Parks, Public Utilities and Technology Committee 6/12/24

Well, good afternoon, everyone.

It is June 12th, 2024. Meeting of Parks, Public Utilities, and Technology Committee will come to order.

Time is 2.03.

I'm Joy Hollingsworth, Chair of the Committee.

Will the Clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Kettle?

Here.

Councilmember Rivera?

Present.

Councilmember Strauss?

Present.

Council President Nelson?

Present.

Five council members are present.

Thank you.

We have also like to note, Council Member Strauss, I'm waiting for you to get a D3 flag in the back.

I see City of Seattle, Washington State, USA flag.

Can we get a D6 flag coming up?

Well, you know, funny thing, I can't find a City of Ballard flag.

City of Ballard, Leschi, Bryant, West Seattle, and one other were all annexed in 1907, but I can't find one in the archives.

I got you.

Still looking, though.

It's time for you to create one.

We have two items on the agenda today.

We have a presentation by the Urban...

urban forestry from our Department of Parks and Recreation.

Super excited about that.

And we also have Council Bill 120797. It's an ordinance that will authorize Seattle Center Director to modify an existing agreement between our city and the Seattle Repertory Theater.

We will now consider the agenda and if there are no objections, the agenda will be adopted.

Seeing none, the agenda is adopted.

With that, the next step will open up the hybrid public comment.

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

Clerk, how many speakers do we have signed up today?

Currently, we have no in-person speaker signed up and there is one remote speaker.

Awesome, okay.

Each speaker will get two minutes.

Can you please read the instructions for public comment?

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

I will call on speakers by name in the order in which they are registered, both on the council's website or from the sign-up sheet available here in council chambers.

If you have not registered to speak but would like to, you can sign up before the end of the public comment period.

Just go to the council's website or by signing up on the sign-up sheet near the public comment microphone.

The online link is listed on today's agenda.

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

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

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

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

The speaker for virtual public comment is Sandy Schettler.

Once I call your name, I will unmute the microphone and an automatic prompt of you have been unmuted will be the speaker's cue that it is their turn to speak and the speaker must press star six to begin speaking.

Sandy Shetler, this is your public comment.

Great, thank you.

Hi, council members.

This is Sandy Shetler with Tree Action Seattle.

Thank you for the urban forest briefing today.

I wanted to express some concern about the parks steep slope, natural areas being overrun with ivy.

One that we can all see is off of I-5 below St. Mark's Cathedral.

The slopes are too steep for volunteers to safely work on, and these forests are slowly dying, suffocated under the weight of invasive vines.

We've been asking for parks crews to save these trees, but they are short-staffed.

At a certain point, the trees will be dead and the slopes will no longer be stable, endangering people and property below.

The most recent parks plan stated that forest restoration work in natural areas would be done by the end of 2026 and resources would shift to maintenance.

I don't think we're that close and I hope that you will help parks prioritize saving our existing steep slope native forest.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Ms. Shetlar.

I know that's important to us to make sure we're saving trees and continue.

I know parks as well.

So we're looking forward to the presentation today.

If there's no additional people who have signed up online or in person, we will now proceed to our items of business.

Clerk, will you please read agenda item one into the record?

Agenda item number one is a presentation from Seattle Parks and Recreation on urban forestry.

This is for briefing and discussion.

Presenting today are Christopher Williams and Stephanie Shelton of Seattle Parks and Recreation.

Awesome, thank you both.

Please make your way to the table.

Thank you for coming today to discuss what Parks is doing for our tree canopy and all the great work that you all are doing in our city.

I have said this before in meetings, and everyone knows up here that my dad worked at Parks for 35 years, I think the task that you all have now is different than what he had to endure 35 years ago.

And I was just with a parks employee at Garfield High School who was there making sure the pool, Maker Evers was clean and the pathways.

And he had talked about all the work that he had been doing at the park to manicure and make it look good for the community.

and just talking about the work he was doing with youth and kids outside of parks as well and how important it is.

So anyways, when I saw him, I saw my dad in him just because of his love and passion for parks and manicuring and making sure they're safe and clean.

So thank you both for being here.

Please state your name for the record and you can jump into your presentation.

Christopher Williams, Seattle Parks, Chief of Staff.

Stephanie Shelton, Parks Natural Resource Unit Manager, Parks and Environment.

Great, so maybe I'll dive in with some introductory remarks.

And I think first and foremost, we are here in response to a request by this group several weeks ago when we made a presentation.

You wanted to know more about our approach to managing the Seattle Park and Recreation inventory of trees.

So we're here to provide for a comprehensive presentation on our tree management approach.

So, as a reminder, this is a presentation only.

We're not asking for a vote at the end of the presentation today.

It is just information about an important area of our work.

There are an estimated 600,000 trees in our developed parks and natural areas, and we take this responsibility very seriously.

The Seattle Parks and Recreation System can literally be described as a vast collection of trees.

Next slide.

All right, I guess we're there.

We received some great questions from council members and your staff in advance of the briefing today, and we thank you for that input.

Your input helped inform this presentation.

Today, we will describe how Seattle Parks and Recreation Tree and Forestry Program works in close partnership with the Office of Sustainability and environment and with other city departments working with trees, including the Seattle Department of Transportation and SPU and other city departments.

We will talk about what we learned from the tree canopy assessment in SPR.

And lastly, we will describe our program, its initiatives, their funding, and how these commitments are helping to grow and support our contribution to tree canopy.

Today's presentation is a mix of science, best practices, combined with a report out on the social environmental impacts trees have in our neighborhoods and communities.

We will make sure to leave enough time at the end to answer questions.

So with that, I'll turn it over to Stephanie.

Okay, sure.

We'll start by sharing some of the big picture perspective around the park system.

Our department manages roughly about 12% of the total land mass of Seattle.

That's more than 6,400 acres of parkland across the city.

We contribute to over 19% of the city's total tree canopy.

We divide our parkland into natural areas and green belts with about 2,500 acres of natural areas and green belts and about 2,300 acres of developed parkland.

Park, forest, and trees are increasingly critical to public health as we experience the impacts of climate change in urban areas, changes such as hotter summers and heat dome effects.

We have two core programs within the department, one in our developed parks and second in our natural areas.

We'll share more about each of those programs and their funding and how each are working to sustain healthy forests and surrounding communities.

All of our work, including our tree programs in parks, bringing in equity and social justice lens on that work, and how we're delivering and managing resources in historically marginalized neighborhoods.

I also want to note that Seattle Park and Recreation is a local and national leader in forestry management practices across the country.

The Green Seattle Partnership is a model that's been copied by other cities across the nation, and we recently received international recognition as a United Nations Role Model City for our community-based restoration forestry program.

So with that, I will turn it over to Stephanie Shelton.

Thank you, Christopher.

So as Christopher mentioned, Parks Collaborates is part of a citywide framework.

We're organized with other city departments that work with trees under the Urban Forestry Management Plan.

And we work with the Office of Sustainability and Environment really closely in that work.

Since 2007, this plan has created an organizing structure for departments to assess current conditions, establish goals, and chart a path towards long-term management of our natural resources.

Some key components that I want to call out from that plan are setting a 30% tree canopy and equity goal that we're hoping to reach by 2037. Conducting a citywide canopy assessment every five years to measure our progress towards that goal, which we'll talk more about, specifically around parks.

Setting department-wide reporting and monitoring targets.

Establishing interdepartmental working groups for collaboration on trees, including an urban forest core team and an interdisciplinary team that parks serves on and is very active.

So the mayor's one Seattle tree plan went into effect, excuse me, I'm gonna go back to be missing a slide.

Let's just take a quick look.

Yeah.

So I'm missing my slide on the one executive tree plan, but I'm just gonna read a few comments around that because it's important.

So actually I know I'm on the right side, I'm good, okay.

The Mayor's One Seattle Tree Plan went into effect in the middle of 2023, so it's less than a year old, and it outlines a strategy to protect and expand tree planting and tree care on public land.

And it really provides key policy guidance for city staff who work with trees.

And a few things I wanted to highlight about the executive order through a parks lens.

It sets a more stringent replacement requirement for tree removal.

So sets ratios at three to one with two to one replacement for hazard trees.

Our own data collection and research conducted by our partners in other cities has shown us that best practices for ensuring that trees grow and thrive to become future canopy is to provide this five years of robust care.

So the executive order really empowers us with this stewardship directive.

This is becoming even more important with climate change and increasing heat and drought conditions in spring and summer, and also changes in historic rainfall patterns.

And Stephanie, we actually have a question.

I apologize.

