SPEAKER_02
To order, it is 2 p.m.
I'm Dan Strauss, chair of the Select Committee.
Will the clerk please call the roll?
SPEAKER_08
Councilmember Hollingsworth?
Councilmember Kettle?
SPEAKER_07
Here.
SPEAKER_08
Councilmember Moore?
Council Member Morales.
Here.
Council President Nelson.
Present.
Council Member Rivera.
SPEAKER_01
Present.
SPEAKER_08
Council Member Saka.
Council Member Wu.
Present.
Chair Strauss.
SPEAKER_02
Present.
And can you call Council Member Hollingsworth one more time?
SPEAKER_08
Council Member Hollingsworth.
SPEAKER_02
Present.
Thank you.
Okay.
SPEAKER_08
So that is seven percent.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you and councilmember Moore is excused all day and councilmember Saka is excused until he arrives Moving right in this is our final Presentation of a standard approach, which is central staff providing presentations again tomorrow We'll move into the forecast council and then have a joint s dot department briefing and central staff analysis.
And with no further ado, clerk, will you please read the fourth item into the record?
SPEAKER_08
Agenda item four, city attorney's office for briefing and discussion.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
We are joined by Tommaso Johnson, Director Noble, Director Eder.
At this time, colleagues, if you want to take it away and Council Member Saka is present.
SPEAKER_10
Thank you, Chair.
Once again, I am Tommaso Johnson, Council Central staff here to discuss an overview of policy considerations related to the city attorney's office or law department.
And do we need something with the slides?
As I mentioned, I'm going to provide a brief overview budget summary for the law department before moving into some selected policy considerations.
As you can see, the overall budget for the law department is proposed to increase in 2025 and 2026. The 2025 increase will be an increase of just under $5 million, representing an 11.7% and a subsequent 5.2% increase in 2026 without changes to FTEs.
Policy consideration number one, is related to the proposed reduction but unfunding and non-abrogation of two positions within the Civil Division of the Law Department.
These are Assistant City Attorneys in the Employment and Contracts and Utilities sections of the Civil Division respectively.
This proposed staffing reduction would result in a savings of $434,000 in 2025 and $458,000 in 2026. The reason, among others, that this is a policy consideration is that while this staffing reduction would result in short-term savings to the city general fund in the amounts that I just described, the law department is projecting that reduction of those attorney positions could also potentially result in increased costs to the city by way of the fact that the caseloads for those divisions which provide legal advice and counsel to city departments is not expected to go down and in the event that in situations currently where a law department staffing in the civil division is insufficient for the caseloads that they manage the city obtains outside counsel at a cost that is higher than the, uh, effective rate paid to law department employees.
Um, so the city attorney's office has estimated that, um, the short-term reduction, uh, short-term cost savings for the abrogating these positions, um, excuse me, unfunding without abrogating these positions, may actually result in costs related to outside counsel of up to $1.8 million a year.
That is a rough estimate and is one that has been provided by the city attorney's office and not an estimate that the central staff has developed internally.
Related options to this policy consideration are A, to fully restore civil division staffing to current levels in 2025 and 2026, which would require an increase of $434,000 in 25 and $458,000 in 2026. Option B is to restore funding for one of these positions, but not both.
And option C is no change.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Councilmember Kettle, as chair of the committee overseeing this department, you are recognized.
Even though this is slightly different, the city attorney's office, criminal division, clearly public safety.
There's civil division, which provides us information and legal advice on the bills that we write.
It is not necessarily public safety, but it's all in one.
We're just going to do this today.
So, Councilmember Kettle, do you have anything to say now?
SPEAKER_07
Thank you, Chair.
And yes, it is proper to highlight that there is a difference between civil division and the criminal division.
But the points that Mr. Johnson – thank you, Mr. Johnson, for being here and joining the table – are germane in the sense that – and I know this – To be true, that if you go to outside counsel, it costs more.
And we need to be flexible.
So this is something that we should be looking at.
I like to work with everyone involved, yourself included, in terms of the options.
But yes, this is definitely true.
Particularly also, it's worth remembering too that The city attorney's office is also, and we have it in our own legislative department, deading, if you will, positions people to support departments such as that we have too.
So that's another thing that kind of, and there's other things too where the city attorney doesn't necessarily have the kind of oversight and control of the attorneys that work in the law department.
And so these are things that we should be doing thoughtfully and every now and again having a review saying to ourselves, Yes, this makes sense still.
So these are the kind of things that we should look at in terms of the staffing reductions.
Thank you, Council Member Kettle.
SPEAKER_02
Colleagues, questions, comments regarding the policy consideration number one before us today?
Council President Nelson.
SPEAKER_00
I'm concerned about this reduction because whether or not it's criminal or civil, these cases end up in court and we get...
You know, we're exposed, and we get sued, and that costs us money.
So, you know, I want to note that when we're talking about if we don't have these attorneys in house, then we might need to rely on external counsel.
That is the case both for any lawsuit representing the city in a lawsuit against us, because people—and utility cases can be very expensive.
But also, there go to people that departments and council members and staff can call when thinking about policy.
And that is advice that we can't get every day.
We can't just call somebody up who's our external counsel and ask a question.
There is an ongoing support level that will be lowered if if we lose these two positions and at the same time, you know, we departments Different departments citywide are hiring internal counsel and including our own and And at the same time, we still rely on the attorneys, both on the civil and criminal side, to defend us in court when something goes wrong.
And so I am really concerned about this reduction.
Thanks.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Council President.
Council Member Sacha.
