Seattle City Council Briefing 3/4/2024

Okay.

Hello, everybody.

Good afternoon.

Today is March 4th, 2024. The council briefing meeting will come to order.

The time is 2.03.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Kettle?

Here.

Councilmember Moore?

Present.

Councilmember Morales?

Here.

Councilmember Rivera?

Present.

Councilmember Saka?

Here.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Council Member Wu.

Present.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Present.

Council President Nelson.

Present.

Nine present.

Thank you.

If there's no objection, the minutes of February 26, 2024 will be adopted.

Seeing none, the minutes are adopted.

Okie dokie, we'll move on to my president's report.

Today we'll have our weekly report from OIR's state legislative team on developments in Olympia.

And we also have a presentation on OIR's federal legislative agenda from the team in DC.

And we'll then have one proclamation for council members to sign and then our usual preview of city council actions.

Okay, tomorrow at full council we'll have eight items on the introduction and referral calendar, including the weekly payroll bill, a resolution setting a public hearing on an alley vacation, a bill accepting funds from the State Department of Commerce to reimburse the Wing Luke Museum for repairs, and five appointments.

And the consent calendar consists of our regular minutes and payments of bills.

And we'll also have two pieces of legislation on the agenda.

One is Council Bill 120275, related to ecological thinning in the Cedar River watershed from the Parks, Public Utilities, and Technology Committee.

And then also Resolution 32128, setting a public hearing on a petition to vacate an alley, which I believe Councilmember Sacco will tell us about.

And we'll have to suspend the rules to allow a vote on this because it's being referred on the same day.

And this was the process for other things like setting the public hearing dates for the Ballard business improvement area and the STIA improvement area.

And we do this because both of those resolutions were very procedural and some were time sensitive in order to be within the time limit of the public hearing notification period.

All right, so before proceeding to the OIR presentations, I do wanna take a couple moments to add some facts about what happened last week at the council meeting because early accounts by bloggers and reporters got some important things inaccurately and they were not present in chambers.

So I just wanted to make sure that we're all on the same page about what actually happened.

Our comms team, by the way, work with those publications to make sure that they corrected facts after the fact.

All right, so this will take a couple minutes.

The meeting was called, the meeting on last Tuesday, was called to order at 2.01 p.m.

Several minutes later, a large crowd of over 50 people entered chambers carrying signs and banners representing various political causes, including free housing for refugees.

And there was also a handful of refugees and children accompanying them.

There were two resolutions and an appeal of Alex Zimmerman's exclusion order on the agenda.

The first resolution, resolution 32126, would change the name of a street in the south end to George Fleming Way in honor of Washington's first black senator who was also the founder of the Housing Trust Fund, which has become a really critical tool and funding mechanism for affordable housing.

The late senator's wife, Tina Fleming, I believe she was in her 80s or so, was also present with his daughter and other family members.

And they were in the audience to speak to the resolution after passage, and they were accompanied by Sharon Lee of Lehigh.

Fourteen people signed up for in-person public comment and four signed up to comment remotely, but only three were listed as present.

With a total of 17 speakers, I gave speakers one minute and set the public comment period at 20 minutes per our rules.

Three in-person speakers were not able to speak within that allotted time.

Of the 14 who did, four self-identified as housing activists and came to demand housing for refugees currently residing in Tukwila or or Kent, and some of them tied their comments to other issues, such as opposing the mayor's plan to implement an acoustic gunfire detection system pilot project, which is often referred to as one of the brand names, ShotSpotter.

One other commenter was herself a refugee and spoke with the assistance of a translator.

And note of the nine others, two commenters spoke about George Fleming, four commenters spoke about app-based worker minimum payment legislation, two spoke about accountability for homelessness service providers, and one about the exclusion of Alex Zimmerman.

Immediately after I closed public comment, the protesters approached the dais and began chanting and shouting loudly, not about me ending public comment without everybody being able to speak, mind you, but against primarily the acoustic gunfire detection system and the police and also for housing for the refugees.

These folks ignored my request to be quiet and stop so we could proceed with the meeting.

So I asked FAS, which is Finance and Administrative Services, I'll just call them FAS for short, who had positioned themselves between the protesters and the podium to escort them from chambers if need be.

And I did ask them to do so, and they refused to leave the room.

After a couple moments, I called for a five-minute recess so FAS could try to calm things down off-camera.

And council members left the chambers.

The recess lasted about seven minutes because it took some time to regather folks at the dais.

But the shouting and the chanting had escalated with one protester attempting to use a bullhorn.

So I called for another recess for 15 minutes.

And during this time, I received agreement from my colleagues that we might have to request that the protesters be removed if they were still present when we returned, and that seemed to be our only recourse to continue with the meeting.

Anyway, we came back into chambers with no improvement to the scene.

A staff person from FAS requested permission to call SPD, Seattle Police Department, to come and remove the protesters, which I granted.

Council members again left chambers while FAS called SPD.

All but seven protesters left chambers and gathered just outside the lobby, just outside chambers in the lobby here to my right.

Chamber doors were locked but at two specific points FAS staff had to physically struggle with protesters outside of chambers to keep the doors closed and prevent those protesters from reentering chambers.

West Precinct Captain Strand arrived first and warned protesters that if they did not leave, they'd be arrested for trespass.

And he did this several times while he was waiting for reinforcements.

And during this time, one of the protesters complied with police and left chambers.

It took, my notes say half an hour, I hear from other people about an hour, for SPD to arrive because they are short staffed and officers had to be called from other precincts.

Finally, over a dozen officers arrived and removed the six remaining protesters.

I note that three of the six who were removed and arrested had in fact given public comment and exercised their right to address us, as is required for open public, per the Open Public Meetings Act.

Let's see, we reconvened in chambers with Senator Fleming's family members and credentialed media present.

and resumed the meeting at 4.01.

Meanwhile, protesters remaining in the lobby escalated their shouting and began banging hard on the glass wall, separating the lobby from chambers in a threatening and aggressive manner.

So after we reconvened, as Council Member Morales was explaining the resolution, Council Member Moore interjected to raise a point of order, noting that she couldn't hear the proceedings and that she feared for her and other Council Members' safety in the event that the protesters pounding on the glass wall were to break the glass and forcibly reenter chambers.

Councilmember Moore called for the arrest of those protesters as well.

Now I want to note that the Seattle Times and other outlets erroneously portrayed Councilmember Moore's call as leading up to the six arrests of the day.

Those had already occurred, which was why we were able to reconvene in chambers and continue with our meeting.

And I'm saying this because it's important because I feel compelled to clear Council Member Moore from individual responsibility for those six arrests.

In fact, as I noted before, we had all been aware that that was a likely eventuality, but it was not that moment that caused those arrests.

All right, FAS was able to get the protesters pounding on the glass wall to leave the area, so additional arrests were not necessary, and we resumed the discussion of the resolution, which was adopted and presented to Senator Fleming's family.

And the meeting was adjourned at 4.30 p.m.

So that's what actually happened.

And going forward, we will continue to enforce our rules prohibiting disruptive behavior and attempts to shut down our meetings so that we can conduct council business in accordance with the Open Public Meetings Act.

All right, just wanted to get that out there on the record.

Okay, let's move on to the state legislative session update.

I will have our team there assemble at the briefings table.

