal restrictions on what in Seattle schools can be funded with local city funds, but the city can fund mental health supports, and these funds are intended to give the Department of Education and Early Learning the resources to support Seattle students.

Central staff has reported to my office that DL believes they have the capacity to provide far more funding for mental health services in Seattle schools if they had more funding available.

At the request of the community advocates who spoke in yesterday's public hearing, I urge DL to work with the Seattle Student Union and current school counselors in evaluating the needs in Seattle schools.

This funding is intended to support hiring counselors and social workers in schools across the city that lack those resources.

And the lack of resources is just, as I said, it's not a cosmetic difference.

They really don't have.

The students simply don't have access to the counselors that they need.

And it should just be unconscionable that that's the situation in a wealthy city.

To fund this, the budget amendment increases the payroll expense tax by a very small amount.

Again, the tax is, I won't repeat the numbers, but basically, again, these are very, very small numbers.

Ultimately, as I've said every year, Budget crises for the city and for the Seattle Public Schools is not an objective inevitability.

Big business continues to make unimaginable profit and made those profits even through the pandemic.

There is plenty of money in the city.

It's a question of political will and the power of big business, the power that big business has to push the burden of every economic crisis off on workers.

If this amendment grouping both amendments passes, the smallest tax rate for businesses with a payroll between seven and $100 million would increase from 7.7% to 0.8%.

Again, that is less than 1.1, that is 0.8.

I mean, that's less than a one percentage point.

The largest tax rate for businesses with a payroll of over $1 billion, again, as I said, would be 2.4% to 2.9% if both sections, the 20 million and the 60 million are passed, sorry, 40 million are passed.

I wanted to thank Council Member Herbold and Budget Chair Mosqueda both for your co-sponsorship earlier in the budget meetings.

And I sincerely hope council members will vote yes on this budget amendment for a tiny increase in big business taxes to support the most dire needs of Seattle public school students and to support decent wage increases for our hardest working public sector workers who have been dealing with a cost of living crisis.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

I want to thank Councilmember Sawant for bringing this item forward.

Just want to put a finer point on the size of this increase.

For the full 60 million, it is an increase of 0.14%.

0.14% for the smaller companies and 0.46% for the larger companies.

So that's less than half a percent for the larger companies.

as stated, a little bit more than a tenth of 1% for the smaller companies.

As relates to the need for mental health services, behavioral health services for young people, we know that the CDC has found that nearly 20% of high school students report thoughts about suicide, 9% report a suicide attempt, and we know that rates are even higher for queer teens, native youth, and the most alarming increase occurring among black youth.

We know that suicide is the second leading cause of death among young people age five to 24 in the US.

As mentioned, the recommendation for a ratio of counselors to students is one to 250, and not many schools in the district are meeting that ratio.

As it relates specifically to the labor-related increase, I do wanna...

say that I have a slightly different perspective on the necessity for that because of the reserves, the labor reserves that the city has built into our budget.

I am very confident that the negotiation with the Coalition of City Unions will come to a favorable and fair to our workforce outcome.

But the reason why I'm supporting this amendment is because of knowledge that in the out years, moving past 2024, where we've prepared for labor contract increases, 85% of the growth in expenses over the next five years is attributable to anticipated labor agreements.

So my support of this budget action is focused on ensuring that in those out years, 2025 and beyond, we have sufficient funds in the planning reserves to sustain those wages.

Again, appreciate the sponsors bringing forward this, I think, small but necessary increase to the jumpstart payroll expense tax, thank you.

Thank you so much.

Are there any additional comments or questions?

Yes.

Okay, Council President, please go ahead.

I'm just waiting for confirmation from my staff, but after the Ingram shooting last year, we put in $250,000 for the school and I believe $4 million.

There was 500,000 in the base budget that the mayor transmitted.

And I believe that that was an original item that Council Member Herbold had worked on.

And then when the budget was transmitted, we worked to include an additional ultimately $4 million.

So it was $4.5 million for the student mental health request in last year's budget.

Right.

Okay.

So it was $4 million.

Okay.

I'm getting $4 million in the 2022. To or last year for 2023. And then for the, for the.

Okay, for the biennium, so so the 2023 adopted was 4Million.