SPEAKER_04
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Recently, over the spring and summer, we passed legislation as a council that, among other things, well, to address problem speed racing in our city.
And among other things, that particular bill, it purported to impose a civil violation or penalty for people that are now get a ticket.
It was an intentional policy choice by this council to not make that a punishable offense under our criminal code, which other jurisdictions like Kent have specifically chosen to do.
But instead, it's a civil infraction.
Remains to be seen how much that, since that legislation was passed, how much it's being enforced, if SPD, how many tickets SPD has actually written to address the spectator piece.
But I'm wondering if...
Because these civil division attorney positions, it purports to impact employment and contracts, utility sections of the civil division.
I don't know to what extent, if at all, based off the title alone, probably no impact or those people, those lawyers wouldn't be responsible for enforcing the civil infraction piece for spectators.
So I'm wondering aloud, that's just one prominent example recently, colleagues, where we've added new civil infractions to our code here.
Just wondering aloud if maybe we need to...
restore some of that in part to address some of that some of the enforcement side of our new code maybe it's not a full two FTEs maybe it's a half or one I don't know but be curious to better understand enforcement by SPD which is going to drive and inform the the prosecutorial piece and I don't but I don't know if they those are slotted within the civil division or anyways yeah um council member Osaka that's a good question um
SPEAKER_10
I do not believe that these two positions would impact the enforcement of the law that you mentioned.
As you stated, these positions are in the employment and contracts and utilities section of the Civil Division, which effectively is the legal counsel for the City of Seattle.
So these roles are more concerned with providing legal advice to departments, city departments, on issues related to employment law, labor negotiations, matters of contracts, utilities payments.
So these reductions I do not believe would directly impact what you're discussing.
However, there's additional policy considerations later in my presentation that do get to the concern you're expressing.
SPEAKER_04
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Council Member Stocker.
Council Member Morales and then Council Member Rivera.
SPEAKER_05
Thank you for this, Tommaso.
I want to make sure I understand, as you were just talking about what these particular positions do.
So because, as I've mentioned a couple of times already, we do spend a lot on...
employment discrimination settlements, on whistleblower-related settlements, on use of force cases.
I'm interested to know if these positions affect that.
Well, first of all, how the departments, how the city attorney's office works with OCR.
of cases come up and what the proactive measures are that the city attorney's office is taking to try to reduce the cost of lawsuits from our own employees.
I'm sort of assuming that there is work happening to educate our different departments about the proactive work they need to do to reduce discrimination, et cetera.
So can you talk about the sort of relationship of those things that the department is doing?
SPEAKER_10
Yeah, I can't speak to proactive work that the law department is doing, not to say that they aren't doing it, but that's just that's not information that I have.
But I'm happy to inquire more and let you all know about that.
I will say at least several of the matters that you discussed when there are when there is litigation, when there is.
In anticipation of litigation, these attorneys will, related to employment or contract utilities issues, these attorneys will work directly with the departments.
If litigation materializes, they will represent the city's interests in the litigation process.
So yes, those are functions that attorneys in the civil division in these sections perform.
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Council Member Morales, Council Member Rivera.
SPEAKER_01
Thank you, Chair.
Tomaso, do you have information about the number of cases that we're defending every year?
I'm trying to get a sense of without these two, you know, how many cases is it that these two positions would have?
on a yearly basis that then have to get farmed out to other other assistant city attorneys and because you know we don't want to diminish the capacity and especially on the contract side because most of the departments utilize CAO for their expertise and contracts when they're contracting out all that granting work that they do which the majority of our the work that city departments do do our contracts with outside parties for the services that we have other external partners do on our behalf.
And so we definitely have concerns about diminishing capacity, especially on the contract side, because there's so many contracts that we do on a yearly basis.
Every department does on a yearly basis.
SPEAKER_10
Yeah, the specific number of cases active or anticipated, that's not a number that I have, but once again, happy to follow up with the city attorney's office and try to provide you that information.
When I spoke with them about the potential impacts of this reduction, they were, though a specific number wasn't mentioned, they were Fairly clear that they did not anticipate the current workload to go down in these sections and that's in part what the estimates for cost of outside counsel was based upon as a projections based on past caseload for these attorneys.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and on the contract side, like I said, I know that city departments rely so heavily as they should because our ability to ensure that our contract is done appropriately and well when we're contracting these services out to external partners is really important, and it mitigates for issues on the back end.
if departments are supposed to be sending all their contracts to cao for review before they sign any contract before any department director signs any contract with an outside party so we want to definitely not diminish that capacity at cao thank you thank you thank you councilman rivera colleagues any other questions uh tomasa seeing none at this time to i'll ask mine tomasa are these positions filled or unfilled at the moment um i believe they are
SPEAKER_10
I believe at least one of the positions is currently unfilled.
Ben, do you have information about that?
SPEAKER_02
I know we're going to be going over this in the line-by-line review.
SPEAKER_06
This is by recollection.
I think there are at least two unfilled attorney positions on the civil side, so I don't think that ...
I think there are at least two unfilled positions on the civil side, so that this wouldn't ...
they weren't otherwise facing a layoff.
SPEAKER_09
You can follow up with more information.
I'm sorry, I don't know that either offhand.
SPEAKER_02
Just also noting, this is one of the few departments that are of separately elected officials.
which makes it different.
I understand that there might be a little, let's drill down on that because Tommaso, your point about outside counsel being more expensive is a point well taken.
I'll say generally of the civil division there and city attorney's office as a whole is they're one of the hardest working departments that we've got in our city right now.
So I appreciate that.
Seeing as we've got no other comments, questions on this, anything else from you, Council Member Kittle?