Director Tarleton is here to tell us what happened last week and what we can expect in this final week of the session accompanied by online remotely from Olympia, her staff down there and our federal lobbyists as well.

Director Tarleton, please take it away.

Thank you, Council President and members of the City Council.

We have today the state relations team on virtual and also our federal affairs team here at the table because we'll hopefully seamlessly move into the federal affairs update for all of you after the state team.

And thank you very, very much for the last 56 days of the legislative session in Olympia.

It is coming to a close this Thursday, March 7th is the planned sine die.

And there are all indications that it will be on time.

Sameer and Ana are down in Olympia.

A fair amount is happening over the next couple of days to get ready for the final day of session.

And today, Sameer will kick off the discussion for all of you.

Sameer.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Sameer Janejo, State Relations Director for OIR.

And as I mentioned, this week is the last week of the legislative session.

This past week was eventful as it was Friday was a cutoff for bills to move out of, get a floor vote and go back either to either those bills that passed when you voted the governor's office or if they were changed, they would go back for concurrence in the originating chamber.

So in today's presentation, we'll go over some of the bills that received votes over the past week.

Starting with a couple of budget revenue bills, both these bills are supported by King County, and we've talked about that before.

The first one is a non supplant bill related to all governments within King County.

And then the second bill relates to Harborview and the ability to, of course, finances and increase its revenues.

Both bills passed and the city supported them.

Good afternoon.

I'm Anna, and I'm the state legislative liaison in OIR.

There was quite a bit of climate and environment action last week, starting with House Bill 1589. This was the final bill that the Senate considered on Friday.

This bill accelerates Puget Sound Energy's transition away from natural gas to electricity.

And then additionally, there was a few other bills that passed that the city supports.

Last week, House Bill 2156. This bill creates additional consumer protections for those who install residential solar on their properties.

This passed unanimously and the city supports this bill.

Senate Bill 5931, this designates six PPD as a priority chemical and also certain motorized vehicle tires as priority consumer products within the Safer Products for Washington program.

And it also requires the state's Department of Ecology to start determining regulatory actions to limit PPD in our environment.

This bill passed 85 to 11, and the city supports this bill.

Senate bill 6058 we've talked a little bit about in previous weeks.

This bill is a governor request bill that starts the process to begin linking Washington's carbon market with California and Quebec and it passed 57 to 39 and we support that one as well.

Moving on to general government, House Bill 1510 creates a revenue source for community preservation and development authorities and that bill passed 41 to 7. Senate Bill 5838 creates an artificial intelligence task force to create recommendations for the regulation of generative AI, and that bill passed as well in the city's support of that legislation.

And House Bill 2014 expands veterans' eligibility for purposes of state benefits and services for veterans.

One of the things that it did also is it expanded these benefits for veterans who are discharged due to their sexual orientation, and that bill passed as well.

On healthcare and behavioral health, mostly behavioral health is really the focus of this session.

House Bill 1929 creates the post-inpatient housing program for young adults, and that bill passed.

House Bill 1956 creates a statewide drug overdose prevention and awareness campaign.

Department of Health would be implementing that campaign.

And then also the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction would create substance use prevention and awareness materials for schools and classroom use aligned with that statewide campaign.

And House Bill 2247 relates to behavioral health and workforce.

So it alters various licensure certification registration requirements for behavioral health professions.

And that bill passed unanimously.

The city supported that bill.

Senate Bill 6228 relates to health insurance and requires health plans to authorize at least 14 days of inpatient or residential SUD treatment on the first utilization review and at least seven days on subsequent reviews.

And that bill passed and the city supported it as well.

On housing and homelessness, House Bill 1892, which creates a workforce housing accelerator revolving loan fund program to administer loans to organizations to assist with development of housing for low-income households, passed unanimously, and the city supported that bill.

House Bill 2012, Expand the property tax exemption for nonprofit organizations that are providing rental housing to qualify households by allowing those organizations to receive funding from additional sources like city and county funds.

So, not just state and federal funds in the city is part of that bill in the past 36 to 13. House Bill 2329 requires the Office of the Insurance Commissioner to conduct a study of property and liability insurance coverage available to housing providers who are getting housing trust fund money and exerting extremely low-income households.

And then Senate Bill 6015 requires cities and counties to enforce certain parking configurations for residential development on that bill passed 95 to 1. labor and commerce bills the first bill uh relates a hospital 2382 relates to death benefits under workers comp for tnc drivers those are uber and lyft drivers and if those if they're drivers death results from injury while they were in to the while they're working for the company and house bill 1905 extends uh the equal pay act to all protected classes and that bill passed 36 to 13. House Bill 2266 requires the Department of Labor and Industries to adopt rules for the safety and health issues for workers on construction activities to menstruate or express milk or both.

That bill passed unanimously.

And Senate Bill 6007, concerning employment standards for grocery workers, passed 60 to 33. And Senate Bill 5793, release to paid sick leave expanding paid sick leave in a couple of situations one is when a child's um school or place of care has been closed after a public emergency declaration or one necessary to care for an individual who depends on the employee uh for care or who regularly resides in employees home and that bill passed 76-19.

Moving on to some of the public safety and criminal justice bills that had action last week.

Senate Bill 6009. This bill prohibits the use of hog time by law enforcement.

This one passed 89 to seven in the city supports this bill.

Senate Bill 5937 is a crime victims and witnesses related bill.

It has a number of provisions relating to the crime victims compensation fund statutory of limitations for certain crimes and.

Regulatory information around forensic nurses as a number of other provisions is essentially an omnibus crime victims bill.

This bill passed unanimously and the city supports this bill.

Gun violence prevention legislation has been a priority for the city and I know for many of the council members here.

All four of the final gun violence bills passed last week.

I've listed them here, and the city supports all of them.

So Senate Bill 5444, which regulates where open carry can be happening and adds sensitive places to a list of restricted locations, including places like zoos, aquariums, transit centers and facilities, and libraries as well.

House Bill 1903 is the lost and stolen legislation.

House Bill 2118 requires more accountability for firearm dealers.

And House Bill 2021 is about destruction of firearms by law enforcement or Washington State Patrol.

And then House Bill 2153 is a bill that deters the theft of catalytic converters, and this bill passed 31 to 18. And then within social programs and education, House Bill 1889, this bill allows people to receive professional licenses and certifications regardless of their immigration or citizenship status.

This bill passed 41 to 18, and the city supports this bill.

House Bill 2007, this extends the cash assistance or TANF, temporary assistance for needy families, time limits for certain situations.

This one passed 27 to 19 and the city supports this bill.

And then House Bill 2441, this establishes a pilot for eliminating the college in high school fees for private, not-for-profit institutions.

Last session, they eliminated fees for the public institutions.

This bill passed 49 to 0, and the city supports it.

Moving on to transportation, House Bill 1989, printing your 3D abatement introduction pilot program, passed 38 to 11. House Bill 1963, requiring license plates to be uncovered, passed 42 to 7. House Bill 2384, a bill related to automated traffic safety cameras that we've talked about in previous weeks, city supports, and that bill passed 26 to 23. So, this week, they will, we're expecting votes on 3. Valid initiatives or initiative to the legislature.

There is 1 on vehicle pursuits on income taxes and then a parent's bill of rights.