I wanted to let my colleagues, I know this is a lengthy presentation.

So if you have questions throughout the presentations, please raise your hand.

Council Member Kettle, you're recognized.

Thank you, Chair Hollingsworth.

Sometimes we ask questions at the end, sometimes as we go along.

So I just wanted to clarify that if you're wondering why I was heading over there and coming back.

And obviously, as you know, I just met with OSCE and SDCI, so I'm primed, and I know the public commenter online, so well-primed, and my mentor, if you will, the former council member, Alex Peterson, so well-primed here.

One of the questions, two questions, one on the previous slide, is I recognize we have all these different players involved, and...

You know, oftentimes when everyone's in charge, no one's in charge.

And, you know, is there a first among equals in terms of kind of leading the charge?

Because I know SDOT is huge in this in terms of right-of-way.

Parks is huge for all that you do and related to, you know, tree canopy.

But is there, you know, a...

single point for the mayor to go to first, or is it truly a council of equals?

No, I'm happy to answer that question, and it's a great question, and I absolutely agree on what's behind the question.

In this instance around trees, we organize ourselves with the Office of Sustainability and Environment as kind of holding the container, if you will, for us.

They become kind of the organizing force, and so They schedule and manage our quarterly meetings with the two work groups that I talked about.

All of our data collection gets rolled up to them historically, and they have made a really big leap in the last six months in hiring an urban-wide city forester.

It's something that the city has been wanting to do for a long time and just came to fruition.

So we have Lauren Erkinson, who I think presented to council last month, and our staff work with her really closely.

And so, yes, to that OSC.

Which I think came about from an amendment, if I remember right, that former council member Peterson.

So, uh, um, one of the things that, you know, one of the drivers for me to run was, you know, keeping city halls feet to the fire.

And one of the challenges that we would have is like talking to one department on whatever issue.

And they would say, no, no, this other department's in charge.

You go to them and they say, no, it was them.

And council member Strauss and I had this happen when, within my first hundred days, which was really interesting to have it happen.

It wasn't anything with parks, just put that at rest.

And, um, you know, as a sitting council member to have it happen was quite interesting.

And as it goes to the next page of the next slide, in terms of like, you know, planting care, for example, parks and SDOT.

The Queen Anne Boulevard is a park, but it's a boulevard.

And because of climate change and so forth, there's been an age, because the park is essentially a little over 100 years old, so there's an age issue too.

So there's been a massive swap out of taking trees down, planting new trees, and to this change to five years.

My understanding was that there was going to be a three-year watering plan, and I'm not sure if that's happening, because it doesn't seem to be happening based on my just walking the dog observations.

And so, A, is that something, you know, that you can speak to in terms of, like, unique parks, like something that has a SDOT?

you know, piece to it and how to ensure that those like watering plans are really, you know, held up to.

Yeah, thank you for the question.

We work closely with SDOT and it's absolutely the case that we've got these really elaborate maps in GIS that we look at as soon as we're talking about any particular tree or group of trees to figure out whose jurisdiction it is and it gets complicated with easements.

The Queen Anne Boulevard area could be SDOT or it could be parks.

If it's right away adjacent to a park property, or it's a boulevard, an Olmstead Boulevard, then it's parks.

So in 2023, we initiated our tree watering program more robustly, and I'm gonna talk about that program a little bit as we move forward.

I can't speak to SDOT's watering protocols, but our new initiative under the executive order is to provide water for a five-year period.

And that's going to vary whether it's weekly or biweekly or every other week during the growing season.

But that is our new program and initiative is to provide that watering.

So if that was a tree planted this past year, it should have been getting water on a regular basis.

I will also add to that that we've had probably a 30-year boulevard agreement with SDOT that gives parks jurisdiction over boulevards and SDOT jurisdiction, obviously, over other non-boulevard, non-park-owned street rights-of-way areas.

Which is important, like in Magnolia, in an area that my colleague from D6 and I kind of share, another area where that can happen.

So I appreciate that point.

Thank you.

You bet.

So the policy also centers on awareness of climate change, which means we look at a selection of native or climate adaptive species.

We prioritize larger canopy species and conifers where they're feasible.

We also really lean into right plant, right place, which we call it for climate adaptation, given the site conditions, and we work to prioritize diversity.

So we also want to note that tree canopy is lower historically in frontline communities and areas of historic disinvestment and that this policy directs us really clearly to prioritize high need equity areas that are also experiencing the related impacts of high heat.

So the plan has having us focus on those specifically this nexus.

Just as right tree, right plant, right place is important for species diversity and climate, it's also really important for us to have flexibility in our tree sizes.

So I want to kind of clarify the no tree size minimum is more speaking to the fact that this new update of the policy allows us to plant the right size place depending on the right condition.

Carrie, in this lower picture of our greenhouse, working in our greenhouse, is modeling a baby doug fir tree.

This is the size tree that would typically be planted in our urban forests, a seedling-sized tree.

So that's the appropriate tree for that location.

And then in the other two photos, you're seeing some of the larger, what we call street-grade type trees that are 8 to 12 feet tall.

And these are more appropriate for urban locations and our developed parks that take a lot more stress from things like soccer balls and heavy use.

So it really allows us to count all of these different kinds of size trees towards our new replacement ratio, which is gonna be really helpful for us.

Last thing on metrics reporting, we had some really great questions from council about how our new post-planting tree care is increasing survivorship of trees.

And the short answer is, Yes, in qualitative observations, but we also look forward to reporting quantitative data next year since we're in our first year.

Another good news story from this new policy is that we are now able to include, as I said, the smaller trees as part of our restoration work in terms of our accountability towards meeting these replacement ratios.

So Councilmember Kettle, to your point, just to give us another visual of some of these jurisdictional areas and some of the complexities and talk about these management units.

So before jumping into a citywide tree canopy analysis, I wanted to start with this quick graphic view to help us better visualize the two main parks management units we'll be talking more about.

So from left to right, in the light green box, the larger unit in parks are our natural areas.

So most of these areas are forested.

They look like our green belts and steep slopes, our forested sections of developed parks like Lincoln Park and Magnolia.

And they can also be shorelines and riparian areas along lakes and streams.

And we manage these for a suite of different forest ecological targets.

And I'll just plant the seed, if you will, that these areas have both vertical as well as horizontal canopy and complexity.

These areas represent about 5% of the city's land area, but have an outsized contribution to citywide canopy of 14%.

Moving one over to the next block, the dark green box shows landscape parks, or what we call developed parks.

And these areas make up about 4% of the total city land area and contribute about 5% to citywide canopy.

So these are areas that can include multiple public objectives like athletic fields and sports areas, recreation community centers, as well as passive recreation for lawns, trees, and public amenities.

And then the last box that I just wanted to mention in yellow dashed is right-of-way trees.

Most of these are SDOT jurisdictions, but we do, as Christopher noted, wanted to note that Parks manages right-of-way trees adjacent to Parks properties and on boulevards.

So I wanna move into what we currently know about the status of tree canopy citywide on parks property specifically.

And key takeaways from this slide are to share, which is a graphic that was taken from last year's published tree canopy assessment report, is that every five years, the city conducts an aerial tree canopy assessment.

And this is citywide across all land use types.

And this kind of snapshot gives us an apples to apples picture of canopy trends over time across different management units and is a really helpful tool for gauging our collective progress as a city towards our 2037 goal.

So parks has two management units that are included in this assessment, shown here in the green box, natural areas and developed parks from left to right.

So citywide, we showed both losses and gains in most management units, but a net loss overall, as you've been hearing, of 1.7%, roughly the size of Green Lake, meaning that our citywide tree canopy has decreased from the last assessment in 2016. And in the two parks management units, we show canopy losses as well, and we're going to be digging into more about why we think we're seeing those numbers and what actions we are taking.

Where are you seeing that 0.1% or whatever that figure was that you said?

1.7% is the canopy loss change from 2016 assessment to the 2021 assessment.

So we lost 1.7% total, which is equivalent to about 255 acres citywide.

So canopy assessment, as I said, is a really important tool and the best single metric that we have in our quiver to use to track our progress in two dimensions across all different management units.

But going deeper, we want to pull in other metrics to help us understand how our forests are doing across a wide range of values that we know they bring environmentally and to the people and communities who live and work and recreate in them.

So to tease this out a little bit more, and this image is an example, parks trees can be seen in three dimensions in the upper photos, and then below them in a simplified way is kind of how they appear in two dimensions in the tree canopy assessment as circles below each picture.

And how trees show up in different kinds of park spaces can make it easy or more challenging for us to convert assessment findings into on the ground management actions across different park landscapes.

