Seattle City Council, full council meeting today is Wednesday, July 5th, 2023. I'm Teresa Mosqueda.
I will be president pro tem of the council today.
Council President Juarez is excused.
And with that, we will go ahead and ask the clerk to call the roll.
Council Member Lewis.
Council Member Lewis, we're on mute still.
Present.
Thank you, Council Member Morales.
Here.
Council Member Mosqueda.
Present.
Council Member Nelson.
Present.
Council Member Peterson.
Present.
Council Member Sawant.
Present.
Council Member Strauss.
Present.
Council Member Herbold.
Here.
Council President Juarez.
Excuse me.
Present, thank you.
Excellent, thank you very much, Madam Clerk.
Colleagues, as I noted, Council President Juarez is excused from today's council meeting.
There are eight of us here present.
If there's no objection, Council President Juarez is excused from today's meeting.
Hearing no objection, we will go ahead and proceed with other items on our agenda for presentations.
I'm not aware of any presentations for today.
Hearing nobody speak up about a presentation, we'll continue on with public comment.
At this point, we do note that there is at least 4 people signed up for public comment.
I will go ahead and skip the video presentation for today for folks who are both remote and in person.
We will have 2 minutes for each speaker and you will hear a chime when you have 10 seconds to wrap up your public comment.
At that point, please conclude your remarks so that you don't get cut off.
Both in-person and remote microphones will be muted after the two-minute allocation.
We're going to start with the folks who are dialed in online.
And Madam Clerk, if you don't mind just reading into the record the two people.
And for folks on the line, you will hear a chime that says you are unmuted.
That's your indication to hit star six.
on your own phone and make sure your phone's off mute and then go ahead and start your public comment.
After that, we'll turn to the two folks in chambers for any public comment there and anybody else that's signed up.
Thank you so much.
Our first in-person, I'm sorry, our first online speaker is Megan Kruse.
Hello, I'm Megan Kruse speaking today on CB120-581.
eliminating design review for MHA projects.
Last fall, the city convened a BIPOC-focused stakeholder group to update design review.
The committee found, despite its flaws, design review is a force for good because it's the only place where neighbors have input into how their communities develop.
They said, fix it, don't cut it.
This bill proposes shutting down public design review for two years.
It shows contempt for the public process that the Land Use Committee has received the stakeholders report, but hasn't read it and is proceeding with this legislation.
The bill rewrites MHA rules by giving extended waivers and departures, including increases to height, bulk and scale, while withdrawing the original MHA promise of public engagement and community informed design.
The bill will not expedite affordable housing projects, which are already exempt from design review.
In return, it will produce a token amount of affordable stock.
A 550-unit Belltown Tower would qualify by including 18 affordable spaces.
And it's a question whether those small number of units will be publicly advertised or available or go to qualifying private referrals.
This is a win for no-rules development and a loss for an inclusive Seattle where neighbors have a voice in their communities.
Please send this legislation back until it includes the stakeholder group recommendations.
This is on review, but don't throw it out.
Thank you.
Our second speaker is Suleiman Apadolo.
Hi, my name is Slamet Apodolo and I'm calling regarding Council Bill 120582. I'm from the Cham community and I strongly support this bill and request the Council to pass and adopt it.
The proposed changes are needed for community-led organizations to thrive wherever they are, to be able to develop their finite land in a way that better reflects their needs.
Having a space Also to generate revenue is critical in combating displacement because it helps them to be self-sustainable.
This bill is a, is a huge milestone helping to put the development of our residential neighborhoods into the hands of the communities that live, work and play there.
Thank you.
Our next and last remote speaker that's registered and present is David Haynes.
Thank you, David Haynes.
I just wanted to address the fact that we still need a 21st century first world quality home and housing build out and a commercial building and school build out that are not on the side of the road next to the bus or the train causing a strain of noise pollution.
Yet, if you go to Ballard and you see how they've watered down the integrity of the building code, they have people that are dining.
