♪♪
-Hello. I'm your host, Brian Callanan.
Should the Seattle Park District double the city's investments
in our parks and public spaces?
How will the Seattle City Council's recommendations
for new light-rail routes impact your neighborhood?
And what does the council think
of Mayor Bruce Harold's new police hiring plan?
Councilmembers Andrew Lewis and Alex Pedersen join me
to answer these questions
and the ones you're sending in, too.
Next, on "Council Edition."
-Look, we need some clear metrics
on what the Parks Department is going to do
to realize this vision
of a clean and safe and open park district.
-There's been more data showing unacceptable increases
in 911 response times
and unacceptable increases in crime.
-All that and more coming up next
on "City Inside/Out: Council Edition."
♪♪
And here they are joining me.
I have with me Councilmember Alex Pedersen,
who represents District 4 in Northeast Seattle;
and also Councilmember Andrew Lewis,
representing District 7, from Pioneer Square to Magnolia.
Thanks to you both for joining me.
I'm going to launch right into this here
and talk about the SPD -- the other SPD,
the Seattle Park District.
And, Councilmember Lewis,
you're hosting some meetings here in late July
and also later this summer
regarding the Seattle Park District.
Quick background -- the district was approved
by voters in 2014, folks, has its own taxing authority.
The City Council is the district's board of directors.
And, Councilmember Lewis, you're serving
as president of that board and there's a lot
on the table here, including a discussion
about potentially doubling the tax rates
Seattleites would pay for the Park District.
I want to talk about that
and your overall approach to this process, please.
-Brian, it's great to be here
and thank you for the opportunity
to talk about the Metropolitan Park District.
The priority for the Park District commissioners
has to be are our parks clean,
are they safe, and are they open?
Those are the things the public expects
from our great and outstanding park system
that I would put next to any other city in the country,
but that hasn't always been well-maintained and -programmed,
especially during these years of COVID.
The Park District offers us an opportunity to really come in
and make sure that our parks are well-resourced,
but to also make sure those resources
are being used accountably.
We had a great meeting this morning
that Commissioner Pedersen was involved in.
We sit as commissioners, when we do this work,
and one of the themes that really came through,
from my colleagues and from myself was,
look, we need some clear metrics on what the Parks Department
is going to do to realize this vision
of a clean and safe and open park district,
where you can dependably rely
on a bathroom being open and being clean.
You can depend on your community center
being open and well-programmed.
This is the kind of work that I'm interested in
and we need to put a plan
in front of any potential investment.
So, that's going to be the work over the next couple months.
I definitely invite the public to participate.
I'm hoping to have at least two additional opportunities
for public comment out in the neighborhoods
where we'll be going, to North and South Seattle,
to have, hopefully, some in-person events.
Definitely encourage people to reach out to my office
to learn more about the process and to comment
on their priorities for the Park District.
But again, it's critical that our open spaces be clean,
they be safe, and they be open.
-Got it. Councilmember Pedersen,
maybe I can go to you on this one,
because I know you've raised some concerns
about this proposal to increase the tax rate for parks.
What are your concerns?
Let's talk about it.
-Well, first of all, thank you for having us on the show.
And, yes, I, first, support what Councilmember Lewis was saying
about the overall principles
of having our parks and community centers
that are clean, safe, open.
And I think we can manage our costs,
as a city government, to achieve that goal.
I am concerned that the initial proposal
that was coming forward would be doubling
that portion of our property tax
that goes toward the Parks District.
And I think we need to be careful about that
because we have lots of people in Seattle on fixed incomes.
Landlords can pass these property taxes on
to their tenants, both residential renters
and small businesses who are on triple net leases.
And so we want to make sure that the Parks Department
is managing the costs well,
so that we don't have to have such a sharp increase.
And I think we also have to be mindful
of other property tax measures that are coming our way soon,
such as on affordable housing and transportation.
But I'm hopeful that getting public feedback,
hearing from all the councilmembers
under the leadership of Councilmember Lewis here,
perhaps we can come up with a proposal
that boosts investment, but also is reasonable in cost.
-Got it. And, Councilmember Lewis,
I know you've heard this back-and-forth
from Councilmember Pedersen before.
Is there anything you wanted to respond to there, briefly?
-Well, I think what's really important, Brian, is looking
at what the metrics are that we get from the department
because I totally appreciate the lens
that Councilmember Pedersen is bringing to this discussion.
For example, this morning,
we were having a discussion about bathrooms.
The Parks Department has come to us
and proposed a line item in the Cycle 2 investments
for 12,000 additional hours of cleaning.
I don't really have a great amount of insight
into what, exactly, that gets us,
if it's not hitched up or attached
to some kind of business plan, you know.
