Seattle City Council Parks, Public Utilities and Technology Committee 4/23/25

Good afternoon.

We are going to call.

It is April 23rd, 2025. Meeting of the Parks Public Utilities and Technology Committee is coming to order.

Also known as PUT, your favorite committee.

It is 2.02 p.m.

I'm Joy Hollings, we're chair of the committee.

Clerk, will you please call the roll?

Council Member Kettle.

Council Member Rivera.

Present.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Council President Nelson.

Present.

Chair Hollingsworth.

I'm here.

Chair there for council members present.

Awesome.

Uh, council member Kettle is excused today on the agenda.

And we are so excited.

Um, cause we have a lot of great topics.

SPU is going to present a three part ordinance package of legislation to increase system development charges, which are also known as utility connection fees.

SPU plan is to use the additional revenue to a cost share and utility project that some developments are required to build.

And the committee will be hearing these comments uh i can't read today i apologize the committee will be um listening to these and up for consideration and looking forward to that opportunity and to ask questions as well we will now consider the agenda and if there are no objections the agenda will be adopted hearing seeing none the agenda is adopted now on to my favorite part of our meetings the public comment period Clerk, how many items, or how many speakers do we have signed up today?

We have seven in person and two remote.

Awesome.

All right, everyone's gonna get two minutes to speak, and then clerk, can you please read the instructions for the public comment?

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

I will call on speakers by name in the order which they are registered.

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

If you have not registered to speak but would like to, you can sign up before the end of the public comment period by going to the council's website or by signing up on the signup 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 you are addressing.

Speakers will hear a chime in 10 seconds 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 speaker.

Awesome.

And we'll start with the in-person speakers first.

And then you said we had online speakers as well.

Two, okay, awesome.

We'll start in person and we'll get through our in-person speakers.

Thank you all for coming today.

Looking forward to hearing your comments and then we'll jump to our online folks and we'll call the first one up.

The first speaker for in-person public comment is Joshua Morris followed by Carol Fieri.

Welcome Joshua.

Members, my name is Joshua Morris.

Give us one second.

We're going to get the clock started and then make sure you're speaking right.

Is that microphone on?

Hello, hello.

Testing, testing.

Hey, we can hear you.

Let's go, Joshua.

You're all good.

Good afternoon.

Thanks for allowing us to give public comment.

I'm Joshua Morris, Conservation Director at Birds Connect Seattle.

Here on behalf of 1,631 people who have signed our petition expressing concern about SPR's plan to build a massive outdoor pickleball facility adjacent to sensitive wetland habitat at Magnuson Park, I'd like to read a statement from one of those petitioners.

My home is in the low-income housing community in Magnuson Park, where my neighbors, including children, families, adults, and elders all live in poverty.

Our community experiences exponentially higher rates of health problems and disabilities.

Barriers exist in every necessary area of life.

One of the positive resources in our lives has been access to a natural environment.

The Parks Department's proposal to build up to 25 pickleball courts less than a block away from our homes and from the restored wetlands is poorly conceived.

Adding more environmental pollution from the loud noise and bright lighting shows an extraordinary lack of concern for us and for the restored wetlands.

We were not included in the advisory committee, which is stated to have included only tennis and pickleball players and advocates.

We were not recipients of the meeting mailer that advertised a meeting to review design concepts for the outdoor pickleball project.

These omissions suggest structural discrimination.

I have reviewed the design concepts.

I do not support the pickleball court development in the proposed location.

I do not support the amendment of the wetlands and supports field master plan.

The Parks Department proposal states that a 2003 environmental impact statement developed for this proposed project location was used to develop its plan.

I ask the city council to vote against any Magnuson Park master plan amendment that would allow this project and basis decisions on more recent and extensive research which document the following factors.

The critical importance of nature to human health, the importance and scarcity of wetland environments, the damaging impacts of light pollution, the damaging impacts of noise pollution, the intersections between poverty, disability, and health problems, and the economic benefits of natural environments.

Thank you.

Thank you, Joshua.

You still had 10 seconds.

All right.

No worries.

Carol Ferry, followed by Martha Taylor.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

My name is Carol Fury.

I am a Sandpoint Way Magnuson Park resident.

I'm on the Magnuson Park Advisory Committee, and I'm here to talk about pickleball.

The Parks Department would like to ultimately build about 24, ultimately build about 24 pickleball courts at Magnuson Park adjacent to those award winning wetlands we've been talking about.

will be utilized year-round, we should be looking at an indoor facility in the north end of the park, perhaps even one of the hangars in the north end of the park.

Yes, it's a little more expensive, a little more money at the outset, but all the mitigation we're hearing about required to deal with sound and light for the present project, as well as meeting regulation heights for the proposed covers for these courts to make them more usable year-round, And those covers have to be 18 to 20 feet tall.

They're pretty industrial looking and imposing.

We don't think it belongs in that spot in the park.

Parks design with walls on three sides of each court with one side open funnels the sign to the south side where there is housing development, Radford, over 550 no 400 for apartments 550 residents also with that open area facing Radford Court you can't keep courts dry in that weather anyway so my point is that an indoor facility would give more opportunities for you know what community for the players, they'd have more benefits there.

And there's two coming up, one in Fremont, an indoor facility in Fremont, indoor.

Next is Martha Taylor and Lauren Wilson.

Okay, hello, my name is Martha Taylor and I live in View Ridge.

I'm here today to urge the council to reject changes to the Magnuson Park Master Plan that would allow 25 pickleball courts to be built in the E5 parking lot.

A pickleball facility of this size should not be built directly adjacent to an award-winning wetland that the city invested millions of dollars in developing.

In addition, the expense of maintaining and securing this facility will stretch an already inadequate MAG Park budget, and the city will lose $250,000 of annual revenue from Children's Hospital using the parking at E5.

I have been talking to diverse people I meet on the ADA accessible paths in the wetlands recently to tell them about the proposed courts.

The most common concerns I have heard are about the effects of light and especially noise pollution on the wildlife.

They are there to enjoy urban nature, not the sounds of 25 pickleball carts from 7 a.m.

to 9 p.m.

People I have talked to are also appalled to learn that SPR disregarded all park users except pickleball players for over two years as this plan was developed.

At an April 9th Magnuson Park Advisory Committee meeting, an SPR employee said that having the pickleball courts at E5 will cut down on crime evangelism in Mag Park.

By that logic, the parking lots at Kite Hill, the tennis center, and especially the boat launch areas should all be reduced in size as well.

Again, I urge you to vote against allowing this pickleball complex in the E5 parking lot.

I am not against pickleball.

The courts should be cited elsewhere in the park or distributed in several parks in Northeast Seattle or even better built in an indoor facility.

Please don't approve this degradation of the existing wetlands and nature areas that will affect the wildlife and the countless people who seek time in urban nature.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Lauren Wilson followed by Ann Paul.

Good afternoon.

My name is Lauren Wilson.

I'm a resident of West Seattle and a constituent of council member Rob Saka.

I'm a birder and a member of the Seattle Insight Meditation Society's Climate Action Group.

I want to express my concern about a plan to build outdoor pickleball courts right next to the Magnuson Park wetlands where my friends and I like to go birding.

Here are some photos of the birds taken at the wetland that my friend took.