SPEAKER_07
Chair, I would just add that to that last point you made is there was reductions in 23, which required them to hold vacancies of civil positions.
And I'm not sure if that led into the 24, but...
basically probably a position unfilled, and therefore the work is not being done.
And that might have sparked a memory.
SPEAKER_06
You have, in fact, done exactly that.
It's actually probably a memory of something that Tomaso wrote.
I do recall now that I think they've got multiple unfunded but unfilled positions.
So again, this would really be more about restoring funding for existing positions.
It may be position authority as well.
We'd confirm.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Director Noble.
Thank you.
Let's move on to policy consideration number two, Tomaso.
SPEAKER_10
Policy consideration number two has to do with a proposed reduction in the criminal division.
So as opposed to the civil division, which I was discussing earlier, the criminal division is the sort of work that people might traditionally more associate with the city attorney's office, the prosecution of criminal cases.
And the budget, proposed budget, unfunds one prosecutor in the specialty court unit of the criminal division.
This proposed staffing reduction would save $182,000 in 2025 and 192 in 2026. The law department has stated that staff reductions in the criminal division may have the impact of reducing timely response to criminal referrals and may reduce the ability to implement recently passed criminal justice legislation, particularly to the extent that it may involve potential diversion opportunities, which is the primary purview of the specialty courts at Seattle Municipal Court.
The identified options are to A, restore funding to this position, or B, no change.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Mr. Johnson.
Council Member Kettle, as chair of the committee overseeing the department.
SPEAKER_07
Thank you, Chair Strauss.
You know, this really goes to, you know, a bigger picture question that we have, and that is, The criminal justice system.
I am deeply concerned about the health of the criminal justice system, both here in Seattle, but also at the county and state level.
I'm concerned about what Olympia may or may not do.
And we have to have a fully functioning criminal justice system.
So otherwise, the work that we've been doing over the course of this year would be a bit of a step forward and two steps back kind of situation.
You know, if we work to address the permissive environment in our city, you know, work through the framework plan and so forth, and it's kind of like the King County Jail.
You know, I had a community meeting a week ago, and there were some officers there, and they were talking about what a difference the new King County Jail Agreement makes for them.
It's massive.
Once you take that next step into the city attorney's office and to the Seattle Municipal Court, we really need to have a fully functioning criminal justice system and so with that said Definitely support, you know this position what in terms of the the public safety.
I mean the prosecutor position And by the way, this is not just one way In fact, I've got a memo from the city attorney talking about you know how they're working with Seattle Municipal Court and you know in terms of the drug alternative court because they recognize you know, in terms of diversion and some of these other options to deal with other than incarceration.
So this is trying to have a comprehensive approach, and I really appreciate that.
But as always...
If we need to go that step, that step needs to be taken.
That step cannot be taken if the city attorney's office or the Seattle Municipal Court are not fully functioning.
It's not in here, but the marshals at Seattle Municipal Court, that's another area of interest to me and to the committee as we look in 25 to ensure the viability and the health of the criminal justice system.
Chair, that's a long way of saying that I am supportive of ensuring that the criminal division is up and up.
Well said.
SPEAKER_02
Colleagues, questions, comments?
Council Member Morales.
SPEAKER_05
Yeah, I just have a couple questions.
So can you talk about what the impact on diversion services in the court might be if we make this reduction?
SPEAKER_10
What I can say about that is that to the extent that cases are diverted through one of the specialty courts rather than running through the mainstream court prosecution system.
Reductions in staffing to that division may create some delays in terms of those cases just simply because of the levels of caseload that the remaining attorneys in that division will have to assume.
One thing that I should have mentioned earlier as well that is in the memo, though not on this slide, is that My understanding is that the specialty court unit prosecutors, in addition to prosecuting cases and working with cases in the specialty courts, also have some job duties that involve working on non-criminal infractions, fines.
So to Council Member Saka's earlier point, to the extent that recently passed laws or existing laws levy potentially civil infraction fines that are not crimes that is also part of the workload of this division and reductions to the available workload available staffing in that this division may also impact effective administration of those fines okay and do we it's not clear to me if this floating prosecutor position that is mentioned in the next issue would cover this specialty court is that the intention or I don't believe so.
I can talk about that a little bit more when we get to the next slide, but my understanding is that that would be a position that could assume prosecutorial work where as needed throughout the criminal division, so not necessarily a dedicated position to this unit, but potentially to contribute to that workload.
Okay.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Colleagues, any other comments, questions on policy consideration number two?
Council President.
SPEAKER_00
How many prosecutors are there in the specialty court unit?
SPEAKER_10
I think in the neighborhood of half a dozen, but don't quote me on that exact number, yeah.
SPEAKER_00
Okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Seeing as we have no further comments or questions regarding policy consideration number two, we're going to move to number three, which is four pages long in this presentation.
So colleagues, we are going to move through the whole thing, and then we'll come back to the start if folks have questions or comments.
So with that, Mr. Johnson, over to you.
SPEAKER_10
Policy consideration three has to do in a forward-looking way with the implementation of public safety policies enacted or in progress this year, which includes, you know, several pieces of criminal justice legislation that this council has passed.
SOPA, SODA, the illegal racing ordinance that was mentioned earlier.
And this policy consideration explores the potential impacts of effective implementation of those policy choices in 2025 and 2026. And the sort of the delta or the absence of additional funding specifically for that implementation in the current budget, I will say a great deal of that likely has to do with the unknowns related to implementation.
