Speaker 3: Agenda Item ten Council Bill 119825.
Speaker 0: Relating to the city's response to a 2020 COVID 19 crisis. Audience 126000 which adopted.
Speaker 3: The 2020 budget. The committee recommends the bill passes, amended with council members must.
Speaker 0: Gather Herbold, Gonzalez, Lewis, Morales, Pierce and Strauss in favor with council members to launch opposed. Thank you, Madam Clerk. I will go ahead and recognize Councilmember Mosqueda as the chair of the of the Committee to address agenda item number ten. Thank you very much. Madam President, the bill in front of us is multi-dimensional in that we take attempts in many places to try to provide investments and community priorities, such as making sure that those who are living unsheltered have the housing and support that they need, making sure that fewer people fall into homelessness, and that there is truly support for working families in our most vulnerable in the city. And also that we that we take a significant step forward to trying to address the call from community to divest in our policing system and to reinvest in the community. I'll just say a few comments here and then I'll save some calls for the closing portion. I want to thank folks for all of their tremendous work, especially our central staff and our teams on each of our offices. There's been it's been a very long budget session and it's only august. I want to thank the folks in i.t. And clerks for your work to helping make sure that we can get through each of these meetings and that we had robust public comment from communications and our i.t. Folks. I want to thank our council colleagues for their staff and their tremendous hours. It's important to note that many of you, like the organizers in the streets, have been pulled from your families, have had to spend long hours, day and night working as we try to deliberately address the call for action in this civil rights uprising . What we can't do everything in this summer rebalancing package. We have set the path forward for tremendous work in front of us as a council and as a city. And I think that all of that work should be really called out and appreciated because a lot of this work is happening around the clock. And that's true, again, for the folks in the street and the folks who have been working around the clock to provide the budget documents in front of us today. We started the city budget inquests in the first week of June and have had have had two sessions a week. At the minimum. Sometimes we've had more than one meeting with two sessions each week. We've had hearings. We've heard from central staff. We've heard from the Seattle Police Department. We've heard from elected leaders in other cities and national research entities. And importantly, we've heard from community coalitions who've been calling for change and who have been doing the research in this area for years. This inquest process has been helpful in us finally acknowledging and recognizing that there is massive changes that are needed, structural changes and continued investment in community for us to realize the changes that are being called for from community, this process and our deep analysis focus on a racial justice lens. Centering our work by lifting up and including the voice of folks who have been most affected is how we aim to make policy decisions. We aim to center politics policy decisions based on those who have the lived experience. And that is exactly what we've done in this speedy budget inquest over the last few months. And honestly, over the last two years, we have been aware that there have been many people who've been calling for structural change. And today, council colleagues, we are beginning to put ourselves on the path to righting the historic wrongs. Structural change. Institutional change is really the only option as we look at individuals who've been killed year after year, month after month, unarmed individuals in our community, black and brown community members who've been killed at the hands of the current status quo policing system. And we can make changes. We can make changes to make sure that folks who are showing up are those who are adequately trained, who are from our community, who have trusted partnerships and who are not showing up with arms. That is the conversation we set ourselves on the chart that are the path that we are charting for this conversation. That is coming up. And we're taking important, critical first steps today. I'll save my the rest of my comments for closing comments. But I just wanted to say how important it is that we have centered the policy changes and the budget decisions that are included in this bill, not just on speedy, but also as it relates to caring for our most vulnerable, vulnerable community partners based on what community has told us that they want. And that's a critical change as we think about inclusive budgeting and policy making. So thank you to everybody who has made this process possible, and I'll save some comments for later. Madam President. Thank you, Councilmember Mesquita, for those introductory remarks. I'm going to go ahead and call on council members who are interested in speaking on me on this bill before we pass it. I see that Councilmember Herbold has our hand up, and as others become inspired to also speak on this Council Bill, I'd ask that you raise your hand accordingly, and I will shut you down in the order that you raise your hand. Councilmember Herbold, please. You're on mute. And whoever's playing bingo probably just got a square because I reminded somebody that they were on mute.