This is a widgeon, American widgeon at the wetlands.

This is a duckling, a mallard duckling.

And this is a cardinal meadow har, which is a dragonfly.

So we really value those wetlands.

We also have watched the pie-billed grebe build her nest in the water lilies, and then the birds have hatched, and we watched her with those.

If this pickleball master plan amendment is approved by you, The resulting pickleball facility could interfere with the nesting wetland behavior of these birds and degrade this restored habitat for 100 other wetland species that live there.

The day round noise and lighting and the magnitude of the noise from the courts could be very harmful to many of the wetland species.

There are sites in Magnuson Park which would not interfere with the wetland that has been restored for so many creatures, and urban nature lovers.

We only have three wetlands remaining of any substantial size in Seattle, and the State of Bird Report that came out this year says the bird populations are declining around all habitats.

With the acceleration of population losses caused by climate war,

Thank you so much.

And you can also, the comments, you can also send them in to council as well, other comments that you, if we're short on time, so please.

My name is Anne Paul.

I'm a member of First Connect Seattle.

I want to share my concern about the current plan to build an outdoor football facility directly adjacent to the restored wetland district.

It is indeed unfortunate that the parks include the complete community of stakeholders when they first began discussions for siting new pickleball courts.

The fact that this site was discussed and advanced for two years using only a base of ideas and preferences of paddleball and tennis enthusiasts rather than the broader community of park users has resulted in polarization that could have been avoided.

Pickleball is famously noisy.

Even the most limited footprint of pickleball courts at this particular location within the park will impact this wetland, both the wildlife that live there and those of us who seek to hear and see wildlife.

There are other locations in the park that would be appropriate for the pickleball facility, which I do hope Parks pursues.

I hope the council recognizes the value of our original investment in the wetland and its success, and that you will vote no on any amendment to the master plan with regard to this site.

Furthermore, it would be useful if Parks Department would pursue more appropriate locations within the park for a new pickleball.

Thank you.

Next is Anne Sherwood, followed by Patricia Noveltree.

Hi.

My name is Anne Sherwood.

I'm in District 4 near the Magnuson wetlands where the pickleball courts are slated to be installed.

I'm a bird collision and amphibian monitor and generally devote my free time to figuring out how to mitigate nature and biodiversity loss.

I'm speaking for the wildlife who live in the wetlands like the pied-billed grebes I watch, building their new nests leaf by mucky leaf in one of the ponds.

The grebes can't advocate for their young, so I will try.

Please build the quartz farther away from where 100 species are just trying to survive.

we've taken so much of their habitat already.

Of course, I'm not just speaking for the birds, but for many humans who find peace and quiet in the wetlands, who feel immense comfort and joy knowing there is protected wildlife out there, even in our beautiful city.

Publicly placing value on our few existing natural places, like the Magnuson wetlands, sends a message to the community that we care about the natural world, not just for ourselves today, but for future generations of humans and other beings alike.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you for taking the time to listen and for all you do to help us coexist with and benefit from nature and wildlife.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Last is Patricia Noveltree.

Thank you, Patricia Novotny, 40-year resident of Bryant.

I love Magnuson, and I love the wetlands, and I'm a lawyer, and I'd like to speak to process.

As decision makers, you know that nothing in our democracy is more basic than fairness, which includes due process.

It includes the right to notice and participation to all interested parties.

Planning for the pickleball courts has been going on for a long time, yet I have known nothing about it.

and about this plan until learning it from Bird Connect very recently.

Consequently, many of us have been deprived of our right to participate.

Seattle is better than this, more inclusiveness, more fair than this.

I've stood before many judges and honor their time, effort, and patience as they listen, learn, and balance competing interests.

Here, you are the judges, and I trust that you feel how wrong it is for other parties to have been shut out of this process.

Simply, you are asked to decide the fate of the wetlands, its inhabitants, and its other devotees without being fully informed of the facts.

I hope you will hear our voices.

study the information we provide, consider whether Seattle can meet the legitimate needs of all parties by citing the courts where they will do good without doing harm.

I'd like to take whatever seconds I have to say why I care about this.

Until I was 23, I didn't know there were any kinds of birds in the world besides robins, crows, and bald eagles.

Then a friend took me to the Oregon coast, and suddenly the world was, boom, full of birds.

Young people have too little opportunity for that kind of revelation and they need it.

Bird watching teaches us to pay attention.

And we know we have a trouble with attention right now.

Birding requires birds and birds requires habitat.

Bird watching is a gateway drug to the world, to our awareness of the world and to becoming stewards of

Thank you.

And we'll move to online.

I just learned a new word, birding.

I've never heard that.

Birding.

It's a new word that I learned today.

Birding.

It's a verb.

I got you.

And we're going to move to our online folks.

And just press star six once you hear your name is called.

First up is Patty Brandt.

And you'll press star six to unmute yourself, Patty.

Can you hear us?

Hello?

We might have to move on to the next person.

We can come back to Patty if they're having technical difficulties.

David Haynes.

I know you know how to press star six, David.

All right, David Haynes.

From hearing all of the complaints, I think that council needs to consider noise abatement somehow around the pickleball courts or just be more sensitive to the neighbors concerns.

But I called in because sometimes The dumpster road rage from the...

They pick up trash more than twice a week.

And we need to get a reprieve from that.

Thank you.

Well, thank you, Mr. Haynes.

Patty, just star six.

We see you online.

Can you hear us, Patty?

Just press star six.

We see you on- Hello.

It's unclear when it's my turn.

Will someone be telling us that?

Yeah.

Patty, it is your turn.

So go ahead and start with your public comment.

Patty, it's your turn.

Patty Brandt.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm here.

Can you hear me?

We can hear you, Patty.

Go right ahead.

Great.

So I'm calling in, my ask is similar to some of the others, for council to reject the master plan amendment that allows pickleball courts in Magnuson that's adjacent to the wetlands and instead relocate the pickleball courts, as others have said, perhaps to the north end, to an indoor facility near the tennis area.

So I'm just gonna speak briefly and it's all about at this time of our climate issues, how important it is for young people, for school age kids to have some connection to nature.

And there's very few wetlands in the Seattle area.

And it's an opportunity for young people to learn about birds nesting, about the animals that live in that area.

Occasionally we see coyotes and deer for their connection and appreciation.

And we need young people to be thinking of our future.

The noise, the light, the impact on nesting of birds and wildlife is really going to be a difficult issue.

And the mitigation that's been suggested isn't adequate.

My last ask is please, as mentioned, in the future involve other perspectives than just those advocating for some activity involved, whether it's a nature thing or some other area.

We would really appreciate the fairness aspect and having a voice.

Thank you for revisiting this.

Thank you.

And is there anyone else signed up?

No, well, that concludes our public comment.

I want to thank the people that came today.

I know I had opportunity to meet Joshua.

Oh, y'all are just leaving me?

No, I'm just playing.

I'm just playing.

But had a chance.

You can put the comments in that container.

But had a chance to meet with Joshua and I know I'll be working with Councilmember Rivera in Magnuson Park is her district and some of your districts as well.

And looking forward to finding a solution to this.

And I know how important birds are.

If you want to heal a sick bird, you just give it a Tweetment.

