-Hello, I'm your host, Brian Callanan.
How comfortable is the Seattle City Council
using the Jumpstart payroll tax
to plug up a major hole in the city's budget?
Plus, how will the failed plan to build a homeless shelter
in the Chinatown-ID neighborhood affect our homelessness crisis?
And what impact will a new city fund
to clean up vandalism have on local businesses?
Council members Andrew Lewis and Sara Nelson
answer these questions and the ones you're sending
in, too, next on "Council Edition."
-This is an example of us
listening to what is really needed
from our small business community,
not often brought to the table.
-When we make a choice to forego shelter options,
we're basically saying we want tents to stay in the street.
-All that and more coming up next on "City
Inside Out Council Edition."
And here they are.
Councilmember Andrew Lewis from district
seven which, as of mid-October,
reaches from Pioneer Square up to Magnolia.
Just so we got that on the districting deal here.
Thank you very much for being here.
-Yeah. Good to be here.
-And in person once again.
And of course, we are also with Councilmember Sara Nelson
in the city-wide position there.
Thank you for being here as well.
-Thank you for having me.
-All right. Let's dive right into it.
I really appreciate both of you being here during what is,
I know, a very busy time with the budget.
I want to dig into this big question
of figuring out this $141 million budget gap here.
So, quick backstory here, folks.
The mayor is proposing some Jumpstart payroll tax money
to help with that deficit now and going into the future.
But the council passed an ordinance last year saying,
okay, if general funds fall below about $1.5 billion,
then we can use Jumpstart to fill the gap.
But this is going to be a short-term fix.
So, now as I understand it, the mayor is saying well,
Council, how about you amend that ordinance?
Tie this to inflation.
Let's use Jumpstart as potentially a permanent way
to fill a structural budget gap.
Councilmember Lewis, let me know what I missed there.
And if you would, your thoughts on what to do about Jumpstart,
which the Council established as primarily a fund for housing?
-Yeah. Well, where I start with that
is going back in time to 2020 when the Council put together
the unanimously passed Jumpstart spend plan.
There was a little bit of division over the tax itself.
But the spend plan was unanimous.
Because if you, you know, if we go back to that time,
we were dealing with a lot of
the same pressures around homelessness,
which still rates very highly as the top concern of voters.
Housing affordability, housing insecurity,
these are the things we created Jumpstart
to make a big, proactive additive difference on.
And I think we need to stay true to that promise
that we made to the coalition that helped pass that
and keep making those investments.
I mean, we're making a game-changing investment
in housing, you know, almost a quarter billion dollars
in this next biannual budget,
which is going to make a huge difference
that's going to be felt.
We need to make sure we can sustain that into the future.
So, for the short-term,
to make sure that the gaps in this biennium are filled in,
we certainly need to work with Mayor Harrell
on the plan he's put forward for the biennium
to make sure that we're using some of that Jumpstart money
to plug that gap.
In terms of going forward, I think that we should wait
and see the recovery of the general fund plan
before we make that commitment of do we revisit the spend plan?
I think it all has to be on the table.
I don't think it's a decision we need to make this year.
And I think that we should dig in,
make the commitment we need to, to close this gap.
And then, if the issue arises again in the future,
everything needs to be on the table to meet that obligation.
-And I know Councilmember Mosqueda,
the budget chair, is working on some new options, too,
potentially for taxing
which we'll talk about I know later on.
But Councilmember Nelson, your thoughts about Jumpstart?
How to deal with this budget gap
that is growing right now in Seattle.
-Well, we have to pay our bills, first of all.
So, the mayor's proposed budget does that.
And going forward,
I'm looking at long-term sustainability of our budget.
And so much has changed between 2019
when the inflation adjustments for contracts was established.
Then the world changed in 2020.
-Right. -We have a lot more expenses.
I believe that the Human Services budget itself went up,
is about 36% more now from 2019. So, we're wrestling with a lot.
And I think that we have to do both.
Be concerned about how we're spending existing money
and also how we're making decisions
about what is sustainable going forward.
-Got it. So, would it be accurate to say
you wouldn't like to see jumpstarted
be a permanent answer there for these budget gaps?