Does this investment make our bathrooms and parks
clean, safe, and open?
Is that more than 12,000 hours
that's required to do that, you know?
How does that investment interface
with the other plug-ins and funding
that we give the department?
So, I really want us to have a very metrics-driven
conversation with the Parks Department
that precedes any kind of investment.
And that is the discussion that we're really trying
to work through, as a park district.
Board members have been very, very patient,
having several meetings
as a board of park commissioners.
But look, I think that the level of value we put on parks
and the level of work we need to do with parks
is certainly worth the amount of time we're putting into it,
but I think it comes down to not just
what investments are we making,
but how do our investments drive culture within the organization
to get the delivery that the people of Seattle expect?
-Sounds good. I want to move on here, if I could.
And, Councilmember Pedersen, I'm going to go to you next
to talk about your work as chair
of the Transportation Committee for the council
and the council's recent recommendations
for Sound Transit light-rail expansion.
Specifically, I want to know why
you did not make a recommendation
for the location of the Chinatown ID station
or the Delridge neighborhood station, in West Seattle.
Really want to know what's going to happen in those neighborhoods.
Will this delay the West Seattle,
the Ballard Link Extension project?
What can you tell us?
-Thank you for that question.
You know, Seattle's arguably
the biggest supporter of Sound Transit
and we're the crucial linchpin for the entire regional system.
So, doing right by Seattle will speed implementation.
With all the construction permitting that needs to occur,
it's going to help the entire regional transportation system
come online faster.
And, rather than sitting back and letting a dozen policymakers
from outside of Seattle decide what's best for Seattle,
we put forward a resolution talking
about the West Seattle/ Ballard Link Extensions
and what our preferences were, as a city.
And, on a couple of items,
we thought that Sound Transit needed to do more work,
needed to go back out to the community
and Chinatown International District
is one of those communities that has been historically subjected
to many disruptive construction projects,
so, we want to make sure Sound Transit
gets additional buy-in from the community
and prevents displacement of businesses and residents.
And I was really encouraged
that Sound Transit's Expansion Committee seemed
to take our City Council resolution to heart.
We worked on that with Mayor Harrell as well
and we hope that, on the 28th of July,
they incorporate most of it.
-Yeah, we'll see what happens there.
I know there's been some back-and-forth
about potentially delaying that meeting,
so we'll see what happens with Sound Transit there.
But, Councilmember Lewis, maybe your thoughts here
on what the council's recommendations are for light-rail?
I know you heard a lot of feedback from KEXP,
other organizations at Seattle Center about this.
Did the council get it right?
-Yeah, I really want to
lift up the leadership of Councilmember Petersen
for running a very inclusive process.
A lot of the stations and alignment
for Sound Transit 3 run through District 7,
forcing a lot of very difficult decisions
in a lot of those segments --
Interbay, Uptown, downtown. -Mm-hmm.
-As you just mentioned, Brian, in particular,
in the uptown neighborhood,
we have to be very, very careful
about the alignment that we choose for Sound Transit 3
because it brings great opportunities
for the Seattle Center campus.
It also brings the potential for massive disruption
for our arts community, which, as you're well aware,
a lot of our arts institutions were the first things to close
and the last things to reopen and I really hate for them
to come out of the frying pan and go into the fire,
having to deal with the mitigation
through Sound Transit 3.
A lot of those impacts are avoidable,
if we can move the alignment from what has been
initially proposed on Republican to the alignment on Mercer.
Really appreciate
Councilmember Pedersen's leadership
in supporting us going on the record for that.
Really appreciate Marshall Foster
and the leadership team at SDOT,
who have been stalwart advocates
for that change of alignment.
That's going to go a long way
and I'm hoping the Sound Transit Board
will follow the leadership of the city
and the leadership of our arts community
in making that simple shift of a block,
which makes a very significant difference to that impact
to our arts community cluster in Uptown neighborhood.
-Yeah, yeah, thank you for that.
Councilmember Lewis, I'm going to head back to you here
and ask a question about public safety.
You're the vice chair of that committee on the City Council.
There's a lot of focus on police right now.
Seattle starts up a series of public meetings here
in late July to get some input on the search
for a permanent chief of the SPD.
I wanted to look, though, at the mayor's recent
$2 million proposal to recruit and retain
Seattle police officers with some hiring bonuses.
Two questions here. Do you support the mayor's plan?
And, because I know you've been working on this issue so much,
are you concerned this plan doesn't speak
to building an alternative response system
for calls that don't require an armed officer to respond?
-Look, no one proposal has to accomplish all
of our policy objectives, Brian,
and I do support the package that the mayor has put forward.