That's it.

Anyways, I thought that was really kind of cool.

You give it a tweet-ment.

Okay, anyways, thank you all for coming today.

We really, really appreciate it.

Well, thank you so much.

I thought that was a good joke.

That was good.

Tweet-ment?

Come on.

Tough crowd.

We will be hearing all the three items in the presentation, so will the clerk please read agenda item number one through three into the record?

Okay.

Agenda item one through three, Council Bill 120966 to 120968, an ordinance relating to the Seattle Public Utilities, revising, consolidating, and enacting provisions related to system development charges for water, sewer, and drainage infrastructure.

An ordinance relating to Seattle Public Utilities authorizing the general manager CEO of Seattle Public Utilities to develop municipal assessment reimbursement area authority in accordance with chapter 35.91 of the revised code of Washington.

An ordinance amending ordinance 127156, which adopted the 2025 budget, including the 2025 to 2030 capital improvement program for briefing and discussion.

Presenting today is Marco Lowe, Chief Operations Officer, Mayor's Office, Andrew Lee, General Manager, CEO, Carrie Burchard-Juarez, Leslie Brinson, Seattle Public Utilities.

Awesome.

And please, we know who you all are, but please state your name for the record and you can jump right into your presentation.

Really happy to have you here.

And then also Brian Goodnight from Central Staff.

Andrew Lee, a general manager, CEO for Seattle Public Utilities.

Leslie Brinson, senior policy advisor, Seattle Public Utilities.

Carrie Burchard-Warez, Seattle Public Utilities deputy director.

Marco Lowe, Chief Operating Officer from the mayor's office.

And for the record, I did love that joke.

Excellent.

Brian Goodnight, Council Central staff.

I'll start off the introduction today.

I think it's for many of us at the table or up at the dais, we've gotten calls from people trying to do a development in the city of Seattle for desperately needed housing, and they found that one of the impediments was the charge for them to connect to a water line or other utilities.

When we came into the office with Mayor Harrell, We talked to SPU about options for how to make that a better process that may be something that can get us the housing we need and also keep the utility whole.

SPU came up with a very novel program.

I think, actually, Carrie Burchard-Warez may have brought it from Austin in the form of system development charges to a non-technical person, which I am.

I describe it as everybody pays a little, so nobody pays a lot.

and we start to look at ways to spread the costs across the entire family of development that is all coming onto the city online into the same water system and drainage system instead of just the projects that happen to be in unfortunate locations that aren't near utilities would pay a lot to connect.

I think that's a really good overview.

I'd love to turn it over to our great team at SPU.

Yeah, thank you, Marco.

I'm going to make you Chair Hollingsworth and members of the committee.

So with the One Seattle Comprehensive Plan and the implementation of middle housing, Per House Bill 1110, SPU has been considering for years now how do we ensure that our city has adequate water, wastewater, and drainage infrastructure while understanding the impact of infrastructure costs on housing development and our commitment to affordability and staying within our current rate path.

So with that, we've been working for years now with developers, stakeholders like the Housing Development Consortium and staff to develop and improve the proposal before you.

which I think strikes a really critical balance.

And so I'll name the balance.

First, it makes sure that SPU critical infrastructure is in place to meet the growing needs of the city.

Second, it makes sure that the cost of this new infrastructure are predictable and spread across, like Marco mentioned, all development and not overly burdensome on any one particular project or project type.

Third, it leverages the efficiency of our development community to actually build main lines where they're missing at the time of construction.

And then lastly, it creates a proposal, and this is really important, that pays for itself and does not increase utility bills for our customers.

So with that, I'm going to pass it on to Carrie Burchard-Juarez, who will provide the briefing on this legislation.

And if it's okay with all of you, I'd like to ask that questions be held until the end.

Thank you, Chair Hollingsworth, Council President Nelson and committee members.

We appreciate the opportunity to present this proposal to you.

SPU and elected officials have considered changing system development charges in the past.

However, we have never considered using the SDC funds to directly partner development infrastructure projects so that's what makes this proposal different from previous proposals and we think it's a very timely solution to some of the frustrations that Marco talked about that you have been hearing about as well about the cost of some of these infrastructure projects So this is the balance that Andrew was just talking about.

We want to make housing projects affordable.

We also want rates to be affordable.

And so we believe this proposal balances those two needs in a way that previous proposals have not addressed.

So this is a three ordinance package.

The first piece of legislation authorizes the revisions to the water system development charge and adds new drainage and wastewater system development charges.

The second piece authorizes SPU to participate in latecomer agreements, which we'll talk a little bit more about later.

And then the third piece authorizes the budget and staffing to implement.

So why are new main lines needed?

Ideally, to distribute clean drinking water, you would have a water distribution main in almost every street.

Parts of Seattle just don't have that infrastructure.

And so it needs to be added to support the development that we wanna see.

So this exhibit here is just an example of that.

You can see in this exhibit, we have existing main lines in the top and bottom of this figure.

The dotted line shows where we need a new main.

And those red lines are services.

So what you're seeing there is the homes that should be able to connect to a main in their street.

In other words, they should be able to connect to that dotted line main.

are actually connecting to those existing mains instead.

So that results in a long service line.

Those service lines can be very expensive to maintain and replace.

And so that's why it's better to have the lines in every street.

And this proposal will help us get there.

So this is another hypothetical example here.

This new development on the left-hand side of this exhibit, under the current state, they would be required to build that entire new, MLE is a mainline extension, that's what that acronym is.

So a new mainline, they would be required to build that entire project.

to connect to the existing line that's shown on the right-hand side.

Under this proposal, SPU would reimburse that project for the portion in front of the vacant parcel.

So the developer would still design and build the water main, but they would only be responsible for the cost of the portion directly in front of their development.

SPU would reimburse the remainder of the project.

And that would allow, if that vacant parcel develops at some point in the future, they could then connect to that new main and they could pay a fee to SPU to reimburse the rate payers for SPU's investment in that project.

So that's the principle behind the proposal.

So this exhibit shows the need for infrastructure as it's distributed throughout the city.

This includes the need for water mainline extensions as well as wastewater and drainage lines.

So some parts of the city have a higher need for water mains, some parts have a higher need for drainage improvements, but this just shows in general what parts of the city are lacking infrastructure and how they could benefit from this program.

So another way to look at this is under the current policy, about 10% of the projects that come to SPU to connect to our systems are required to build some sort of mainline extension or other infrastructure in order to make that connection.

So about 90% of the projects that come to us do not have a requirement.

They've got a main in the street that they can connect to.

But those 10% of projects are spending on average $16 million a year on those projects.

And that remaining 5 million is coming from our current water system development charge.

So on average, over the past 10 years, developers have spent $21 million per year on utility-related infrastructure investments.

But 76% of that has been borne by 10% of the projects.

So what we're proposing is to spread that responsibility out a bit.

So looking at that same $21 million, Under the new proposal, the increased system development charges would bring in about $18 million, which we would then use to cost share on the larger infrastructure projects such that they would only be spending 3%, I'm sorry, $3 million or 14% of the entire investment.

So this exhibit is showing sort of the relationship between these developer built projects and SPU's Capital Improvement Program as a whole.

So SPU spends about $240 million on CIP or Capital Improvement Projects every year.

