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MAKING IT WORK
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide information, inspire involvement, and make things work in this great city. You can request additional information or comment on the newsletter by emailing richard.conlin@seattle.gov.
CONTENTS:
CHANGING SOUND TRANSIT POLICIES ON TRANSIT ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT
 The Sound Transit Board will engage in a policy discussion about integrating and valuing transit oriented development (TOD) at a Board retreat scheduled for early April. Sound Transit (ST) has focused on building and operating transit systems, and has been especially cautious to maintain this focus with strong financial oversight since the financial problems that ST ran into a decade ago that caused the scaling back of the original ST light rail plan.
However, I have asked the Board to reconsider how TOD fits into the ST mission, as we begin thinking in a more sophisticated way about attracting and serving ridership. Transit is, after all, about moving people, and land use and transit are not just linked, but two sides of the same coin. Sound Transit has not hesitated to build park and rides -- and operate them at no charge to drivers – in order to attract and serve riders. ST investments in TOD will bring riders into the system who will not have to drive to get to transit lines, and it is time that we recognized that this is an investment worth making.
ST's mission is to support and implement the voter approved transit plan. Legally, ST has the ability to design stations and invest in TOD to achieve the number of riders projected in the documents presented to the voters. The problem is that current financial policies consider the actual finances of the transportation system as the primary criterion for evaluating costs and benefits of a transaction. They do not consider transit oriented development (TOD) as a factor in evaluating the financial return from property sales and investments around station areas.
Thus, in a recent discussion evaluating the possibility of overbuilding the Roosevelt station and creating additional units of housing, ST staff assessed overbuilding costs as approximately $3.3 million, and anticipated revenues from the sale of the overbuilding rights as $1.6 million, leaving a $1.7 million gap. The project was considered not to be cost effective, even though it would result in 48 housing units right over the station – the closest thing to guaranteed ridership one can imagine.
One way to change the evaluation of such projects would be to include revenues based on anticipated ridership. A 48 unit development located adjacent to a station is likely to generate strong ridership. Assume only about 1 regular rider for every two units, or 100 rides per day (to and from). Assuming $3/ride in 2020, and 250 days a year of travel, yields 100 rides x 250 days x $3 = $75,000 annually. ST could evaluate the investment based on this revenue as a rate of return on capital. In Roosevelt, investing $1.7 million with a return of $75,000 annually is a 4.4% ROI. This will increase over time as fares rise.
Of course, transit systems do not plan to fully fund their operating expenses from fare collections, so it would be anomalous to require 100% recovery from a TOD investment. Multiplying the fare return by 2 would reflect collecting a conservative 50% of operating expenses, and would better reflect the value of these riders. 2 x 4.4 = 8.8%, a pretty good rate of return.
The Federal Transit Agency has begun using such tools to evaluate the financial actions of transit agencies, and would likely welcome engaging in a dialogue about valuing transit oriented development in this kind of approach.
The Board decided not to pursue the Roosevelt station overbuild, which has other complications, but did decide to review policy. Decisions about the Northgate station will be made in the near future, and there is a much greater opportunity to shape these decisions towards TOD. ST is considering a 500 car garage at Northgate as part of a range of options to cover required mitigation for lost parking places. I think developing a serious strategy around TOD, in partnership with King County, Seattle, and private property owners, is a better direction for ST to focus on, partly using money that could be saved by reducing the replacement parking plan to the minimum requirement.
Seattle has now realized how important it is to develop housing around transit stations, and to include affordable housing in the mix. We did not have a strong policy in place when the line was constructed in the Rainier Valley, and that has left us scrambling to catch up, rezone, and attract investments to those stations. We have developed a great partnership on Capitol Hill, where the community has a visionary housing proposal that includes a major commitment to affordable housing. Sound Transit and the City have been negotiating to ensure that ST's surplusing policy on Capitol Hill is consistent with that vision, and we are close to concluding an agreement.
That makes me optimistic that we can change ST policy to be more focused on TOD on the lines currently in construction and planning. I think the Board is ready for that discussion, and hope that the April retreat will result in giving that policy direction to the staff.