So the physical footprint, if you will, that each tree holds and how this relates to total canopy can vary due to the type of tree and how it's planted, whether it's in overlapping groves or allays like single leaves in these cherry trees, overlays like in this photo from the Green Lake Esplanade, or when it's a more complex assemblage like this image from this forest in Seward Park.

And you can see how easy it would be to measure change with the pink flowering cherry trees.

If you took one pink dot away, you would have one left, and you'd be able to measure that.

But in natural areas and in some of our developed parks, trees overlap in their canopy, and it's really challenging to tease out our management actions and our cost of planting new trees from the gains that we're getting.

So in summary, the canopy is an important yardstick to see where we're going as a city, but we supplement those results in parks with additional monitoring so that we can understand processes like forest regeneration, biodiversity, as well as accessibility for people and community considerations.

So stepping back once more into the canopy analysis and first looking at parks natural areas, I wanna pull your attention to the lower table on the second line.

And we can see again that natural areas are 5% of the city's land area, but their existing cover in 2021 is actually 82%.

Our target for 2037 is 80%.

So we're actually currently exceeding our target canopy cover in this area, but we did see a 5% loss from 2016. So changes in this management unit send a bigger signal, if you will, that shows up since it contributes to 14% of the city's total cover.

Our planting in these areas has increased in recent years, but trees grow slowly and they don't yield major canopy gains right away.

We call this a temporal lag.

And so we use, as I said, other metrics to help us understand if we are on the right trajectory.

And as I showed in the earlier graphic, the new assessment may somewhat overstate the problem in Seattle's densely wooded natural areas.

This canopy snapshot looks at from a top down view instead of a vertical view.

For developed parks, which is the line just above this, we're looking at a smaller overall contribution to the city's canopy cover But we have been less directed historically in some of our programs and resources to addressing losses in these spaces until recently.

So we see a need and an opportunity in this management unit.

And I'm going to get to talk more about that.

Council Member Kettle.

Chair Hollingsworth, thank you.

Quick question on this, and I believe you're going to hit natural areas later, but this seems like a good opportunity.

We have D7 natural areas like along Aurora, south of Aurora Bridge, and I believe Parks has been planting seedlings and the like, but they've been trampled by various individuals.

When you're making these efforts to increase canopy, what protections are being in place that can be...

yeah, helpful because it's one thing to plant a bunch of seedlings and then have them all trampled to death.

And, you know, so then we do get the increase.

Yeah.

And I'll get into some of our monitoring data later, but we do find overall that we see a positive trend in survival of the seedlings that we planted.

And to your point, we also have had damage in certain locations that have been highly used in our understory coming out of the pandemic.

We all have seen, you know, challenges around encampments in some of these spaces.

And I would also add that the presence of some of these other uses in our forested areas have impacted or limited the amount that we can have volunteers working in those spaces.

So it's an active kind of work in progress with our UCT team to kind of manage those unintended consequences from other uses.

But we do see and are monitoring a positive trend in terms of the survival of the seedlings that we plant citywide.

Thank you, and I'll take the opportunity as I looked at developed parks, but if you want to increase that number a little bit, there's a great place called Portal Park in Belltown to add to that number and that tree canopy.

Thank you for that.

So key message here overall is that while the 2021 assessment showed that although parks is still exceeding its 2037 tree canopy targets within its management units both units show stood did show meaningful losses and these losses can impact the city's overall target and trajectory.

As we lessen the services that trees provide to communities so we're going to talk more about the drivers behind these losses and then move into what actions we're taking.

So there are many things that impact the trends that we're seeing in tree failures.

And we're going to talk about some of these in the different management zones.

So tree deaths from pests, diseases, and storms are all part of the normal lifecycle of trees.

But climate change is exacerbating this in really new ways.

So in recent decades, shifts, as I mentioned, in seasonal rainfall have meant longer, drier summers, higher average summer temperatures, as well as these extreme heat dome effects in the last decade that we're starting to see on a more regular basis.

So stressed trees, and there's kind of a human health analog here too, are more susceptible to pests and diseases, and so we get this synergistic negative impact, and we see this qualitatively at different age classes of trees, and so we are also seeing shifts in the presence of insects and pathogens because of climate shifts.

So we really have a perfect, if you will, storm of an aging tree population, stressed trees, and newly arrived as well as existing pests and diseases.

In addition, we have weedy colonizing species that we're still working on controlling, like English ivy, as you mentioned.

Himalayan blackberry and knotweed, which can challenge forest health and tree health, and also forest processes for natural regeneration.

In developed parks specifically, we have multiple objectives that can all require and compete for space, and they all provide valuable services to communities like sports fields and community event spaces.

Historically, we've added smaller numbers of new trees and not had an organized program that was devoted to doing this work.

Trees that died in developed parks weren't formally replaced.

They didn't really have a long-term tree care.

When we had resources, we would put them towards that, but then when we had to turn towards public safety issues with trees, we weren't consistent in our care.

historically.

In 2022, quarter four, we started turning that around.

As I mentioned earlier, through data and partnerships, we've learned the critical importance of post-planting tree care and replacement, especially with the impacts of climate change.

So those are some of the drivers.

We've also been asked what we're really seeing in terms of trends in our tree mortality data, so I wanted to share this slide.

The blue bars at the top represent tree removals due to tree failures between 2016 and present day in 24. And the pink points on the map are showing locations of tree removals geographically.

This is just a screenshot of one just to show you what this data looks like.

So some takeaways from this data are, and I wanted to note, tree removals are done because they are risk or hazard trees that have to be removed because they are impacting or potentially impacting public safety.

A relatively stable over this eight year period number of tree failures, around 550 trees annually.

Typically, the only trees removed, as I mentioned, are those that pose a public safety risk.

So these are the ones near playgrounds or athletic fields or sidewalks where more people gather.

So we're not really seeing proportionally the trees that may be in natural areas reflected in this data.

Trees in this inventory are also documented in relation to work orders that are called in by the public.

And we know these work orders happen more frequently in areas of higher advantage.

So we'd need to correct for that inequity in this data in terms of making management decisions.

Similar to this, when a tree dies in a forest area, it's usually left.

It has ecological benefits as it decays for birds and other wildlife.

And so we're really not seeing the full picture of trees with this data.

We've estimated 600,000 trees in the park system in all our management units.

And so we don't have a clear picture when a tree dies in a forest, as the saying goes.

It doesn't necessarily make it into our data set.

Qualitatively, our managers are seeing some increased mortalities in our natural areas from some of the diseases and pests I mentioned due to climate change.

We're seeing sooty bark disease in maples.

Councilmember Kettle, you mentioned Queen Anne.

We've seen sooty bark disease in maple in the Queen Anne area as well as in Ravenna, along Ravenna Boulevard, birch borers, hemlock and western red cedar deaths, and we're watching these patterns really carefully and we're talking to other specialists across our region.

So I'm gonna transition here from the canopy analysis, talking about parks programs, the two key programs that we have, where they operate, what they do to support tree canopy and what we're doing to sustain and to grow these two programs to address the tree canopy loss that we've been talking about.

So on this slide, I wanted to start with talking about our urban forestry tree crew.

This is a team of really amazing arborists and tree workers who are responsible for managing trees and public safety.

They're frontline workers who respond to storm impacts.

They prioritize tree retention using international standards for tree risk assessment.

They're highly qualified.

They do corrective pruning when feasible, and they sometimes have to remove trees that are too great a public risk.

Our arboriculturists are subject matter experts in review also of new capital projects.

They work with designs early on to support find ways to conserve trees.

They also support make sure that trees are protected during construction.

We're really working to get ahead of or manage existing pests and disease challenges through our inspection and monitoring, including bringing on summer interns from the University of Washington to try to get ahead of emerald ash borer, for an example, last summer to understand how many ash trees we have in our inventory and what size and health they are so we can get ahead of this pest if it shows up in our region.

They also manage a robust data collection system, which includes inputs directly from folks performing the work in the field and putting data into GIS through an app in their phone, which is pretty cool.

And then we can access this as managers through our dashboard.

Our urban forest arborist team has also actively engaged over the years, as I mentioned, in planting new trees and develop parks to replace the trees that have failed.

But the program I'm about to share on this slide has empowered this work to go forward in a new level.

So the good news story is in 2023, due to new Metropolitan Park District Cycle 2 funding, we had the funds and resources to stand up a new crew of four people.

And this is the first time we've had staffed an in-house crew that was dedicated year round, both to tree planting during the planting season, and then caring for our newly planted trees during the remainder of the year.