Speaker 3: So before I moved to the speed related budget amendment, I do want to just flag my appreciation for some other important elements in this next bill. The pilot project funding the Stay Connected program for seniors is included in here. The proviso to remove the police department as the gatekeeper for co-lead referrals is included in here. The funding for the. Race Inequity Toolkit on expansion of choose 180 to begin to serve defendants over the age of 24. The pre filing diversion program is included in here and I'm I'm sorry that this is somebody else's somebody else led on this but I feel like it was maybe councilmember awards and I don't want to miss it. The restoration of funds for the AIDS Memorial Pathway is included in here as well. This package also, of course, includes much of the work that this council has been doing since June in the the Seattle Police Department budget inquest led by Councilmember Mosqueda, the package of amendments that we worked together on and came to a unanimous council decision on includes 38 full time employment reductions starting in November, with suggestions from specific units, including mounted patrol, school resource officers, the Navigation Team, Harbor Patrol, Public Affairs and a SWAT team. It includes us capturing the savings from an additional 30 FTE, from expected attrition through the officers voluntarily leaving or retiring from the police department. And it also includes an additional 32 FTE suggested general reduction in sworn officers. It's really important to understand that ultimately Chief Best holds the authority to make decisions about how and where these reductions may occur. The Council may determine the overall appropriate size of the police force and suggest specific specialty units where layoffs may be made. It's the chief of police who will make the determination as to where layoffs occur. In addition, all of the reductions take a very specific format in order to set the city up for the most positive labor bargaining outcomes. Instead of making cuts of positions, the amendments put a proviso on two months worth of salary for each position that is targeted for reduction. We have received expert advice that it may take between 2 to 4 months for each reduction to be bargained. If it takes longer than that officers so that officers can continue to be paid as the bargaining finishes up. But the proviso format means that the city will have those dollars on hand just in case they are needed. The actions, if approved, approved by the council in bargaining as described below, will result in a reduction of Spd's police force by about 100 officers. From the current level of about 1400 officers, that's about a 7% reduction in the sworn force and also a result in savings of about $2.9 million. The package also includes modest cuts to the Seattle Police Department's travel, training and recruitment budgets, which seemed appropriate given the current travel restrictions in the mayor's hiring freeze. Those cuts totaled less than $1 million. Finally, the budget actions, which we'll talk about later in the in the resolution, commits to a number of transfers of functions out of the police department. The other point I think is really important to make, as we are about to take this vote, is that, you know. I think that we as a as a council and the mayor's office are in a really unique position to seize upon a moment in this city and in this country. And I am hopeful that we are more aligned in our desire to do that. That has appeared in the last few weeks. The mayor has been saying that we should be realistic and that we've been irresponsible for committing to a goal before we have the details. And I really believe that big change like this, shaking things up, accomplished by limiting to action to what seems realistic is never has never been realized. We always have to think beyond what is normally considered realistic and possible. We have a we've we've through agreeing to try to work towards a 50% reduction. I hope with the kind of partnership with community that has brought us to this place where we're at now and has created a pathway and a plan for reductions in 2021. I think there was over the weekend there was an editorial that we took a swing and we missed. And I think. I think it's really important to look at what we've accomplished for the left for the next four and a half months of the budget, and understand that that's our starting point for deliberations for a whole year's worth of budget. So it's really important to annualize the value of these four months of cost. And I think when you do that and you take a paper and pencil up to do that math, our actions now are significant and noteworthy and also express a commitment to not. Disregard public safety, but to recognize that public safety means public safety for everyone in our community. And public safety must be we must recognize that by asking police officers to do too much. There are two things that go wrong. One, you send an armed response in some cases to a situation that doesn't require an armed response, which is an unsafe situation. And two, you're reducing the capacity for officers to respond to core law enforcement efforts. And so I'm really encouraged by the work that we've done, and I'm really hopeful for our efforts in implementing the council's interests, in working together with the Mayor's Office and the Chief to try to realize this this this pathway for reimagine public safety for our city. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Herbold. Appreciate hearing from you as our public safety chair on this issue. Colleagues, I apologize to Councilmember Morales and to all of you. I didn't realize that I had an updated script in my inbox reflecting two additional amendments that are being brought forward by Councilmember Morales, and so had inadvertently opened it up for general debate before we considered those amendments. And so I want to apologize and apologize for that oversight. Councilmember Morales did not mean to bypass your amendment. So again, I understand that Councilmember Morales has two proposed amendments to this bill that we are currently discussing that were distributed after 12 noon. And in order for the Council to be able to consider these amendments, the Council rules will need to be suspended. So if there is no objection, the council rule relating to circulation of amendments by 12 noon will be suspended to allow consideration of two amendments. Hearing no objection. The Council role is suspended and the Council will proceed with consideration of these two amendments. Councilmember Morales You are recognized in order to move version two of Amendment 59.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Council President. And no need to apologize. There was a lot happening this morning, so I want to thank you for letting me bring these. And thank you for all of your indulgence. As I mentioned this morning. We did have a couple of provisions ready to go last week. We learned over the weekend that we had to change them around a little. So we were just waiting to hear back from law. So you have received the new versions in your inbox? Amendments 59 and 60. As Councilmember Peterson said, there has been a lot of work happening over several weeks now. And this reflects the intent of amendments 33 and 34 that we passed last week. And those amendments were committing us to investing in organizations that are the intent of them, was to commit us to invest in organizations that are led by people of color, for communities of color, for organizations that work to improve community safety through restorative justice, mental health and wellness, youth mentoring programs. These are the kinds of organizations we want to invest in so that as we build up community safety infrastructure, we can do that while we are trying to dismantle our overreliance on policing. So the provisos that we have today are intended to hold each city to that standard in a way that hews as closely as possible to the preference for bipoc organizations. And as I said earlier, the issue is that because of our 200, we cannot directly express intent to contract with Bipoc communities. But that doesn't mean that we can't exercise our express express our intent to our departments, that our contracting process should be more inclusive in its criteria and selection process. So this Amendment 15, Amendment 59 amends the $4 million investment and clarifies that receiving organizations should have culturally relevant experience with holistic community safety efforts. And the amendment requests that the chair of the Community Economic Development Committee, who oversees civil rights, receive a report identifying the selected organizations.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much, Councilmember Morales. Are there any questions or comments on a proposed amendment 59? Okay. Hearing. I'm going to go ahead and. Actually, I think I'm not sure we've had a formal motion. And second. Yeah, so can you go ahead and move it and then we'll see if there's a second.
Speaker 4: Yes, I move Amendment 59 again.
Speaker 0: Okay. It's been moved and seconded to adopt version two of Amendment 59. Councilmember Morales has already addressed the proposed amendment. Are there any other comments on the amendment? Hearing none. I will ask that the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of version to of Amendment 59.
Speaker 1: Peterson I.
Speaker 0: Want.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: Strauss Yes.
Speaker 3: Herbold Yes.
Speaker 1: Lewis Yes.
Speaker 3: Morales Yes.
Speaker 0: Mosquera Yes.
Speaker 3: President Gonzalez?
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 3: 18 favored and opposed.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Madam Clerk. The motion carries and the amendment is adopted. Councilmember Morales, you have a Second Amendment. So I am going to recognize you to move version two of Amendment 60.
Speaker 4: And move version two of Amendment 60.
Speaker 0: Excellent. Is there a second? Second? It's been moved and seconded to adopt version two of Amendment 60. Councilman Morales, the floor is yours to describe this proposed amendment.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Colleagues, I'll be brief. This amendment places a proviso on the $10 million investments that we made last week to require that HST submit a spending plan through the committee overseeing civil rights issues and that the plan be approved by ordinance.
Speaker 0: Thank you for that description, Councilman Morales. Any other comments on the proposed amendment? Hearing no additional comments on proposed Amendment 60, I will ask that the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of version two of Amendment 60.
Speaker 1: Peterson I.
Speaker 0: The one.
Speaker 5: Yes.
Speaker 1: Strouse Yes.
Speaker 3: Purple? Yes. Lewis.
Speaker 1: I mean. Yes. Yes.
Speaker 0: Morales.