I think it's really critical to look
at our comprehensive offering of hiring incentives.
And this particular package, I think, is necessary,
but it isn't sufficient.
We need to be providing the basic baseline of incentives
that a lot of our peer departments are providing,
just to be competitive for lateral applicants
and other people who are trying to navigate
what department to go to,
who are on a national market for this kind of work.
I think Mayor Harrell's proposal gets us there,
but then it's what do we do on top of this?
How are we working on retention?
How are we working on making sure
that we aren't losing more officers,
as we're recruiting new people in?
But I do think, as far as recruitment goes,
this is a good package of investments
to get us up to parity
with departments we're competing with
because we are in national competition,
like every police department in the city is --
or, sorry, in the country
is experiencing these same pressures.
I think this gets us to parity to be competitive
with those other departments,
but we have a lot more work to do.
On the issue of alternative responses,
I think it's a separate issue that we're working on.
Councilmember Herbold and I moved some money
that was going to get absorbed
sort of back into the general fund
to park it in finance general temporarily.
That's sort of a wonky answer,
but we have carved out about $1.2 million
that we're working with the executive
to put an alternative response pilot together.
I see those as disconnected issues.
The executive has been a good partner on both of these things
and I think we're making progress on both of them,
but it's not a one or the other contention.
We need to be doing everything to meet our obligation
under the charter for public safety.
-That's fair. That's fair. I just wanted to make sure
I checked in with both of you on this.
And, Councilmember Pedersen,
I know you serve on the Public Safety Committee, too.
Your thoughts about the mayor's hiring proposal?
-Yes, I support the mayor's plan, and more.
Everybody deserves to feel safe
and I appreciate we need a holistic approach
that includes not only the sufficient staffing
of frontline public safety workers,
but also the alternative emergency responses
for mental health crises
that Councilmembers Lewis and Herbold
and others are working on.
We also need a police contract, a labor contract,
that expands and deepens the reforms that have been in place.
On September 10th of last year, ten months ago,
I actually introduced two budget amendments
to fund between $1 million and $3 million
for SPD recruitment and retention,
but I couldn't get enough support at that time.
Since then, there's been more data showing
unacceptable increases in 911 response times
and unacceptable increases in crime.
So, I'm hopeful the mayor's recruitment incentives
will pass next month
and I'd also like to see more emphasis on retaining
the highly trained professionals already here in Seattle
because it takes so long
to train and deploy new recruits.
-Yeah. Yeah, big question.
Maybe I can ask the question just so many people
in the public are looking at this week.
What are you looking for in a permanent police chief?
Councilmember Lewis, can I ask you that, briefly?
-Well, Brian, I want a really strong partner
who is going to engage in this work of rightsizing
what the role of police is
and focusing really, really hard
on building and expanding those core competencies.
We need police to be responding
to the spate of commercial and residential burglaries
that we're seeing in the city of Seattle.
We need police to be a critical part
of business district-level presence, patrol, and outreach.
We don't need police to direct traffic at sporting events.
We don't need police to be
mental health and disorder responders.
We have other people who can do that work
and should do that work.
And just a chief who could really use their platform
and their leadership to put in the proper context
how a comprehensive public safety system comes together
and that, while the police are the nucleus
of a system like that, they aren't the only actors in it.
And changing some of the lines of business
of what police have traditionally done
to really focus and lean into the things
only the police can do, that we need the police to do,
and that we respect the police to do.
-Got it. Coun-- -And that's the kind
-Sorry. -of leadership I want to see.
-Great. Councilmember Pedersen, some thoughts
about what you might be looking for
in a permanent police chief?
-Well, you know, I know the mayor
is working really hard on this.
This is one of the key things that he'll be doing,
is choosing the next permanent police chief
and will be consulting experts on this.
Obviously, we want somebody who is experienced,
somebody who knows how to keep a growing urban population safe
in all neighborhoods
and has integrity to be transparent
and hold all the officers accountable,
inspire them to stay in the department,
to do good work,
and has an open mind to the holistic approach
that we want to take for community safety.
-Great. Thanks for breaking that down.
And, Councilmember Pedersen, let me go back to you here
for a question about Vision Zero,
the city's plan to have zero traffic deaths
or serious injuries by the year 2030.
You recently took a tour of District 2,
in Southeast Seattle,
with Councilmember Tammy Morales.
We have a few photos of your trip down there.
D2, unfortunately, is where more than half
of Seattle's traffic fatalities happened last year
and, overall, the trend we're seeing across the city is
we're not getting closer to that Vision Zero goal.
We're actually seeing a rise in these fatal crashes.
What did you learn on that tour?