For spend about $21 million a year.

So developer contributions are a relatively small portion of SPU's capital investment, but it can still be a huge burden for some of these projects.

And so what we're showing here is the way that $21 million investment could be shifted from the current state to a future state.

where it is more of a shared cost across all development projects rather than a burden for just a few projects.

So as Marco said, everyone pays a little more, so more projects become feasible.

That's the idea here.

This also has a benefit of making these project costs more predictable.

That's something we know is really important to these projects.

So under this proposal, developers would have clarity very early as to what the requirements are and what portion SPU would reimburse.

It also reduces those long service lines that we talked about that can be very expensive for future homeowners to maintain.

So SDCs would be charged on all development projects.

We tend to focus on residential development because that's where we have an affordability crisis.

But these are charged for any type of development project.

And right now we have a water SDC, but it is very low.

compared to our regional neighbors, and we do not have a drainage or wastewater, SDC.

So this proposal is to increase the water system development charge and add new system development charges for drainage and wastewater.

The SDC, the way we calculate system development charges is defined in state law, but it has some flexibility.

And so that's why we are able to move from one method of calculating to a different method of calculating.

We believe for water, drainage and wastewater, it would generate about $13 million in new revenue that we could use for this cost sharing.

And we're proposing to update the SDCs once every three years with our rate studies.

So that would be per fund staggered annually the way we do it now.

So the current water system development charge is $2,400.

The new proposed system development charge for water would be 6,900.

For wastewater, 2,600.

And for drainage, 1,225.

So the water and wastewater SDCs are based on the size of the meter.

So this is what the SDC would be for a standard three quarter inch meter, which is our smallest meter size and also our most common meter size.

The drainage SDC would be based on an increase in impervious cover or hard surface.

As Andrew noted, this proposal is rate neutral.

So this is some examples of different types of development and how they would be impacted by this proposal.

These are hypothetical because every project is unique, but these are the project types that we tend to see a lot of, particularly these two in the middle.

So on the left hand side is showing a single family, a new single family home that needs a new three quarter inch meter.

So currently it's paying $2,400 for a water SDC.

Under this proposal, it would be 12,800.

It's really important to note though, that this is for a lot that does not have an existing service.

So a lot of projects that are building a new single family home or adding an ADU or a DADU or a basement apartment, they are going to continue to use their existing three quarter inch service.

So they will not be subject to the water or wastewater SDC.

If they're adding impervious cover, which they may or may not be, they would be subject to the drainage SDC.

but they are not going to pay that larger SDC unless they need a new water service.

And so that's what we're showing here in this next example, which is a single-family home with an addu and daddu.

So in this hypothetical example, perhaps this is a three-story daddu that needs a sprinkler system, and so it needs a larger meter than the standard three-quarter inch.

So this project would pay $23,500 based on the one and a half inch meter.

This 12 pack of town homes, for example, if it needed a new two inch master meter, which is something we see quite a bit, it would pay $34,650.

Um, this hypothetical 150 unit apartment building, it might need a new four inch combo meter.

It would pay 161,500 as opposed to the current 40,800.

I would also note that for the projects that do build infrastructure, they are not charged this SDC.

So it is one or the other, it's not both.

So this is a benchmarking effort that we went to to show how our SDC currently and proposed would compare to some of our regional neighbors.

So what you're seeing there in the left hand bar at the very bottom, there's a very small turquoise line that you can barely see, but that's the current SDC.

The other parts of that bar are showing other costs that developers pay for various project types.

And then the potential, the next column over is showing the potential change and sort of the scale of that as it compares to other charges.

And then also compared to some of our neighbors.

It's challenging sometimes to make an apples-to-apples comparison because development charges are handled differently and called different things.

So this is our best effort at showing how we compare regionally.

This is for a typical multifamily development here.

And then this next slide is a similar analysis for a typical single family home.

And just as a reminder, this would be for a new service, a new home with a new service, most likely not for like a remodel or adding an ADU or DADU.

So our proposal is to use these SDC funds to directly partner on these development infrastructure projects.

And like I said before, that's what makes this proposal different from previous considerations of SDCs.

So the developer would build the main and pay for it up front, and then they would get reimbursed based on the portion of their project that does not directly benefit their development.

So in other words, the portion directly in front of their lot is what they would be responsible for.

SPU would be responsible for the remainder.

In order to make the program predictable, we're proposing to pay $1,500 per linear foot.

That is an amount that we have talked with developers about extensively to kind of ground truth it and make sure that it's reasonable.

We would limit our reimbursement to the first 750 feet.

That's just to make sure we don't get caught up in any strange outliers that are extremely long.

The vast majority of these projects are less than 750 feet.

The future beneficiaries of the projects would repay SPU ratepayers as part of the latecomer agreement.

So in the example that we looked at before, any vacant lots that develop or redevelop or need a larger service line would have that main there to connect to, which is a huge benefit to them.

but they would be responsible for reimbursing the rate payers for some portion of that infrastructure investment.

And we're proposing to evaluate this program annually to sort of true it up.

because these numbers are based on historical and projected development patterns and we know that can be unpredictable.

So we would need to watch it closely over time and see if the revenue raised and the amount contributed is consistent with what we projected and make adjustments if we need to.

So this is an example here.

This lot in yellow is a hypothetical development and there's no main in this hypothetical street.

So currently that developer would be required to build that entire dashed line water mainline extension all the way up to the existing main shown at the top of the exhibit.

and there's currently no cost sharing in place, so that developer would pay that entire estimated 375K.

Under this proposal, SPU would reimburse them $281,000 of that based on the cost of that project that is not directly in front of that yellow lot.

And in the future, those green lots and the pink lots, if and when they redevelop and connect to that new main, we would have a latecomer agreement in place to reimburse that money back to SPU through a latecomer agreement.

And that's if it redevelops within 20 years.

So as we're rolling this program out, and as we were crunching these numbers, we're estimating that the program will need, will have a minor shortfall as we're rolling it out.

And so our proposal is to supplement that with some capital funds that we already have allocated.

This is in order to keep it rate neutral.

And this would go into our sort of reassessment over time and the monitoring of the program to make sure that it's balancing out.

I would note that we have not included any latecomer payments, even though we will likely get latecomer payments, but they are unpredictable and they can take a long time, years, 10, 15, 20 years to come in.

And so we are not counting on those funds to make this program viable, but that is something we would monitor going forward.

And so we have a better sense of how that's actually gonna work.

So we've done a lot of public engagement on this.

We talk to our customers a lot about their projects and trying to understand what their challenges are.

So we got feedback from this before, during and after.

As we developed the program, we stayed in very close contact with our customers and got a lot of great feedback, which we have incorporated.

Some projects will benefit directly from this cost sharing.

All projects will pay the higher SDC.

So most of our stakeholders have expressed that they understand the purpose of this proposal and how it helps the city's housing goals and are generally supportive.

This is just a more detailed listing out of what these three ordinances actually do.

We are proposing to start the cost sharing on January 1 of 2026. There are projects we know that are waiting for this program to go into effect if it is approved.

And so those projects will continue to move forward.

Since it is a reimbursement program, they would need to build the project anyway, so we don't believe this is going to slow any projects up that might be waiting for it, for example.