And so rather than proactively budget for costs that we may not have clear understanding of at the current time, there is a possibility of coming back as happens in other end of year supplementals in the ongoing years as those costs become better known.
So just with that caveat, we wanted to make sure that you have the information that we have now ahead of you as we're going into the budget for 25 and 26. So law has stated that staff reductions to prosecutors, as I said before, may impact timely response to criminal justice referrals.
and may reduce the ability to implement recently passed legislation to the extent that involves diversion opportunities and also the workload of the prosecutors in general, which is dependent on the rate of referrals from Seattle Police Department.
Policy consideration 3A relates to staffing for prosecutors in the criminal division, generally speaking.
As I said before, city legislation creating new crimes and expanding prosecutorial authority is likely to increase referrals to the criminal division from SPD.
Without additional staffing, that may result in increased caseloads, and this may create delays in prosecution or reduced resources for other types of cases handled by the criminal division.
In addition to the other reductions that are already in the proposed budget, law has stated that the addition of another one FTE floating prosecutor at a cost of $182,000 in 2025, that combined with the restoration of the specialty court prosecutor would improve workloads and anticipated outcomes related to recent policy changes.
I'll move on to B.
Additionally, central staff would like to highlight for the council an issue that's also related to implementation of proposed criminal justice policies in 2025 and 2026, though this is not exclusive to the law department and touches on the seattle municipal court because there's not a presentation specifically on issue considerations for the court this is the opportunity to highlight those potential anticipated costs so the court has stated that implementation of both the score jail agreement and potentially also the expanded jail capacity at King County may have additional costs that are not included currently in the 2025-26 proposed budget.
The court has developed preliminary but somewhat detailed cost estimates related to SCORE jail implementation based on two potential scenarios.
Scenario one would involve transport of defendants from SCORE, South County Correctional Entity, to the court for hearings at the court.
That is estimated to cost potentially $196,000 in 2025 and $520,000 in 2026. Ongoing throughout the 2026 cost is estimated to be ongoing throughout the duration of that contract with SCORE.
And this would primarily be additional staffing costs related to the transport and care of defendants from SCORE hearings.
Cost estimate two relates to the creation of a new judicial department.
So I should be clear that one and two are potential options that exist independent of each other.
If instead of transporting defendants from SCORE to SMC, SMC was to create a new judicial department to conduct virtual hearings with in-custody defendants at SCORE.
That would create additional costs.
The estimate there is 584,000 in 2025 and approximately 1.7 million in 2026, also ongoing throughout the length of the contract with SCORE.
The bulk of this would be also additional staff costs and other measures to handle virtual hearings with in-custody defendants.
I will note that the court has highlighted that this option would also require additional authorizing legislation to create the new judicial department and current labor agreements with SMC staff would likely need to be renegotiated as well.
So that's a more intensive cost and logistically intensive potential option.
So the options here are to potentially increase appropriations for SMC in the 2025-2026 proposed budget, or option B, to not attempt to anticipate these costs in the 2025-2026 budget at this stage, but to address these costs when they are more fully realized and we have better information to predict the reality of the costs in a future supplemental budget request.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Tommaso.
Council Member Kettle is chair of the committee overseeing the department.
SPEAKER_07
Thanks, Chair Strauss, and thank you, Mr. John.
I actually love this in the sense of that these are the kind of questions and issues that need to be raised and be under consideration.
And the first thing I will say is, It lines up with what's going to be a theme of the 25 committee here, and that is, as I said earlier, the health of the criminal justice system to ensure the different pieces are working, particularly with the changes that have been made.
The score jail, for example, a lot of work being done in terms of coordinating.
It's very complex.
And I mentioned the marshals earlier.
You're highlighting these things.
Where we are now, I'm not exactly sure.
So it may be a bit cart before the horse.
But I think it's important to be working through this process in terms of what we're doing.
Because we got...
24 is going to end up we have the less lethal weapons and for those that were asking about it we will come through committee um and you know work that one and then again the shift to 25 and uh 2025 and this is an area that we need to be looking both with the law department and the smc and um And I should say, too, that it's important to remember that diversion piece.
I talked about the drug alternative court piece in terms of what's happening with the city attorney's office and Seattle Municipal Court.
But overall, the diversion piece as well.
I've been to the lead policy coordinating group meeting where they added on loitering.
What they do is so important in identifying those that should be diverted and to get a better outcome to get them into services.
But also, as it relates to the criminal justice system, allow the criminal justice system to adjudicate those that are problematic in that respect, that don't have just the addiction piece in this case.
And I think working through this process is going to be very important.
I anticipate working with the executive on the SCORE jail implementation.
and how it impacts the both law and SMC and But also as noted in city attorneys Memos, I think we're near memo here, you know in terms of soda soap street racing all the above and and just the idea that we need to have this fully functional criminal justice system where we're working the processes because it shows that government is engaged that they're engaged in terms of accomplishing a safe base in our city and uh which you know then goes to the the issue of a permissive environment or as chief war likes to say lawlessness and um and so i again really appreciate um you bringing this up and the way you did.
Colleagues, I think we should work through, I would recommend working with the central staff, budget director, the executive on this.
Some of this may be a little bit early, but I think having this discussion now, maybe we can act on a piece or two, but just having this discussion now is going to set us up positively maybe for mid-year or end of year next year or when we go to the second half of the biennium.
SPEAKER_06
And I would just say that was largely our intent.
It was to raise this to your awareness.
The executive is certainly aware of it.
Again, it's the kind of thing, once we better know, it could be addressed with a supplemental.
But again, if there's interest in something sooner, that could also be a possibility.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Council Member Rivera, followed by Council Member Saha.