All 3 are expected to receive votes this week in the legislature.

We're also expecting to see the final budgets released, the transportation capital and operating budgets that were being negotiated over the past couple of weeks.

We expect to see those sometime this week and then action taken on them as well before March 7th, which is the final day of session.

Happy to answer any questions.

I don't see any hands raised right now.

I have a couple of questions.

Let's see.

Regarding the three initiatives, Does the city have a position on those?

Go ahead, Samir.

We don't have a position on any of them.

Okay.

I thought that they had already voted to...

Anyway, what is the next final step on that?

The Senate voted on three of them earlier today in the House.

It has not taken them up yet.

All right.

Thank you.

I was getting confused.

So I noticed that the bills that you highlighted in your presentation, they passed and most of them the city supports.

Is there anything that the city, what about things that didn't pass that we wanted and what are the implications of those?

How bad is it, I guess, as I'm asking?

Some of those may have been provided to you last Monday, where Samir and Ana described some of the bills that died, did not make it through policy cutoff.

Samir and Ana, were there any in particular that you might want to note that didn't make it through the final cutoff last Friday in the opposite houses?

Maybe the unemployment insurance for strikers, or what do I think?

Yeah, no bills that we really needed that I can think of off the top of my head died.

Certainly some high-profile bills, for example, transit-oriented development, the rent stabilization, but none were bills that we were asking for that I can think of.

Okay, thank you.

And then one final question.

I remember at the beginning of this session, I think that there was on your list a legislation.

I believe that it was proposed by the Housing Development Consortium to mitigate for uncollected rent payments.

Was that whatever happened to that?

I think that failed back.

I don't think that made it.

Yeah, I'm not familiar with the bill on that topic, and if there was one introduced, it did not move along very far in the process.

It's not coming to mind right away.

Okay, thank you.

We can check on that, though.

Maybe I'm just remembering it as part of our legislative agenda that never actually made it into legislation, so I could be completely wrong.

Are there any other questions from my colleagues?

Okay.

Thank you very much.

You're going to be staying at the table with your federal team, correct?

Thank you, Council President.

Samir and Ana, thank you so much.

Good luck this afternoon.

And the rest of this week.

So, Council Members, you've had the opportunity this morning, I think a number of you, to meet with our...

OIR federal affairs team, Michelle Nance, the federal affairs director for the city, and Leslie Pollner, our federal contract lobbyist with Holland & Knight in Washington, D.C. And for those of you who have had the opportunity to work with Michelle on the federal goals and priorities, for example, or with Leslie in previous iterations of what is happening in the U.S.

Congress or not, as the case may be, I think you all will realize that we are really fortunate to have a dynamic team of people who are trying to help not only our city but our region deal with the many changing priorities and pressures that are going on in Washington, D.C.

right now.

I also want to highlight that OIR's Deputy Director, Sierra Harlett Brown, was the prior Federal Affairs Director before Michelle Nance came on board two years ago.

And I promoted Sierra to Deputy Director.

So in essence, we have three people who are deeply steeped in the federal agenda.

And believe me, we need it because Leslie also has a team behind her with Holland and Knight who are tracking what's going on in the individual agencies, in the cabinet level, as well as individual offices within the congressional spaces.

So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Michelle and Leslie and have them drive this train And I think Leslie provided us some information over the weekend to give us the most recent update on what is going on with the U.S. budget.

And I will just note that every year, you know, when Washington stayed and here at the city, we have to have a balanced budget by a certain date.

by law, the state has to have one and the city has to have one.

And that law does not exist for our federal government.

And therefore, nailing down a budget is always a moving operation.

I won't say target because there almost is no target.

So I'm gonna turn it over to Michelle Nance and Leslie Pollner.

Hi, everyone.

Hi everyone, my name is Michelle Nance.

I'm the Federal Affairs Director.

And as you know, I'm based in Seattle and my job is to strengthen our relationship with the federal government.

And we're really excited that Leslie is here.

She flew out from DC, Leslie Pullner Holland and Knight.

I've had the privilege of representing the city of Seattle for close to 10 years.

And can you all see the, is this sharing?

Oh, okay.

I have the PowerPoint pulled up.

Thank you, Megan.

Michelle, can you pull the microphone stand a little closer to you too?

Yes.

Yeah, thanks.

Great, how is that?

Okay, perfect.

So I'll quickly go through the agenda for today.

Leslie will be giving an update on what's going on right now in Washington, DC.

You're probably seeing in the news, but a lot's happening right now.

She'll give an update on the appropriations package that's currently going through Congress.

And then we'll talk about federal funding, what the city is doing, and then we'll go through the federal goals.

and our engagement with the congressional delegation here.

And then Leslie's gonna end with the political landscape.

So, Leslie?

Great, thank you.

Well, as Gail alluded to, already since we put this PowerPoint together last week, there have been some changes between Friday and Monday.

But here we are.

We, top of mind for Congress, has been getting the FY24 appropriations bills through.

As many of you may know, the federal fiscal year starts actually October 1st, and here we are five months later without a budget.

However, progress has been made, and we'll talk a little bit more about that, and we expect to see at least six of the bills passed by Friday.

But in the meantime, there is funding outstanding for Ukraine, Israel.

You've seen the president try to put forward a supplemental funding request.

That still needs to be dealt with.

There are also multiple reauthorizations that have already expired, including for the Federal Aviation Administration, the Farm Bill.

And so as Congress has been trying to work through this very difficult time with appropriations, the work continues to back up.

And so there's a lot to get done even once they get through FY24.

But on appropriations, so as I mentioned, we're almost six months into the federal fiscal year.

And so President Biden brought House and Senate leadership together on February 27th, later that week, last week, leaders were able to negotiate the beginnings of a package.

And so we're now on what's called a continuing resolution, which means they're just buying a little bit more time using the existing budget.

And so they passed two short-term resolutions, one extending funding for one group of package, one group of bills through this Friday, March 8th, And the second deadline is March 22nd for the second set of six bills.

And so over the weekend, six bills were released.

That includes actually a number of earmarks for the city.

So it's very exciting.

We expect those bills to pass this Friday.

and then, of course, they still need to deal with the remaining six bills to try to get through those.

Those are a little trickier, and you still have a number of Republicans wanting to put challenging policy writers on those bills.

But in this first six, there's some really good stuff coming, so I will let Michelle tell you a little about that.

Yeah, so there are four earmark projects that the city of Seattle put forward this past year that our congressional delegation has supported and that have so far made it through this process.

And three of them we're expecting to see in the bills passed later this week.

So the first one is $3 million for South Park drainage improvements to add a formal drainage system in South Park to help prevent flooding episodes like the King tide from December, 2022. And that was moved forward by Senator Murray and Senator Cantwell.

Then 1.95 million for the Care Department, which was moved forward by Congresswoman Jayapal and Congressman Smith.

1.3 million for upgrades, seismic upgrades for the University Branch Library.

moved forward by Congresswoman Jayapal.

And this is the one that would be in the second tranche of bills, the one with the March 22nd deadline.

So we'll be staying tuned to see if this one ends up passing as well.

And then $1 million for a passive house multifamily development in South Park referred to as the Henderson Street Project, also supported by Congresswoman Jayapal.