Added to the 0.5 that was in the base budget that the mayor transmitted.

So, 4 and a half.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, and council member herbal this, are you nodding on that?

If you have anything else.

Affirmation.

Okay.

And on that note, I would note that the students also had signs that acknowledged the 4.5 from last year, but as the sponsor noted, the increased need Continues to outpace the investments that we've made and I think that this is a relatively Newer area for the city to be involved in but as councilmember Sawant noted the added capacity that we're adding through the city complements the investments that the school Districts that makes plus the county and the state but there's not sufficient Resources across the board as the.

Counselors testified to yesterday and given the increase.

Isolation, depression and suicidal thoughts that have.

Escalated post pandemic, this is 1 of the areas where we're seeing an increased need for additional resources.

I.

I'm kind of speaking off the cuff if Councilmember Sawant has anything to add to that, but didn't want to interrupt you, Council President, so please go ahead.

So, and I recognize now in certainly in the last two or three years, and well, actually for a while, JoAnne Hanrahan, The need for mental health services in Seattle public schools and working with director chappelle.

JoAnne Hanrahan, And when we had we've had more than shootings just an ingram we've had them everywhere and deaths occur.

JoAnne Hanrahan, And that it is no longer just a Seattle public school budgetary item, but these are children, and so I want to thank counselors to want for bringing this forward and highlighting the money.

for the commitment and services to our school district for these services particularly in light of the heightened i think we have the highest level of shooting now in our city And it's become commonplace for our children to shelter in place.

We just had some more incidents two, three weeks ago, not just in the north end, but across the city.

So I want to thank Councilor Sawant for bringing that to our attention and that now that should be a responsibility of Seattle City Council to finance and look at these mental health components, particularly in light of the fact that we work with DL on this.

And that has been an issue for them, at least since I've known Mr. Chappelle or Director Chappelle.

So, thank you.

Well said, Council President.

Thank you.

Council Member Sowon, did you have something else you'd like to add?

Yes, thank you.

Yeah, I just wanted to, I mean, first of all, I appreciate the supportive comments and I hope all council members will support this.

Just to put some numbers and put it in perspective, what the funding that President Juarez was reminding us about, what that accomplished.

the $4.5 million that was allocated for the student mental health supports that resulted in five pilot schools receiving up to $500,000 each through 2025 with two to four more schools anticipated to be added in 2024. And I just wanted to put that in perspective with the fact that there are 104 schools in the public school district.

I mean, this is a city, this is a metropolitan area.

The amount of funding that my office put together in this amendment in consultation with students and counselors is in proportion with the need.

So it's, as you said, Chair Mosqueda, the students acknowledged what was allocated last year, but it is just so tiny compared to the need that exists out there for all these schools.

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

Council Member Morales.

Thank you, Chair.

I want to thank Council Member Sawant for bringing this forward as well.

I think I'm the only parent of a public school student on council and I will say that is real the anxiety and depression that our students are dealing with.

Because of COVID after coming back from.

From the public health crisis, in addition to.

gun violence issues that our community is experiencing are really having a detrimental effect on their ability to focus and learn.

And the fact that there are so few counselors available to help people figure out how to manage all of this is a crisis.

I will also say that as we are moving into this realm as a city, it is not just about partnering with the school district and DEAL, but That 4.5 million, much of it went through Public Health Seattle King County through the school-based health center program.

And so we will also need to be sure to work with our public health department as the administrator of a lot of our mental health resources to make sure that their team has capacity to get these resources where they need to be.

And that said, I do want to thank everybody for working on this and for making sure that our public schools begin to get anywhere near the resources that some of our private school students get to experience and really want to thank you, council members that want for bringing this forward.

Thanks.

Thank you so much.

Any additional comments or questions on Amendment number one?

It has been moved and seconded to consider Amendment number one to Council 119950. Seeing no additional comments, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of amendment number one?

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Juarez?

No.

Council Member Lewis?

No.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

No.

Council Member Peterson?

No.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Councilmember Strauss?

No.

Chair Moschetta?

Aye.

Four in favor, five opposed.

Okay.

The motion fails and amendment number one is not adopted.

That moves us on to amendment number two.