SPEAKER_01
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Tommaso, for this detailed presentation.
Very much appreciate it.
I have a couple questions.
One is on score.
When we passed the score, it was because King County Jail was not letting us utilize the jail beds that we were paying for, and so it forced us to have to find a different alternative.
subsequently I know that King County jail has now said they can accommodate beds and now I' m not clear how much we will need to utilize score I believe we still there is still a need to utilize score but I' m not sure to what extent.
So that's my first question.
And then my second question is related.
So let me just ask it while I'm at it.
It's just I'm not clear why we would need a new judicial department to accommodate what I think is just we needed some bed space capacity and, you know, went to SCORE to do that.
I'm not sure why we would need a whole judicial department to manage everything.
SPEAKER_10
any few beds that we would be utilizing at score so getting more information on that would be very helpful because i i feel like i must be missing something yeah i'm happy to follow up with the court to get more information about the the necessity of that option um my understanding is that you know these were these were two uh potential options that were presented i think um there are uh fiscal and other reasons why option one may be more preferable, but we may still be in too early of an implementation stage with the SCORE jail contract to be able to make definitive statements about that.
I'm happy to get more information from the court about that, and then I would defer to the executive in terms of the interaction between the SCORE jail agreement and the more recent King County agreement in terms of what that will look like for bed space utilization at both facilities.
SPEAKER_07
chair yes council member kettle in response i just wanted to add that you know the score a according to the ordinance they have to come back to us before they go final with the score jail so there's like i mentioned there's a lot of coordination on um and the score jail agreement is different than the king county where you're kind of paying up front so this is as needed basis and so it provides that flex uh option um and so that we're you know able to do so if needed for whatever reason and so the score jail agreement is still important from that perspective and that's why it's still being worked and it's complicated and as you can tell there's multiple moving pieces and then they kind of interrelate and then you get the budget aspects to it so again this is good that we're working through this and And it's also good to remember, too, that the Seattle Municipal Court went through some major reductions just a number of years ago that really impacted it, and whole sections were shut down.
And that may account for, in terms of the basis of your question, in terms of If we're bringing pieces back, then we kind of have to bring back the elements of the Seattle Municipal Court that they were there before, before they were truncated a number of years ago.
SPEAKER_01
I appreciate that, Chair.
Keep going.
Sorry.
I just want to address what Tomasso was.
I appreciate what you're saying, Chair.
It's just this new judicial department here specifically to address SCORE.
And so I would like more information because my understanding is exactly as Chair Kettle, you just delineated, which is it was just giving us some additional bed space if we needed it.
And so my question goes to, do we need it?
now that King County has changed their policy on the bed space at King County Jail.
So do we need it?
And then separately, why would we need a whole new judicial department to deal with any overflow that we would be using at SCORE?
And then, Tommaso, I understand the transport piece.
That makes sense to me since we have to transport folks to SCORE.
So that piece, I understand.
It's the creating a whole new judicial department just to deal with whatever overflow we may be having at SCORE that I'm unclear about.
So getting more information, I would really appreciate that.
SPEAKER_10
Thank you.
Happy to do that.
And I'll just reiterate that these were initial initial projections based on the rather limited information that we in the court have at this time and I think to give a lot of credit to the court for their thoroughness on providing these estimates at a time when we don't have the information to accurately make concrete predictions.
SPEAKER_01
Agreed.
Appreciate SMC putting this together.
Just wanting more information and direct reader if you have any things to add in terms of King County Jail and our contract with the jail there and any would be appreciated.
SPEAKER_09
Yeah, I don't have anything to add.
I can confirm what Council Member Kettle was saying is that they are intended to address different purposes and that we are still finalizing the contract with SCORE.
And if we did move forward with that, then there would be some need for additional Expenses to be determined what they what the dollar amounts would be and we have anticipated that in the in the proposed budget Thank you anything further vice chair So sorry just to clarify so King County Jail has space but not necessarily for Seattle's needs
SPEAKER_01
So we still need to go to score.
Is that what I heard you just say, Director?
SPEAKER_09
When we originally proposed the score deal, that was before the King County deal was proposed.
Now that the King County deal has been solidified and increases the number of beds that we have access to, the score deal would be in excess of that increased amount if we needed more than what King County can accommodate.
And as Councilmember Kettle said, that would be on a flexible basis.
We could use one, five, up to the maximum number anticipated in the SCORE contract.
We wouldn't have to pre-commit to pay for entire years of any number of jail beds.
SPEAKER_01
So how many jail beds do we have at King County now, as opposed to in our prior contract with them?
SPEAKER_09
I think I know the answer to that, but I prefer not to free...
SPEAKER_01
We can take it offline.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Vice Chair.
Council Member Saka, over to you, and then Council Member Nelson.
SPEAKER_04
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Tommaso, for this really excellent analysis here and teeing up these options.
Yeah, I appreciate the comments made by my colleagues, I guess most recently by Councilmember Rivera, for the point about the courts and the potential need or not for standing up a net new judicial division or department to support a score jail contract where we...
We need and we have at our disposal, but now given the revised contract, our dependence on that is less, we have less of dependence on that.
So maybe we do, maybe we don't, I don't know, need that.
I think more information is needed to make sure we have appropriate data to support that.
And I think colleagues, part of what I believe our legislative oversight role is, especially during these budget times, is to figure out what our sort of mission-critical items, must-haves versus kind of nice-to-haves.
And in the context of a $250 million budget deficit, you know, we need to be as best as we can only addressing, well, starting by addressing those mission-critical must-haves versus nice-to-haves.