I know I heard that a little bit for Councilmember Lewis.
Your thoughts on that?
-We need to look at the budget as a whole.
And so, if we're going to be having this conversation
in another two years, that is a fundamental problem.
-Okay. Okay. All right.
Now, thank you for breaking these pieces down.
I want to talk about budget priorities
because we're just about a week away
from the budget deliberations stage of the budget.
And, by the way, I have pinned the Council's new
demystifying the budget page
at the top of my Twitter at @callananseattle.
Check it out. Great way to track the action there.
But this is the time council members are really coming up
with amendments to the budget projects you'd like to fund.
Councilmember Nelson, you chair
the Economic Development Committee.
Is it more help for local businesses
or what are you considering?
Give us a preview if you would, please.
-I am very, I am impressed with how much OED
has been able to do this year with --
-Office of Economic Development.
-Yes. -Keep going. Yep.
-With getting funding directly into the hands
of small business owners that need it,
particularly in in BIPOC neighborhoods.
And so, I want to make sure that that funding stays intact.
And I have a priority that doesn't necessarily
have to do with economic development.
-Okay.
-But it has to do with root causes.
And that is making addiction treatment
more readily available. Because we are, because so much
of the challenges that we face in Seattle
right now, I believe, are due to the fact that we are,
it's too difficult to get treatment
to actually recover from an addiction.
And that has downstream effects that impact
not just the city's bottom line
but, more fundamentally, human lives.
-Got it. Okay.
And I'm going to follow up on that issue in just a little bit.
Thank you for bringing it up. Councilmember Lewis,
you chair the city's Committee on Homelessness.
Is it more funding for the regional homelessness committee?
Or what are you going to be proposing here
in the next couple of weeks?
-Well, the question that's been posed to us
in issue identification last week
is how can we reconcile some of the things
that the city wants to do with some of the ambitions
of the King County Regional Homeless Authority.
And I'll just break it down a little bit.
-Yeah. -So, we've got a Partnership
for Zero agreement between We Are In,
a consortium of business and philanthropic partners
with the county and with the city.
Where we are working to get to functional zero
in chronic homelessness in the downtown core
by early next year.
That includes a lot of outreach components
like the system navigators.
People have lived experience who work
for the King County Regional homelessness authority,
moving people through a by-name list
that are in downtown into housing, into shelter.
Getting them the wraparound services
and the assistance that they need.
We need to make sure that we reconcile
that work with the Unified Care Team,
which is an idea that's been advanced by Mayor Harrell.
And I, you know, I think it's a good idea.
Like, I appreciate the work that's been done
on the Unified Care Team
to take care of a lot of the issues
that were associated with the old Navigation Team
and, kind of, come forward
with a reconfigured way to do outreach
and to do encampment remediations in the city.
But we need to make sure there's not a duplicative resource.
We need to make sure that
the King County Regional Homeless Authority
and the Human Services Department
where the Unified Care Team is going to be housed,
that we are really reconciling clear roles
for both of those functions.
And then, we are funding accordingly.
The bottom line is we have to work backwards
from what we're seeing on the street
and what we're hearing from our constituents in the city,
both housed and unhoused,
about the need to address the homelessness crisis.
Which involves getting people off the street,
getting them into housing, getting them into shelter.
And organize our resources accordingly to meet that goal.
So, there's a lot of stuff in play early in the budget.
And I'm hoping that we can put it all together
for the comprehensive plan that Mayor Harrell and the KCRHA
and the Council want to create.
-Thank you.
And let me throw another budget issue out there.
And Councilmember Lewis, I'll start with you here.
I want you to speak to the plan the council and mayor
are working on regarding an alternate,
an alternative to 9-1-1.
So, an agency that can respond to less acute emergency calls
like welfare checks, for example.
The mayor and council now have a term sheet,
an agreement that says we're going to have
a plan for this by the end of the year.
We're going to launch something in 2023.
-Is this something you're working into the budget?
Can you take us into that process, please?
-Yes. There's a $2 million line item
in the budget Mayor Harrell
proposed to support this work on an ongoing basis.
That's probably a sufficient amount of money.
When we look at some of these other cities,
these alternative responses
don't tend to cost very much money.