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EARTHQUAKES AND UNREINFORCED MASONRY BUILDINGS
When the Nisqually Earthquake hit, I was in an older brick building in Pioneer Square. While skyscrapers swayed, the Pioneer Building was bouncing up and down, and a window shattered a few feet from me. That building has been retrofitted since then, but it is a great example of the kind of building – Unreinforced Masonry (URM) — that keeps emergency management people up at night. You don’t want you or anyone you care about to be in one when the big earthquake strikes Seattle.
That’s why I have been working on finding a way to get these buildings upgraded, and we have now taken the next step by convening a Policy Committee of interested stakeholders to provide feedback to City Staff, the Mayor and City Council on options for developing a retrofit program for URMs.
There are over 800 URM buildings in Seattle. These buildings are typically relatively low, located in older areas of the City, and are of the highest concern for possible collapse when a large earthquake takes place. The earthquakes in Chile, New Zealand, Japan, and Indonesia over the last few years have demonstrated how dangerous a place the Pacific Rim is – and the only region not yet affected is the Pacific Northwest. URM buildings were generally built before modern earthquake resistant building codes, and these recent earthquakes demonstrated how much of a concern URMs are. DPD and the Office of Emergency Management have already completed a study of the number of buildings in Seattle and developed an understanding of the risk that we face and what we need to do in order to reduce that risk.
The good news is that URMs are a relatively small part of our building stock. The bad news is that retrofits are generally expensive, and that these buildings are older and relatively modest in size, so making improvements could be difficult for building owners. If the City simply adopted a regulation requiring these buildings to be retrofitted, this is likely to be financially unaffordable for many owners, and they would either close the buildings or tear them down. Many of these buildings are elegant and historically significant structures with many years of expected life. Even with the recovery gathering steam, this is not a great time to tell building owners to spend large sums of money that will have little immediate payback.
That’s the dilemma we face. On the one hand, we can keep gambling that the earthquake won’t hit – on the other hand, we could force serious economic consequences on the property owners and the City. We need to find a way to connect these issues, to stop taking risks while making retrofits affordable. That’s why the collection of business owners, property owners, residents, and interested individuals who were identified and invited by the City to participate in this process will discuss a variety of topics and provide recommendations and advice to the City for inclusion in the URM policy. What we would like them to do is figure out a way that the City can support a retrofit process in a way that is affordable to property owners, by figuring out how to lower costs, stretch out requirements over time, or provide incentives that will help property owners make this happen.
It’s not an easy assignment, and there are no readily available answers. But we must take action, and I am looking forward to receiving their report, to be completed by the fall of 2012. Legislation implementing a URM retrofit program is anticipated to be submitted to the City Council in early 2013.
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SEATTLE FOOD ACTION PLAN FOR 2012
While the City will be putting together a long-range plan for local food through a series of three workshops that began on March 13, my office will continue to work with City Departments and regional partners on actions to implement the Local Food Action Initiative in 2012. Here is our list of planned activities:
- Support developing Food Web, an initiative to increase and sustain the capacity of the Puget Sound regional food system.
- Use the Seattle Farm Bill Principles as a tool to work with local, regional, and national partners to encourage local governments and others to support them and advocate for appropriate policy in the renewal of the Farm Bill.
- Convene community partners working on hunger issues to identify next steps to meet immediate needs. Continue efforts towards a long-range campaign to meet the long-range needs of underserved communities by improving healthy food access and participating in community building around the food system.
- Work with the Regional Food Policy Council to create an Action Agenda and launch a project to inform and engage elected officials in food issues.
- Coordinate with state agencies and organizations around the state to strengthen Washington State food policy work, and raise the salience of food issues for candidates for Governor.
- Work with the Seattle Human Rights Commission to develop policies and practices around the concept of food as a basic human right.
- Create a campaign to promote the health and nutrition of City employees, modeled after the successful work in the Department of Parks and Recreation.
- Update and begin implementation of the P-Patch Strategic Plan.
- Support further action steps to make City and other public lands available for food production.
- Develop and adopt Phase 2 of the land use code changes to encourage food production and urban agriculture.
- Convene organizations working to preserve and enhance farm land in King County, including County agencies, the Agriculture Commission, and the King Conservation District, to develop coordinated strategies.