And, you know, the belt and suspender approach is great, but maybe we only need another way of saying that, you know, belt and suspender approach is great, but maybe we only need the belt.
or the suspender, but not necessarily both.
In any event, more is needed there and more information is needed there.
But I also want to make sure that we are setting our partners up at these various departments, whether it's the law department, city attorney's office, or the courts, SMC, we're setting them up for success as well.
And we're not just passing these very excellent, thoughtful laws.
But we're also making sure that they have the tools and resources they need to be successful.
It doesn't mean rubber stamping everything, the idea, proposal that comes through.
We need to put some rigor around it and making sure, you know, like working collaboratively with them.
So I support making sure they have what they need to be successful.
On slide five, this prosecutor staffing, the last bullet there, the floating prosecutor the last blurb says it would improve workloads anticipated I'm sure that's—there's—I wouldn't disagree with that, just on its surface.
And—but I guess, you know, we need more data to better understand the current impact of the current laws on the speed racing bill, for example.
I understand having conversations recently with the Southwest Precinct Commander, Captain Bayer, and some LTs there at the precinct that— The department has begun, since we passed that in the summer, has begun issuing citations for spectators.
I don't know the volume.
I don't know the total.
But more importantly, as it relates to this conversation, I don't know the total volume across the city and what type of potential impact that has or not on the caseload here for our prosecutors.
But bottom line, we need a coordinated approach that is informed by data.
laws that we've already passed.
I'm sure there's like an initial set of data available including how these various laws are being enforced, the total initial impact it's having on case volume, et cetera.
But we need to better understand some of these sort of floating variables before making firm decisions.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Council Member Sackett.
Tommaso, Director Eder.
I see Director Eder.
SPEAKER_09
I just have some real-time information.
The contract with King County is for up to 130 beds.
That's actually a commitment of 135 beds.
SPEAKER_03
Thank you, Director Eater.
How many was it before?
SPEAKER_02
Hang on, I'm gonna keep facilitating.
I know you just shared information out of order.
I'm gonna keep us on this topic and then we can come back to this.
Anything to share or add to Council Member Saka's comments at this time?
I'm gonna go with Council President, Council Member Morales, and then Council Member Rivera.
We're just gonna come back to this topic at the end.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00
Council President?
I was going to make this point about the importance for maintaining the services that we are under in ILA to receive from SCORE.
It's my understanding—I was about to mention that 135 is the number of beds from King County that was recently negotiated.
My understanding is that prior to booking restrictions, I think that our contract stated something about 190 or so.
So there is already a decrease from 190 to 135. My understanding is that with SCORE, we've agreed to 20 or 40. I'm not quite sure.
But numbers aside, here's why we need to keep SCORE.
SCORE has medication-assisted treatment inside for people with opioid use disorders.
King County Jail does not.
If anybody has consumed drugs within the past, I don't know how many hours, they are sent by the King County Jail to a medical facility, jamming up emergency rooms.
And so, in addition, when we were being briefed on the ILA with SCORE, we were told that the reentry services, once people are getting out, are superior, helping hook up with case management, et cetera.
I don't have the facts and figures right in front of me.
But those are two really good reasons in addition to just the sheer math, which I'm not really as much focused on, that I believe strongly that we need to keep score amongst our options.
Now, my question is for central staff.
Is there more information in the question and answer tracker or any of the budget change requests from SMC about this additional kind of department?
I would like to know more about that.
Or is this kind of a recent idea?
Because I have to admit that when I was first reading it, I was thinking about technology to be able to interact with somebody that instead of transporting them here, then there was a technological link to folks that are at SCORE.
But I don't know why a whole new department and why that nomenclature.
SPEAKER_10
So there was a short memo prepared by SMC in response to our central staff's pre-budget questions related to potential additional costs for implementing the SCORE ILA.
Just to restate it again, they provided two options that are exclusive of each other for implementation of the SCORE ILA at SMC.
Option one is the transport of defendants physically to the court for hearings, and option two related to the virtual hearings, and that is the option that they identified as potentially needing a new judicial department.
I'm happy to share their memo with you all in addition to following up and getting more clarification about the reasons for that.
I think option two, in addition to assuming no transportation, also may assume a higher caseload.
I know some of the agreements and the working agreements and the mechanisms that the court is accustomed to with regard to working with the King County Jail, there are some different considerations there.
with working with SCORE, and that may be the reason for the belief that it may be necessary to create a new judicial department if the hearings are virtual rather than transportation.
I will say in my and other central staff's conversations throughout the contemplation of the SCORE ILA, the conversation with the executive has always involved the assumption that there would be transportation.
I don't have any reason to believe that that's changed, but I am happy to follow up with SMC to get a little bit more detail about the justification for the potential option around creating a new judicial department.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Thank you, Council President Nelson.
Anything else from you at this time?
No.
Sounds good.
Council Member Morales.
SPEAKER_05
Okay, so I want to make sure that I'm understanding the total potential costs for both to the court for implementing soap and soda legislation and for the impact of the score jail.
So if I'm understanding this section right, the totals are the court's potential costs for both things.
SPEAKER_10
The court at this time hasn't put a specific cost estimate on soap and soda implementation.
My recollection is that they stated that there may be additional staffing costs, but they would be minor.
if they do materialize, so the cost estimates that I'm conveying via this presentation and memo for the court have exclusively to do with SCORE jail implementation.
SPEAKER_05
Okay, and then do the floating prosecutor and specialty prosecutor costs get included in that?