So, you can have a pretty significant impact.
I think the original pilot for the Denver STAR program
was only like half a million dollars.
So, $2 million is enough at least to have a pilot
to test the viability of an alternative response like this.
Lots of other cities are doing it.
We're going to be a late adapter,
but better late than never.
I give a lot of credit to Mayor Harrell and his team
for helping us formulate a way
to efficiently get through the work with the term sheet.
-Yeah. -And that is paying dividends.
I mean, it's leading to some actual material progress.
The council central staff and the mayor's team
are meeting all of their deadlines
that we've assigned as part of that process.
And we're working through it in good faith.
-They got a budget to you recently, I think, on that.
-Yes. -Did that come through?
-Yes. -Okay.
-Yeah. And there was some money
in the mayor's initial proposal last month,
parked to fund
whatever ultimately came from this process.
So, they're clearly acting in strong partnership with us.
-Okay.
-And I think that's going to be
one of the really game-changing components
that comes out of this budget. Because by 2023's budget,
when we drew up the biennial budget --
-Yeah. --- we could be in position
to potentially expand something if the pilot is promising.
-Okay. Thank you for that. Councilmember Nelson,
I heard you talk about addiction treatment, either earlier.
I know you've talked in the past
about creating community safety hubs
to help deal with behavioral health
and things of this nature. Do you have any thoughts about
what a new third public safety agency could look like?
-Well, it's interesting because we cannot.
The budget is presented to us as buckets of
in categories, line items. -Right,
-And to me, when we're talking about the care team
and addiction treatment
and an alternative police response,
we're talking about how do we help people in crisis.
And so, I believe that the care team
will provide a binding list geographically distributed.
You know, there will be teams all over the city.
This is more coordination, it's more boots on the ground.
That can help.
And obviously, making sure that when somebody is ready
to try to get off drugs,
they have those options readily available.
And this will also help with our public safety needs
because it's all connected.
So, when, it's difficult for me
to think of these things, separately.
But I do see some areas where there are overlapping needs.
And I hope that my colleagues look at the big picture
when we're making our decisions.
-Right. It sounds like overlapping needs,
but also trying to make sure they go in the right buckets,
as you were saying earlier.
-Well, look. Having a tight budget cycle
means we need to have a really keen eye for spotting redundancy
and doing consolidation where appropriate.
-Yeah.
-And making sure there's not overlap of authority.
I mean, when I talk to first responders,
you know, be they, you know, CoLEAD or REACH or,
you know, the fire department, the police department --
-Sure. --- whoever I'm talking to,
crossed lines and redundancy
can also lead to inaction in some cases.
-Yeah.
-It's not clear who's supposed to go to something.
-Okay.
-You know, who is bailiwick is it in?
-Yeah. Right.
-So, just making sure that as we're funding these services,
they're all being reconciled into a strategic plan
that really only the executive can harmonize.
-Yeah.
-And seeing how we can use our power
as the Council to structure,
you know, oversight requirements,
reporting requirements, performance auditing,
to make sure there's accountability.
To make sure we see
that result on the investment that we're making.
-Okay.
-To make sure that these things are working together.
-Thank you for that.
-May I? -Please. Yeah.
-You know, I am so glad
that you brought up accountability.
And you, because what's on the line is public trust.
They want to see progress on our major issues.
So, when we're talking about avoiding redundancies
or better coordination,
we have to make sure that that the, our human service contracts
are meeting performance expectations.
-Yeah. No, that's a huge part of this.
And I want to move on to some viewer questions
because we got in a few about the budget.
And thank you for your feedback,
everybody who has been diving in on this.
Councilmember Lewis, you're up first.
Here's a note from Carl, who writes this,
"Funding for digital equity is down 30%
this year compared to last year.
What are we doing to ensure we're appropriately
funding digital equity initiatives in Seattle?"
Carl, thank you for the email there.
Some thoughts on this Councilmember Lewis.
-Yeah. I mean, I think that we should build on the work
that we're doing with the Seattle Public Library
and the library system to make sure
that more of our collections
and our archives are translated to the digital realm.
So, people don't have to go all the way downtown
to the central library.