Central staff, could you please describe amendment number two?

Correct.

Amendment number two would increase the payroll expense tax rates to generate $40 million of additional revenue annually.

This would support the spending proposed in FG501A.

Thank you.

Council Member Sawant, would you like to speak to amendment number two?

Yes.

Thank you, Chair Mesquita.

I have to move it first, is that right?

Excuse me, please go ahead.

I move Amendment 2 as listed on today's agenda.

Second.

Thank you.

So just to keep it brief, this budget amendment increases the tax rate of the big business Amazon payroll expense tax by a tiny fraction to raise an additional $40 million to increase the city's reserves to make funding available for the city negotiating a new contract with the Coalition of City Unions.

I'M, YEAH, I WON'T ADD BECAUSE I'VE ALREADY SPOKEN TO IT, BUT I'M HAPPY TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS.

NEW SPEAKER THANK YOU, COUNCILMEMBER SAWANT.

ANY ADDITIONAL COMMENTS ON THIS ITEM?

I'LL ADD SOME COMMENTS.

THANK YOU, COUNCILMEMBER SAWANT, FOR SPONSORING THIS, AND AS COUNCILMEMBER HERVOLD NOTED AS WELL, I THINK THAT THERE IS A REAL INTEREST IN MAKING SURE THAT THERE IS FUNDING PAST 2020 Uh, 5, 2025 and beyond, and I appreciate that the sponsor has worked with central staff and numbers of the community to ensure that there's not a correct tie to this funding being contingent on a full and comprehensive contract being passed.

We, we do have some funding in the.

Um, planning reserves, but I think it's imperative that we continue to add to that again.

This is not for direct.

Positions, so we had a little bit of a conversation last time we met yesterday about whether or not there's funding going to direct positions.

This is also funding that can support the delivery of services.

So, if you think about our most vulnerable community members, this is ensuring that not only do we have personnel.

but that we have the delivery of services for elders, for small businesses, for families, for food assistance, for housing and shelter assistance.

The core elements of our city's government rely on people being able to deliver this work.

I am supportive of this amendment and I also appreciate that.

There's not a direct ties to this amendment to specific contract elements.

I am no longer on and we will probably talk about that a little bit later today.

My biggest concern is that we look holistically at the universe of contracts that are in front of us.

and ensure that there's sufficient funding for the suite of services that this city is supposed to be providing.

An investment of $40 million to support the underlying planning reserve is a smart down payment on future expenses that we know are going to come to the city and imperative for us to be able to deliver complete care.

For those of us who care about ensuring that there's proper tree protection or people get their permitting to build or small businesses can open or that arts and culture can have the support they need and technical support to thrive in this city.

Think about every type of way that the city provides rec services.

And if that is not motivation enough, simply knowing that we are barely climbing out of this this pandemic and there's ongoing crises for family members and our most vulnerable and small businesses, we have to be able to deliver these services.

So I would strongly encourage a yes vote on this.

Again, as the sponsor and the co-sponsor noted at the beginning, this is a very small, very small, very reasonable addition to an existing known tax that will allow for us to have additional funding in the coffers.

for future years.

So my support for this amendment is strong and I appreciate your consideration of it.

Thank you.

And just, again, to put a finer point on how small this increase is, this tax rate addition is, for the smaller large businesses, it is less than one-tenth of 1%.

For the larger large businesses, it is three-tenths of 1% of a tax rate addition.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any additional comments?

I am not seeing any.

And I will ask the Clerk to go ahead and call the roll on the adoption of Amendment Number 2 to Council Bill 119950.

Council Member Herbold?

Yes.

Council President Orrez?

No.

Council Member Lewis?

No.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

No.

Council Member Peterson.

No.

Council Member Sawant.

Yes, yes.

Council Member Strauss.

No.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Four in favor, five opposed.

Okay, thank you.

The motion fails and Amendment Number 2 is not adopted.

Third time's the charm.

Council Central staff, would you have anything else to add to Amendment Number 3's description?

This one would increase the rates to generate $20 million annually, and it supports the spending proposed in Deal 1A.

Excellent.

Councilmember Sawant, do you want to move Amendment Number 3, please?