On the road in the gutter with no floor, where if it's slightly raining your feet get wet.
And yet I see the same council member introducing all this watered down legislation to help suspect nonprofits build so-called affordable housing for the disproportionately impact.
And impoverished and oppressed get out of all the complaints that the poor have made about low quality housing.
some of these watered-down legislative initiatives to help these non-profits who are not exactly qualified, they're getting a pass and they're still building run-down real estate that's not exactly in the most prime location on purpose, that is low to the street, and it has a warehouse echo that causes a mental health crisis for a lot of people in Lehigh and Plymouth housing who have to take a bunch of pills and drink alcohol to get to sleep because It's such an egregiously modern third world slum type of patchwork fix.
We need a law that allows the for-profit industry to participate in these hundreds of millions of dollars that the city council has and the democratic party of the state have created to help them get reelected with some of their reelection apparatus that hides within the housing and affordable housing crisis nonprofits and homeless crisis nonprofit who are really squandering a lot of tax dollars when we need a really robust build-out, including the for-profits that should not be given a pass by paying into a system that only allows for non-profits that the re-election apparatus of the Democrats are connected to.
Our first in-person speaker is Carolyn Malone.
Just a second, sorry, just a second.
I'm Carolyn Malone.
I've been here many times.
I haven't been here lately, but I'm here today because Joseph Ellenbos, who claims to be a Seattle police officer, case manager, case worker living in my resident.
I don't believe Seattle Police Department has case workers.
He illegally maintains surveillance on me because I protest on street corners about police living in my building.
We have no legitimate managers.
We have no legitimate resident service coordinator.
This is senior housing, police should not be living in my senior housing, maintaining surveillance on me, violating my housing rights, my civil rights, my privacy rights, and other rights.
The building is regularly vandalized.
We old people are not vandalizing our house and this is the police legitimacy for living in the building.
They are doing the crimes.
Flo Bowman, Cherie Robinson, Catholic housing services allow these rogue racist cops to live in the building.
And I will keep coming back protesting on street corners until these police are removed.
There is no valid reason, legitimate, legal or otherwise, for Seattle police to be living in my housing.
and violating my rights because I protest against their illegal presence.
Seattle firemen and Seattle ambulance drivers in solidarity with the police scream around me whenever I protest at 4th and Jefferson and 5th and Cherry.
Our next and last speaker is Ryan Donahue.
I'm going to adjust the microphone there for a second.
Sorry.
Hello.
My name is Ryan.
Hello, members of the council.
My name is Ryan Donahue and I am the chief advocacy officer at Habitat for Humanity, Seattle, King and Kittitas counties.
I want to thank you for bringing forward CB.
120591, that's a mouthful, or as I kind of consider it, since I have to have a shorter version of it anyways, the affordable housing cleanup legislation.
We at Habitat know better than most just how the complications of our current building code around affordable housing and design review can impact affordable housing projects and affordable homeownership projects.
We've seen projects get delayed significantly growing costs and ultimately died because of things like design review our project, one, one of our projects is an affordable condo project in Capitol Hill called Olympic Ridge, where we recently had to go through the design process.
which ended up adding roughly eight to 10 months and a quarter of a million dollars to the project because we were asked to add things like significantly more expensive windows and black powdered steel trellises on the windows.
These are purely subjective things that makes our projects come online slower, cost more taxpayer money, cost more donor money, and ultimately cost more of our home buyers money.
Olympic Ridge is a project with 17 permanently affordable homes.
Imagine, if you will, our project off of MLK, right nearby the light rail, which is going to be the world's largest single building habitat project.
Imagine if we had to go through that same design review process for that project.
Imagine the cost of time and money that would occur if we had to go through the same process like we did with Olympic Ridge.
It would likely kill the project, adding 10 or more months and millions of dollars and leaving 58 families without an opportunity to buy a home.
Ultimately, This legislation will be able to it's a really simple piece of legislation, but it's going to do amazing things.