Speaker 3: Yes. Mesquita Yes. President Gonzalez.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 3: Adrian Favor and unopposed.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Madam Clerk. The motion carries and the amendment is adopted. All right, so that concludes all of the amendments that I'm aware of. So I will now open it back up to general comments about the bill as amended. So, colleagues, any other comments on the Council bill as amended? This will be your last shot to talk about this bill. Okay. Councilmember Strauss and then Councilmember Swan and then Councilman Lewis and Paterson.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Council President. As we all know, there is much more work to be done regarding improving our public safety, to provide public safety that works for everyone in Seattle so that when you call 911, you get the right response right away. We already know that 56% of Spd's 911 calls are non-criminal calls. These are parking violations, noise complaints, mental health crisis and welfare checks. And for these types of calls, we don't need a police officer with a gun to respond. And we absolutely need the appropriate first responder to respond quickly with the resources they need to be successful to resolve the reason for the call. And this means greater responsiveness across the board. We currently already have programs in place that we can scale up to meet these needs, such as Health One Mobile Crisis Unit, Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, and our Community Service Officer Program. These are the same models that are already in place in Eugene, Oregon. And their program is called cahoots. The biggest difference between cahoots and our programs is that cahoots is hard. Why are these 911 responding to 20% of their nine calls? While Seattle's programs require an officer to respond to make a referral. If these programs were hardwired into 911, patrol officers would have more time to respond to and complete traditional police work. The results of this historic transition that we are in right now will enable us to deploy the proper professionals to respond quickly with the appropriate resources needed, whether it be crisis intervention, special victims assistance, medical care, social services, or with an armed response when necessary. Through this transition, you'll always be able to call 911 to receive a response. And at the end of this transition, if you have to call 911, you'll get the right response right away. Every day of this work, we have found additional ways that additional proven improvements that can be made to the Seattle Police Department's budget and how we deliver public safety. It is important for us to ensure that we are delivering the priorities of government in an efficient manner. And this 2020 rebalance is just the first step in that work. In this work. I look forward to receiving the real time speed. Reports about their spending every other week and the robust reporting ahead of the creating the 2021 budget in the next six weeks will have the opportunity to make additional improvements to make meaningful and lasting change. And again, throughout this transition, to always be able to call 911 and receive a response. And at the conclusion of this transition, if you have to call 911, you'll get the right response right away. And if your call merits the response of an armed officer, you'll receive that response. And for every other call, you'll receive the first the right first responder who will respond right away. There's much more to be said about this council bill. And I know that I wanted to focus my comments specifically on the Seattle Police Department's aspects, and I'll reserve comments for another time on the rest. Thank you, Council President.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Strauss. Next up is council member so on. And then after customers what will be Councilmember Lewis.
Speaker 2: Thank you. This is the vote today to adopt the city's new budget as a whole. It is euphemistically called balancing package, but that is only because the political establishment does not want to call it what it is an austerity package. There is nothing balanced about this budget. It completely fails to defund the police by 50%. Six of the eight other council members are promised to support, and it carries out a major austerity program on behalf of big business, cutting tens of millions from the essential work of the city across departments like parks, roads and libraries. It is mind boggling to me how council members can claim they are anti-austerity when they are voting yes on an austerity budget. Where is the balance? When Amazon reported profits in the second quarter of 2020 of over $5 billion. Double their profits from a year earlier. Since January 1st of this year, Jeff Bezos's net worth has skyrocketed by 72 billion. That's billion with a B to an astounding $188 billion to date. At the same time, tens of thousands of Seattleites have lost their jobs and incomes, cannot pay rent and are struggling to put food on the table. Where is the balance when the Seattle Police Department continues to be funded more of the city's discretionary funds than any other department. My office fully supports and voted yes on. And in fact, the People's Budget Campaign and Black Lives Matter activists and Socialist Alternative have fought or every progressive budget amendment won by our movement. We won the funding for the Green New Deal Oversight Board, the end of funding for the euphemistically named Navigation Team, which carries out the inhumane and ineffective sweeps of homeless governments. Of course, I would caution that there are other ways that Mayor Durkan could allow sweeps, and we need to continue organizing to completely end