What are you doing about this situation?
-Thank you. Yeah, safety has got to be
the priority for everybody using Seattle's roads
and, unfortunately, like you said,
the first part of 2022 continues the disturbing national trend
of unacceptably high numbers of traffic-related
injuries and deaths, especially among pedestrians
and people experiencing homelessness in South Seattle.
So, I joined Councilmember Morales
in her South Seattle district.
We brought SDOT and the Mayor's Office
so we could see, firsthand, three locations
that were high-risk for traffic collisions,
especially for vulnerable pedestrians.
And, already, SDOT has proposed some changes
in one of those locations.
You know, we've lowered speed limits,
we've increased sidewalks.
We have a drop in enforcement, you know,
we don't have enough officers
to do traditional traffic enforcement,
but I'd like to see the increased use of speed cameras;
and fines, based on each individual's ability to pay;
so we can reduce these traffic-related harms.
We also need to bring more people inside.
I mean, the number,
the percentage of people experiencing homelessness
who have been the victims of these collisions
has increased, so it's just another call to action.
We need to see this in the budget
that the mayor submits to us in the fall,
an increase in investments in South Seattle, in particular.
-Got it. Councilmember Lewis, plenty of feedback on this one
and I'm sure I'm sure you've seen it on social media.
One writer said this...
I wanted to throw that out there and also ask this --
How frustrating is this for you?
Because you pushed to increase funding
for Vision Zero in last year's budget
and yet, here we are,
seeing these traffic fatalities increase.
Some thoughts about this -- what needs to change?
-Yeah, Brian, we don't spend nearly enough
to realize Vision Zero.
I mean, that's just flatly
something that we can confidently say.
I appreciate the framing of that caller
who who sent their comments in because it really does come
down to the design of some of these places,
like so much transportation planning.
If you have grade-separated and protected bike lanes
and pedestrian spaces that are completely
outside the lane of travel of traffic
and difficult for traffic
to accidentally go up on the curb of,
you're going to dramatically reduce
the amount of injury and fatality
that members of the community are experiencing.
I am very proud that I worked with my colleagues
on increasing Vision Zero funding,
creating the first ever dedicated source of funding,
and Councilmember Pedersen was a big champion of that
and I appreciate his support for these initiatives.
That money just started being accumulated.
There is a six-month delay
in that commercial parking tax funding coming in
and that commercial parking tax increase
became official as of July.
So, that money, you know, is critical,
but we're probably not going to start seeing it manifested,
in terms of physical improvements,
for a little while
because it has to be accumulated by SDOT.
They need to then go out and effectuate some plans
to build infrastructure in the community
that is conducive to making things safer.
But look, it's important to note,
as Councilmember Pedersen points out, on a regular basis,
you know, SDOT has a several hundred million-dollar budget.
You know, we shouldn't just be looking
at this commercial parking tax money.
We've got to be comprehensively looking
at how we can expect more from SDOT
and demand that SDOT prioritize traffic calming improvements,
you know, and other critical infrastructure,
to make sure everyone can walk and roll
through the city with confidence.
-Got it. And, Councilmember Pedersen,
sticking with the transportation topic,
we actually got an email in about driverless cars.
Here's the question that our viewer wanted to know. Says...
I know there's a very specific question
about driverless cars, these automated cars,
but some thoughts on this, Councilmember Pedersen?
-Yeah, so, as autonomous vehicle technology develops,
cities around the country are trying to figure out
how best to regulate that, the experimentation
-Yeah. -of those autonomous vehicles
on their streets.
I mean, these are public streets
and yet, we have for-profit companies
basically experimenting on our streets.
So, there needs to be some form of reasonable regulation,
just so that there's transparency, accountability,
and advance notice of what's happening.
And, you know, that's something that we can handle
through our street permit process.
We do want to encourage this technology to develop,
but we also want to keep people safe
while these companies are experimenting
on our public streets.
-That's fair. Thank you for taking that one on.
Councilmember Lewis, another question to you
that came in from a viewer, sort of where transportation
and your work on homelessness intersect.
Christine asks this...
I know the city's been discussing an idea
about building at least one safe lot for these RVs.
Anything you can tell us there?
-Well, we have a safe lot pilot that the council funded,
actually, I think two years ago.
-Mm-hmm. -It did finally get effectuated
by the King County Regional Homelessness Authority
and I'm very grateful for their partnership.
A contractee was awarded
in response to a competitive bid.
I believe it's the Low Income Housing Institute.
-Right. -They're going to create
a 50-unit safe lot to pilot a new system
for providing that kind of service.
As your viewers may be aware, Brian,
and remember, we have experimented before
with RV safe lots, during the -Yes.