Habitat for Humanity and our vision is to build a world where everyone has a safe, decent, affordable place to call home.
This legislation is an important step in that direction to make that a reality.
Thank you.
That concludes our public commenters.
Great, thank you all for dialing in and presenting today.
If there's no one signed up for public comment, the public comment period is now closed.
Moving on to item E on our agenda.
If there's no objection, the introduction and referral calendar will be adopted.
Hearing no objection, the introduction and referral calendar is adopted.
Item F on our agenda is adoption of agenda today.
If there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.
Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.
We'll now consider the proposed consent calendar, which is listed on our agenda as item G.
Items on the consent calendar include the minutes from the June 27th, 2023 meeting, the payroll bills, which is council bill 120607. Are there any items that the council members would like to remove from today's consent calendar?
Hearing none, I move to adopt the consent calendar.
Is there a second?
Second.
Thank you very much.
It's been moved and seconded to adopt the consent calendar.
Will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the consent calendar?
Council Member Lewis?
Aye.
Council Member Morales?
Yes.
Council Member Nelson?
Aye.
Council Member Peterson?
Yes.
Council Member Sawant?
Yes.
Council Member Strauss?
Yes.
Council Member Herbold?
Yes.
Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
Aye.
Eight in favor, none opposed.
Thank you very much.
The consent calendar items are adopted.
Madam Clerk, will you please affix my signature to the minutes and the legislation on the consent calendar on my behalf.
Moving on to committee reports.
The first item on the agenda is from the Economic Development Technology and City Light Committee.
Will the clerk please read item one into the record?
Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 120594, relating to underground utility districts.
The committee recommends the bill pass.
Thank you very much.
And Council Member Nelson, as chair of the committee, you are recognized to address this item.
Thank you very much.
Hello, everyone.
So 55 years ago, Council enacted an ordinance requiring that all electric distribution, telephone, telegraph, CATV, and other wires and facilities in four districts across the city go underground.
Facilities are mostly completely undergrounded by now in three of the districts, but only 20% have been undergrounded on First Hill.
And City Light has to replace antiquated 4V cables with 26V cables there next year.
And City Light has determined that it would be more cost effective and less burdensome on rate payers to take a more flexible approach to determine which overhead cables to move underground, where cables can stay overhead without compromising safety.
And this bill gives City Light that authority.
And this came out of committee unanimously, and I ask for your support.
Thank you very much.
Are there any additional comments?
Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the passage of the bill?
Council Member Lewis.
Yes.
Council Member Morales.
Yes.
Council Member Nelson.
Aye.
Council Member Peterson.
Yes.
Council Member Sawant.
Yes.
Council Member Strauss.
Yes.
Council Member Herbold.
Yes.
Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
Aye.
Eight in favor, none opposed.
Thank you very much.
The bill passes and the chair will sign it.
Madam Clerk, will you please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf?
Moving on to item number two, Madam Clerk, could you please read item number two into the record?
Item two, resolution 32095, authorizing commencement of Cable Franchise Contract Renewal Proceedings in accordance with the provisions of 47 U.S.C. section 546 and written requests from Comcast Cable Communications Management, LLC.
The committee recommends the resolution be adopted.
Thank you very much.
Council Member Nelson, as chair of the committee, you are recognized again to address this item.
Thank you.
So the city contracts with telecommunication providers to provide a franchise, allowing them to use the right of way to provide cable television.
Those franchises must be renewed every 10 years.
This resolution authorizes the city to enter into franchise renewal proceedings with Comcast and to implement processes to comply with federal law.
This is the first step in a year-long process and the council bill authorizing the actual renewal won't be before council until next year.
The timing of this resolution is driven by a federal requirement that the utility begin proceedings within six months of a formal request by the franchise holder, and in this case this is Comcast.
Timing is also driven by a requirement that renewal begin three years prior to franchise expiration, and Comcast's current franchise will expire in 2026. And while we expect to reach a new franchise agreement with Comcast through an informal process, this resolution preserves the city's right to go through a formal process should that be deemed necessary, while allowing us to proceed right now with the informal process.
and there will be engagement from CTAB as this process goes forward as well.