As I talked about, we've stayed in close contact with developers, so they know that a proposal of this type is coming.

They also understand that it is not approved at this point, so.

So they are watching this closely, too, to see how it plays out.

And with that, we're happy to answer any questions.

Awesome.

And before we jump into questions, I would love to offer Brian goodnight if you have any thoughts

Thank you, chair.

I don't have any today.

Like you, I just started reviewing the proposal and I'm working with some of my colleagues on it as well, but we can have more at a future meeting.

Awesome.

Thank you so much.

And would love, I know I want to recognize council.

Well, first of all, thank you for the presentation.

Really appreciate your time putting this together and walking us through.

I know council member Rivera had her hand raised for a question.

Probably, I think it was back on slide 14 or something, but want to give you the floor for your questions.

Thank you, chair.

Thank you, SPU for being here and our trustee central staffer, Brian Goodnight.

So I have several questions actually.

So first off on slide 14. So this comparison between the cities, does this, I'm assuming it doesn't take into account the expense of development.

I guess what I'm getting to is I assume that the expense of development in each of these cities are not the same.

So how do you, so it's not really, it's kind of an apples to oranges comparison versus apples to apples.

because Seattle of all of these seems like, I assume it's the biggest city, so I assume it's more expensive to build here than some of these other cities.

So how do you account for, I just find this difficult in terms of comparison, because it's not the same.

Is there a response you have to that?

Yeah, well, these are showing the city costs.

So these are fees that they would pay for their development to the city of Seattle versus to the city of Redmond, for example.

So you're right, it doesn't take into account other things that impact the cost to develop, right?

like just construction costs and labor costs and things like that.

And the price of the property.

Yes, that's a property cost, absolutely.

It's kind of a hard comparison point.

So I guess that was both a question and a statement.

And then on page 19, I'm wondering, it sounds like you did some outreach.

I'm wondering who you did outreach to.

I see the list of other stakeholders, but the original outreach piece in April of 23. And I guess what I'm getting to is who's going to be unhappy about this.

And I just want to know how extensive that outreach is. was, and just for transparency, I just heard about this for the first time a couple of weeks ago when you came to brief me.

And this is something that obviously will have a big impact on the district that I represent.

So can you give me some information about that?

Because we often hear, and I will say for transparency, folks will say, I didn't know anything about this.

I didn't know outreach was happening.

Then we do these things and people get really upset.

And I'm a big proponent of early and often outreach to mitigate for that.

And also because it helps us identify problem areas that we could potentially solve.

So can you?

Yes, so our primary method of identifying stakeholders was through our customer base.

So anyone who has ever connected to a utility or one of our utilities in Seattle is in our customer database.

And that is who we reached out to primarily.

That is an enormous number of customers.

We also reached out to that list there just to make sure that we were capturing everybody, just to make sure that we weren't missing any customers.

And just for clarity, that list of organizations, they weren't brought in later, they were brought in initially for our original meetings where we invited all of our existing previous, anyone who's ever done business with the development services office, was invited to these meetings, yeah.

And it was a series of meetings, yeah.

Thank you.

What did the outreach look like?

What does that mean?

When you went out to the customer base, what did that outreach look like?

Yes, so most of our customers communicate with us through email.

And so that was our primary method of contacting our entire customer base.

They have an email address on file with us that they use, and we keep it fairly well maintained and current to make sure that we can communicate important information.

You know, we often need to communicate with our customer base, and so they're used to getting emails from us.

And as far as getting those other organizations, I mean, we contacted the leaders of those organizations and arranged to come and present to them in person.

I guess I'm more interested in the individual folks because those are the constituents I represent.

So you sent emails.

What was the response?

Did you have these public meetings?

How well attended were they?

Can you give me details about that?

If you don't have that now, then we can follow up later, but that's what I'd be interested in receiving.

Okay, yep, we can do that.

So it sounds like you don't have that now.

And then as to who will be unhappy about this, can you tell me about that?

You know, I think that...

Developers are used to working in the current environment, right?

And so some developers are very savvy about avoiding these expensive infrastructure investments.

They don't purchase vacant lots on streets that don't have water mains, for example.

So those, if you exclusively only develop lots that don't have infrastructure requirements and you're paying a higher SDC, that might make you opposed to this proposal.

What we are though trying to accomplish with this proposal is really targeted towards these lots that are potentially in the middle of a block and maybe the person who owns that lot has not been able to redevelop it.

because it would be cost prohibitive, right?

Because there's no main on their street.

In order to get a service, they would have to build the new main and it's $500,000 say hypothetically, which is not unusual at all.

And so they are not able to do anything with their lot.

Those people don't have the flexibility to pick a lot to buy, that's their lot that they own and live on, right?

Those are the people who would benefit from this cost sharing proposal because it will unlock the value of their lot because it makes those investments more feasible for them with the cost sharing.

So you're saying the single family homeowner that wants to redevelop their lot, maybe split it because it's getting really expensive to live in the city.

You have a lot of retirees who are living on fixed income.

They would be in support of this because it sounds like they would be paying more, a lot more.

than they would be paying now?

Well, it depends on if they happen to live on a street that has a main in it or doesn't have a main in it.

If they happen to live on a street that has a water main, a wastewater main, and a drainage main for them to connect to, they don't have to make any infrastructure investments.

All they're paying is an SDC.

So yes, those people would pay around 13K instead of around 3K, right?

So that's $10,000 more for that person who happens to live on that street that has all the infrastructure it needs.

If you are that same homeowner on a street that is missing one or more of those mains, which as we showed you on one of the exhibits is fairly common around the city, and you are required to build some main, you might then be very pleased with this proposal because it might allow your project to move forward, whereas before it could not move forward, right?

So it is really the luck of the draw based on where your lot is located and what infrastructure happens to be available for you to connect to or not.

So I see, I mean, looks like going back to my district, the red, not just my district throughout the city, the red spots are where there's the issue of the no main.

So in these areas, they're gonna wind up.

So these areas are, yes, highly likely to be missing either a water main, wastewater main, or drainage infrastructure.

So people who live in these areas and maybe want to subdivide their lot and sell half of it may be in a situation where their lot is not very valuable because it would require a large investment of infrastructure to maintain.

So they might benefit dramatically from this proposal.

If they happen to live on a main, on a street that has all of that, yes, their system development charge will be $10,000 more than it would be otherwise.

Even though the value of their home might be the same or whatever they're...

That's right.

And then can you tell me about existing homes?

So you talked about if there isn't, if they were doing a new single family with the adu-dadus, what about, because a lot of existing homes, especially in the district I represent, are just adding an adu-dadu to try to help defray the mortgage costs because they're living on fixed income.

Yes.

How does that...

So if they are able to use their existing three-quarter inch service, then they are not subject to the water or wastewater SDC.

Most of the time, if someone is adding an ADU or a DADU, and it doesn't need to be sprinklered.

So in other words, if it's two stories or less, most of the time they can continue to use their existing three quarter inch service.

So they will not be subject to the water or wastewater SDC.

If they're adding additional hard surface, so if they're adding a DADU, for example, they may be, unless they're replacing a garage or putting it over some other paved area, they might be adding hard surface.

And so they would be subject to the drainage SDC.