So now moving on to just federal funding overall, wanted to give you a little bit of sense of what the city has seen over the past few years.

You're likely aware that there is an unprecedented amount of funding through the bipartisan infrastructure law and Inflation Reduction Act.

So as a high-level overview, I wanted to share that since May of 2022, we've received about approximately $95 million.

And some of these awards are spread out over several years, but it's a significant amount of money, and this is not the only federal funding that we're receiving.

This is just through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act.

And then for earmarks, for fiscal year 2024, what we're hoping to see is 7.2 million.

So going into the bipartisan infrastructure law, first of all, you might also hear it referred to as the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, but it's an unprecedented amount of funding, $1.2 trillion over five years for infrastructure.

And then the Inflation Reduction Act, which is President Biden's landmark climate legislation, which is really focused on climate investments and also lowering healthcare and energy costs.

So I have these slides here which list the grant awards that we have received at the City of Seattle over the past few years.

I'm not gonna go through them all, because there are a lot of them, which is really incredible.

But I'm just gonna highlight a few of the key ones that are, pretty significant dollars.

So you can see safe streets for all here, the third row down.

And that is for traffic safety projects in underserved neighborhoods, including Rainier Valley, Soto, downtown, U District.

And that includes projects such as ADA upgrades, traffic calming projects, protected bike lanes, things like that.

Let's skip over this one here.

Then here you can see the $15 million award through the All Stations Accessibility Program that's renovating the Seattle Center monorail station, adding ADA upgrades there.

And then here you can see the last slide and this one includes the urban and community forestry program award for 12.9 million.

And that's actually our first award that we've received through the Inflation Reduction Act.

All the other funding that you see here is through the bipartisan infrastructure law.

But we're just now seeing money from the Inflation Reduction Act starting to trickle in.

So that's why this is the first one and we're continuing to apply for more.

And then on earmarks, just wanted to share a little bit about that too.

You'll hear this referred to as two different names.

In the Senate, it's congressionally directed spending.

On the House, it's community project funding.

We're just calling it earmarks here to keep it a little shorter, but it's essentially federal funding for a governmental entity or a nonprofit.

for a specific community project.

And there are certain eligibility criteria as well that we have to fit projects into, but it tends to be a little more flexible than some of the other grant programs.

And they're requested by members of Congress.

our congressional delegation will choose which projects resonate the most with them and they'll move them forward.

And we're currently in the process of developing our fiscal year 2025 earmark projects.

And we have the opportunity to uplift the projects of nonprofits or other organizations as well.

So you might start receiving some requests in the coming weeks.

as this kind of gears up a bit more from community organizations asking for your support.

And so that's a great way for us to uplift the projects in our community.

And these are the ones that we're hoping to see in the fiscal year 2024 appropriations package that we already went through.

Next I wanted to share about our 2024 federal goals.

And I think most of you have this already, but I'll make sure to send it around afterwards as well.

But this is a two-page document, very high level, but essentially it provides a high level view of what our priorities are at the federal level.

And you can see the language on the first page here.

This is the second page, but we start the process of updating this in the fall in September generally.

And we start with hearing from city departments, what changes they want, reaching out to council members.

So we'll be reaching out to you this fall and then also the mayor's office.

And then there's also a federal snapshot, that's what we're calling it, from 2023. It shows the highlights at the federal level, like the key grant awards that we've received or other big wins.

So this, as you can see here, the front page, last year the city received nearly $215 million from the federal government, some directly from the federal government, but other funding came, funneled through the state or through the county or PSRC.

And that's the second page of that too.

And I'll make sure to share these with you so you can take a deeper dive.

One other piece of our job is is engaging with our delegation and making sure they're aware of what the city's priorities are and top issues are.

And so we will set up tours and briefings for our delegation.

And these are oftentimes led by the departments and they do an amazing job showing all the great work that the city is doing.

But this just shows a sampling of some of the tours and briefings we did last year.

So if you have anything else that you're interested in showcasing, let me know and we'd be happy to try to set something up.

I'll let Leslie discuss the political overview.

You may have heard that there's going to be an election in November of 2024. And so I don't need to tell you about what's happening at the very top of the ticket.

But just in terms of the Senate and the House, on the Senate side, there are a couple of open seats where members have decided not to run for re-election that I think are very vulnerable this go around.

And that includes, believe it or not, Maryland.

with Larry Hogan, former governor, Republican, entering the race.

Of course, Joe Manchin's seat in West Virginia and Michigan Debbie Stabenow's seat will all be tightly competitive races.

And so, of course, this election may very well determine who controls the Senate going forward.

Next slide.

And so, you know, Democrats have a much more challenging map.

They're defending 23 seats while Republicans are just having to defend 11. So there are a number of races, as I mentioned, that we'll be watching very, very closely as we move forward.

On the House side, I think, you know, as mentioned before, Speaker Johnson has, at this moment in time, just a two-seat majority.

And I think there is some optimism that Democrats could flip the House.

I think there's a lot of attention being paid right now to a number of California seats that a Republican held, the New York maps getting redrawn.

And so I think there is a potential pathway to victory for Democrats in the House.

But needless to say, it's going to be an interesting six months ahead of us, a long six months ahead of us.

So that's the end of our presentation.

Any questions at all?

Council President, team, no questions here.

I guess following up on my statements last week about the number of grants and federal funding opportunities that, Director, you've helped Shepard and Sierra and Leslie, and you all have actually made happen.

So, Michelle, can't thank you enough for making this happen.

And Leslie, it's really great to see you again.

Colleagues, if you're ever in Washington, D.C., make sure to meet with Leslie and have her show you around.

She was one of the few meetings that I had during the pandemic in person, and it was just such a treat.

So thank you.

No question, because you answered the statement that I made last week through demonstration of so many slides that we couldn't sit on them for very long.

So job really well done securing that federal funding.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I have a couple questions about journalism.

As you know, I've been interested in this for a long time, driven in part by the education from Briar Dudley at the Seattle Times about actions that are happening or bills in DC that could help sustain journalism.

journalism across the country.

So one of the bills is Senate Bill 1094, which is the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act.

And this bill would set out a process by which the social media platforms negotiate with news content providers over the terms of use of that content.

And so what are the chances?

I mean, you provided me with a memo, but what...

What are the chances that that could pass?

It does have bipartisan support.

I believe it's 17 co-sponsors, eight Democrat, eight Republican, and one Independent.

So I think, you know, as I mentioned, I think this is a hard year once we get through appropriations to get major legislation through, especially as we're heading into an election year.

But I do think that having bipartisan, this is really a foundational year, and so building support for legislation like that that is already bipartisan is going to be really important.

I think, you know, you're seeing Congress starting to grapple with social media, with AI on a number of major issues.

And so you could see legislation like this getting folded in at some point.

I think it's just very hard for this session of Congress for that to happen.

And these are the ones that I've identified there.

The other one is the let's see.

It is, well, there are several of them, but the credit for newspapers, but however that's defined, some of these do have budget implications and others don't.

So am I wrong in thinking that the policy only pieces of legislation have a standing chance in anything that has an impact on the budget?

Well, the other interesting piece of legislation will be the 2017 tax credits or tax cut package that was passed by President Trump.

That expires in 2025, and there will be a renewed effort Some of those tax cuts will get renewed, some will not.