So in developed parks, as I mentioned, we use these larger street grade size trees, and we were onboarded this crew in the second quarter of 2023. So the 23-24 winter season was our first formal planting season.

The program set an ambitious 75% target of planting all new trees in high equity areas, as well as prioritizing areas in the city that have lower existing tree canopy, and we know that these things tend to co-occur.

It's also worth noting that some of these high heat and low canopy areas that you can kind of see in this lower red map also occur in places that have transportation corridors or industrial zones and airports.

And so tree planting solutions may not always be a tool that helps resolve all of our heat island impacts in some kinds of zoning scenarios.

Planning for locations for new trees can be really time intensive and involve many layers, including working with utilities, tree selection, park design, and historic landscapes.

Community and stakeholder participation is also critical to the success of tree planting programs, and we reach out to collaborate with community, and we're really working to make this a more robust process in 2025. OSC is actually initiating a citywide tree equity and resilience plan later this year, and we, as I mentioned, work closely with them.

And they're gonna incorporate community-led working group that's gonna help us better inform how we locate trees equitably and get community input into the process.

In May of 23, the new tree crew initiated its first summer season of tree care, providing weekly watering to trees planted in parks, as well as mulching and pruning.

And as I mentioned, we're data driven and we monitor both to ensure we're meeting our tree replacement policy, as well as to learn and iterate from our successes and challenges as we move this work forward.

So we had some great questions leading up to this presentation about temperature mitigation.

So I wanted to just step out and talk really briefly about some of the benefits that we are excited about seeing from our historic investments and our new investments.

Specifically in 2022, Green Seattle Partnership partnered with 12 other cities nationwide in a cooling city study.

We set up monitoring stations across different kinds of land use types in the city, including from forested areas to the built environment.

We had some great results as did other cities who contributed to this as a result of this research.

So some takeaways are that natural areas and land surfaces were the coolest.

Maximum temperature changes we saw in deeply forested areas were from seven to nine degrees cooler than paved urban areas.

We also learned that natural area forests provide cooler air temperatures than isolated trees in the landscape.

And during the hottest times of day, more diverse, complex forests were also cooler than forests that were less healthy, that were weedier, which was interesting.

One of the outtakes from this, to me, as a consideration towards our developed parks is that it really suggests that pivoting towards planting trees in clusters or groves is gonna provide more temperature mitigation.

We think that the results really underscore how caring for urban natural areas is a vital way to mitigate elevated urban heat.

And this is particularly important when we consider the equitable distribution of trees as a public health imperative.

Turning back to look at our developed parks tree planting program, we're very new in this program in terms of reporting successes.

As I mentioned, our first year to report on survival metrics will be for data collected through the end of this year.

But anecdotally, we're seeing about 10% mortality.

And most of this is actually due to vandalism impacts.

people with cars backing over trees or other issues.

This is in line with other establishment trends in other municipalities.

And the kind of data we're going to be collecting currently and going forward and also reporting up through the One Tree Plan are number of trees we plant, trees removed, tree mortality and the cause, and survivorship.

So we feel like we're on the right path.

Cities have tried one million tree planting initiatives, or what they're called, TPIs, for decades.

And what we've learned is that post-planting care and stewardship is really the critical factor to urban tree survival.

So we think we're doing this work in a more thoughtful way.

In our ramp up year, starting this program and develop parks, we set some robust targets.

As I mentioned, we stood up a new crew.

We matrixed a planning tool.

We coordinated with other areas of our park department.

The team was onboarded.

Contracts were established to supplement in-house watering.

Young trees were planted and prior years were mulched and pruned.

And we set up systems in GIS to facilitate data collection.

So in the fall of this year, new trees, like this picture of all the trees on this flatbed, were coming in and arriving in our yard up at Beacon Hill every couple weeks.

It was really exciting to see this happening, and our team was averaging planting between four and six trees a day during our first season.

some really quick results from our first year that we wanted to share.

We planted over 500 trees in our first planting season.

These trees were planted in 48 different parks.

They represented 53 different tree species.

We've mentioned diversity is really important.

And 80% of these were planted in equity zones, which as I mentioned is an overlap of both low tree canopy and high equity.

And lastly, just wanted to circle back, we received some really thoughtful council member questions asking us to help connect the dots between our program's work and our contribution to tree canopy gains in parks.

We found this initially a really challenging question to answer with the limited data collection we have and the newness of our program, but we did do a little bit of math around the first year of our program.

And we know that trees, depending on the tree species and location, can take anywhere from 20 to 50 years to reach full canopy maturity, so the signal of this work can be slow to show up.

But as I mentioned, we extrapolated from the number of trees we planted on our first season.

We assumed 90% survivorship.

We adjusted for species canopy size differences.

And we calculated out of that a very rough net gain of six acres of new canopy at an average 30-year maturity.

So this isn't going to be next year or 10 years from now in 30 years.

We'll have six acres from the efforts that we did this year.

This is very back of napkin math, just wanna be clear, but it suggests that we can continue in this work and hit our target, as I'll mention, of 1800 trees by 2028. We can start to move the needle back towards canopy gain in a meaningful way.

It's gonna take time, but with continued support and resourcing of this program, we believe we can get there with a strategy and approach.

So I'm gonna move into our second program.

We've talked a bit about developed parks, and I'm gonna focus now on our department's urban forestry work in natural areas under the Green Seattle Partnership.

So Seattle has a robust and diverse urban forest restoration program that aligns multiple departments, community organizations, and individual volunteers.

GSP was founded in 2005 within parks in a key partner for Terra and is continuing in its ongoing mission to restore Seattle's forested natural areas.

We continue to grow and add new acreage to our management areas every year, and we're now working across 2,500 acres in over 230 parks under a unique framework that supports community-led forestry restoration, volunteer stewardship, contractors, as well as an in-house crew.

This framework is created, coordinated, and led by Park City staff who collaborate also with 16 community partner organizations.

The GSP strategic plan was established 19 years ago in response to a groundswell of community concern about aging canopy, weedy undergrowth, and a lack of care and resources directed towards these spaces.

In 2027, the strategy was updated and we're preparing in 2025 to update and renew the strategic GSP vision to take the successful program forward into the next 20 years.

As the commenter mentioned, we still have a lot of work to do and we're really excited to carry this work forward.

So a healthy forest really includes lots of attributes besides cover.

Biodiversity of trees, shrubs, and ground covers, the presence of wildlife, low weedy species cover, and also what we call structural diversity.

In restoration practice, we want to consider the vertical layer from the soil all the way up to the highest treetops.

Robust and healthy forests within this vertical complexity contribute more strongly, researchers show, to lowering temperatures, destroying carbon, and infiltrating stormwater, and also to creating spaces for both people and wildlife when compared to the shade that's created by a single tree.

So we want to manage and measure this kind of health and complexity.

The GSP program plants an average of 9,000 to 10,000 seedling trees, if you remember the baby tree in the picture, every year, mostly in the understory layer beneath existing tree canopy.

But these seedlings aren't yet registering as a signal in these five-year canopy assessments, and so it's difficult for us to tease out the cost of tree planting specifically when we're trying to tell the story of holistic community-based forestry restoration.

Removing colonizing weeds and selectively clearing non-native trees and trubs in other canopy layers are examples of the kind of stewardship actions that help create light gaps that expose native soil to allow for natural seedling regeneration processes.

So managing the forest in three dimensions, or four even if you want to add time, is all part of how we do this work.

The last big idea to share about forestry management is that while we do get new trees and forests by planting them, and this is really important that we keep doing this, healthy forests also generate their own seedlings.

So our job is to clear out competing weeds and overgrowth so that trees can do this work to germinate, generate, grow, and thrive.

And this is the long and steady work of labor and love that has been taking place across our urban forests.

Measuring forest health takes a long time too, but we're seeing successes.

Here's some of what we're seeing in our boots on the ground view and our monitoring.

As of 2023, the long-term forest monitoring data has showed us that we've seen weed species decrease on our sample plots from 71% to 25%.

We've seen native plant species increase in our sample plots over time.

Monitoring has also shown that we're regenerating trees more rapidly as a result of plant installation, so we want to keep doing that, and that the density of native seedlings who come in on their own, volunteers, have increased from 138 to 234 stems per acre at sites where we've been doing active restoration, and it's these young, regenerating trees that are so essential for the long-term self-sustainability and health of Seattle's urban forest.

The Green Seattle Partnership is nearly two decades into doing this important work and really excited to continue moving forward.

To date, over half a million paid parks partner and crew staff hours have contributed to direct restoration action in our parks.