That is the smallest of the three.

It would be an additional $1,200, something in that range.

And if they're doing a three-level townhouse, for instance, then they would be subject to the full.

Most of the time, those are required by fire.

And most of the time, that requires a larger service than a three-quarter inch.

And so that homeowner might, they might retire their three quarter inch service and purchase a one and a half inch meter, for example.

They would get a credit for retiring their three quarter inch service, but then they would pay more for that SDC for the one and a half inch meter.

Thank you, Chair.

Sorry, I didn't mean to take up all the time.

You're good, no worries.

That's why we're here at committee.

You're all good.

Thank you, Council Member Rivera.

Council President Nelson.

I have probably more than one question, but first of all, what is the main problem this package seeks to solve?

The main problem is that sometimes these water main extension or drainage and wastewater main extensions can cost a million dollars, right?

So a project might become unfeasible because of that.

So let's say a developer is wanting to put in a five story, 30 unit project.

they come to us and we say, well, there's no drainage main to connect this to.

So you have to build it and here's what you have to build.

They may go do their due diligence on that and realize that it's gonna cost them a million dollars to build that main.

That may not pencil into their calculations to make that a profitable development.

And so they might walk away from that opportunity.

And so the city then is out 30 units of housing that we otherwise might have had, and we don't get the infrastructure that they would have built.

So this proposal shifts that such that they're building the main, which is needed, We reimburse them for some portion of it, which makes it hopefully still affordable for them.

And the city gets 30 units of housing.

So that's why we're looking at this as sort of a win-win and potentially timely in response to House Bill 1110 and the comprehensive plan, which is encouraging the addition of housing.

So how many of our...

how much, you can say there's a percentage of blocks or roads, how many streets develop, well, how many streets do not have water mains?

I mean, percentage-wise.

About 25%.

Thank you very much for that detail, yes.

So really, the very high cost of putting in that infrastructure would really only...

impact if you're building in a very small amount or a quarter of the right of ways that could support that, right?

I'm just trying to get a sense.

It seems like a very small amount of development would have to pay under the current way it's set up.

And so I'm just wanting to make sure.

But in the future, that cost is decreased.

And I think that's a good thing.

But then the cost of the projects that could be built in 75% of the other right-of-way would go up.

I think one of the things that is happening is there are certain places in the city where lots are not developing and they probably won't develop because of these mechanics, especially in, and Andrew, you may have to correct me on this, but there are some long blocks like a 600 foot block, so that mainline extension will have to be 600, 700 feet, so that's a million dollars.

And if it's a sewer mainline, the slope has a significant impact, so it can't just, so even if we went back to the one where there was a main at the top and the bottom, If you're down here and you're on a slope, you have to build all the way to the one in the right direction.

So you might be really close to a main, but you're far away from others, and those blocks we're seeing aren't developing.

We're seeing the ones that are close to the mains developing, but these other places are just underdeveloped.

In a landlocked city, in a growing landlocked city, promoting growth in all of our blocks is what we're aiming to do.

I'm just trying to think.

I totally get that in the gravity issue in our town.

Makes us a little bit unique, I suppose.

I'm just trying to get a sense of just spreading the cost and then what will not get redeveloped.

For example, someplace where there already is a water line, but now they have to pay because of the cost sharing.

And that's just for the main line for the water.

And the drainage and the wastewater is a brand new cost.

that on top, and it just seems like when I'm looking at the square foot with that chart on page 13 or whatever that was, it seems like the small, well, the smaller the actual project, the more the cost per square foot goes up, which is then, while we're trying to increase missing middle housing, that seems like that would hit that category the most.

Go ahead.

If I could jump in for a second.

I think we're all really sensitive to the cost of housing and the cost of construction.

And that's been a voice from many people in the council and the mayor as well.

It's not taken lightly that this would increase the possible cost of housing.

What is the contra is that we would have places where we don't build housing.

And that was really the fear.

fear is that there's many lots that are frankly just shut out because the cost of running these lines would be too high.

The other thing that we think about is in a utility, we all have shared risk and shared expense for a shared benefit.

And you could be a member and a customer of Seattle Public Utilities on a block that is infeasible, and even though you're paying for all your water and your drainage and everything else, you actually don't get the benefit that somebody might get who bought a house on a block with already an existing water main.

And this, I guess, brings it back to we're all in this together and we're all going to pay a little bit.

Yeah, and you and I have also probably heard from some of the same people that do talk about the cost of regular maintenance or keeping up the system.

And so therefore, when new development goes in, there is a perception that, you know, that that's an opportunity to recover costs.

So I just wanted to make sure that that wasn't the driving intention.

On page, one last question, on page, when you're comparing what everybody else pays, other cities, I really love those kinds of diagrams because it really does help.

On page 14, the hatched mark affordable housing with bonus versus the unhatched kind of light green affordable housing.

Are you making the point that Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond, and those three cities, they only have to pay that affordable housing fee if they are getting a bonus of going above a certain height?

Correct.

It's the difference between Seattle's mandatory housing affordability policy and incentive zoning, which is what Kirkland, Bellevue, and Redmond use.

So it could be argued that they are getting more value because they're able to put on another story and so therefore they could absorb that cost a little bit better.

I mean, because it's an incentive, it's not required because it's just development.

Correct.

And I think Seattle went through the mandatory housing affordability up zone as a way of getting at that.

I'm just making the comparison, like what would make it attractive in one place and not another and why they can bear to the cost of, you know, one cost versus another.

Thank you.

Awesome.

Thank you, Council President Nelson.

And is that an old hand?

That's a new hand.

Council Member Strauss has questions.

Obviously, I've gone already, so I

Okay, awesome.

Councilmember Rivera, and then we'll go to Councilmember Strauss.

Thank you, Chair.

Have you considered, I'm worried about folks that this will impact negatively in terms of, you know, they just can't afford to do it like our, retirees who are trying to split their lots or trying to stay in their home.

I mean, could there be, have you considered exemptions for, you know, these folks who, I mean, all these, I understand the, I understand our infrastructure's aging.

I understand that we're trying to get creative about how to both upgrade our infrastructure and also develop more housing because we know we need housing of all types across the city.

I'm also mindful that the folks that have lived here a long time, and particularly those living on fixed incomes, you know, they're having to pay more and more and more of their share, fair share.

And so I'm wondering what you all are looking at or have you in terms of exempting some folks so that they're not, you know, they're able to stay in their homes and not get displaced because of all of this, meaning still be able to split their lots and build something and stay in their home.

I mean, I think this will have an impact on that subset.

I don't know how many people those are, but it is a concern.

And I shared this concern earlier.

I didn't get a good response back.

So round two on how can you help, you know, have you considered this?

How can we help this subsection of the population?

Because when, you know, Mr. Lowe, you're talking about, you know, I mean, we're trying to incentivize development, but we don't want to have a negative impact on the folks that are already here as much as possible.

So how do we mitigate?

If I could jump in first and correct me if I'm wrong, I don't think this program currently has any exemption for somebody that might be in financial need.

Most of the incentives that we see at the utilities, as you all know, are in the discount program that is somebody that can prove they would need some assistance and it comes off the rate.

I think what you're saying, though, is really important.

A lot of these homes are not built for an investment.