But there will definitely be a look at another tax package next year.

And so you could see some of that, that would be a vehicle for that to move forward.

I do think that both the policy pieces, just as you talk about social media broadly, Congress is really having to grapple with that right now.

And so I actually think both of them are a little bit challenging, but not impossible in the next session of Congress.

I agree completely, and we're happy to follow up with you further, too, about how we can pass this along to our congressional delegation and make sure that they're aware of your position and support.

Thanks.

Anybody else?

I do have one last question.

Okay, go ahead, Councilmember Kettle.

First, Director Tarleton, thank you so much for coming and for the complete rundown.

I really appreciate it.

Thank you for all the work done in Olympia.

Also, thank you for having the federal piece today.

As a veteran of D.C.

three times, I found it very interesting, and I enjoyed the conversation that we had.

Also, thank you for the printouts, the 24 federal goals.

I will say...

Thank you for that.

But I will say it's unfortunate that we don't have a bullet in there that says addresses the permissive environment that underlies our public safety challenges today.

So if you want input, bullet number one next year should be addressing the permissive environment underlying the public safety challenges we face in the city.

Quickly followed by...

the next bullet addressing the fentanyl and synthetic opioid crisis because this, as I've said many times, public safety, public health, both sides of the same coin, and we cannot succeed in public safety if we don't also succeed in public health.

I will quickly say, too, right after that is the bullet regarding alternative response and accountability.

So I just want to make that point very clear as well.

And one thing I was thinking about in looking at this and looking at past federal response support beyond the various points mentioned.

I think it's actually in here, the All Inside program, which was very important related to homelessness.

I would call for a version of that, you know, safety on the outside by having that same approach for that two-sided coin, public safety and public health.

And I think if we had a focus from the federal to support that process, particularly on the fentanyl on the public health side, but also elements on the public safety side would be so beneficial to our city.

And so I just wanted to note that now and give you an early heads up for bullet number one next year.

And again, thank you so much for coming to us today.

I really appreciate it.

Thank you, Council Member.

We'll make sure to add that as feedback for 2025. Thank you.

What is...

When last year I know that Senator Cantwell was talking to a lot of local electeds and leaders in the behavioral health space and addiction sectors.

And I'm wondering in one of her top priorities was increasing Medicaid reimbursement levels.

And so can you tell me how far did that go?

Well, I do know that Washington State recently received a waiver through the Medicaid reimbursement program, and I'm happy to share those details with you.

I think that announcement was made about two weeks ago, two or three weeks ago.

I do know that Senator Cantwell is continuing to work very closely on the fentanyl crisis as well, outside of just the Medicaid reimbursement issue.

But, Leslie, do you have anything else?

No, I think that's exactly right.

I know this is a top priority for her.

Her team is looking at legislation that they'd like to get introduced, really kind of comprehensive pensional legislation.

So that's another area that we're working closely with them on.

Thank you.

Okay, seeing no other questions or hands raised here.

Madam Council President?

Oh, yes, please.

Yeah.

So I have a question.

And first off, I just want to thank you, Director Charlton, for a very fantastic, insightful, in this case, federal overview.

Thank you, Michelle, Leslie, and Sierra as well.

I have a question pertaining to your slide five, I believe.

It's the appropriations update.

You know, list out a few kind of key projects there.

And including...

I'll call out the South Park items.

So there's a $3 million investment for the South Park drainage improvements.

And there's also a $1 million investment in South Park for passive house multifamily development.

So as the city representative of South Park and District 1, I'm delighted to see that.

And just as an aside, I had the pleasure of touring, you know, an SPU pump station in South Park and touring the flood plains area, King Tides, of course, huge, important that we track and monitor what's going on and have the facilities and infrastructure in place to make sure, you know, we are taking care taking care of the people in South Park.

So love to see that investment.

Just curious to, I just want to make sure I understand next steps on that.

So later this week, there's a key vote and when, and what will that effectively accomplish?

So we are expecting that Congress will pass these, pass the first tranche of appropriations bills.

It's six appropriations bills this Friday, by this Friday.

And so that's gonna include both of these earmarks, the South Park drainage improvements and the South Park passive house.

Got it.

And then from there, the agencies will start reaching out to the departments that are responsible for administering these funding.

And it's unfortunately a somewhat elongated process, but it'll take several months.

They'll submit paperwork, and then they'll be able to draw down the funds after that.

Got it.

Thank you.

Oh, I was just trying to get attention for Council Member Saka, but I will say just in the spirit of Council Member Saka, he is the king of filling potholes in our city, but we do not want him to be the king of tides, maybe the king of holding back the tide in this sense.

So good on you, Council Member.

Okay, so this is not goodbye, correct?

Director Tarleton, you will be appearing before us one more time after the session in Olympia, correct?

So that's to your discretion, Madam President.

The session will end on Thursday, and the state team is available to brief you on Monday, March 11th.

March 18th, I believe, Anna Johnson is out.

I think she's out.

So hopefully, if you would like a follow-up, just debrief of what the session was.

They'll have a chance to tell you about the budgets and what capital operating and transportation budgets, what ended up in there, what ended up not in there.

That would be a timely thing to provide on March 11th, if you have the time.

on your calendar.

Okay, well, I want to hear about the budgets, but I also want to be able to properly express my appreciation for your service to the city.

So shall I tell Samira Nana that we should plan on March 11th?

Yes, I need to make sure the person who's minding the briefing schedule in my office is fine with that.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you all for extra time today, but a lot will happen this week, unusually, in both the federal government and the state government.

So stay tuned for Friday night.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

Up next, I believe Councilmember Moore has a proclamation recognizing March 2024 to be Women's History Month.

Councilmember Moore?

Please lead the discussion on the proclamation for any additional feedback before I request signatures to be affixed to it.

All right.

Well, thank you very much, Council President.

And my office is putting forth a proclamation.

And I wanted to thank the Women's Commission for their work in creating this proclamation.

And I also want to thank my colleagues in the Mayor's Office for your contributions.

I am told that all of the suggested additions to our first draft have been incorporated into the final proclamation, which we have in front of us today to proclaim March 2024. to be Women's History Month.

So the celebration of Women's History Month dates back to 1987, and I'm bringing this proclamation forward to you today in March 2024 to both celebrate the accomplishments of women, but to also recognize the work that is still needed to eliminate barriers for all women in our society.

This proclamation specifically recognizes the lack of gender parity in leadership roles, the continuing attack on women's reproductive rights, the lack of affordable childcare, alarming rates of domestic violence, and lack of access to healthcare as well as culturally competent healthcare as significant barriers to women's participation and success in all levels of our society.

So before I ask my colleagues to add their signature proclaiming March 2024 to be Women's History Month, I was wondering if there are any comments or suggestions for the proclamation.

Thank you.

Sure, I'll make a comment.

Okay, thank you.

I want to thank you for bringing this.

You may or may not know, colleagues, that in Seattle, women still only make 79 cents on the dollar.

And we have, including some of our city workers.

So I think it's really important that we acknowledge that there are still pay disparities.

There are still challenges that we have.

in reaching that kind of pay equity and parity for folks.

And it really does have serious implications on the ability of people to pay, support their families, pay for childcare, and really have an opportunity to thrive in the city.

So this is something that we do every year.