- Develop additional opportunities for expanding economic activity, marketing, and jobs in the local food economy including exploring how best to support Puget Sound Fresh.
- Increase connections between the city and local and regional farmers and increase ties with small and mid-sized farmers in Eastern Washington.
- Work with food system stakeholders to increase small-scale regional distribution that supports small farms and farmers.
- Continue to strengthen urban agriculture including finding a home for the business directory of urban agriculture related businesses in Seattle and the urban agriculture business association.
- Develop additional strategies for preserving farmland to produce food for Seattle residents in partnership with entities such as the Pike Place Market.
- Adopt a Transfer of Development Rights program to protect farmland.
- Solicit community feedback, approve, and begin implementing a Food System Policy Plan. Work with the City food staff person to strengthen the City's Interdepartmental Team on food and to identify and write grants and perform community outreach and policy development.
- Develop indicators of success in transforming the food system.
- Work with immigrants, refugees, and associated organizations to expand opportunities for market gardening and farming.
- Continue to work with and encourage community—led projects and the CPPW and CFG funded projects.
- Work with OEM and regional partners to strengthen the regional plan for food reserves for emergencies.
- Incorporate food system policies, goals, and implementation strategies in the Comprehensive Plan, revised Climate Action Plan, Neighborhood Plans, and Transportation planning.
- Secure adoption of healthy food guidelines for City vending machines.
- Consider how to take local food work to scale in transforming the local food system through developing the “Food Web” project.
- Work with the PSRC to develop an assessment tool for evaluating urban agriculture.
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MORE CITY FUNDS CAN BE DEPOSITED IN CREDIT UNIONS
Senate Bill 5913, sponsored by Senators Prentice, Hobbs, and Benton, was approved by the Legislature and will go into law on June 8. The bill, which passed the Senate 43 to 2 and the House 80 to16, increases the amount of funds that governments can deposit in credit unions. I suggested adding this legislation to Seattle's legislative agenda. Its passage is a modest but gratifying success for those of us who would like to broaden support for cooperatives like credit unions, and who would like to see a financial system that provides more diverse opportunities for public and private investments.
Washington has a long and proud heritage of cooperatives and other alternative institutions. We have the largest percentage of publicly-owned electricity providers of any state, many successful credit unions, and some of the largest and most well-known cooperatives in the country – like Recreational Equipment Incorporated (REI), the Puget Consumers Co-Op (PCC), and Group Health Cooperative (GHC).
Yet, until recently, Washington required that public agencies deposit their funds only in commercial banks, and prohibited them from using credit unions. State law requires that any entity that will hold public funds must be certified as a 'public depository' by the Public Deposit Protection Commission, which consists of the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and the State Treasurer. This Commission can only authorize funds to be deposited in entities which will provide collateral that can be used as part of a pool to ensure that public funds are secure if any institution fails or defaults. These fairly conservative financial policies were designed and have been managed to, appropriately, ensure that public funds are stewarded properly and that the public is not put at risk.
Credit unions don't quite fit into these standards, so they were not certified to hold public funds. In 2010, the legislature decided that credit unions should be eligible, but that they would provide security in a different way, through their protection as part of the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund. But the 2010 legislation only allowed the use of state-chartered credit unions (many credit unions hold national charters), and limited deposits to $100,000, even though credit union accounts are insured up to $250,000.
The new legislation adds nationally –chartered credit unions to the list of eligible institutions, and sets the ceiling for public deposits at the maximum deposit insured by the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund, which now is $250,000 but which could increase in future years.
This is a modest change, but one which contributes to opening up the financial system. Congratulations and thanks to the legislature and the sponsors for making this happen.
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SAFE HOUSING FOR DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SURVIVORS
In 2010, the City Council identified safe housing for the survivors/victims of domestic violence as a priority issue to work on. Seattle has a long track record of working to reduce domestic violence, and the Council had identified working on domestic violence issues as one of our priorities for 2010. In looking at the area where additional resources could be most useful, we concluded that providing housing for domestic violence victims was a major concern. We have now designed and funded programs to address this, and these are now moving into implementation.