And this came out of committee unanimously.
Thank you very much.
Are there any additional comments?
Hearing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of the resolution?
Council Member Lewis?
Yes.
Council Member Morales?
Yes.
Council Member Nelson.
Aye.
Council Member Peterson.
Yes.
Council Member Sawant.
Yes.
Council Member Strauss.
Yes.
Council Member Herbold.
Yes.
Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
Aye.
Eight in favor, none opposed.
Thank you very much.
The resolution is adopted and the Chair will sign it.
Madam Clerk, please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf.
Let's move on to the Land Use Committee, item number three.
Madam Clerk, will you please read item number three into the record?
agenda item three accountable 120581 relating to design review for affordable housing adopting temporary regulations to exempt housing projects that meet mandatory housing affordability requirements using on-site performance units from design review the committee recommends it will pass as amended with Council Members Nelson and Pearson in favor, with opposition for Council Member Strauss and abstention from Council Member Morales.
Thank you very much, Council Members.
This is from the Land Use Committee, which is chaired by Council Member Strauss.
Council Member Strauss, you are recognized to address this item.
Thank you, Council Member Mosqueda.
I will admit, colleagues, I was reading the wrong part of my script when we took final vote on this bill, and I voted no because I thought I was voting on an amendment.
So if you want to look back at the recording, you can even see me speak to the amendment after that vote.
So I support this legislation.
I sponsored this legislation.
I think that this is good legislation.
This legislation is a pilot program to allow mandatory housing affordability projects that that create on site performance so they put the affordable housing at the location in which they are building for those projects to be exempt from design review.
This is one option and many that we are considering as we continue to review design review as a whole, we're going to engage in a top to bottom review and how to improve the program because we know two things are true.
that the program does not provide the best tools necessary for community members to engage in design review, to have their priorities incorporated within the projects, and also, on the other hand, that design review can be weaponized to slow down important projects that our community needs.
And so we will be taking a top to bottom review of design review in how to address these issues.
We don't have a clear solution.
We do have a clear understanding of what the issues are.
In that intervening time, we have this pilot before us that will help incentivize on-site performance of mandatory housing affordability projects, which we want more of, to be exempt from design review.
This is a pilot, this will last two years, and it also gives us the opportunity to, since this is only a two-year pilot, that we're not going to put these changes in permanently without further review.
Thank you, Chair, that is the report.
Thank you very much.
Are there any additional comments on this item?
Council Member Morales, please go ahead.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair as well.
I want to thank STCI for bringing up this question.
I think we had a really important conversation about how to offer incentives for affordable housing development.
I did abstain on the bill in committee because I do still have questions about the benefit to our low-income communities stemming from some parts of this bill.
And also about the work plan that was discussed.
For the pilot period, I think that's going to be an important conversation.
But at least the information that was presented to us didn't really talk about how recommendations from the racial equity toolkit that was completed were incorporated into the work plan.
And the truth is, we just voted on this last week.
So I haven't had the opportunity to get some of my questions answered.
So I am really interested in ensuring that we work to provide benefit to affordable housing developers, we all know how important that is to make sure that we're addressing the crisis, and that we're ensuring we have an equitable distribution of housing across our city, particularly of affordable housing.
What concerns me is providing that equivalent benefit to market rate development without receiving some level of public benefit in return, and particularly for folks who are low income.
So I appreciate that this is a pilot and that those questions will be answered in the interim, but I will be voting no on the bill because I really do believe that before we start to offer the exemption for market rate units, that we have a very clear understanding of what the impact will be on our ability to deliver and on our ability to to deliver public benefit in return.
So I wanted to make sure that my intent was clear there and look forward to the conversation over the course of the pilot.
Thank you very much, Council Member Morales.
Are there any final comments on this item?
Council Member Strauss, did you have any closing comments?