SPEAKER_10
Uh, those are separate costs, uh, that the law department, uh, would be at the, uh, in law, not, uh, not at the courts.
Yes.
SPEAKER_05
Okay.
So, um, then option one just for the score is, uh, would be 196,000 this year, five 20 in out just in 2026. Um, you're referring to the Seattle municipal court.
Yes.
Sorry.
SPEAKER_10
Yes, option one would be just under $200,000 in 2025 and $520,000 in 2026. I'll say again that these are pretty preliminary cost estimates.
The difference between the 2025 and 2026 cost estimate has a lot to do with the assumption built into the court's estimates that implementation of this wouldn't commence until sometime in Q3 2025. So that's why it's lower in 2025 than 2026.
SPEAKER_05
That's helpful.
Okay.
I was wondering why there was such a huge disparity there.
Okay.
Okay.
I think that answers my question.
Well, except to say that I would also be interested to know if and when we could get some idea from the court about what the impact of implementing the soap and soda legislation would be for them.
SPEAKER_10
Yeah, I can follow up with them again on that.
My recollection from those conversations is that they largely believe that that implementation can be absorbed within their existing cost and staffing model.
But once again, it depends on the level of referral, the level of utilization and prosecution.
SPEAKER_05
And then the last thing is just to be clear that none of these costs for the SCORE jail are included in the budget.
SPEAKER_10
There is $2.8 million, I believe, that was included in the proposed budget in finance general for implementation of the SCORE ILA budget.
I do not know what, if any, amount of that would be available for Seattle Municipal Court.
I understand that there's approximately $1 million of that.
2.8 is intended for non-contract costs.
I don't have any information about whether or not any of that would be available to the court specifically versus SPD or other city departments that would need to be involved in implementation.
SPEAKER_05
it would be helpful to get a breakdown of that and to have a better sense of whether the court has any funding for how they will be impacted by this.
SPEAKER_10
yeah.
director eater might be able to speak to that.
I don't by by raising this policy consideration at this stage I think as Director Noble said before our intent is just to daylight this now so if and when there is a supplemental you have that information information ahead of time then you're already thinking about it my my understanding is that If and when there are additional costs to SMC, depending on what implementation option is selected to be preferable, that the executive would be in full support of bringing that in a mid-year supplemental.
So I don't want to make this presentation to sound like the executive is planning to leave SMC out to dry on this.
These are just initial cost projections that we wanted to get in front of you to show you thinking about it.
SPEAKER_06
Thanks very much.
The gist of this is that there are costs coming to both community court side, potentially to CAO side.
BUT NOBODY KNOWS, INCLUDING EXECUTIVE, KNOWS QUITE WHAT THEY ARE.
IT WILL DEPEND A LITTLE BIT ON HOW THE IMPLEMENTATION FOLLOWS THROUGH.
SO WE ARE FLAGGING THAT THESE COSTS ARE LIKELY TO BE SOME OF THE NEED TO GET APPROPRIATED TOWARDS MID-YEAR NEXT YEAR.
AND AGAIN, I THINK THAT THERE WILL BE RESOURCES SUFFICIENT TO DO THAT AT THAT TIME.
BUT DIDN'T WANT YOU TO BE SURPRISED BY THAT AND IN THE CONTEXT OF THE THE POLICY CHOICES THE COUNCIL HAS MADE TO THE STATE THIS YEAR ON BOTH IN TERMS OF AMENDING THE SMC AND ALSO APPROVING ENTERING INTO THE SCORER CONTRACT.
I JUST WANTED YOU TO KNOW THAT WE ARE TRACKING THE IMPLICATIONS OF THAT.
A GOOD DEAL OF THAT WILL COME TO YOU AGAIN ANTICIPATED MID-YEAR, NEXT YEAR IN SOME FORM.
SPEAKER_09
I agree with central staff's description of the situation.
I have nothing further to add.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Council Member Morales, do you have more?
No, thank you.
Thank you.
If we can go back to Council Member Rivera's question and Director Eater, your answer there, just giving space for that conversation.
SPEAKER_01
Thank you.
Thank you, Director Eater, for answering.
It's 135 is in the new contract for bed space.
Council Member, Council President Nelson, you indicated it had been about 190 something before.
So I understand better the need for the score piece.
I'm not suggesting we shouldn't use score.
It's just when we Initially talked about score.
We didn't know what bed capacity if any we had at King County Jail So that's important.
I will say since council president you brought up the piece about Score having that medical component to it.
You know, I've often thought that is needed at King County Jail and Yes.
And it continues to be needed at King County Jail.
And also toward that end, I will also say, you know, Council President and I have both talked about and agree that, you know, there is a need for something like a sobering center, which I understand that was something King County did.
and partnership with Seattle has had in the past.
On their website, it says they're continuing to partner to reopen it post-COVID, but I have continued to ask questions about this without actual a response about when and where and we have to consider how this will be reopened but there' s a continued need for it because we know that with the laws that we passed to councilmember sakas point early about all the laws we passed and councilmember kettle brought up as well is that in terms of diversion which is really important if folks are not sober they can' t flagged as eligible for diversion they're being put let out and back on the streets because they can't actually consent since they're not sober so thereby the continued need for a place for folks to go to sober up so then they can get that we can get the consent to get them the help that they need and so I will raise that now since you raised the treatment piece because that is continues to be a something that many of us really care about and something that I would like to have some answers to.
Central staff, if you can help track that down, I sure would appreciate that because I don't understand why King County would have this on their website information as to when and where.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Council Member Rivera.
Director Eater, anything else you'd like to share just on this subject matter?