them. We want a small reduction in the police department. We want millions in funding for community programs, funding research into alternatives to repressive policing, youth programing and restorative justice. Our movement succeeded in reducing the salaries of most of the top executives in the police department who teargassed peaceful protesters and then lied about it, saying that the protests were riots. We want a proviso to end the hiring freeze in the Office of Labor Standards. We want a proviso to protect the North Lake, tiny house village from being swept this year. But as I said, on balance, this budget does not prioritize or meet the needs of ordinary people. It is not a moral document. Seattle Times conservative columnist Danny West need is as opposed to my socialist politics, as you might imagine. But he looked at the budget committee's action last week and came to the same conclusion that we did. Quote For all the heated rhetoric about Seattle defunding the police, both from activists demanding it and the police union decrying it. The key takeaway right now is this Seattle is not defunding the police. Not by half. Not by a quarter. It's not even clear whether this first phase of proposed cuts to the city's police force would reduce the current number of officers out on the street at all. That's the headline. The city isn't defunding the police, unquote. A month ago, the city council voted on the Amazon tax, a historic victory for working people and the oppressed, and an a victory for the Black Lives Matter movement. At that time, my office and the Jackson Amazon movement proposed an amendment to increase the Amazon tax by a $293 million per year to eliminate the need for austerity, which no other council member supported. Now the police. Now the political establishment insults the intelligence of working people and acting like there is no alternative to budget cuts, as if our memory cannot stretch back a few weeks. City Council Democrats had an alternative. They had a choice, and they decided to side with Jeff Bezos. Many activists in the movement will be outraged at council members for reversing their pledges to defund the police by 50%. And they should be. This vote. Is going to reduce the police budget by less than 2%. That's not a defunding. Less than $3 million out of $170 million remaining in the city's budget this year, instead of the 50% demanded by the movement and promised by six of the eight Democratic Council members. It represents a total abdication of responsibility and abdication of responsibility in the context of the historic movement for Black Lives. The brutal attacks on protesters, the Seattle police's long record of racist and violent policing, and yet eight years of failed attempts at police reform, our people's budget movement gave council members every opportunity to follow through on their promises. We proposed defunding the police by 50% now, but every other council member voted no, falsely claiming that the budget cuts could not be done until November. In response to that, on Wednesday, my office proposed defunding the police by 50% starting on November 1st, even though I don't accept that logic but still. Okay, let's have it by November 1st and no other council member would even second that proposal. We just received a powerful letter signed by 25 rank and file leaders of UAW 4121, the Union of Student Employees and Postdocs at UW, as they wrote, quote, We are deeply disappointed that many of the same council members have tried to delay the 50% defunding by claiming it would interfere with the Seattle Police Officers Guild contract as a public sector union. We recognize this tactic for what it is management grasping for justification to maintain the status quo. These issues are not new and we have too long seen both the city and the Police Officers Guild use collective bargaining as political cover to evade responsibility rather than as it should be as any of the strongest tools available to fight for progressive change. We know that defunding SBT is possible, possible now. And we reject any attempts to prop up collective bargaining as a politically convenient way to evade responsibility. This hollow excuse is an insult to the labor movement, as our union wields our position at the bargaining table to protect workers and people of color, not our oppressors. We urge other council members to vote for someone's proposed cuts to SBT in the 2020 budget, unquote. That was just an extract of their letter. If our movement does not win defunding the police this summer, that does not mean that we cannot win. It means that we need to learn the lessons of the struggle. Recognize that what we win is a function of the strength of our movement and the balance of social and political forces. We will continue to organize and fight for defunding and the militarization of the police. We should learn the lessons from the Amazon tax fight, where in 2018 we saw the repeal of the tax and betrayal by Democrats on the Council. We learned that we can win if we build a stronger movement and never give up. We learned that our movement needed to be democratically organized by the hundreds who attended. Each of the Amazon action conferences, made key decisions democratically after public debate, and that the leadership of the movement was not going to make alliances with the Democratic establishment, but instead relied on independently organizing ordinary people, including the thousands upon thousands who eagerly signed our petitions of the George Floyd protests. How would today's Budget Committee discussions be different if there was a credible ballot initiative to cut 100 million or $200 million or $300 million from the police budget? That's a question our movement should ask ourselves throughout history. Progressive change has come from mass movements, not from friendly politicians and the political establishment. The history of our recent struggles also shows once again, working people need our own party, not one beholden to big business. Socialist alternative. And I celebrate the victories. We are one, but stand against this austerity budget and failure to address the ongoing epidemic of racist and violent policing. With my no vote today, I perform our movement's unchanging demands. Defund police by at least 50%. That's big business and their reach and not austerity on working people. Because we can't pay and we won't pay for this crisis. This crisis of the racist and bankrupt system of capitalism. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you comes my response. Next up is Councilmember Lewis and then we will hear from Councilmember Peterson. Councilmember Lewis, please.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Madam President. I'll be brief. Given all the other comments that I have made throughout this morning and throughout our broader process, I really just want to say, you know, I didn't know when we were starting this out exactly what type of plan we would able to be able to create and to finally start taking shape and to lay the groundwork for much bigger. And coming up this fall in 2021, where we get to well, for the 2021 budget, where we're really going to be able to make final decisions on a lot of the things we're laying the groundwork for right now, given the limitations of the summer budget session. And I you know, I just really think it stands as a testament to the leadership of Councilmember Mosquito Councilmember Herbold and, you know, the president, in assembling a package that has united a lot of the factions on this council from the from the far left to the far center left. I think that we've really been able to reach a pretty good initial package that lays the groundwork for much bigger transformative change to come in short order. You know, I don't know if this counts as an obscure metaphor or an analogy, but I'll throw it out there and hopefully the judges in the in the competition will we'll let it ride. But, you know, if you if you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go together. And I think that's really what we've been able to put together here is a process not just of this budget, but of the accompanying resolution later to make these final reforms and transformative changes that Councilmember Strauss alluded to earlier, too, in terms of the different types of first response. You know, I remain a very big advocate of building a community based low acuity. First response modeled on the crisis assistance helping Out in the Streets program. Who is from Eugene, Oregon? Following the lead of other cities from Denver to Oakland to Portland who have been doing the same thing and engaging in the same process. You know, we are not alone as a progressive city working to finally. Right, right size our first response. And I know many others will join based on the examples. So I won't take up any more of our time here. And I look forward to voting for this package.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Lewis for those comments. Next up is Councilmember Peterson, followed by Councilmember.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Council President. So in the middle of a persistent pandemic and ballooning budget deficits and even the cracking of our West Seattle bridge stranding a hundred thousand of our residents. In the middle of these crises, your elected officials are striving to seize this historic moment in the wake of the brutal and wrongful killing of George Floyd and countless other black, indigenous and people of color, so that we address systemic racism by rethinking policing and revitalizing community health and safety. It's not an easy process. It's it's messy, it's difficult, it's uncomfortable, but it's necessary. Even as I speak now, I'm getting emails and phone calls from constituents who want us to do more now and other constituents who want us to slow down and think it through more. Of course, we were elected not only to synthesize these various viewpoints and address the concerns of our constituents, but also to craft thoughtful plans on how to do things better. We need to apply our own critical thinking and plan ahead rather than just reacting. I'm cautiously optimistic that the legislation today is a prudent mix of all these goals. It leverages the few tools in the tool belt of this city council to make a down payment toward a bigger, broader discussion, bigger, bolder changes as part of a long, more thoughtful, small budget process. I thank my colleagues for incorporating my amendment earlier today to answer some basic questions with the reasonable initial reductions approved today. What will the impact be on the ground in every neighborhood? How will the chiefs of police choose to redeploy our resources? And what will the impact be on response times? According to the most recent data? Only 71% of the time spent by police officers is for priority one and priority two cars. That means 29% of the time is spent on non-priority cars. There is an opportunity there for community led solutions. These reports will also make sure we do not recklessly jettison the good work done by our Harbor Patrol throughout Lake Union. The reports we're asking for as part of this legislative package can be combined with the planning efforts of our mayor and our police chief as they craft their budget proposals for next year. These reports and planning documents are an opportunity, a second chance for the city council to work authentically and proactively with our mayor and our chief of police to rethink and revamp public safety and healthy