And every year, we hope that the parity issue is addressed and we're still working on it.

So maybe by next year, we will have a little bit better pay equity for folks.

And thank you for bringing this.

We will continue to carry on.

Thank you.

Council President?

Yes.

I just wanted to say briefly, A, I think it's important as one of the three male council members on the dais to express support and to highlight how important it is to be mindful.

I think that is very important to understand the circumstances that drive all the whereas in this proclamation and speak up when we need to.

And there's little ways we can do that.

Here in Seattle, we often hear about the Kraken.

And as you've heard me say more than once, and the storm.

And I think it's important to have that balance, in this example, to highlight the Seattle storm.

It's not just the Seattle Kraken.

Little things like that come up, and I think it's important for us, and particularly the male members of this dais, to highlight that.

And I think that shows that intentionality related to the proclamation.

And also, it's very important to model for our girls I won't go into my moniker from the campaign trail, but we really should do that.

And one last thing from District 7. I want to take the opportunity to highlight for us and for the city the incredible story out of Queen Anne and District 7 where four women, four moms, got together with two law school students and fought for their children who were disabled.

And because of those four women, we have education for all, for education for those disabled children.

And that generated out of Queen Anne.

And it was supported by Governor Dan Evans.

and it became law, HB 90, it became law in Washington State.

And five years, approximately five years later, Senator Magnuson took it to Washington, D.C., and word for word, practically, that would never happen today, became U.S. law, education for all.

It was later subsumed into ADA, but it all came from the work of four women on Queen Anne, and I just wanted to take the opportunity to give a little shout-out to that as an example where those voices were heard and change was made to happen.

Thank you.

Council President, thank you.

I want to say that as a woman and as a mother of two daughters, pay equity is a huge issue for me.

And I want to say it's not just a Seattle issue.

It's a national issue.

We see these numbers across the nation.

And, you know, I feel really proud to be able to, as a body, bring attention to this via this proclamation, but also to remind us that, you know, we are not alone.

And this is something that very much at the federal level needs to be addressed as well.

Well, as I grew up in a household where my mom was a member of the National Organization for Women, and so I very much appreciate this.

I'll save my comments for tomorrow, but thank you very much for putting this forward.

I used to call her a woman's liver, not liver, but anyway.

Okay.

Thank you.

All right, if there's no further discussion, will the clerk please call the roll to determine which council members would like their signatures affixed to the proclamation recognizing March 2024 to be Women's History Month.

Council Member Kettle.

Aye.

Council Member Moore.

Aye.

Council Member Morales.

Yes.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Wu.

Yes.

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Nine signatures will be affixed.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Okay, now we'll begin our next item on the agenda, which is a discussion of what happened last week and what's coming up this week, and we'll go in the established roll call order.

Today it is Councilmember Kettle, then Moore, Morales, Rivera, Saka, Strauss, Wu, Hollingsworth, and me.

Okay, Councilmember Kettle, would you like to start us off?

Yes, thank you, Council President.

Upcoming this week is a Board of Health orientation, which is very important, as mentioned in my earlier comments regarding public health and public safety.

And also with my colleague to my right, we have a meeting of the Regional Water Quality Committee, which is very important in terms of our public utilities.

I also wanted to highlight that my office will be represented at the South Lake Union Community Council meeting, tomorrow in the Queen Anne Community Council meeting on Wednesday.

Very important to support those neighborhood organizations.

Thank you.

Am I next?

Yes.

I don't have much to add other than to say that I have been having district hours every Thursday afternoon and I've implemented them the first Saturday mornings as well as one Wednesday evening a month.

And I've been overwhelmed at the number of people who have signed up to talk to me.

So I'm very, very pleased to be able to provide that opportunity to be available in person as well as remotely.

And I'm getting the full gamut of of issues that are confronting our city.

But it's really been a pleasure to actually be able to meet with people one-on-one and to establish those relationships and to feel like to have the privilege of people putting their faith in you that you're going to be able to make a difference.

So thank you to everyone who's been coming to those district hours.

I really appreciate the opportunity to meet with you.

Thank you.

Council Member Morales.

Thank you.

I will be very brief.

Let's see.

The Land Use Committee will meet this week at two o'clock on Wednesday.

We'll have a presentation from the Equitable Development Initiative folks to talk to us about that program and how it relates to some of the legislative discussions we've been having.

This week, I'll be attending the PSRC Growth Management Policy Board meeting.

That is one of my regional committees that I sit on.

This past weekend, oh, and then also related to land use tomorrow, for everyone's information, the comprehensive plan will officially be released.

There will be a series of open houses over the next couple of months, including one in each council district.

So that information will be available to us tomorrow.

There will also be, and my office is going to be working with the Office of Planning and Community Development to make sure that each district knows the location and time and communication strategy there.

And then we will also be getting, as a full council, a briefing on Monday next.

Is that right, Council President?

Yes.

Okay.

So we will be getting a briefing here on Monday afternoon so that those of you who aren't on the Land Use Committee can still begin to get an understanding of what this is all about.

This weekend, I attended the Resource Equity event sponsored by the Black Legacy Homeownership Program and Caleb Jackson and the work that he does on supporting black homeowners and black developers.

I was joined by OPCD to talk with those folks about some of the things that are coming down, both with a comprehensive plan and the impact of House Bill 1110 on community and what opportunities they might have.

And this weekend, my office will be meeting with Restaurant to Garden, which is a neighborhood organization that supports local businesses, elder, gardeners, and community volunteers by taking restaurant food waste and turning it into compost.

So those are some of the things we've got going on this week.

And that's my report.

Council Member Ribera.

Thank you, Council Member Morales.

My next in-district office hours will be held this Thursday at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford.

Time slots are filled up again, so I'm glad they're being well-received.

My first one was in Magnuson Park, and we were fully booked, so it really reiterates the importance of being out in community and listening to constituents, and that's in addition to the work that we do.

We will always meet with a constituent via at city hall or in the district or by phone.

So we have a commitment to be responsive to all constituents.

In terms of policy, I'll be holding my next libraries, education and neighborhoods committee meeting on March 14th.

At that meeting, we will be receiving a briefing from Seattle Public Libraries And speaking of libraries, very exciting news.

The Northeast Branch Library opens today after being closed for a few months for some needed HVAC updates.

The community really missed it, and we got emails about how thrilled everyone is that it is reopening.

So that's really a terrific thing.

And then lastly, I want to express I'm very pleased to see that the gun violence, prevention legislation bills passed in Olympia.

It's something that I care deeply about and I know our district cares about in terms of the public safety space and keeping youth safe in the city and in the district.

And then toward that end, I want to say that I just continue my conversations with the chief and others on youth gun violence across the city and ways that we can work together to reduce that and keep our kids safe in the schools and across the city.

Thank you, Council Member Saka.

All right.

Thank you, Council Member Rivera.

So on the Transportation Committee front, big news.

Last week, the Seattle Transportation Plan, the proposed Seattle Transportation Plan, it has been transmitted last week from the mayor's office downstairs here to the second floor.

to the legislative department.

So the transportation committee has scheduled two discussions starting at tomorrow's committee meeting.

And the transportation plan, it really does set the stage for the new levy proposal.

And so I would encourage colleagues, I would encourage all of you to pay attention to the Seattle transportation plan.