They don't have to go, you know, search through microfilms
and, you know, little like,
no carded, you know, cabinets and everything.
-Sure.
-There's just an online database
where they can find digitized records,
scanned, digitized records.
-Yeah. We called that the card catalog when I was a young man.
-Exactly. -Yeah. You were saying.
-Yeah. No, I was trying to remember, you know.
-No, no, no. Old guy over here. Yeah.
-Yeah. Yeah.
So, you know, the library has been a big leader
in doing a lot of that work.
Some of that was funded in our last library levy renewal.
So, continuing to work with the library,
which sits under my committee, to put more of their resources
into the digital realm, make it searchable,
make it accessible internationally online
is something we should be working on.
-Okay. I Got a fun question
Councilmember Nelson about, from Eric about housing.
So, here we go. Seattle hasn't funded
housing choice vouchers
since February 2017. "The system you are funding
instead gives money to developers
to set aside units as affordable,
then creates a bureaucratic nightmare,"
Eric writes, "for getting one of those units.
Wouldn't it be better for everyone
if you just helped people afford market-rate housing?"
So, folks, just a background on this.
This is the program the Seattle Housing Authority
used to administer with the lottery,
formerly known as a Section 8.
There hasn't been a new lottery in five years.
Councilmember Nelson, any thoughts on this idea
of housing choice vouchers
brought up by one of our viewers?
-Well, I'm not well-versed on in that program.
-Okay.
-But I can say that we need to preserve our existing,
naturally affordable stock of housing,
make sure that those units do not go off the market,
and be replaced with market-rate units
that are brand new and even less affordable.
-Yeah. -So, that's one thing.
And make sure that when we are, again,
I'm going to hit on direct funding.
Why can't we just, how about making sure
that we are providing rent assistance still?
-Yeah.
-And perhaps also thinking about, what am I trying to say?
Making sure that we are preventing homelessness by,
there have been suggestions
about permanent rental assistance.
-Yeah.
-So, it's all about making sure
that there are different levels of housing that are available.
And we can't just look at deeply subsidized.
We also have to think about workforce
and keeping people in the homes that they have.
-That's fair. Thank you for that.
I want to move on to another issue
regarding the expansion of a homeless shelter
that King County had planned for the Chinatown-ID neighborhood.
So, King County recently scrapped
that plan after public comments like this one
at the Seattle City Council's full council meeting
about a month ago.
-[Speaking native language]
I'm horrified to learn that the government
is going to put together a problematic shelter,
campsite very close to Chinatown.
-Councilmember Lewis, you had a recent social media post
expressing some frustration at this reversal,
of course, from King County. I'm trying to figure out
how you do this balancing the concerns from the CID
with the need to respond in a tangible way
to our homelessness crisis.
-Right. I think my concern, Brian,
was more frustration that knowing this shelter
is not going to be completed. I don't have great confidence
that we're going to be able to quickly turn around,
find an alternative site,
and site that shelter just given the planning.
There's been almost a year of conversations
about this site, about this project.
And you know, look, if we could just turn on a dime
like I think that people expect
and that they're right to expect --
-Yeah.
--- and find an alternative site
or multiple alternative sites, that'd be one thing.
But look, we got to be really clear about this.
When we make a choice to forego shelter options,
we're basically saying we want tents to stay in the street.
And I'm all for individual neighborhoods
having concerns about the siting of some of these.
And we have a burden as public officials
to have a public process to make guarantees
that they'll be well-run. Make guarantees that issues
won't spill out into the neighborhood.
You know, I've done that in my district
with the South Lake Union Tiny House Village,
one of the first projects that I spearheaded
to get doubled in my district. The Interbay Tiny House Village
doubled that in my district with strong community support
because we did that outreach.
People are willing to take the trade
of more tiny house villages,
more shelter if it means fewer tents.
And we just need to look, you know,
put that, look at that right in the eye.
Because look, the reality of this
is there's going to be more tents on the street
for a longer period of time
for the reversal of this shelter not getting built.
And we just need to, the bottom line is this.
Ballard Commons Park, there's no tents there
because we doubled the Interbay Tiny House Village.
Woodland Park Zoo, or not the zoo but --
-The park area.
--- the Woodland Park, the park area.