I see we have another.
Wonderful.
I'll come back to you, Council Member Strauss.
Council Member Sawant, please go ahead.
Thank you.
I will be voting no on this legislation that is to remove and reduce the regulations on big for-profit developers.
There have been several bills reducing the regulatory barriers for developing affordable housing, and I have, of course, supported all of those because they were specifically about housing that would be affordable to working and low-income people rather than the outrageously expensive apartments that big developers, property management corporations choose to build.
This bill that gives outrageously expensive market rate housing development the same advantages, gets almost nothing in return for just at this point, the countless people who are in search of affordable housing and are unable to find it in this city because rents are skyrocketing.
At most, it requires the MHA that it requires affordable housing be built on site, but it doesn't add one unit of affordable housing.
Absolutely nothing added.
Council Member Strauss said that design review can be weaponized.
I don't know what his intent was by that language, but the renters at the shadow building in the central district, you know, very working class, low-income renters, senior renters on fixed incomes.
These tenants at the shadow building in 2019 appealed to Design Review when a big developer called Cadence Real Estate tried to force them out of their homes and because of the campaign that we built, including my office, union members, including UAW and UFC at the UW, who all stood in solidarity with the Chateau tenants.
We were able to win a serious victory against Cadence Real Estate, who were actually forced to pay their tenants for all the problems that the tenants had endured over the years without those problems being fixed.
And they got an extended period of time before they could find alternate housing for themselves.
So that was a real victory that was, obviously it was the result of building a working class campaign in the city, but the fact that the tenants appeal to the design review was part of, it was one of the starting points of that struggle.
The premise of this legislation is that reducing the costs incurred by for-profit developers will somehow benefit working people.
It will reduce rent.
None of this is true.
It is completely untrue.
Developers and landlords and the landlords that they sell to do not set rents based on their costs.
They set their rents as high as they can.
And every time the city has passed legislation to reduce landlord costs with the promise of lower rents, it has been a lie.
I remember when the city changed its land use laws to permit micro units such as apartments.
Developers argued that permitting tiny, flimsy apartments with zero amenities, sometimes without kitchens or bathrooms, would reduce rent.
And then, of course, they raised the rent.
And this, keeping in mind, this is on top of the fact that by square foot, many of these micro apartments are actually more expensive than just normal housing.
Last Friday during public comment at the sustainability and renters rights committee, which I chair, where I introduced.
The rent control legislation from my office, which already has the support of 35,000 people who have signed the petition in support of it.
We heard public comment in support of this.
from dozens of people who signed up for public comment.
And one of those was a Nicholsville resident who lost her housing when the 125 square foot micro unit she rented increased the rent from $900 a month to $1,500 a month.
In my view, $900 a month is already totally outrageous.
And then the landlord corporation had the temerity to increase it to $1,500 a month.
And as a result of that, her path towards homelessness began.
Let me say that again, $1,500 a month for 125 square foot apartment.
I will not support this bill, which reduces regulations of big developers and gets nothing in return for working people and ordinary people who require affordable housing.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Council Member Strauss.
Thank you, President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
Again, this bill before us does provide design review exemption for development projects that elect to meet city's mandatory housing affordability requirement with on-site affordable housing.
There's no way to get out of the mandatory housing affordability requirement for affordable housing.
either developers options are either to pay the in lieu fee or to provide on-site performance of that affordable housing.
The bill before us only speaks to the exemption that the exemption is only applicable to buildings that provide on-site affordable housing.
One of the things that we have seen is that buildings come in and chart with a new building rents are very expensive and that affordable housing is often not placed in the areas that the in lieu fees are stemming from this bill before us requires that onsite performance of affordable housing.
It is a pilot project to help us understand the impact of being of being able to incentivize this onsite performance.
and the impact of design review.
There is going to be a top to bottom review of design review, and this bill only lasts two years as a pilot.
Thank you, Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
about that.
Didn't realize I was on mute.
Thank you very much, Council Member Strauss.