Domestic violence is one of the leading causes of homelessness for women, but it has often not been part of the discussion around community housing programs. Victims/survivors face considerable challenges in accessing the safe shelters and transitional and permanent housing that is critical for their long term safety.
In order to better understand the complexity of this issue, Councilmembers took a training course on domestic violence, conducted by the Human Services Department, using the model they have developed for City employees. The Council also held a forum with a panel of domestic violence survivors and housing providers to review the areas of need, and to identify where our resources could be most useful.
Our Human Services Department (HSD) will take three major actions in 2012 to implement this priority.
- In the spring of 2012, HSD will begin the process of renewing and modifying our contracts with human service providers who work on homelessness and housing issues. The new approach to funding will be guided by a long-term Strategic Investment Plan that was developed in 2011 in conjunction with an extensive community process, and that involved staff working on domestic violence issues. Through this process and the restructuring of the funding process to follow the Investment Plan, there will be greater opportunities to ensure that agencies working with homeless populations and low income housing take into account the specific needs of domestic violence victims in their proposals.
- Because domestic violence survivors often have children with them, and also have skills and education that can allow them to quickly reestablish themselves in a secure living situation, they are good candidates for rapid transition into more stable housing. HSD is currently piloting a program that will provide rental/move-in assistance for clients who have left their homes under stress or are ready to move from temporary shelter into more stable housing. The program has $27,500 in funding initially, and if it turns out to be successful, HSD would look at moving other funds into it.
- Shelter providers need training on how to deal with the special concerns of domestic violence survivors. Among other critical issues, survivors often fear further abuse, and need to have their identities safeguarded and privacy protected. The City has partnered with the King County Housing Authority to conduct training sessions to increase the awareness of domestic violence among housing providers, and to give them guidance on how they might modify their screening or intake procedures to serve domestic violence victims more effectively.
There are tens of thousands of domestic violence incidents annually in King County, and there is substantial evidence that a significant portion of the women and women with children experiencing homelessness are victims/survivors. These programs will help to ensure that appropriate services are provided and that these women and children have the opportunities to reestablish secure lives.
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UNIVERSITY DISTRICT OF DOWNTOWN
The Sound Transit Board will engage in a policy discussion about integrating and valuing transit oriented development (TOD) at a Board retreat scheduled for early April. Sound Transit (ST) has focused on building and operating transit systems, and has been especially cautious to maintain this focus with strong financial oversight since the financial problems that ST ran into a decade ago that caused the scaling back of the original ST light rail plan.
Seattle is the proud home of the University of Washington, and also hosts Seattle University on First Hill and Seattle Pacific University on the north slope of Queen Anne, as well as a great set of community colleges. And there is also the campus of Antioch University Seattle at 6th and Battery near South Lake Union, and the Bainbridge Graduate Institute, which offers classes at 4th and Vine. Seattle's universities and community colleges enrolled more than 106,000 students in the 2011-2012 academic year.
Now a new complex of universities is emerging downtown, creating an interesting set of options for students and employers of students who are looking for additional course work, degrees, or research opportunities. Seattle policy makers should accelerate our work to embrace this development and the associated economic activity.
The original home of the University of Washington was downtown, in a group of blocks called the 'Metropolitan Tract', which the University still owns and receives substantial revenue from. The Washington Territorial Legislature decided to locate the University in Seattle in 1860, early in the history of the Washington Territory. Legend has it that Seattle was the third largest city at the time, and there were three public facilities to be allocated. Walla Walla, as the largest city, got the state prison; Olympia, the second largest, got the State Capitol; and Seattle got the University, which existed only as a gleam in the eyes of those who foresaw its possible future.
Seattle has been very fortunate to have the University of Washington, not only as a great educational facility, but as a premier research institution which consistently ranks as one of the top recipients of federal funding contracts and grants. UW is also a robust center for entrepreneurial activity. In addition to a significant commitment to fostering the growth of small business through a variety of programs and an incubator facility, a number of companies have been launched by UW faculty, often to take the next steps in building commercial applications that can be spun off from research at the University.
The University of Washington School of Medicine has developed a campus in South Lake Union, designed to complement the emerging biotechnology and world health economic sectors that are centered in that neighborhood. This campus now includes some 1250 researchers and staff in four buildings, and is expected to continue to expand.