-Murray administration, before Councilmember Pedersen
and I were here on the City Council.
-Mm-hmm. -That project,
on the whole, was not effective.
We've learned a lot over the course of time
between that and now.
The King County Regional Homelessness Authority
has developed metrics and a plan
to assess how effective this provider pilot is going to be
and the hope is there could be
some scalability built into that,
once we have a better sense of how to provide the service.
People who camp and live in RVs tend to be
a tougher population of people experiencing homelessness
for us to provide services to. -Yeah.
-They tend to have a historic skepticism
of the traditional housing and shelter system,
hence why they are living in an RV.
-Right. -In a lot of cases,
they'll tend to own that asset and it's obviously
a very expensive and critical asset to them,
so they're reluctant to want to leave it
to accept an alternative offer of service.
So, really trying to develop a program
that meets that population of people where they are,
that works with them to go to a designated place
and to accept case management and work on their own terms,
that is something we're trying with this pilot
and my hope is it'll be scalable and we can provide that relief.
I know Councilmember Pedersen
has large portions of his district
with a lot of folks living in RVs
in the Interbay neighborhood.
I certainly do as well.
So, this is work I'm very interested in,
that we're following.
And, again, that, you know,
over two years ago, the council funded this
because we share a sense of urgency on it.
It's great to see it finally acted on by the KCRHA
and I'm very grateful for their partnership.
-Got it. Thanks for that. Councilmember Pedersen,
did you want to touch on this issue?
I know it's something that does affect
all districts out there.
-Well, I really think that we want to be supportive
of the King County Regional Homelessness Authority.
You know, this is a regional problem
that requires a regional solution
-Mm-hmm. -and I appreciate that they
are doing it as a pilot project because,
as Councilmember Lewis pointed out,
it hasn't worked in the past, so it's very importants
where they decide to put the safe lots.
And I think that we really need
the King County Regional Homelessness Authority
to be very proactive.
in talking to those individuals living in RVs,
find out what their needs are,
because they really, you know,
we do have legitimate offers of housing and services,
so we want to make sure they take those
and aren't just in an RV that's not working,
sitting on the side of the street for weeks.
-Fair, fair. Thank you. Councilmember Pedersen,
I want to make sure I go back to you for a discussion
about the measure you recently passed through the council,
only to face a veto from the mayor.
So, this was that measure that would've required landlords
to give information about their rental rates to the city.
The city would've then used that information,
have a local research institution analyze it
and get some details that the city could, potentially, use
in the debate on affordable housing.
We haven't had this information for several years, now.
The local business that used to generate a report on this
isn't in operation anymore.
So what happens right now?
What impact is that veto going to have?
-Sure. Well, big-picture, we need to do more
to prevent the economic displacement
of existing residents from Seattle
and the most direct form of displacement we've seen is
when a real estate developer
may buy an older apartment building
and they'll actually tear it down
to make way for a larger building.
And where do those tenants go?
And, in contrast, the economic spin we see
from some construction lobbyists,
and even some urban planners --
building new housing doesn't, by itself, prevent displacement.
We need to preserve the naturally occurring,
affordable housing that we have and we need the data
to know where that is throughout the city.
And you're right, we haven't had it for years.
I really appreciate a majority of the City Council
approving our reasonable plan to collect that data
on all affordable housing in the city
and appreciate Councilmember Lewis' support
on that, so that we know where the unsubsidized,
affordable housing is, so we can do a better job,
when we work on our comprehensive plan.
We do that only eight years
and so it's not clear to me how city departments
are going to be able to comply with state law
and our own state government policies
to prevent displacement, if we don't have the data.
-Yeah. Yeah. Councilmember Lewis,
I know you were supportive of this.
Your thoughts about what might happen next?
Got about a minute and change here,
so, please, if you wouldn't mind.
-Look, I just appreciate
Councilmember Pedersen leading on this issue
and I do think it's unfortunate, the way this turned out.
I think that, especially given that we have
a history of collecting this information
and that we do have a lot of big decision points
coming up in the future where that information will be useful,
I do look forward to working on some alternative ways
to get approximately the same information,
but I think Councilmember Pedersen
brought forward a viable proposal to do that
and, you know, was proud to stand with him
through the veto override and everything else.
And, you know, just back to the drawing board
to find out how we can get that information,
but, you know, them's the breaks.
-Yeah. Yeah. Some interesting news there, certainly,
and we'll see what happens with the rest of this issue
as it continues here for the Seattle City Council.
That's all the time we have for now.
I'm Brian Callanan. Thanks for joining us here.
We'll see you next time on "Council Edition."
♪♪