I will just also add, I'll be supporting this legislation.
It is a big benefit to affordable housing providers.
It helps to make sure that departures are more flexible.
And I know of a number of affordable housing projects that are really counting on this legislation to allow for those affordable units to be created.
It also allows MHA performance projects to not have to go through a lengthy design review, which encourages MHA performance.
Housing, housing, housing, including housing that is more affordable.
So it allows all residential projects to do administrative design review instead of the full and lengthy and costly design reviews.
I think this is a good benefit for our city overall, and I'll be voting yes.
Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll?
Council Member Lewis?
Yes.
Council Member Morales?
No.
Council Member Nelson.
Aye.
Council Member Peterson.
Yes.
Council Member Sawant.
No.
Council Member Strauss.
Yes.
Council Member Herbold.
Yes.
Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda.
Aye.
Six in favor, two opposed.
Thank you very much.
Madam Clerk, can you please affix my signature to the legislation?
The bill has passed and I will go ahead and sign it.
Item number four is from the same land use committee.
Madam Clerk, will you please read item number four into the record?
Agenda for Council Bill 120591 relating to land use and zoning, correcting topographical and other technical errors, correction sections, references, and clarifying regulations and sections that relate to or may apply to low income housing and other developments with units subject to affordability restrictions.
Committee recommends the bill pass.
Thank you, Council Member Strauss.
Please go ahead.
Thank you Council President Pro Tem.
This is the Office of Housing omnibus bill and omnibus bill for the viewing public is a cleanup of technical errors changes, and it simplifies the terms that are being used so there are four outcomes within this bill.
Updating defined terms, it updates over a dozen obsolete defined terms and inconsistent application of provisions to low income housing and other units with affordability restrictions.
Outcome two is it expands the application of design review exemption and waivers or modifications.
Currently permanent supportive housing is design review exempt waiver and modifications of certain development standards can be requested.
But this does not apply to other publicly funded low income housing developments and so this extends that ability and outcome three, it consolidates incentive zoning provisions incentive zoning provisions related to affordable housing.
largely became obsolete with the adoption of mandatory housing affordability.
And so this legislation repeals obsolete code sections and makes them more consistent.
Outcome four is improved consistency, clarity, and readability.
The current code is complicated, unclear, and inconsistent regarding provisions such as regarding low-income housing and affordable units.
So this legislation is a comprehensive review of Title 23 to provide simplified, clear, and consistent language.
This is a largely technical and cleanup bill, and I urge a yay vote.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Are there any additional comments?
Seeing none, Council Member Strauss, I have a few comments myself.
I'll go ahead and share those now and then I'll turn to you for any follow up items on agenda item number four.
Does that sound good?
Sounds great.
Thank you so much.
I'm excited about this legislation here in front of us today.
I think as we work to scale up our investments to meet Seattle's growing need for affordable housing through sources like the Seattle housing levy legislation, which this council just passed unanimously.
And through efforts like the jumpstart progressive payroll revenue, which again was unanimously supported in terms of this spend plan.
We must also simultaneously remove barriers within the city code that add time.
And when you add time, it adds costs to critical projects.
Affordable housing supports the health, the resilience and the stability of our community, and it quite literally saves lives.
There is nothing more important than making sure that we have a place for people to call home.
The pandemic has underscored the critical importance of having a place to call home.
And we, as the policymakers in this city, need to do everything that we can to help these projects come online as quickly as possible.
We have built into housing policies like the housing funding policies into the jumpstart Seattle progressive payroll tax housing spend direction and we've built this into the housing levy legislation.
We have taken every opportunity we can to make sure that we're prioritizing community-driven projects that are rooted in and serve community needs.
And it has proven to be very effective and important for us to make sure that the folks who are building housing, led by the vision of those most directly affected by displacement are at the front of the line to be able to create housing to right that wrong.