Two other universities will be Joining Antioch and the UW South Lake Union campus in the emerging downtown university district. City University of Seattle is an independent University with main offices (somewhat anomalously) in Bellevue. They have made a decision that their future lies in reconciling their name with their location, but more importantly taking advantage of the urban setting and the transportation and housing options that Seattle offers for their students. They have entered into a lease for the former P-I/Group Health building at 6th and Wall, and will be opening their doors there in January of 2013.
Further strengthening this emerging educational center will be Northeastern University, based in Boston, which has announced its intent to establish a branch in Seattle that will ultimately serve up to 1000 students. The Seattle campus will offer graduate degrees “tailored to the workforce needs of the local economy”. While they have not selected a location as yet, downtown is their preferred option.
There is a wonderful synergy between great cities and great universities. City University and Northeastern are locating downtown because of the value they place on being in the middle of vibrant, culturally rich, and diverse neighborhoods with a dense concentration of residents and employers. There will be prospective students, jobs, internship opportunities, and student housing in close proximity. And others who are interested will have easy access because these areas are served by light rail, street cars, bus systems, and good bicycle and pedestrian facilities. The City's task is to ensure that these transportation systems are maintained and expanded, as well as to protect public safety and support other employers and housing opportunities.
The next economy will be built around creativity and a highly educated work force oriented towards lifelong learning. The emerging downtown university complex bodes well for Seattle's future in harvesting this potential.
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FOOD BANK REOPENS AT SACRED HEART
In March I had the chance to participate in one more reminder about how generous this community is. The food bank in the Uptown neighborhood – in the shadow of Seattle Center – had a ceremony to celebrate its successful reopening, after financial woes forced it to close last November.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, a Catholic Church in Uptown (formerly known as Lower Queen Anne) has hosted a food bank for many years. With the support and assistance of Food Lifeline, nearby grocery stores, and the people of the parish, the food bank provided not only groceries, but breakfasts and lunches for the hungry. It operated with lots of great volunteer energy from its faith community, and a single full-time employee. The monthly budget was only $2500.
But last November, the program ran out of funds, and had to lay off the coordinator, Elise Hale-Case, who has been running the program for the last few months, since graduating from Mount Holyoke College. The food bank was scheduled to close after Thanksgiving.
Then the generosity kicked in. Articles about the closure appeared in the Seattle Times and the Queen Anne/Magnolia News. A television station ran a report. Elise decided to make an appeal on the programs web site, www.queenannefb.org
Emails, phone calls, letters, and personal donations poured in. The web posting attracted people to donate from all around the country, but most of the donations came from right here, in our wonderful city. The goal was to raise enough money to fund the organization for two years, $100,000, and they are just about there.
This is a small food bank, serving around a hundred people a day. But it is important to those who are in need. And I am very grateful to those who rallied around to keep it open.
The official reopening was a short and sweet ceremony with a couple of dozen volunteers, members of the fund-raising committee, and the priests from Sacred Heart. I thanked all of them – and all those who donated – on behalf of the City. We are committed to do all that we can as a City to provide food, shelter, and social services to the people of our City who need help, and our voters have pitched in on many occasions to support that effort. Those public services are very important.
But our community thrives because of the volunteers and donors who step up to the plate in so many ways for the myriad of voluntary organizations like the food bank at Sacred Heart. That's what makes Seattle such an extraordinary place.
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SEATTLE CAN DO PROCESS RIGHT. IF WE DECIDE TO.
Maligning 'Seattle Process' is somewhat of a cottage industry in our town, although it may not generate much economic development. We have some processes that drag on way past their sell-by date. And sometimes people deride process because it didn't go their way. Seattle has a history of effective engagement, but often we don't design an appropriate process for decision making – such as in the recent Roosevelt neighborhood rezone decision.
BTW, IMHO it should not be called 'Seattle Process'. It's actually 'Washington process', and the ownership has to be shared. Some recent outstanding examples – the viaduct replacement, SR 520, and Sound Transit East Link – are all processes that are not Seattle exclusive, and not even Seattle driven.