Really importantly, Green Seattle Partnership averages 30,000 volunteer hours a year.

That's 1.4 million volunteer hours in total since 2005. That's a tremendous number.

We lead the nation in the number of volunteer hours that are spent in our forests as a percentage.

GSP volunteers, staff, and partners have planted over this time period nearly 340,000 seedlings in the past two decades, as well as ground covers, native shrubs, and ferns in urban forests.

We reported on some of our progress towards removing weeds, and we had a question also about ivy on I-5, which I see coming and going from work every day.

So I wanted to say this work is ongoing, and also we're We're proud that we are nearing our 50,000th ivy-free tree.

This is a data point that we record.

That's ivy removal from existing canopy trees.

I wanted to note that these are 50,000 trees that we are conserving that we may have otherwise showed up as part of our mortality numbers.

Saving trees is as important as trees that we plant, in some cases more because these are large canopy trees.

The commenter was absolutely on track that this is critical work and that we need to continue it.

This year we have 164 active forest stewards working across 75 parks as community and volunteer leaders.

Green Seattle Partnership also funds paid stipends in some cases for youth and adults to pursue job training and career exposure while being paid a wage or stipend, and this reduces economic barriers to participation.

The Green Seattle Partnership's success can be linked back to the initial twofold goal of both robust urban forest restoration while also galvanizing an informed and involved community.

This vision created a structure for prioritizing community needs and participation alongside restoration actions and goals.

So community partners and forest stewards help us division and guide this work, which really also engenders a deep engagement and commitment to stay activated.

Park's GSP ecology team staff really provide the container.

They coordinate the work and provide training and support.

And supporting our forest stewards in a robust way is really critical to the success of ongoing engagement, as well as meeting our forestry goals and tree targets.

So I wanted to note in the second bullet in particular that during the pandemic, our staff onboarding of new stewards was paused to ensure that the needs of our existing stewards in the program could be met.

However, we're really excited to share that this summer we're currently scheduling a series of on-ramp trainings and in January of 2025, a new forest steward orientation is being set up to meet some of the demand.

We're really excited that people continue to want to participate in this program and we want to support them.

As Christopher mentioned, the GSP model has been replicated by 14 other municipalities in the region, showing that this model can be scaled and expanded to other cities nationally and internationally.

Our collaborations really make us stronger and our programs don't rest on their laurels.

We bring an iterative lifelong learning and adaptive management framework that helps us improve as we evolve.

And we wanted to share, as we close out this presentation, a more granular look to respond to some questions at some of the budget and expenditures over the past 18 months across all the programs that we've been sharing that support tree canopy in parks.

So the green and the green represent our two programs that we've been sharing.

And on the second line, the Tree Crew Plus is the new crew that we stood up in 2023. So we had zero expenditures prior to that in this program.

I want to highlight that our ability to stand up this program, as well as to enhance GSP's work in the two bullets in the middle here, had to do with investments in cycle two MPD funds.

And those funds will carry forward through 2028. We've made some concrete commitments to action around this funding, and we anticipate, we look forward to celebrating the planting of at least 1,800 trees in our developed parks at the end of this cycle, and an additional 60,000 trees in our native areas, plus the ongoing forest and tree care and all the holistic things that we've been talking about to support the community in this work.

So I just want to summarize where we've been.

We've shared the story of parks urban forestry programs.

We know the canopy assessment has showed us losses, but we're responding to those findings by going deep and building on our assets in natural areas and developed areas both.

Funding has really helped us begin to turn this story around.

We've set some clear goals between now and 2028, and our path forward builds on what we're doing well and makes adaptive improvements in our program where we saw opportunities to do better.

We feel this is going to be really positive to Canopy, both in parks and citywide, and we're looking forward to tracking and reporting back on our progress.

Thanks so much for the opportunity to share this with you, and we look forward to taking any additional questions you may have.

Thank you, Stephanie and Christopher.

Would love to open it up to my colleagues to see if they had any questions.

Colleagues, I see Council Member Kettle and then we'll go with Council President Nelson.

Well, Council President Nelson, I know Council, yes, Council President Nelson.

Well, could you go back to slide seven, please?

So I remember looking at this slide when we were beginning the work on the tree bill last year, and I was thinking to myself, well, we should prioritize preserving trees where they're the most trees, right?

So my attention was drawn to the parks and natural areas and developed parks, and I strongly supported the idea I had strongly supported the additional funding for ivy removal in the year before.

That's a park spending plan, so ivy has long been a pet peeve for me because perhaps it is visible, unlike...

the boar weevil, which is under the bark, or the impacts of drought, et cetera.

So here's my question.

I'm glad that you are beginning to, I guess, formalize, because you probably have done this in the past less formally, but that you've got a mortality monitoring system now.

That's great.

Can you give me an idea?

Do you have a gut idea when it comes to the relative impact of ivy on tree death compared to some of the other things?

And then I would probably have a follow-up question.

That's a great question.

It would just be a qualitative observation.

I know we have some really dedicated forest stewards across the city who've kind of made it their life's work to target ivy removing trees in their neighborhoods and the parks that they care about.

I can't give you a percentage of the total ivy trees that we've treated versus those remaining.

That's a great question.

I would be interested to kind of bring that information back to you if we have that.

It impacts trees slowly sometimes.

And so it's kind of hard to know what the timeline is on those.

But it's absolutely something we're collecting data around.

It's something that we target.

It's something that's extremely visible.

And we are making headway, I believe,

Yeah, it's a slow death, and it also, once you do some mitigation, then it comes back, and so it's like, it's Sisyphean, it seems like.

Yeah, it's not just a cut and done, or even a cut and treat and done, and birds who we love and are an important part of our wildlife continue to bring new ivy seeds in.

Okay, that gets to a couple questions.

Then number one is, has the city ever considered, I think I've seen this, but has the city considered goat mitigation?

And I'm sure that you get this question all the time.

And then also regulating the sale of ivy within the city, but you just said that squirrels bring them in, et cetera.

So I'm sure you've thought of everything and you're doing as much as you can, but just...

From my curiosity.

No, I'll share.

Folks who are restoration practitioners have strong feelings about some of the plants that we see for sale in our local nurseries, but that's controlled by a state board.

So yeah, we don't have control over those.

I have seen a decrease in the number of species that are problematic, including knotweed for sale.

Goats is a great question.

It's funny that you asked that.

I just was having a conversation with one of the gardeners in Genesee Park about whether goats were used.

They're really effective for blackberry.

There are some kind of costs and benefits to using them.

They attract a lot of public interest, which is kind of a cool thing.

I think that we, what I can say is if we, when we have a complexity of species in one place, goats kind of don't, they're not selective.

And so we can- They'll go after the new-

The new seedlings you planted the previous season.

I would also add to that that ivy is one of the reasons volunteers are so important.

It has to be hand-rooted out.

We don't want to use pesticides and herbicides in our green belts and natural areas.

And the more we can get more young people engaged in the work of removing ivy, the better off we'll be over the long term.

It's a community builder.

Thank you.

Council Member Strauss, and then we'll go to Council Member Kettle.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Christopher, for the Parks Department for such a great presentation.

You are on slide seven, where I was going to ask you to track two.

This graph really shows that in neighborhood residential zones, we're seeing a lot of loss with that 87 acres, 1.2%, which is more than the 10 acres in the right of way and less than the 111 acres in the parks department.

And so when we talk about the tree protection ordinance that was passed last year, this slide really demonstrates where a lot of those, I know we're here to talk about in parks lands, We needed to ensure that the trees were.

Not going to continue to be cut down and neighborhood residential zones as they had been.

And that we needed to invest in parks and natural areas because of the changing climate.

So, if you could slide to.

Change the slide 10, which leads me into my next point that you've also already made.

Which is that we are experiencing, and this is not just happening on parts lines.

This is happening on private property as well.

That the issues that are killing the trees as council president said, are not always seen.

And as we continue, I've heard some artists call Seattle, the largest botanical garden in the state.

Not necessarily on parks lands, I think parks department does a pretty good job of choosing, as you said, right species, right size, or right size, right species.

But this is where we get to the point of our investment today is so critical for battling climate change.

You know, really, where we are is, if we don't start planting these climate resilient trees, and we don't start taking care of the trees, like Sandy was saying in public, or as Bob was saying about Sandy anyhow.

We're going to be faced with even greater losses.

I think of the North parking lot and discovery park now part of the 6 probably.

So I remember when that was just an empty field and.

Christopher, I'll ask you at the end.

here, if you remember when those trees were planted in that north parking lot, I think it was about 10, maybe 15 years ago.