They're built for a loved one.

whether they're older or younger or need help or what have you.

I think the Turner Center at Berkeley said like 26% of California ADUs collect no rent at all, which tells you there's somebody in there that probably couldn't pay it, and that's a good thing they're built.

I think one thing that I'd love to work with you on is the overarching look at how we do ADUs, because I think we are getting to an increasingly complex system for what is ultimately a very simple house, and we could look at ways that we can, Tacoma's doing this, they're lifting up the ADUs so it's not an impervious surface, So, a lot of the drainage fees goes away.

We are starting to see scope creeps sometimes in how we're doing corrections at SDCI on, again, a pretty simple structure and how do we introduce pre-designed as we already have, but modular as well.

So, they come in done.

Those are .

So I think also state law doesn't allow us to do an exemption for system development charges.

We have to treat everyone the same way, but they do allow a low income deferral, which means that similar to the way we do, similar to the way the Office of Housing sort of would defer a payment until the sale of a home if they were engaging in emergency home repair, for example.

So, and I think at your urging of looking at retirees, we looked harder at the code and we found that the low income threshold that is allowed currently for our current system development charge is very, very low.

It's 200% of federal poverty level, which is 43,000 for a family of two.

So a two person retiree couple.

we can raise that to 80% area median income and adjust some other pieces of the code.

So 80% of area median income is about $100,000 for a household of two.

We looked into the data on our seniors, and about 50% of our seniors are below 80% of AMI.

So that would capture those folks.

And we can adjust it so, like...

COO Lowe said, to apply in a way that it stays on the property while they live there and doesn't have to be paid to SPU until later they defer it until the eventual sale of the property.

And we would love to work on that improvement to the program if it's at council's interest.

It is.

I'd love to have further conversation about this before we would move forward with this, because I don't want the unintended consequence, and I think there is some, you know, folks feel a little bit of undue stress when we say, oh, well, we'll do that, but let us do this, and then we're in a spot where it's just not possible.

I want to take care of the unintended consequences as part of it, not post it, I guess is what I'm trying to say.

So yes, I welcome that conversation and those mitigation efforts.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Rivera.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Chair, the one, the only Chair of the Parks Utilities Association.

Committee.

Colleagues, thank you for coming here today.

This presentation has been very informative.

I do have a few questions.

Some of them I know the answer to and they're leading questions.

Some of them aren't best guess which ones are which.

If we could go back to slide four, that would be helpful.

I guess I have an old presentation here.

The new development vacant parcel pre-existing home.

Correct.

I came to this awareness many years ago when I was working with Bob Hennessy on a constituent case work issue.

So again, thank you, Bob, for educating me about the problems that we face sometimes.

The spaghetti string is the next slide where Bob really was helping me understand.

Sally Bagshaw's office had gotten a call from somebody that was trying to add an ADU to their property and couldn't because of the very issue that you have set up right now.

They had done the whole budget, run everything, had pinched every single penny, and at the end of the process, right when they were going into the final moments, I think it was something like $750,000 was added, which doubled the project.

It was because and there was no main line, and so they were responsible for building that entire new main line.

I've had a long time to think about this.

I am impressed that we have a solution to this.

We regularly here at Public Comment about places that are unable to be built because it just becomes cost prohibitive.

When I look at, and now I'm going to zoom out to talk about zoning.

Sorry, I know this is not the zoning committee, but our comprehensive plan chair is also the chair of this committee.

And so when I look at zoning, especially if I'll use 15th Avenue Northwest, there are still single family homes in what is currently zoned as neighborhood commercial.

I now kind of want to go in and look at the water maps.

I did have them pulled up at a moment ago.

Sometimes those parcels don't get developed because property owners don't want to sell.

Sometimes the financing doesn't work.

Sometimes for many reasons.

What I am becoming more aware of through your work here is that these parcels aren't always developed because they don't have water or wastewater in front of their building.

I'll admit when you put up slide and you can just go to the next slide with the high need, medium, high need.

I think very highly of district six.

I'm biased in that way.

And to see nearly the entire district in red, it made me think, well, we've got mostly sidewalk.

We have the highest number of sidewalks in the entire city.

We have a street grid that connects.

How can this be?

Do you want to speak to what the difference between our street grid and our water and wastewater grid is?

Yes, so every street, it would benefit from having a water main in most cases, right?

So the best way to deliver clean drinking water is through a gridded system.

It's more reliable.

In other words, if we have to operate or maintain the system, it puts fewer people out of water if we have a grid in place.

Unfortunately, Seattle's water system just didn't develop that way many, many decades ago.

So a neighborhood may have developed say in the 1940s or 50s, for example.

The people doing that work at that time just chose not to put a water main there.

It would have been better if they did.

but they didn't.

And so that is sort of what we're responding to at this point, is trying to go in and put water mains where they probably should have been originally.

To a lesser extent, we have a similar situation with drainage.

For example, for parts of the city that we have annexed, they may have informal drainage, but they don't meet current standards and they don't operate as well as a formal drainage system.

And so it really has to do with previous sort of lack of standards around how utilities grow and develop over time.

Many cities have this challenge.

This is not unique to Seattle, but it is a landlocked city that needs more housing.

So that makes us somewhat unique in having a combination of very old infrastructure systems, looser development requirements many, many decades ago, being landlocked and having a high need for additional housing, all of those things working together put us in somewhat of a unique position.

It makes us a little bit different from our regional neighbors, for example, and even some other large cities that we tend to compare ourselves to.

Thank you.

I'm tempted to ask to share, I don't know if that's the right to share.

As I'm looking at your SPU water mains and service GIS map, I'm a little taken aback because 80th Northwest doesn't have a main line down the middle of it.

85th, it's choppy, so it's not consistent.

And then in some places it looks like there's two main lines.

83rd does not have a main line.

It just, I'm wondering if when you come back, you could walk us through your GIS map a little bit more.

I'm gonna, let's let the professionals drive, right?

Chair, thank you.

I say this because 65th doesn't have a main line.

15th doesn't have a main line.

And so I want to make sure that I'm looking at the right map.

Okay.

Make sure you have the right layer open on the GIS.

It says SPU water mains and service.

That sounds right.

Yeah.

Water mains.

And so.

That sounds right.

I guess.

When I first confronted this problem because of the story that I told that Bob Hennessy helped me with, it was on maybe off the beaten track is the best way to put it.

And so it seemed, OK, this sounds standard.

When I'm taking a look at this map, there are so many parcels that are unserved that it's giving me a little bit more pause to realize how much larger this problem is than I initially realized.

And we could definitely sit down with you either in this meeting or separately and just look at the map together and, you know, just maybe answer some basic questions about like, for example, why there might be two water mains in one street, right?

Why that might happen and why we have missing mains, that sort of thing.

We can definitely do that.

Thank you.

If you could go to the slide, goal, more equitable distribution and development, that would be helpful.

Which slide number was that for you?

It was seven on the one you gave me yesterday.

So it's eight.

There we are.

Thank you.

Just confirming in both of these graphs, this is all private money.

We're not talking about rate payer money at all.

Correct.

And so when COO Lowe says that this proposal allows everyone pays a little, so fewer people pay the most or something.

I think I paraphrased, you said it better than I did.