The Seattle Neighborhood Planning Process is an example of the right way to do public involvement and decision making. This was a complicated process in which 37 neighborhoods analyzed their current conditions, involved some 20,000 residents, and came up with a set of land use recommendations to meet their assigned targets under the Comprehensive Plan, and recommendations for neighborhood improvements. The process was commissioned in 1995. The planning was undertaken in 1996-1998. By 1999 all 37 plans had been completed and approved by the Seattle City Council, along with all land use revisions required to meet the Comprehensive Plan targets. Since then, the City has worked its way through the 6000 recommendations for improvements, and has completed most of them.
Why did the original neighborhood planning process work so well? Because the parameters were laid out with great precision, and there was a clear deadline for decision making. Each neighborhood was given a growth target, and was asked to decide whether it was reasonable. Each neighborhood knew that they were entitled to come up with a wish list for implementation if they met the targets. And each neighborhood was given both the process guidelines and resources for carrying out the planning process. Neighborhood planning started in an atmosphere of controversy. Discontent over growth targets fueled political insurgency culminating in the election of Comprehensive Plan opponent Charlie Chong to the City Council in a special election in 1996. But every neighborhood ultimately accepted its growth target and completed the process on time and on budget.
Here are five steps that we can take to make processes work better:
- Remember that an effective process is something to be proud of and to embrace. Involving people in decisions that will affect their lives is a good thing, and it usually improves outcomes – none of us is as smart as all of us, and there are countless examples of projects that are better because of thoughtful engagement.
- Keep in mind that process works best when the steps are clearly laid out in advance, possible outcomes are defined, and there are clear statements about how input will be used, who will make the final decision, and when that will happen. A lack of clarity around these parameters is the most frequent cause of frustration. Sometimes circumstances change, and you have to reopen processes, but that should be the exception, not the norm. It's not fair to the many busy people in our community, who have the right to be involved, to drag out processes until the only people participating are the last ones standing. People have the right to know when their involvement is meaningful, and continuing to punt decisions down the field “to hear more input” will, perhaps counter-intuitively, often lead to less real involvement, not more.
- Make sure to manage the process so that constructive input gets attention, and sabotage is recognized and discouraged. Everyone should have the opportunity to express their opinion. But when you are making critical decisions, the people who are involved must agree to commit to an outcome and be willing to live with a reasonable one, even if it wasn't their first choice. As Hubert Humphrey once put it: "The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously." It is important to challenge all parties to engage constructively.
- Strive for consensus; seek win-win solutions; but acknowledge that not every outcome will be win-win. An honest effort to come up with consensus can pay huge dividends. Seeking to engage people's interests and values, rather than engaging in positional debate, offers the best chance to achieve agreement. If people's input is respected, and a sincere effort is made to accommodate it, they will most often be willing to go along with an outcome. At some point (defined by the parameters set out in advance!), the discussion has to come to a close, and if consensus cannot be achieved, that should be acknowledged and everyone encouraged to look for an outcome that is acceptable.
- Work to improve the structures that make decision making harder. Decision authority is fragmented, both legally and institutionally, in our system. Sometimes this is a strength, as having many people engaged helps to build the constituency that will ensure that good decisions are implemented. But sometimes there are too many steps, too many hurdles, and multiple decision makers who don't necessarily have an interest in bringing things to a close. Reviewing some of the obstacles to making a decision could be a constructive effort to shorten the decision making process.
Conflict is not a bad thing. It is how we manage conflict that determines whether we will be successful. The best way to do that is to lay out clear principles and parameters in advance, work to engage all relevant parties, and then make the call when it is clear that input has been taken and it is time to come to a decision. And the first – and critical – decision must be to commit to a process that is well-designed from the start.
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QUOTE:
"Even a small branch library has a vast chunk of the whole world. To see how vast any library is, compare it to what you would see on TV in a lifetime which is always going to be determined by attention grabbing, but a library has everything. And it has it for free within walking distance - knowledge really is power and the library has the only kind of power it's easy for poor people and children to get in this country - when there are branch libraries, when they are open late."
-- Anne Herbert
DEEP THOUGHT:
"I'd put my money on the Sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that."
-- Thomas Edison, 1931
Richard Conlin
Your Seattle City Councilmember
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