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Content:
2012 Priorities – early progress
At the top of this year, I took over the center seat at the dais and will serve as Council President for the next two years. I think I'm starting to get the hang of the job, though I still stumble regularly in the Full Council script and am convinced some Thursday I'll simply forget to sign off on the draft agenda for the next Monday's meeting. Regardless, I'm honored to help lead and focus the Council's work over the next two years.
To that end we drafted a 2012 Action Plan and released it in February. The subject areas and projects probably won't come as any surprise (leadership on public safety, progress on major mobility projects, steps forward in performance-based budgeting, innovation in human services). For me the value of the Action Plan is in having a tool to measure ourselves. It's so easy to become distracted over the course of the year by important problems that demand the Council's attention. The Action Plan ensures we remember what we set out to achieve. (In fact, a little before release of the 2012 Action Plan we released the report on 2011 objectives)
Work proceeds on all these items with some more "cooked" than others at this point in the year. Already, the Third Ave. Initiative, spearheaded by Councilmember Tom Rasmussen with Councilmember Sally Bagshaw, enjoys a building head of steam from people dedicated to changing the feel and perceptions of safety on Third Avenue Downtown. At the March 5 Full Council meeting the Council unanimously voted to release money for groundbreaking on the First Hill Streetcar. The public hearing, chaired by Councilmember Richard Conlin, on proposed zoning changes from neighborhood plan updates around the Othello and North Beacon Hill light rail stations happened Leap Night. Councilmember Bruce Harrell took his public safety to the Southeast Seattle Senior Center March 7 to hear directly from neighbors about crime and what people are doing about it.
I'll use future newsletters to keep people apprised of progress we make throughout the year. Feel free to stay in contact about action priorities of particular interest to you.
Skillet Street Food mobile truck sometimes populates McGraw Square at 6th and Olive. What a fun way to active a wide-open space.
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2012 Committee Priorities
After four years as the land use chair I moved at the start of the year to a new committee -- the Committee on Economic Resiliency and Regional Relations. The slightly unusual title has garnered attention, specifically the "Economic Resiliency" part. I chose the word "resiliency" because we've been talking for too long about what "recovery" from the recession may look like. I think we might be living recovery. Too many people are still unemployed. Too many people live still under the cloud of foreclosure. While we continue to build up and out of the recession crater, we need to start looking further out. We need a jobs base and community that can better withstand economic swings.
I've sketched out a three-level focus for my economic resiliency committee work:
Economic resiliency for individuals and families
More and more the experts (who are supposed to know these things) say successful cities will be defined by the pool of smart, creative, skilled workers available. Seattle has been successful in holding onto great home-grown businesses and nurturing new ones. However, we "import" many people to take great jobs at the same time we have local men and women struggling. Through the committee we'll look at workforce training, job sector predictions, and put forward steps to improve the support and connections people need.
Financial empowerment will also knit into this work. In 2009 I helped launch Bank on Seattle/King County which gives access to no-cost or low-cost checking to people who have had to rely on higher cost check-cashing and payday lenders. It's time to take the next steps in changing day-to-day (and generational) financial stability for individuals and families.
Economic resiliency for small businesses
Small businesses sometimes complain that we have no idea how much time they expend trying to make sense of permits, building regulations, street use fees and various taxes. And they're right. For a small business person, each moment away from production or the sales floor is non-earning time. Geek alert – we'll be doing process mapping to understand all the hoops and hurdles so we can try to delete or combine some. "But, Sally, doesn't the City go through this exercise every time a new person takes over the economic development committee?" Maybe. We've made progress in recent years, and I'll be taking a look at how we further improve.
The City's Office of Economic Development (OED) helps small businesses with financing, marketing, sometimes façade improvement funding and basic business development advice. With the help of a federal grant OED staff are looking at how to focus their efforts on Rainier Valley and the Othello Station area in particular. We heard about this in committee on March 6. Also, check out the latest Only in Seattle neighborhoods here.
Economic resiliency for the city overall
This may seem like an easy catch-all, but it's intended to help us get at the greater business climate in Seattle and at policies supporting living wage employers. A successful and resilient city requires a healthy diversity of living wage jobs and talent sectors. In league with the Council's Government Performance & Finance Committee we'll evaluate our tax policies, particularly how we apply the local business & occupation tax to research and what are called
affiliated transactions."