communities. With the reductions we are making for 2020, that will likely carry on to 2021. I believe adjustments can be made so that response times do not get worse. As I talked about earlier today, the remaining officers could respond to fewer types of criminal calls. Fewer types of non-criminal calls. Elsewhere. Ms.. Strauss detailed this thoroughly earlier. We also need to recognize that we cannot do it all through the budget. We need to discuss what has not been discussed enough, and that's the need to redo the police union contract. This complex contract needs to be redone to encourage the good police officers to stay in Seattle, to reduce excessive salaries and costs to fix their disciplinary system so that it no longer impedes justice. We need a good contract more than good slogans, even as the city council partially defunds our police department. We still have a police department, and we'll still have a police department as part of a broader public safety strategy that involves more community led solutions. Are the police reforms implemented since the federal consent decree enough? No. Reforms are not enough when there are systemic and institutional racism. But should we toss aside the progress made by the Community Police Commission, the Office Police Accountability, the Office of Inspector General? No. We need both reforms, real reforms and reinvestment. And as we invest tens of millions of dollars, we need more black led organizations at the table from the everyday marchers to the Urban League. They all deserve a seat at the table. We need to make sure those investments are smart and effective and that we measure results to show the general public whether we are achieving the positive outcomes we all want. Now, today's legislative package is not perfect. I do not support ending the navigation team. That was a team created that had a coordinated response. A team of dedicated city government employees, public servants from our Human Services Department and Parks Department who have been engaging those experiencing homelessness and who work for the public health of all city residents. By a narrow 5 to 4 vote, a majority of this council took what I believe to be a hasty action without a full replacement plan. Business improvement areas across the city that represent hundreds of small businesses that employ thousands of our residents are disappointed and concerned. Even if the navigation team goes away, the challenges of homelessness will not. So I look forward to working with our Chair of the Committee on Homelessness Strategies to piece together a reasonable and responsive replacement strategy. I also do not support suddenly and with little to no analysis, cutting the salary of the first black police chief in Seattle's history and the diverse team that she hand-picked. Yes, we should take a hard look at excess pay throughout our city government, but I believe it should be more thoughtful and methodical. But we're here today facing a massive deficit. We must be balanced the budget. We're required by law to do this. Just like all appropriation bills at all levels of government. There are items in the bill that each of us might not prefer. But the big picture is we need to throw together both the executive and the legislative branches to give the general public confidence that we can function and move forward for their benefit. Let's approve the budget package today and resolve to work collaboratively with our mayor and police chiefs to solve problems and make progress for Seattle. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Peterson, for those remarks. Next up is Council Member Morales. I think it's still with us. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Thank you. Council president. I will be brief. I really just want to take an opportunity to thank a few folks. I want to start with the central staff who, as we all know, have responded tremendously over the last several weeks. From my perspective, they've responded with grace and wisdom to every single inquiry coming from this freshman office, and there have been a lot of them. So I want to thank Justin and Dan, each of your members for the work that you do. I also want to thank advocates for community safety, for black lives, for our homeless neighbors, young people, immigrants and workers. And I want to thank my staff, the Kiesha Farmer. And turns out that you led the effort with King County Equity, now with De Croix, Seattle and all of the other community safety advocates that we've been working with over the last several weeks. Devon Silver, who worked closely with homeless advocates and service providers. And Alexis Turley, who knows how to ask the right budget questions to get greater transparency in the information that we get, particularly the way it's transmitted from the executive branch. This team has worked countless hours to serve the people of District two and the people of Seattle, and I am very thankful to have them on my team. And that's all I have. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, councilmember moralists for those comments. Really appreciate it. Okay, folks, so I think we are coming close to an end here. I will just really quickly before I give the last word over to remember Muscat as the chair of the Select Budget Committee. Just say that I also like some of what I just really want to express my appreciation for all of the Legislative Department staff, our council central staff, our legislative department, I.T. and clerk's office. And, of course, every single member of our individual office's staff who've been working tirelessly on staffing all of us on these really important issues and engaging in thousands of hours of community engagement and conversations across the city as. And look at how.