That is what this is showing.

Is that correct?

Where we are charging a higher fee to everyone.

so that we are creating essentially an insurance pool that allows for the places that need these new water mains to allow for that to be funded, not on the back of one or two property owners.

Am I getting this right?

Can you add more nuance to this?

That's correct.

And, you know, there are all different types of developers, right?

There are single family homeowners who once in their life would like to subdivide their lot and sell part of it.

And that's the only time they're ever going to be a developer, right?

It's a one-time thing.

All the way up to developers who...

have been doing it for a really long time and build lots of huge projects every year and everything in between, right?

And all of those different types of development will benefit from this cost sharing, right?

And they will all pay a slightly higher SDC.

Now, obviously, the big projects are going to need the larger meters, so they're gonna pay the really high SDCs, which is over $100,000, for example, in that 150 unit apartment complex that we showed.

And the person who maybe wants to have their one time ever subdividing their lot and selling it, assuming that whoever buys it needs to put in a new water service, that potentially is gonna be a $10,000 higher cost there.

But all the different types of developers that come to SPU are going to both benefit from this and pay higher cost.

Now, what Leslie was talking about, the deferral is a really elegant solution to address that in some way because it allows them to defer that payment or at least a portion of that payment until they actually sell their property, right?

And so that is a really nice possibility that could address at least part of that issue.

Thank you.

If we could now move to why our main lines needed the showing of the spaghetti string.

This I believe is just, I would assume is an anecdotal example.

Or is this a real life example?

This is a real life example.

Don't ask me where it is because I don't actually know.

I won't, I won't, I won't.

Just to say, I think it would be, this makes a lot of sense to me because I've spent maybe too much time thinking and talking about main lines and sewer lines.

It would be helpful to have a larger scale, and maybe this is where you could do some interactive work with us, to show the breadth of the problem citywide.

Yes.

I say this again because we oftentimes will, like as I drive on 85th Northwest or 15th Northwest, there are so many parcels that are in high zoned areas, neighborhood commercial 65 to 85, that are not being developed.

and are seemingly underutilized.

And it's becoming more aware to me through this presentation that our water mains may be the problem.

And so just as, and after this committee, I'll say, come on up here and make sure I'm looking at the right map.

Because if the situation, if I'm on the right map, this problem's a lot worse than I thought it was.

You know, from a human perspective, this issue I think is one of the most challenging issues that we deal with as a utility.

So for example, if you look at those long red service lines, so say that vacant lot there next to the green one, If that service line needs to be repaired, that individual homeowner is responsible for making that repair.

And it may go into public right-of-way, like in this example, which is extremely expensive to excavate or replace a service line in the public right-of-way, right?

You may have pavement repair requirements.

So this is an issue that can be extremely challenging for homeowners who live in these areas with no water main directly in front of them.

Because not only are they impacted if they ever want to subdivide or sell, but they're also impacted by having these really long service lines that they are responsible for maintaining.

And so one of the ultimate outcomes of this proposal, we hope, is that we will have fewer streets that don't have a water main.

So we will have fewer homeowners that are impacted by this situation.

Thank you so much.

I'm sure I'll have more questions once we look at this map together, but that's all for now, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Thank you all also.

I just had one quick question.

Oh, I came up with a cool nickname for COO Lo.

You can just call him Coolo.

COO Cool, no?

That word has never been used towards me in the past, and I think this may be the only time it'll ever be used, but thank you.

In Spanish, I was told it's not good, so we won't say that.

We'll just...

Okay, so we'll just say COO low.

Okay.

Thank you for that.

It is a mouthful.

Yeah, okay.

Well, we'll just say COO low, but thank you for that, Council Member Rivera.

She immediately said no.

The other question is, because when I was looking at the costs and you all were explaining about some of these developments, like a million dollars, 750,000, like that's a lot.

Is there an option with Seattle Public Utilities?

Every company always has a good, better, best.

are we saying, hey, you have to build the best bells and whistles of a water main extension, or is there a good line, or is there a better line?

Is there options for folks?

That is a great question.

We have design standards that are pretty straightforward.

We definitely don't have like a gold-plated water system, for example.

We're requiring the minimum line size that we believe we need to adequately serve that area.

These projects are expensive because of labor costs, material costs, excavation costs.

So building a main is expensive even if it is a smaller main of an inexpensive pipe type, just the project itself.

is expensive.

So to answer your question, I don't think we have requirements in place that are increasing the cost of those projects necessarily.

The project cost is gonna be what it is probably just because they have to excavate and go into the right of way.

That makes sense.

And when you're developing, you're trying to go, I don't want to say as fast as you can, but you're trying to move quick because time is of the essence.

And I was taught that you can have two out of the three things, good, fast, and cheap.

And so if someone wants it to be good and fast, it's going to be expensive.

It's not going to be cheap.

So anyhow, Shaw said that it was super informative and I know that my other council members and OIC, Council President, you have a hand up.

I'll finish my comment, but it, is really good to know that, hey, here's an idea that we're thinking about and how can we make it better?

We all up here want housing.

We all want to help continue to build in Seattle, but we also wanna make sure that, like Council Member Rivera said, unintended consequences and making sure that people are able to afford to continue to build in our city, especially as we're thinking about House Bill 1110 and as people are trying to continue to stay in their home as the cost of living continues to increase in Seattle.

Council President Nelson, I see your hand is up.

Yeah, I just wanted to note for the record that I I recognize that you're trying to thread a very thin needle.

Right.

And I do support the pay as you grow principle.

I mean, new development should assume the cost instead of, and I appreciate that you're also trying to keep, you're trying not to increase the rates And so I recognize that.

Just wanted to put that on the table.

And my thinking, my questions are motivated simply by, not simple, that makes it sound like it was simple.

But the point is that we're going to have the totally vacant lot is fairly rare that needs a new water meter or line.

I am also thinking about the lots that we are hoping will be redeveloped with additional housing.

right now and facilitated by the comp plan update.

So that I just wanted to explain my thinking that it was behind my questions.

So, and recognizing that every requires a balance and been thinking about this for a really long time.

So thanks.

Thank you.

Awesome.

Thank you.

And I see council member Rivera.

Just to say, acknowledge that, Carrie, thank you.

I just noticed a little while earlier today you sent that email telling me exactly what you said today.

So thank you for that.

I wanted to acknowledge that.

And I look forward to the conversation about how we can mitigate for these unintended consequences, especially in light of HB 1110. So thank you.

Thank you.

Awesome.

Thank you, council member Rivera.

And are there any other closing comments at all?

No, no.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, thank you everyone.

Thank you all for being here in the presentation, looking forward to working the continued work together.

Thank you everyone.

And with no other items on today's agenda, there is no further business for our meeting.

Just interesting fact for the record for all the two people that are watching, because we love everything that's water and environmental and yesterday was Earth Day, we've only discovered 5% of the ocean.

So we've only explored 5% of the ocean.

There's more to explore.

So as we see people blasting into space, that's great, but we can discover more of the ocean, just 5%.

This concludes our April 23rd meeting of the Parks Public Utilities Technology Committee.

Our next committee meeting is May 14th at 2 p.m.

Hearing no further business, it is adjourned 3.30 to 7 p.m.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

you