Feel free to join, even if you are not a member of our transportation committee, feel free to join.

Tomorrow, we're gonna learn more about it, receive a briefing on that.

Happy to have individual conversations with you outside, focus solely on the Seattle transportation plan.

Don't hesitate to reach out and request your own briefings on this really, really important topic.

And just as an aside, look, everyone is welcome to our Transportation Committee meetings on a regular basis.

I intend to be very transparent and collaborative.

And there are certain ones that are going to be more I guess productive or potentially useful for you all given all the competing time demands and priorities we all have going on.

Tomorrow's briefing, at least certainly for the Seattle transportation plan component would be one of those good ones.

But again, plenty of opportunities to connect and engage.

I spent the weekend on two things.

As a dad of three young kids, I spent the weekend on baseball.

We're teeing up for youth baseball season.

So recreation and community baseball in West Seattle, love it.

And then, so that occupied a good chunk of my weekend.

And then of course, diving deep into the Seattle Transportation Plan and it's 600 plus pages.

So, but, really riveting reading, colleagues, so check it out.

And then tomorrow on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting, we'll also dive deeper into the state of bridges, and there's a really critical opportunity.

The city has over 150 bridges in the city, and many are maintained, owned, and operated by the city, not all.

And so there's an opportunity there.

We'll learn more about that tomorrow.

And we will also hear from SDOT about an art project on the columns of the Fauntleroy Expressway.

I am looking forward to hearing from them.

about their consultation with our local tribes and tribal organizations.

And then finally, I am also looking forward to talking to each of you colleagues about your respective priorities for the upcoming transportation levy.

Had some initial conversations with a few of you, we'll continue those.

But we all need to gear up for our formal discussions with the executive, to start, which will start in late May, or excuse me, late April, early May timeframe.

That is all I have on transportation right now.

Anyone have any questions, comments, feedback?

Did you happen to mention that I missed the timeframe for any vote on the plan?

We, so it's an excellent question.

It's technically hasn't, And it's not technically, well, it's in our court, but it has to make its way through the IRC process right now.

So first things first, we're going to get the briefing, an initial briefing tomorrow.

We will talk about that tomorrow.

That's an important item.

But, you know, I don't want to rush.

I want to be deliberative and thoughtful.

And, yeah.

To be continued.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Council Member Saka.

And I'll say that I tried looking at all of the maps for the transportation plan and it got a bit jumbled.

And luckily, SDOT knows how to use ArcGIS.

And so the modal elements on their website are a really helpful way to digest all that information.

Excited for tomorrow.

Colleagues, our next committee of the Finance, Native Communities, and Tribal Governments Committee will be held this Wednesday, March 6th.

This meeting will be focusing on the Native Communities and Tribal Governments subject area within the purview of the committee.

We'll be joined by our Tribal Relations Director, Tim Raynon, and our Indigenous Advisory Council Liaison, Francesca Murnon.

In addition to that, we will be joined by two of our Indigenous Advisory Council members, the Honorable Council Member Suzanne Salto of the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe and Derek Belgrade, the Executive Director of the Chief Seattle Club.

We'll be covering an overview of the work within these two bodies of work, one body being Office of Intergovernmental Relations with Tim and one with the Indigenous Advisory Council with Francesca.

In future meetings, we will dive more deeply into the sections of their work.

similar to the budget overview that we had in the last committee meeting where we will be diving in more deeply on some of those slides in future meetings the same is true for this week so again all council members are invited to attend any of all of our FNC meetings and Yeah, big issues are small.

I'd love to have you there.

Council President, I'm still endeavoring to get you the requested dates of the Select Budget Committee.

I've just today been able to pass off the draft schedule with my Vice Chair, and we just need to circle back and make sure we're on the same page.

Great, thank you.

Just because everyone's talking about, I've been trying to keep my remarks focused on my committee work, but everyone's talking about office hours.

I also hold them every week in person and virtually.

This is actually the first week that we're skipping because we have, I'm attending the Phinney neighborhood, the Phinney community council meeting, as well as the swearing in of the Seattle fire department recruit class.

So with some scheduling issues there, we're looking forward to being back at it next week.

In regional committees, I attended the Sound Transit board retreat in Everett last Thursday.

It was a really great opportunity to reconnect in person for returning board members and a wonderful way to join the board for new members.

Council President, I hope we can figure out a way to schedule a retreat because that relationship building without having to take votes or being briefed on material was incredibly useful.

I'd say the biggest outcome of it was a recommitment to regionalism by the Sound Transit board members.

And what I mean by that is each of us as members representing jurisdictions not to be parochial about what happens in our area that I need mine before you can get yours, but rather to be representative of the best on the ground information so that we all can make the best regional transportation network possible.

One example of this is If we had already today finished the spine of Sound Transit from Tacoma to Everett, it would be easier for us to be working on the West Seattle and Ballard extensions.

And the reason it would be easier is because we would not be in the back of our mind, cost benefit analysis on, for us to get a tunnel in West Seattle that connects down to White Center, back to Renton-Kent and up the east side, That's a conversation that is out of the scope of many board members' minds today because we have not finished the spine.

The same with the Ballard extension.

If we had completed the spine, it would be really easy for us to talk about the need to not stop in Ballard, but to get to Crown Hill and to get to 105th and Greenwood and then back to Northgate and onward.

And so that's the excitement about recommitting to regionalism.

Eastside Link will be open on April 27th at 10 a.m.

Everyone's invited to join, as well as the date for Linwood Light Rail Extension will be announced.

later this year, we're looking at fall at this time.

And so there were no decisions made during the retreat, rather it was a productive session for us to review the financing, long-range plans and rider experiences on Sound Transit buses, Bus Rapid Transit, light rail and heavy rail through the Sounder.

I will say that it is very important for me that the user experience is centered so that folks are not having to navigate unsafe situations, drug use on the trains, or garbage.

So those are some of my guiding principles there.

Also in regional committees last Tuesday, I'm sorry I wasn't with you on Tuesday, I was at an AWC bylaws meeting.

We were reviewing and preparing to update the Association of Washington City's bylaws for the first time in a long time.

Some of the issues arising are increased population in our largest cities, and the potential for annexation in Vancouver in particular.

For reference, our city of Seattle had to be left off of some charge because the next biggest city in the state is a third of our population.

And so there was a conversation about population centers versus geographic.

It's going to be a robust conversation.

And one interesting piece of information which was reported about was about perception.

Large cities believe that small cities' voices are overrepresented.

Small cities think that large cities' voices are overrepresented, and medium-sized cities don't believe that their voice is represented enough.

So what this says is it's generally working fine, and on the other hand, there are clearly improvements that can be made so that all 281 cities and towns feel adequately represented.

So I'll be sure to keep you updated on as this work continues.

And again, I'll put in a plug for Association Washington City's annual conference in Vancouver, Washington, June 18th through the 20th, which I will be requesting to be excused from full council for at a later date.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you, colleagues.

Any questions?

Seeing none, I'll pass it over to Council Member Wood.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So we had our second Seattle City Light Sustainability Arts and Culture Committee meeting where we received an introduction to Seattle's power supply and learned more about one of Seattle City Light's partners, the Bonneville Power Administration.

This is the head of legislation we'll see this year.