And when they were first, yeah, when they were first planted, it was kind of like, oh, what are these trees ever going to do for us?

And now those trees have grown so large that they create shade on that parking lot.

I think the point that I was bringing up about Bob and Sandy is in that five-year stewardship phase, Sandy's advocacy is what got some of the provisions written about the development procedures in that tree ordinance bill requiring five years of maintenance in and around new developments.

Again, not in the Parks Department.

But I bring up This slide, because what we can't see today.

If we, if we aren't addressing what we can't see today, we're going to be in a really worse place in just a few years from now.

And so that's why.

using the parks department's new crew that we helped fund last year, I get to the point of every year we need to be doing more and investing more and in different ways to create a large wraparound system of increasing and protecting our tree canopy.

If you could slide to or go to slide 14 for me, what I really appreciated in this just

Thank you very much.

Yeah, I've got one of my friends here in Ballard.

If you could go, so on slide 14, this slide really shows the forest through the trees, if you will, where the different type of land that we are creating creates these different heat islands.

And then if you could go back to slide 13, I'll bring up my favorite Discovery Park again.

Where you see, it is 1 of the most forested areas in the city.

And it is 1 of the least heat impacted places.

In the city, because this canopy goes back to a gentleman that I interviewed in Ballard who.

From siblings planted his urban forest in his backyard from seeds.

30 years later, he's got some of the most significant trees in the city.

he's able to keep his property colder or colder in the summer, warmer in the winter, because he plants deciduous.

But to the point that I was making just before I got cut off by my good friend here is that each year we have to be investing more and in different ways.

And that's what we were able to do in the Metropolitan Parks District, because as we saw on slide seven, the parks land, the public property land that we own is where we need to be funneling a lot of resources.

And so Christopher, I guess I don't have a question.

I probably could say I apologize for that.

I was just getting here on my soapbox.

The compliment that I'll pay you is one that I've already said is that this presentation is very clear.

It helps us understand some pretty complicated information.

that is not a one size fits all because as you saw in slide 14, different parts of our city contribute to heave in different ways.

And the Parks Department manages, as you said, 12% of our city's landmass.

So job well done.

I'm looking forward to planting more trees with you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss and Council Member Kettle.

Thank you, Chair Hollingsworth.

I think my colleague in Ballard has just been outed that he's not at the government center, but in fact, that's just a white false backdrop and he's put some flags there and he's actually, now we know.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Well, Council Member Kettle, just for the record, I'll prove it here, which is I am at my district office here at the Ballard Library.

Those filters are very nice, Council Member Strauss.

Okay, Council Member Kettle.

You know, there's been a lot of discussion about invasive species, the ivy and the like, which is a big issue, particularly on our slopes in District 7 and its impacts, which reminded me that there's other, you know, kind of invasive, you know, pieces that come in, you know, within District 7, particularly in the Queen Anne magnolia world is that, you know, bushes like rhododendrons and holly have turned into trees.

And so, you know, how does that capture it in terms of, you know, in terms of the canopy?

You know, and I understand canopy is defined somewhat by how above ground you're going as well.

And is this something that you've seen?

Because we just had a briefing.

We were talking about this more in a residential context.

But is this an issue also within the parks and the natural areas where you get a beautiful...

older roadie that looks like a tree, acts like a tree, but is it really a tree, and is it taken away from what we should have instead?

Yeah, that's a good question, and I'm not a subject matter expert on the methodology used.

It was a lighter analysis, which sends a signal down from an airplane, it bounces off vegetation, and then it uses a lot of complicated algorithms to tell us what we're seeing on the ground, right?

So I know that there are things, particularly you mentioned holly, that are non-native species that are present many times mixed into our natural areas and that can compete.

But I think the canopy is not necessarily discriminating if it's a sort of a tree size height is my short answer.

But again, I'd wanna qualify that as me not being an expert in lidar.

Okay.

My second question slash editorial comment, like my colleague from D6, is what makes Seattle unique compared to other cities, and I've lived all over the country, is its evergreens.

I'm from western New York, between Buffalo and Rochester.

You fly in the wintertime, it's a great white-brown mess, unless it's the fresh snow.

And then you fly back into Seattle, you break through the clouds, and you have the evergreen trees, which is beautiful.

I'm curious in terms of emphasizing that, in terms of replantings or replacements, because if we just do deciduous trees, then we look like any other American city, whereas what's unique about Seattle is its evergreens.

And I recognize with climate change, we may have to adjust on evergreens.

And I say this because I recently, with my colleague, Chair Hollingsworth, been down on the waterfront And when you're down there, those unique pieces really make a difference.

And it kind of drives, from an economic point of view, people wanting to come.

Hey, this is unique.

This is different.

This is not Sim City America, where everything looks the same.

And I was curious about your views on that question, because it seems like I see more deciduous trees being planted versus varying types of evergreens.

Yeah, again, it is a location, location, location question with where evergreens go compared to deciduous trees for sure.

And we've got a lot of competing uses in our urban environment that preclude evergreen trees just because of space issues.

And that can be a challenge.

I would say absolutely in our native understory, in our restoration efforts in our urban forest, we are counter for forward.

What we saw after kind of the legacy of the first logging that came through is that our conifer forests were effectively decimated and the regeneration that happened following that was largely deciduous.

So species like big leaf maple and alder are much more dominant in our urban forests right now than they were historically.

And so our restoration actions in most of those places are trying to return to a more conifer dominated forest.

It's hard to give a short answer because it's a complex question.

But in developed parks, we lead with conifers where there's not competing uses as well.

The other benefit from conifers from an environmental standpoint is stormwater interception.

During the season when we were having all of our rainfall and really need something to intercept and infiltrate, that's when conifers are there doing that.

good work, right?

So we're really trying to put conifers in, emphasize conifers wherever we see opportunities.

Okay, thank you.

And my last is not a question, but a thank you.

Thank you first to you both and everyone who's joined you and to Parks Department for your work in this area.

But I also like to say thank you to, because to your point about volunteers, I know the amount of work that the Friends of McLean Park has done Friends of David Rogers Park and a host of other parks throughout District 7. And it's not just like the friends of types as well.

South Lake Union Community Council, because they were primarily focused on land use, but as you know, South Lake Union is pretty much developed now.

So this group has turned its sights to parks, be warned, because they're very smart, very energetic, and very resourceful.

and to work South Lake Union Park, Cascade Park, and Denny Park.

And there'll be a great resource to you in terms of trying to improve those three parks.

And I should also note Queen Anne Community Council's Park Committee led by Don Harper.

He's a great resource in terms of the parks in District 7, and particularly Queen Anne Community.

And then of course, Another plug for Portal Park in Belltown because they need it and the canopy needs it.

But also to Wee Hart Seattle, which I mentioned before in terms of the natural areas.

I did the one day of service.

I stopped by on the West Queen Anne Green Pelt, Kinnear Park area.

Incredible amount of work to facilitate the restoration of that natural area.

So thank you to We Heart Seattle.

And I would be remiss if I didn't also give a thank you, because I'm sure she is watching, because she's been referenced about a half dozen times now.

But thank you also to Sandy Shetler, who no doubt is watching.

So thank you, Sandy.

I just wanna maybe make some remarks as we close about the fact that our park system is 137 years old.

The work that Stephanie and her crews are doing are really positioning us for the next 50 to 100 years.

You know, the impact and the result of all this work taking place right now maybe won't be seen until the next generation of young people, but I think as many council members have said, it's important to begin this work yesterday, and that's the pathway we're on.

So thank you, Stephanie, to you and your team.

Thank you so much.

And I'll extend an invitation to the whole council that I mentioned to Council Member Hollingsworth on the side is that we would, our staff and plant ecologists would absolutely love to host you for a walk in the woods.

If you're ever interested to schedule something, we'd love to have you out, just walk you around a little bit and hug some trees.

So thank you.

And I'd like to recognize Council Member Rivera.

Thank you, Chair.

I just want to echo some of my, or all of my colleagues' sentiments about the important work of preserving tree canopy across the city.

I know that in District 4, constituents are really concerned about tree canopy.

They are good stewards of trees in the district.

And you know, they very much recognize all the important work that Parks is doing.

So really want to thank you for that work.

And Christopher, you're absolutely right.

You know, we needed to do this work 100 years ago, 50 years ago, like keep it going, right?

It's been a long time coming that we've been losing some of this tree canopy and we're not replacing things quickly enough.

And I think that's part of the issue too.

And coupled, obviously, as we have said here, climate change We just can't keep up.