Yes, I move Amendment 3 as listed on today's agenda.

Second.

Thank you so much.

It has been moved and seconded.

Councilmember Sawant, would you like to add anything else to your description of Amendment Number 3?

Yeah, I just wanted to say that the points that have been made in the last few minutes about how small this increase is on big business, well, that applies even more powerfully to this amendment because it is the smallest amount of increase of all the options that my office presented to the budget committee.

So this is just $20 million just for the mental health crisis.

I mean, just to in order to begin to make a dent in the mental health crisis that our school students are facing.

And we have to be clear that the reason that they don't have the funds, these students don't have the funds, is because the vast majority of them are working class or belong to working class or middle class families.

And in fact, there are many students in the school district also who are facing bigger challenges.

They belong to very low income households.

Many of them, as we've seen from statistics, face bouts of homelessness.

It is a pretty brutal experience to be a working class or a low income child in today's age.

And I think that this is the very, very bare minimum that the city council owes to the students in our school district.

And just the chasm between how much big business and the billionaire class has in terms of profits.

And let's keep in mind where those profits come from.

They organically under capitalism, they come from not paying workers what they are owed in return for their labor and productivity.

And so the chasm between these unimaginable profits that big business is making and the wealthiest among them are making.

And the shortage of basic necessities being funded at the school district level could not be wider.

And so this is a choice between big business, between representing the greed of big business and the Chamber of Commerce or serving the most basic needs of our student.

And it's just astounding to me that council members will talk about how school shootings are going up, suicides are going, suicide rate is going up, the lockdowns at Garfield and West Seattle and Franklin, and talk about the trauma, pay all this lip service to the needs of ordinary people and the youngest people in our communities, and then vote no on something like a fraction of a percentage point increase in the taxes that big business is already paying.

I mean, I just don't have words for this.

And I think that council members should know that people are listening, working people are listening, and it's not going to be the last word.

The Chamber of Commerce has succeeded for the most part in transforming the composition, political composition of the city council in the coming years.

but that will not be the last word and everybody's votes will be watched and people are not going to just go quietly.

And so I urge you all that you vote yes on at least this very, very modest amendment, because if you don't, then you are leaving students without the very basic support that they need and the students are watching.

Thank you.

Are there any additional comments?

Council Member Herbal.

Thank you.

Just like I've done for the other two versions of this amendment, I'd want to just quantify how small of an increase this is.

To raise $20 million from the Jumpstart payroll tax, this would mean a tax rate addition of 0.05%, or that's 1 20th of 1% for the smaller large businesses, and 0.15% percent of one percent for the larger large businesses.

Thank you.

DIRECTOR RIVERA- Thank you.

I would just offer this before we go to a vote.

Colleagues I think that the there was an opportunity here for a lot of common ground.

I think that this is something that many of you have spoken to and I appreciate the council members who have seconded these items.

I do think that there's really a good opportunity for us to have common ground on something that's a very, very small increase to an existing tax that is a very small assessment on a very small number of corporations.

With this nominal increase, I think there could be significant impact.

So again, just searching for that opportunity to find commonality across nine members and It feels like there's a huge opportunity in this amendment for $20 million that we've heard that the department can continue to expand upon the 4.5 million that they've deployed.

And as you heard from the counselors and the students yesterday, could make a really significant and meaningful impact.

Thank you for considering this.

And thank you again for searching for all opportunities that we can today to find that common ground as we look to advance this budget before its final passage on Tuesday.

I see one more hand, and I see accounts President off mute so just double checking.

Oh yeah I do and I customer so on, I appreciate what you say and and most of the time, you and I agree on a lot of things we just sometimes disagree how we get there.

And as a child, as you said, of low income working public assistance and food coupons and public housing.

And as you all love to say, lived experience.

I get it.

And I'm not saying that, you know, if I were to vote yes or no or to vote no, that somehow I'm for big business in the chamber and greed.

I mean, some of this is just based on principles and about taxation.

And I don't ever want to make it personal.

I will be supporting this.