So our next meeting will be March 15th and we'll hopefully be fulfilling some appointments as well as a briefing on legislation from Seattle City Light.

This past week, I attended two ShotSpotter public comment events, one in person and one virtually.

I also attended the State of Africatown and got to hear Councilmember Hollingsworth speak.

Also went to Seattle Opera's Life and Times of Malcolm X, which was a great experience.

Also attended the Sui Sing Chamber of Labor, I guess, celebration where I got to meet small business owners from all along the West Coast in LA, Oakland, Sacramento, and San Francisco.

And if there are no further questions, I'll pass this to Councilmember Hollingsworth.

Thank you, Councilmember Wu.

I see Councilmember Moore's hand.

Is that an old hand?

Right.

Okay.

Old hand.

Oh, okay, my apologies.

Thank you, Council Member Wu.

Parks Utilities Technology Committee, we met last week.

Council Member Nelson brought up, we'll be addressing Council Bill 120725. Cedar River Watershed that passed 5-0 out of our committee that protects our watershed and the aquifer that runs through the ground.

We also had an overview of our IT department for their 2024 goals and projects.

And we also had Seattle Public Utilities come and speak about their overview infrastructure, current long-term projects.

how we're gonna improve the infrastructure as we continue to grow as a city, rates, impact, and keeping Seattle affordable as well.

Our next meeting will be March 13th at 2 p.m.

and we're currently organizing that agenda.

Council Member Kettle also mentioned him and myself will be the Regional Water Quality Committee.

We are going to get a water treatment report, talk about sewer rates, wastewater treatment.

And I also believe we're going to kind of finalize the work plan for 2024 as well.

Other things, I have a ship canal water quality.

quality project tour.

I believe Council Member Strauss is joining us on that tour, so I'm excited about that on Friday.

Always anything to get us out the office and into Ballard and Council Member Strauss' district.

District three, State of Africatown meeting, which was phenomenal this weekend, which I saw some of our council members.

Also, having a public safety meeting.

This will be our third public safety meeting.

As you all know, we've been very aggressive with these meetings, talking to aggressive meeting scheduling, having these meetings.

This is our third meeting that we'll be having in the Leschi community.

This is also...

Right on time because there were three people that were shot this weekend on Capitol Hill, unfortunately.

So we'll be having it at Leschi.

We'll have the mayor's office, SPD, and myself.

And then in the next two weeks, we'll be hosting one on Capitol Hill, which will be at Seattle College.

So very grateful for them hosting this meeting.

The one that we are having tomorrow at 6 o'clock will be at the Central Area Senior Center in Leschi.

I'm also attending the Capitol Hill Business Talk GSBA this week as well, which is important because our small businesses are struggling right now.

And so we're going to go talk to them about some improvements the city can make and be a listening ear.

And with that, I'll pass it to our council.

Oh, there's a question.

Yeah.

Council Member Hollingsworth, only because you mentioned our ship.

ship canal water quality project tour.

I checked with your team, you're not available, but I was gonna try and set us up with a boat tour afterwards.

So anyone who wants to come to Ballard, I will set you up on a boat tour of our working waterfront that Council Member Kettle also represents.

Well, that would have been fun.

That was last minute for you to invite.

We can always do it again.

Okay.

We got a couple years.

I got you.

Thank you.

And I'll pass it off to Council Member, or excuse me, Council President Nelson.

All right.

Can you throw in maybe a tour through the tunnel or into the catchment thing?

That is such an amazing project.

I'm kind of kidding because I don't even know if I can do that.

But I've been watching that project evolve.

And it's near my family business.

And it's huge.

And it would be great to see it as it's before it's actually complete and full of potentially wastewater.

Okay, so I'll talk now about my stuff.

All right, there is nothing up for a vote tomorrow from the Governance, Accountability, and Economic Development Committee in our next meeting.

That committee's meeting is on March 14th.

I'll tell you more about what's on the agenda next week.

As for what is going on this week, I met for the first time with two members of the Seattle Indigenous Advisory Council.

This council, correct me if I'm wrong, was formed in, I believe it was 2022, could have been 2023, 2022. And we, you know, the two people that I met were Jackie McCormick and Suzanne Salto, who will be in your meeting committee this coming week.

It was so...

We're so aligned on addiction, the need for urgent prioritization of addiction prevention, and especially among youth and treatment and education.

getting our state and folks at the federal level mobilized on that.

And so that was a really interesting and fruitful conversation.

I look forward to seeing what happens and what unfolds in the Finance Committee.

So that was just this morning.

And then on Thursday, I will be making some introductory remarks at the Downtown Seattle Association State of Downtown event on Thursday afternoon.

So I get from now until then to get really nervous about that.

So those are some top of mind things that I'm thinking about right now.

And before we adjourn, I would like to offer you the opportunity, Council Member Moore, if you still would like to ask a question, because I would like to have some closing remarks.

Oh, thank you.

I just realized that I forgot to mention that the mayor's office is actually sponsoring a day of women tomorrow.

And there will be an event held at the Bertha Knight Landis room over the lunch hour and I think throughout the day.

So there will be activities to participate in.

And just to note, Bertha Knight Landis was our first female mayor.

So thank you.

Thank you.

So I wanted to recognize that in line with talking about some of the vision and some of the things that our past Council President Juarez got done, I wanted to say hello to Sarah Mays here in Chambers, who was a staff member in that office, and really great to see you still here, or here again, and looking forward to working with you, and I know that my staff are as well.

And then I just wanted to note, colleagues, before we adjourn, that as you have heard, I wanted to recognize the Retirement of Legislative, of the Legislative Department Director of Human Resources, Services, and Finance, Karen Jackson, and thank her from the bottom of my heart for her 10 years of service.

As HR Director, Karen led her team, and every employee of the legislative department through years of extraordinary and tumultuous change, I have to say.

probably a really difficult time to be an HR director.

And she did so with tremendous warmth and professionalism and the street smarts that she has accumulated over the course of many, many, many years working in the HR field.

And so I just really wanted to say thank you, and I will miss her.

Many of you were not here, but the people that have been here for a long time have entrusted her with their most thorniest personnel issues, some of the decisions that come with major life changes like the birth of a child or the need for extended leave of absence to care for a family member or whatever.

And so she's just really done a great job on top of everything else, just keeping us afloat during the changes, especially during the pandemic era.

Thank you very much, Karen.

And her last day will be this March 8th, so Friday.

And after that date, Justin Roberge will become director of HR Finance.

And this is a transition plan that was blessed by Council President Juarez and which I fully endorse.

Justin has served as the finance manager for the past seven years and worked in the same capacity in the private sector before being hired with the city.

So he's got extensive background in organizational finance, and there's broad agreement that we'll be in good hands under his leadership.

So we'll be welcoming him.

Now, you might be thinking, well, what about HR?

Well, to fulfill the division's HR functions in Karen's absence and wake and departure, we're in the process of interviewing certified HR specialists as candidates for the vacant finance HR deputy director position.

And we hope to have that individual in place in early April or May.

So that's what's going on.

Thank you very much, Karen.

We were not, I personally, many council members were not able to attend your going away because we were riveted during the course of the finance meeting.

So thank you very much for your service.

All right, any other business?

Seeing none, this meeting is adjourned and it is 3.30.

Thanks, everyone.