And so we really need to be doing this work.

And so very much appreciate all the work that has gone into the planning for the tree canopy across the city, because as you've also discussed, there are places of the city where we just are not where we need to be.

And so I really appreciate the intentional prioritization that goes into going to areas that have a lack of tree canopy.

And I know everyone across the city is really interested and supportive of that prioritization.

So really appreciate all the work that goes there as well.

And then just, you know, the being good stewards of the park.

It's nice to see you, Christopher, from this weekend.

We were at Pathways Park.

And there are a lot of great trees because that's right off of the Burke-Gilman Trail, which is such a, so many treasures in the city of Seattle.

This is, I mean, I've lived in Seattle 23 years and I super appreciate how, what a focus and emphasis and priority we give to parks in general.

And I feel really lucky to live in this beautiful city with folks that care very much about tree canopy and parks in general.

And I know it's something that all our children benefit from.

So really want to thank you.

Kudos to you all and super appreciate the report.

Awesome, thank you.

We all love trees.

Allergy season is among us.

And I save the trees and less sneeze.

Trees clean the air.

And my allergies have gotten worse in Seattle.

So I want to see more trees, obviously, as we continue to progress.

And also, I know that a lot of people just commenting about the work.

that you all do, we know that when we plant new trees and seedlings, we won't see those benefits until 30, 40 years from now.

So how it's important to continue to plant those.

So thank you both Stephanie and Christopher for the presentation.

Really appreciate your time and answering all our questions.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, we will now move to agenda item number two.

Clerk, will you please read the agenda for item number two?

Agenda item number two is Council Bill 120797, which is an ordinance relating to the Seattle Center Department authorizing the Seattle Center Director to execute a fourth amendment to the Facility Use and Occupancy Agreement between the City of Seattle and the Seattle Reparatory Theater, and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts.

This is for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Presenting today are Diametress Winston and Julia Levitt from the Seattle Center.

Awesome, our favorite Seattle Center.

Only Seattle Center, but it's our fave.

Appreciate you having us today.

Looking forward to the presentation today, and I'm really happy to be here, and obviously all of us, I don't want to speak for all of us, but I will, we are all excited about arts and culture and how much it means to our city and the repertory theater, so looking forward to the presentation today.

Thank you.

And go ahead and introduce yourself for the record, and you can jump into your presentation.

Sounds good.

Thank you, Chair.

Good afternoon, Chair Hollingsworth and council members.

I'm Dematris Winston, deputy director at Seattle Center, and I'm here today supporting the amendment to the current agreement, the facility use agreement with Seattle Rep. And so I'm here supporting and for the City of Seattle, sorry, Seattle Center.

And also today here is Julia Levitt, strategic advisor with the center's redevelopment team, and Jeff Herman, who's here representing as the managing director, the Seattle Repertory.

Julia will share the details about the amendment to the current facility use agreement.

Thank you.

Before I get started with the presentation, I want to give Jeff a chance to just introduce himself and the rep.

I'll be very quick.

I'm Jeff Herman.

I'm the managing director at Seattle Rep. I just want to say we've had a long, very productive and fruitful relationship with Seattle Center dating back to our founding in 1963. They've been great partners to us.

We have been working collaboratively on this amendment and looking forward to sharing some more about it with all of you.

So this legislation is a proposed Fourth Amendment to the Seattle Rep Facility Use and Occupancy Agreement.

I'm just gonna say a little bit unrelated, but somebody brought up that Fourth Amendment makes them think of the constitutional Fourth Amendment.

This has nothing to do with search and seizure.

It is just the fourth in a series.

There have been three amendments before this one to the Facility Use and Occupancy Agreement for the Rep. In this presentation, I'm going to go through the background.

And it's a pretty straightforward piece of legislation, but it does have some history because the rep has been part of Seattle Center since the 60s.

I will discuss the text of the amendment and the implications of the proposed legislation.

Starting with the background, Seattle Rep was founded in 1963 and is one of the oldest resident organizations on the Seattle Center campus.

They occupy the Bagley-Wright Theater, which is a building that was built in 1983, and it was the first new facility constructed on Seattle Center's campus since the 1962 World's Fair.

It's also the first public nonprofit partnership undertaken by Seattle Center, and since then, Seattle Center has really been characterized by public and private partnerships.

Seattle Rep has done outstanding work out of their home at Seattle Center, including bringing home the 1990 Tony Award for outstanding regional theater.

They have run many nationally recognized programs that engage the community out of their space and are just really a contributor to the vibrancy of the arts and cultural hub at Seattle Center.

This amendment deals specifically with Seattle reps and the city's maintenance funds and the process for spending those funds on investments to keep the building a modern functioning theater facility.

And I'll just go through a little bit of the history of why we are amending it.

The 1996, so when the Bagley-Wright was built in the 80s, the city envisioned that the city would would take care of the building systems, including the big exterior systems, the roof and the cladding, and also the interior systems, the theater lighting systems, the stage, and HVAC and everything like that.

Fast forward to 1996, and Seattle Rep came back to execute a new agreement with Seattle Center because they had added to their facility, they were growing, with another part of the theater.

And at that time in 1996, Seattle Center had welcomed more resident organizations, including, for example, the Seattle Children's Theater and Pacific Northwest Ballet.

And we had changed our standard for how we negotiated those leases.

So the city was no longer taking responsibility for the interior systems of the building.

That was the responsibility of the tenant and the city took care of the exterior.

We wanted to transition the rep to that model.

And so the 1996 agreement kind of set up a very, very carefully process oriented transition where the city would contribute city funds into a city maintenance and replacement and repair fund that would be used for those systems that would continue through 2009. and the rep was going to pick up and start contributing larger and larger sums into its separate maintenance replacement and reserve fund, and would eventually take over responsibility for those interior systems.

As I just mentioned, the city's annual contributions phased out in 2009. We still, however, So this is where we say the best laid plans still sometimes are subject to change.

So since 1996, a lot has happened.

Things did not play out exactly as we expected, most notably, and you'll see this actually in the trail of amendments preceding this one.

The Second Amendment, the Third Amendment, and the Fourth Amendment now all really deal with repercussions from big economic transitions in the country.

And so the Second Amendment dealt with expenditures in capital improvements and maintenance reserve funds coming out of the Great Recession.

And then I'm going to go to our next slide.

And more recently, investment in the Bagley-Wright Theater.

In 2020, City Council approved an amendment that allowed Seattle Rep the option to use its maintenance, replacement, and reserve fund to fund operating expenses, kind of like a rainy day fund, because the theaters were closed, the governor's order had shut down gatherings, they were not able to operate, and so this became kind of, it was an opportunity for them to use it to keep their business afloat if they needed to.

Luckily, they made it through, federal funding came through, Things changed again.

They did not have to draw on that reserve fund.

However, since the theater was closed between 21 and 22, Seattle Rep made use of downtime during the pandemic by still making capital improvements in its building to the tune of almost $4 million, which they discussed with Seattle Center.

We approved the design.

We were all for the improvements in the building, but Seattle Rep chose not to spend money out of its SRT fund, out of its maintenance fund, because they were reserving that in case it needed to be used for those emergencies.

Looking ahead, this summer, Seattle Rep is queuing up to do a second phase to extend that renovation and renovate its lobby.

It needs more flexibility.

to accumulate and spend those maintenance funds.

And separately, Seattle Center is undertaking its largest refunded project in its plan this year to replace the exterior cladding and aging portions of the Rep's roof, which are at end of life.

Just a quick look, because it's looking very good now, the facility, at what happened during that almost $4 million renovation project.

Seattle Rep was able to improve more equitable access throughout their facility, making things more, bringing things up to ADA code, also adding improvements like gender neutral restrooms, upgrading their water fixtures and light fixtures to current sustainability standards, upgrading theatrical equipment, and replacing seating throughout the theater.

This ordinance authorizes the Seattle Center Director to execute the Fourth Amendment to the Facility Use and Occupancy Agreement between Seattle Rep and the City.

Primarily, this just adjusts the process for how Seattle Rep will make expenditures out of its Seattle Rep Maintenance Replacement and Reserve Fund.

It does not change the total expected investment in the building per the terms of the 1996 agreement.

It will allow Seattle rep more flexibility to use those maintenance funds to meet the needs of the facility, which is still determined by mutual agreement between Seattle center and the rep. And it will allow Seattle Center to offset increased costs for its CIP project by diverting the remaining $120,000 from that last 2009 contribution into its city fund to its CIP project to replace the Bagley-Wright Theater roof and cladding.