But, you know, as the budget chair was saying, You know the common ground here is the humanity for our children and also the principle about how we pay for this, I don't think because and i'm speaking for myself, not my colleagues.

who voted no on the other two doesn't make us, you know and i'm trying to make my comments to the Chair, not to my colleagues personally doesn't make us, you know.

as we've been called in the past, you know, cowardly and spineless and watering things down.

It's just a matter of principle where we can agree to disagree.

So with that, I have immense respect that you brought this forward and it makes sense to me.

And thank you councilor Herbert for breaking down the percentages.

I didn't have that on my sheet here.

So thank you for breaking down the percentages and hopefully the next council will revisit this.

And this could be another opportunity to talk about increasing the tax So with that, I will be supporting this.

And it isn't because I feel like people are watching me or I'm going to be bullied or people are going to come to my house again.

I'm doing it because I think it's the right thing to do.

And if my colleagues vote differently, that's okay too.

We can agree to disagree because we've got a lot to get through.

So I do want to thank you for bringing this forward.

I do want to thank Council Member Herbold for breaking down the numbers.

And I want to thank the chair and my other colleagues who voted the way they did differently than me, but with the same principles, particularly right now today about respecting each other's humanity.

So I will be supporting this.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

I would like to call for a vote on this and I will come back to the sponsor for final comment before we vote on the amended version, if that's okay.

Oh, Chair Mosqueda, if you don't mind, I just wanted to read quickly a comment from the public testimonials last night from one of the counselors, Catherine Becerra Hanson.

She's a counselor at TOPS K-8.

She said, quote, I have spent many years working 14-hour days with a caseload of over 1,100 students.

In my years, I have supported students who have experienced shootings.

family deportations, housing instability, and who have experienced profound neglect and abuse.

I have helped with many suicidal students, students who self-harm, and students with numerous diagnosed and undiagnosed mental health challenges.

There is ample scientific evidence to show that students can't learn if they are struggling with mental health and behavioral challenges.

School counselors, social workers, and nurses are the only people with specific training to support these mental health needs, and yet we are the very professionals who are the first to be cut or whose funding is taken away whenever there are budget shortfalls.

Please help us help our students by providing this critical funding by increasing the Amazon tax.

This funding will support our entire city." And there are many other quotes that I won't read right now. I do look forward to making comments during the final vote. Thank you, Chair Mosqueda, and thank you, President Juarez, for your YOU KNOW, IMPENDING YES VOTE ON THIS. I APPRECIATE THAT. AND I DO THINK THAT THE ONLY WAY TO SHOW HUMANITY TOWARDS OUR THOUSANDS OF STUDENTS IN OUR CITY IS TO VOTE YES ON THIS. THANK YOU.

NEW SPEAKER THANK YOU.

I NOW SEE ANOTHER HAND AS WELL.

COUNCILMEMBER NELSON, IS THIS SPECIFIC TO AMENDMENT NUMBER THREE AS WELL?

NEW SPEAKER YES.

THANK YOU FOR EVERYBODY'S WORK ON THIS.

I would like to say that when we talk about the impacts of legislation, and that this will have a very, it's a super small increase and therefore it'll have a really insignificant or very small impact on businesses.

I believe that we understand, we've heard from the people that will benefit, and I think that we all collectively understand the tremendous need that exists here for better mental health in our schools.

So I'm not arguing that.

I am just putting in a plug for talking to all sides when we do legislation like this.

Instead of just throwing names around like, oh, the chamber, i think that sitting down with both sides is a good um is a good practice and i would i don't know if that happened this time i um haven't heard that it had but that is just something that i would it's just an editorial comment that i would like to make going forward thanks how much madam clerk could you please call the role on the adoption of amendment number three council member herbold yes council president juarez aye council member lewis

No.

Council Member Morales?

Yes.

Council Member Nelson?

No.

Council Member Peterson?

No.

Council Member Sawant?

Yes.

Council Member Strauss?

No.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Five in favor, four opposed.

Thank you very much.

The motion carries, and Amendment Number 3 is adopted to Council Bill 119950, Agenda Item Number 26. The bill, as amended, is in front of us.

Are there any final comments?

Councilmember Selwa, you noted that you might want to have additional final comments.

Is there anything else from you?

I just want, I appreciate the yes vote on the $20 million because I think that is really the bare minimum that we as a council should be funding.