There's no tents there anymore
because we built Friendship Heights up in North Seattle.
There's a clear nexus to when we build these things.
Major encampments are able to get removed
because the people in them are able to go
to places they want to go to. -Yeah.
-So, I'm just going to say this.
Look. There's still going to be this massive encampment
in the Chinatown-ID now that would have been able to be
replaced by one of those pallet shelters.
We got to come together and figure out a way
to remediate that encampment location.
And that means we have to build something in a different place.
And we need to come together,
use the emergency powers of the state of emergency.
Do this like it's an emergency.
You know, people do not want to live in these encampments.
And they don't want to live near them.
-No.
-And the answer to this is more housing.
It's also more enhanced shelter like the type
that was going to be built in this proposal.
-Yeah. Councilmember Nelson, a bit of a balancing act here,
as I see it. Your thoughts on what happened
with the county's plan for a shelter in the CID?
-Well, again, not having the historical knowledge.
People do. The concern from the community
that was expressed was we were not consulted.
To me, what is important going forward
is that we are using the assets that we also already have.
And it is.
I am looking at our, all our hotels, really.
There was an article in the "Times"
saying that there are empty spaces that we're not using.
And so, for me, we have to look
at how well our whole response is working.
It comes back to coordination and ensuring that we are,
that, again, root causes. -Yeah.
-Why are we talking about moving people around
instead of helping them with their court issues?
-Yeah. And let me stick with you, Councilmember Nelson.
I'll pick up the pace ever so slightly here.
But I wanted to talk about something.
The storefront repair fund program
where business owners can get up to $2,000
in grant money to repair damage to their storefronts,
dating back to January 2021. This program just opened, folks.
And if you do run a small business,
search for Seattle Storefront Repair Fund.
You'll find a link to the Office of Economic Development.
You can check that out. But Councilmember Nelson,
what impact do you hope a program like this
is going to have?
-Well, I can tell you that it will have a very real impact
for the business owner that gets that check.
-Yeah.
-I suspect that the need is far greater
than the resources to pay. But this is an example of us
listening to what is really needed
from our small business community
not often brought to the table.
And this proposal came out of that conversation
with small businesses.
And it was one of the many recommendations
they put forward for immediate help.
So, what I hope is that business owners
will be able to basically take that money,
and perhaps they. Can I just restart again?
-Please. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-Two thousand dollars is not a lot of money
when you're talking about a broken glass door.
Let's face it. All right.
So, this is a small amount of money,
but it is a meaningful signal to the business community
that we're trying to help. -Yeah.
-And it's an unusual step for the city to take because,
normally, that is something that the business
improvement areas do on their own.
-Right.
-And so, I think that we're showing
that we're trying to help.
And, ideally, I would like to see more money
to help more businesses pay for bigger bills.
-Yeah. And Councilmember Lewis,
I know you've worked on this issue before downtown.
Touch off what Councilmember Nelson is saying here, maybe.
-No, it's a great initiative.
We're working on a similar program that would have a nexus
if it's part of a criminal case, a victim compensation fund
that was funded in last year's budget.
But it's still going through
the, it's a smaller amount of money.
-Yeah. -And it would involve a nexus
of the matters in court to make sure that --
-Okay.
--- victims are compensated.
In a lot of cases, you have defendants
that are completely judgment-proof.
It goes to collections -- -Yeah.
--- and the business owner never gets their money.
So, you know, it would be a fund
that would operate independent of the judicial process,
that person would still be held,
could be held criminally accountable and everything else.
-Okay.
-But it would make sure a process kicks in so that
that business owner can be compensated for that damage
if, ultimately, it gets to the end of the line
and there's no money for that person,
which is an incredibly frustrating experience.
So, no. I think the initiative
that Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Nelson
have put forward is great where, you know,
because look, we don't always know who's responsible
for breaking the window. And having a more flexible,
robust fund is critical to make sure that this gets done
and these windows get fixed. -Right. Please.
-And we don't know who broke the window
because, oftentimes, the security cameras
go out at the same time. -Sure.
-But what's important to note is that most business owners,
the vast majority, do not file.
They don't file an insurance claim.