In the first half of this year we'll carry through on creation of an Economic Development Commission for the city, define a draft scope of work or set of initial questions to the group, and populate the commission.
Sally speaking to the enormous crowd celebrating Governor Gregoire's signing of marriage equality legislation, at Plymouth Congregational Church on February 13, 2012.
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Regional Relations – News from Olympia
Regional Relations is the other half of my committee work. Regional work fits naturally with the role of the Council Presidency. Fostering connections with other area governments only helps us further our own efforts. Here's what's on tap:
We have four councilmembers (Conlin, Licata, Harrell and O'Brien) heading back to Washington DC for the National League of Cities meeting and a pack of visits to the Capitol the week of March 12-19.
The first months of this year have been focused on the legislative session in Olympia. I thought the session would be wrapped up on March 8, but the latest dramatic maneuvers in the State Senate virtually ensure a special session. The final budget will determine how much of formerly shared revenues will continue to be shared and how much will be kept for the state's depleted coffers.
Councilmembers have visited Olympia regularly this session to further the city's legislative agenda (two full-day visits on the federal holidays in January and February and then weekly visits for one subject or another). We succeeded in seeing a few priorities achieved (marriage equality, arts revenue from Husky games to be played at CenturyLink, tools to crackdown on the sexual exploitation of children), but too many priorities failed to make the final cut-off (lower speed limits for residential streets, lower fees for private tow contracts). We've had two full time lobbyists in Olympia (Craig Engelking and Kelsey Beck) working tirelessly and it looks like they'll be there a bit longer.
This spring I'll be reactivating Seattle for Washington, an initiative started a couple of years ago by Councilmember Richard Conlin. Appropriately, most of my time as a councilmember is focused inside Seattle's boundaries, but what happens in any city connects to what happens in other parts of Washington. Whether it's in the pressure cooker of session or outside during the break it's important to have levels of mutual understanding. So, each Councilmember will travel the state to visit with legislators in their home districts in the year ahead. Whether it's Everett, Renton, Federal Way, Aberdeen, Walla Walla or Spokane, we have shared goals for the well-being of our cities and we can be constructive partners.
Sally's father, Stephen Clark, and her partner, Liz Ford, administer the oath of office
for Sally's second full term as Councilmember.
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We're almost at the end of the first quarter of the year and the time has flown by at super sonic speed. Wait – super sonic? SuperSonics? Sorry – I couldn't resist. It wouldn't be fair to close this newsletter without mentioning the proposed basketball arena or, as I like to call it, the subject that launched 3,500 emails. You can check out my blog post on the arena proposal and the questions I'll be asking if and when we receive a concrete proposal.
I hope to have an update soon on work we're doing to improve policies, supervision and accountability around use of force by police officers. That work, prompted by the December release of findings by the U.S. Department of Justice, is underway, but is part of a negotiation with DOJ and, therefore, not open yet for public review. We will have public review of the improvement steps we plan to take and public involvement in monitoring implementation of changes to policies, procedures and oversight. For now, I can say I'm committed to advancing Seattle into the forefront of innovative, accountable urban policing. Officers and Seattle communities deserve the opportunities and responsibilities that come with that.
"Cider with the Sallys" at the West Seattle Farmers Market late last year.
Join Sally Bagshaw and me for the next "Coffee with the Sallys" neighborhood chat
on March 31 from 9:30 – 11 a.m. at the QCafe in Magnolia/Interbay.
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Seattle's Office of Economic Development sends out a daily email with the top economic news of the day. Here are the 12 most clicked articles for February:
Many visitors popped in to visit at the third annual City Hall Open House in January.
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Most Active City
Most Techiest City
8th Most Moved-To City
14th Youngest City
9th Strangest City
6th Best City for Dating
4th Most Volunteering City
6th Worst Dressed City
4th Best City to be a Mom
2nd Most Literate City
Seattle featured in Travel and Leisure Magazine
Seattle Happiness Survey Results
Fortunately, we didn't rank on Forbes' most Miserable Cities list
Thanks to Amy Rolph, reporter at the Seattle PI's Big Blog for writing stories about Seattle's rankings
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