The implications of this legislation are, The Seattle Reps Maintenance Fund belongs to the rep. It is managed by the rep in cooperation with the city.

So no city money is being expended as a result of this amendment.

And were this amendment not to pass, the rep fund money is not eligible to be spent or redirected anywhere else in the city.

Seattle Rep will, if this amendment passes, Seattle Rep will draw down the balance of its fund to reimburse itself for the funds it invested in its first phase of its renovation project, the $3.9 million major renovation.

And before the end of the term of the Facility Use and Occupancy Agreement, which ends this agreement signed in 1996, comes to the end of its term at the end of May, 2026. Seattle Rep will still spend at least $918,994 on mutually agreed Bagley-Wright Theater capital projects, which equals the schedule of investments from the 1996 agreement.

And Seattle Center will add the unspent $119,000 balance of the city fund to its CIP roof project.

It's a $6.5 million project, so this is a relatively small contribution to a big pot, but it will make a difference and help us get that project done.

And that brings us to the end of our presentation, so we would welcome any questions that you have.

Thank you so much.

I will pause for my other council members to see if they have any questions.

Council member Kettle, question, comment?

Thank you for being here.

I've actually walked through this, and I know this has been coordinated with Seattle Center, with discussions with Marshall Foster.

So I usually have a question, but you know what?

I will skip the question.

Any questions?

No worries.

I'm going to go play lottery since you don't have a question.

That's shocking.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, and thank you to the Seattle Center team.

I love what you do.

I love the Repertory Theater.

It's a place I've spent a lot of my life, and some big life events too.

I do have a number of questions.

I am going to reserve them to follow up with you after the committee meeting, and so I'll be abstaining today.

but it shouldn't indicate in which way.

I just have some more questions and would like to engage in a little bit deeper discussion.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Council Member Rivera.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for being here.

And full disclosure, I'm a big fan of the rep. I was there this weekend, in fact, seeing that Jinx Monsoon major scales production.

Very, very fun.

And I also had, I feel so privileged to have seen come from away there before it moved on to win a Tony and various other awards.

So I think the rep, it really is a gem.

I have a quick question just about this, the fund, the SRT fund.

So you'll, it sounds like you're drawing down the remainder of the balance of the fund.

And so then what happens at, and then the city will be drawing down its balance of the fund.

And so then what happens to these two funds at zero balance?

Do they, I mean, what happens next?

So, well, the zero balance in the reps fund would only be temporary because they are still um obligated by the lease to make another almost million you know 900 plus thousand dollar investment in the theater before the end of their lease term and the end of their lease term is very soon it's in the middle of 2026 so we we really see this as getting us to the end of the lease term um any other improvements that are needed in the facility it's um it's pretty carefully lined out in the facility use and occupancy agreement what the city is responsible for to fix if it breaks, if it needs replacing, and what the rep is responsible for.

And so we wouldn't have these funds to draw from, but it doesn't mean that we wouldn't make those improvements, but we would have to find them.

The city uses REIT and makes it part of our CIP program, and the rep uses its own funding.

Is that...

Do you have anything to add to that?

No, no, no.

I think that's right.

But after...

you know, June 1st, 2026, we are, we're actually already in discussions with the rep about renewing, well, our next phase of agreement, which would probably be writing a new agreement for the future and, and hoping that the rep will be with us for another several decades.

Yep.

So in other words, you're still obligated under your contractual agreement to The building in working order.

Regardless, and you have funds that are not in the SRT fund that you can use to do that through the remainder of the lease in 2026, and then there'll be a renewal of that new arrangement.

A new format for how we're going to keep the building up to date.

Great.

Thank you.

Awesome, any further questions?

Council President Nelson.

Just one more.

Eric, is there anything that you would like to add or any comments?

Usually, you're there as a great resource.

I don't have any questions for you, but there is no central staff memo or anything.

So is there any more information we should have?

Thank you for asking.

Eric McConaughey, Council Central staff.

I cover Seattle Center issues.

I've had great conversations with folks from Seattle Center leading up to this, and I understand that they were also really open to having discussions with council members before this to get some questions answered in advance and looked over the materials sort of technically to make sure everything was sort of attached in an order.

Consequently, I didn't have a recommendation or memorandum.

I'm here to field any questions you might have, follow up with the rep, and Seattle Center, of course, but I don't have any other outstanding concerns or comments.

Thank you for acknowledging me.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

Just a quick comment.

I had the opportunity to go to the Seattle rep. First off, I think your branding is like, I think their branding is like phenomenal.

Thank you.

Seriously, I don't know who does it.

I'm all into, like, how aesthetics, how websites feel, the branding, the piece, how it draws people in.

You all do a phenomenal job of the branding and your website.

But I was able to go see Fannie.

Oh, great.

It was phenomenal.

It's, like, one of my favorite heroes, civil rights activist.

One of my favorite parts was Fannie Lou Hamer also started a farm after...

during the later parts of her life to create the moving people away from sharecropping to land ownership and sovereignty in the South, which was huge.

But anyways, just know that a part of our downtown activation plan and bringing people to the city, how important the arts and culture are going to be.

for people to come to Seattle and not just only our tourists, but our locals coming to Seattle and spending money and understanding our city and the economy.

And so I just, arts is a major play to our city.

So just, yeah.

And I love the branding piece.

Anyways.

My marketing team will be thrilled to hear that.

Will they?

Okay.

Do you do everything in-house?

Yeah, yeah.

Damn, that's amazing.

Sorry, excuse me.

We're very lucky, we have a very talented team.

That is, yeah, go ahead, Council President Nelson.

Please do extend to your community involvement team, whoever they may be, my appreciation because my son's school has taken advantage of some of your programming, and I have as well, and I know that you are very generous.

in your support of other organizations in town.

So thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And Chair, if I can piggyback on what Council President was saying, I know that you all do a lot to make sure you're providing access to folks who are not able to otherwise afford to attend the theater.

And so I...

as a kid who grew up and that was something I needed.

I really appreciate all you do to make the theater accessible to others who would not otherwise be able to appreciate it.

And you reminded me council member Hollingsworth that I saw in the Heights there written by another fellow Puerto Rican.

And it was really a phenomenal and you know, Not to say for the amount of stage, it's amazing what you all are able to do in terms of magnitude with the space that you do have.

So it's really, really an amazing theater.

And like I said earlier, a gem.

So thank you.

But thank you for all you do to provide that access.

Thank you.

Council Member Gettle.

Chair Alengsworth, thank you.

I just wanted to know, I said thank you for the presentation, but this discussion is highlighting that if my colleagues on the dais here in the committee or full council hasn't been to get the full tour, because as you know, been there many times myself as you have, but to get the tour of the spaces and the support systems and all that is very well worthwhile.

And gave me an opportunity to go through this before.

And so I really appreciate that tour, and I recommend it to my colleagues here on the dais.

That's great.

We're very happy to have you there.

And if any of you want to come over any time, I'd love to walk you through the building.

Thank you.

I need to meet the marketing team.

I don't know if Marshall Foster might jump in at the last second, too.

And marketing team.

This is phenomenal.

But anyways, okay, so I move that the committee recommends passage of Council Bill 120797. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and second to recommend passage of the bill.

Are there any comments?

Seeing that there's none, okay, please call the roll.

Clerk for recommendation that the council pass Council Bill 120780.

Council Member Strauss.

Abstain.

Council Member Kettle.

Aye.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Chair Hollingsworth.

Aye.

Four in favor, none opposed, one abstained.

Thank you, the motion carries and the committee recommendation that the bill passes amended will be sent to the June 18th, 2024 city council meeting.

Thank you everyone for joining us today.

I really appreciate your time and looking forward to supporting the Seattle Rep Theater.

Great, thank you very much.

Awesome, thank you.

Do my colleagues have any more items of business for the committee?

I'll make sure I look on Zoom to make sure Strauss, Council Member Strauss, nope, okay.

Well, I mean, I'll tell you later, but I had a really great meeting.

Council President asked about this at briefing.

I had a really great meeting last night with the Parks Department about Greenlight Community Center.

Happy to fill you all in later, but I think that there's a good road ahead for us.

Awesome, thank you.

Looking forward to hearing that.

And seeing that there's none, this is going to conclude the June 12th, 2024 meeting of Parks, Public Utilities, Technology.

Our next meeting is scheduled June 26th, 2 p.m.

And I also want to give a shout out to my brother.

He just had his first baby a couple weeks ago, Raph IV.

Auntie Joy loves you, all right?

Thank you.

There's no further business.

This meeting is adjourned, 3.41 p.m.