SPEAKER_09
Nothing further.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you.
Council Member Kettle, Chair of the Committee, do you have anything else that you'd like to share?
SPEAKER_07
Yes, Chair Strauss.
Thank you very much.
I really appreciate, again, you bringing this up.
It's really important to Council President Kettle what mr johnson said to pretty much all the above yes apply to your questions um to council member morales to the answer that it related to soda and soap it's really a volume question which it should be absorbed in some respect but it could at some point conceivably reach a point where you know additional resources are made but the additional resources really are tied to this core jail and that's because of its differences from the king county jail you know the the logistics, the operational challenges, the differences that exist between King County Jail and the SCORE Jail.
And I also wanted to reemphasize that, you know, even on the King County, there's a lot of pressures out there.
We have our pressures at the city level.
The county has its pressures in terms of budget pressures and which will impact both public health and public safety.
And so I think it's from a be prepared to status, due diligence and all the above, good governance, for us to be positioned in a way that we can respond to any changes either here at King County or in Olympia with the state.
It's not just what we're talking about.
The public defender system, again, this morning I talked about being frustrated.
This afternoon I'm worried as it relates to the criminal justice system.
So that's why it's gonna be a major theme of the 25 year for the committee.
And so we'll be stepping through these things early and often, the points that we're raising this afternoon related to law department and SMC.
And again, I really appreciate this dialogue because it kind of sets it up.
So don't be surprised next year when there's a lot of criminal justice system, the health of the criminal justice system, its various pieces.
Oh, by the way, we're engaging with the executive and OIR specifically as well, because when we get our you know, in public safety, you know, when we go to Olympia in terms of our priorities, our priorities, one of them has got to be the criminal justice system, you know, in terms of the health of it.
And so again, thank you so much for bringing this up because it's a chance to daylight, if you will, these different pieces.
Oh, one last thing, Council Member Rivera.
Yeah, the day centers are so important.
So that's really important.
So thank you for raising that because it's all interrelated.
And I think if we just have a comprehensive approach, and to my earlier point this morning about Okay, and public safety committee is pushing the public safety aspects of this, but the human services committee, the human services, the public health aspects need to also be pushed.
And if we do it in a concerted way, I think we can find greater success.
So things like the day centers or the sobering centers, there's different ways of calling it, but I think this is good.
So I, again, appreciate it.
Thank you, Chair.
SPEAKER_02
Thank you, Council Member Kettle.
Tommaso, I will just say, I'm reserving my questions because I'm gonna spend a fair amount of time with you when we are going through the Chair's budget package.
If we can just make sure to reserve a fair amount of time for this policy consideration three, I've got a pretty good handle on one and two.
This is also, Tommaso, where I would insert a joke about us going to rival high schools.
All that said, job well done.
Thank you, colleagues, any other aspect to come before this section?
I will just take a point of personal privilege at this moment, colleagues, something that I've experienced over the last years, having two deaths in the family on days where I chose to come to work instead of be with the family.
I strongly suggest not doing that.
They were the wrong choices.
This week I will be spending time here in the city working on behalf of you instead of attending one of my favorite college professors, final lecture.
And so colleagues, if you would permit me just a moment to say a little bit about Doc, because I will not be attending his final lecture.
Seeing thumbs up.
So Doc, you've had a deep impact on my life.
This moment is too short and words too blunt a tool to describe the ways you've made me a better person in both my personal and professional life.
In your class, it was clear It is the whole person that is most important beyond just learning the materials.
I wish I could be with you for your last lecture for now in Hoover 100. My colleagues here are relying on me to balance our collective priorities to pass budget for our city of Seattle.
And while you are lecturing, I will be voting on building the next leg of our light rail system here in the city of Seattle.
And what stuns me is that in these moments you are teaching more students.
I have the humble honor to be a practitioner of your teachings while stewarding the will and desire of our Seattle residents.
Colleagues, a brief synopsis of Dr. Mike Doc McBride, He's retiring at the end of an academic term after 56 years, the longest in the institution's history.
He's published articles on Soviet politics, migration issues, simulation, baseball, public hearings, education, and has served as a consultant for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees since 1993, and serves on the Secretariat at UNHCR's annual executive committee session each October.
He's also the advisor for the Model United Nations program and on the corporate board for the Model United Nations of the Far West, one of the oldest and best Model United Nations programs in the country.
He has additional extracurriculars.
He was the advisor for the Lancers for 42 years and had been the advisor for the Palmer since 77, has served as the head or assistant coach for women's softball since the founding of the program in 1979, and has served as the assistant dean for advisement from 81 to 85 and director of study abroad from 81 to 2005. Doc, you are a living legend.
The known unknown of the day is how deeply you've impacted this world through being a practitioner at UnionHCR and the rippling impacts you've made through your students such as myself.
And yes, on ratemyprofessor.com, you have 100% rating of would students take your class again.
quoting from the last two stanzas of At School Closed by John Greenleaf Whittier, written in 1877. So shall the stream of time flow by and leave each year a richer good.
And when the world shall link your names with gracious lives and manners fine, the teacher shall assert their claims and proudly whisper, these were mine.
Doc, I'm proud to be one of yours.
With that, we have reached the end of today's meeting.
The next Select Budget Committee will come to order on Tuesday, October 22nd at 9.30 a.m.
Tomorrow's meeting is a joint meeting between the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council.
This meeting will accept only written public comment.
Members of the public may continue to submit written public comment at council.seattle.gov.
Is there any further business to come before the Select Budget Committee before we adjourn?
Seeing none, we are adjourned.
Thank you, colleagues.