And I am very excited about this legislation being one of a myriad of things that we need to do to help continue to provide access to affordable housing by making sure that we're reducing barriers and serve our community who has long waited for affordable housing and housing, which has been held up in expensive design review processes.
So I'm looking forward to supporting this effort and to make this policy permanent to better align the city's policies with our investments and values.
Council Member Morales?
Thank you.
Madam Chair, I will be supporting this legislation.
I do think it's really important and appreciate the chair and the office of housing bringing this forward.
We did hope to see social housing included here as another form of affordable housing to receive the same kind of benefits that development of affordable housing received.
So offered an amendment that was not included in this package.
But I am happy to have the commitment from the chair and from the Office of Housing to work with my office on bringing forward some standalone legislation through the Land Use Committee to provide the same level of benefit to social housing as we do to other kinds of affordable housing.
That will be another conversation.
In the meantime, I'm excited to support this legislation.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Any additional comments?
Council Member Strauss, anything for wrapping us up?
Thank you, Council President Pro Tem.
Just that this is an omnibus bill that cleans up complex and out of date language throughout our land use code.
And it does speed the production of affordable housing and home ownership opportunities.
This is important because the family that I grew up in should be able to afford to live in the Seattle of today and tomorrow.
This bill cuts red tape to help do just that.
Thank you, Council President Pro Tem.
Thank you very much.
Any additional comments?
Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of the ordinance?
Council Member Lewis?
Yes.
Council Member Morales?
Yes.
Council Member Nelson?
Aye.
Council Member Peterson?
Yes.
Council Member Sawant?
Yes.
Council Member Strauss?
Yes.
Council Member Herbold?
Yes.
Council President Kotem Mosqueda.
Aye.
Eight in favor, none opposed.
Thank you very much.
The bill passes and the chair will sign it.
Madam Clerk, will you please affix my signature to the legislation?
Okay, we're on to agenda item number five.
This is still within the Land Use Committee meeting.
Madam Clerk, will you please read item five into the record?
Agenda item five, Council Bill 120582, relating to land use and zoning, removing regulatory barriers and simplifying and increasing permitting predictability for equitable development projects by modifying requirements for small institutions and residential zones.
The committee recommends the bill pass.
Thank you very much.
Council Member Strauss, you are recognized in order to speak to this legislation as chair of the committee.
President Pro Tem, this legislation reduces regulatory barriers for anti displacement projects, including those funded by the city's equitable development initiative.
I want to thank the Office of Planning Community Development for your work on this legislation I'm proud to support these technical code changes.
In short, this makes six general changes that allow number one allows community centers and libraries as institution.
uses permitted outright in neighborhood residential zones.
Number two modifies the amount of off-street parking required for community centers and libraries to be more accurate to the neighborhoods that they serve.
Number three defines and provides standards for community farms as a type of institution allowed outright in neighborhood residential zones.
Number four, it modifies the definition of community club or center to better reflect the types of activities and programming commonly included in EDI projects and increases the predictability in permitting process.
Number five, it allows community centers to include certain accessory commercial uses.
And number six, for institutions in low-rise zones, apply setback requirements consistent with those uses permitted outright.
That is what this bill does.
It is a good bill, and I urge a yay vote.
Thank you, Council President Pro Tem.
Thank you very much.
Are there any additional comments?
Seeing no additional comments, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the adoption of this item?
Council Member Lewis?
Yes.
Council Member Morales?
Yes.
Council Member Nelson?
Aye.
Council Member Peterson?
Yes.
Council Member Sawant?
Yes.
Council Member Strauss?
Yes.
Council Member Herbold?
Yes.
Council President Pro Tem Mosqueda?
Aye.
Eight in favor, none opposed.
Thank you very much.
The bill passes and the chair will sign it.
Will the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf?
I think that brings us to the end of our agenda here.
Are there any other items before a business to come before the council?
Okay, hearing no additional items, this concludes items of business on today's agenda.
The next regularly scheduled Seattle City Council meeting will be held on July 11. Thank you all very much.
We are adjourned.
Thank you.