So, oftentimes, the police are not called to take the statement
because they don't want their insurance rates to go up.
And so, this program removes by,
it just basically says, show us your receipts.
-Yeah. Right.
-And that is, that's welcome.
-That's how it's going to work.
I want to jump back to you, Councilmember Lewis,
and talk about your work heading up
the Seattle Park District Board,
the board made up of all nine council members.
You just approved a plan to roughly double
the tax levy rate from the park district.
The average homeowner pays about $155 right now per year.
That will go up to about 342 next year,
450 the year after that.
I know there's a lot of talk about that rising cost
and want to be real about that.
But there's also a very real demand for services, too.
Can you give us an overview of how this settled out?
-Yeah. Well, going into this,
it was really clear from talking to people
out in the neighborhoods.
Talking to, you know, organizations that advocate
for open space like business improvement areas,
Parks Foundation,
that people really wanted a funded mandate for our parks.
People are not satisfied with the state of our parks
coming out of the hangover from the COVID
era where our parks were the,
you know, the previous mayor had made a decision to use them
basically as encampment locations for a while.
There had been significant damage
from a lot of the demonstrations and protests.
People wanted to restore the parks
and open spaces in our Olmsted Legacy Parks.
-Yeah.
-So, we set on a mission to build a plan
that would make those investments
but hold the department accountable,
to have a funded mandate to hold it accountable.
So, people can expect that when they go to their parks,
bathrooms are going to be clean, safe, and open.
When they go to their parks,
there's going to be a park ranger
who's going to be there to be a resource
for the people who are using the park.
-Yeah.
-That when we have sustained smoke events,
like what we're experiencing this week.
That our community centers can be places that will be HVACed,
that'll be places of refuge to get out of those elements.
So, you know, now comes the difficult part
because this is all just on paper until it's realized.
I'm really impressed with AP Diaz,
Mayor Harrell's nominee to lead the Parks Department.
-Right.
-He's very excited about the prospect of really living up
to the expectations we've put forward as a council in the MPD.
So, you know, the hard work really begins next year
in implementing this and being vigilant
as a council in our oversight.
You know, we've put in performance auditing mandates.
We've put in a lot of reporting mandates.
So, I fully expect that we're going to see
a lot of energy from Parks to live up to this.
Because they know, you know, if they meet this mandate,
it means sustained support for the activities of our parks.
And the people of Seattle want to see that.
We're proud of our parks.
-Absolutely. Councilmember Nelson,
I need to switch gears. I wanted to draw some attention
to the work you've done on cannabis equity.
So, the Council passed this into law last month.
You made sure that the needs assessment process
for this would be handled
by an independent academic institution.
I just, I know you had some reservations
about this bill initially,
but you worked through it with other council members here.
And I wanted to ask about
what you hope comes out of this drive for cannabis equity.
-I hope that it's really about equity.
We have got to make sure that the goals that were set forth
are continuing to be worked for. And there are a lot of people
that have been left out of the cannabis industry.
-Yeah.
-When regarding the academic institution --
-Yeah.
--- this needs assessment will be the foundation
for future policy changes in the cannabis industry,
which is a new and vulnerable industry.
-Yeah.
-And so, it's absolutely crucial
that the convening agency,
that the body that is doing this analysis
and bringing the parties together is neutral.
-Yeah.
-So, that is what I was trying to accomplish in that amendment.
-Got it. We are just about out of time,
but maybe I'll throw this one at you, Councilmember Lewis.
Any chance there's any funding in the budget
to help the Mariners land
another power-hitting outfielder?
That J-Rod deal was only like 210 mil.
So, and any chance at all there? None?
-No. It's likely we're going to have money
to make sure we have a really great All-Star game.
-That, there you go. Okay.
-And make sure that that's well-programmed in the community
and that we have a lot of stuff
going on all over the city to celebrate,
being able to host an event like that.
-Yeah.
-But no, I, you know, I got to say, though, you know,
despite that disappointing end the other day,
Mariners acquitted themselves well this season.
So, I look forward to next season.
And we can just build on this.
-I like it. I like it.
Okay. Thank you for bringing that up.
Thank you all for being here, Councilmember Nelson.
We will see you next time on "Council Edition."