Speaker 3: To.
Speaker 0: Rise to the occasion of this historic moment that really calls upon us to take a hard look at how we can reevaluate how we deliver public safety services. And over the last few months, many of us have had an opportunity to engage in conversations across the spectrum, because, remember, Peterson did a really fine job of describing where that spectrum is. Obviously, there are folks who believe and we heard it in public testimony even today, who we need, who believe fundamentally that we need to continue to expanding and growing law enforcement arms, law enforcement approaches. And then there are people on the opposite end of the spectrum who believe we need to abolish the police department as council members and pursue this as a city wide council member. I believe it's my responsibility to listen to a variety of different opinions in this space and to weigh what what the the the balanced approach might be in moving forward. And I recognize that the proposal that we're voting on today is isn't perfect. But it does put us on a pathway towards having additional community engagement to have conversations about how we can truly capture savings and additional investments that we can allocate towards communities who are negatively impacted by overpolicing and criminalization in our city. And and I think that that's an important endeavor for us to to to undertake. I think it's going to become harder before it becomes easier. It is clear to me that folks who who are nervous about having the council and the city undergo this effort are many of those folks, I think, are worried about what impact this will have on their public safety day in and day out. And, of course, there are also individuals who believe that continuing to invest in law enforcement also carries with it dangers for their public safety in terms of police violence against black community members in particular. And so our job here today is to and always is to take as much input as we can to synthesize that information into evaluate strategies and options that lay before us that we feel represent the broader will of the people that we represent. And I guess what folks are seeing now is their democracy at work. And I hope that we will be able to, in the coming weeks and months, continue to engage each other in these important conversations, and that we are able to to really develop a broad table of stakeholders who will come together to help us identify clear solutions and strategies for how to meet the public safety needs of the people of Seattle without the need to resort, always the need to resort first to an armed response with a gun. Even in those even in those instances in which the activity that is at hand is a nonviolent, noncriminal offense. And so I am hopeful that we will be able to have this conversation. I think this is an opportunity for us to continue to engage positively with people across the city and with the chief and with Mayor Durkan around those potential solutions. And I look forward to doing that work in collaboration with all of you colleagues in this really important moment in in a time in our history.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 0: I will go ahead and leave it there and just say thank you to my own staff. Cody, writer Brianna Thomas, The Nguyen and and to all of the staff and all of your offices as council president, we get to serve in the unique role of having to be able to have the opportunity to engage with each and every one of your officers on all of these issues and really have appreciated the opportunity to learn with you and to work with each of you. And I have a tremendous amount of. Respect for. For all of our staff who have been working really hard at serving the people of Seattle, they do that in the background and they do it extraordinarily well. And I just want to want to thank thank all of them, especially my staff, for all of the work that they've been doing to help me balance home life with with the work life. So with that being said, I am going to conclude my remarks and I'm going to hand it over to Councilmember Muscadet to close debate out on this bill, and we will then take a vote. Thank you very much, Madam President, and thanks to all of our colleagues for all of your comments. This council has done something truly extraordinary, something that hasn't been done, at least in recent memory. We have passed and we are on the verge of passing a mid-year budget revision while working remotely during overlapping health and homelessness and housing housing crises. It would have been easy for us to, instead of going through this robust process that we engaged in, it would have been easier for us to just rubberstamp the mayor's proposed budget. And conversely, it would have been easy to vote no and not do the work. But instead we're rolling up our sleeves. We've committed to doing the hard work, and we've put forward a comprehensive and robust proposal. We didn't do this over the series of a few hours or a few meetings. Instead, we worked over the past few months on several budget measures that centered equity, anti austerity, transparency and collaboration at the heart of what we've put forward as a comprehensive package to address the crises that are in front of us. And it started with passing Jump Start Seattle. $214 million a year in payroll tax coming in the form of immediate release for covenant and long term economic stability. We are replenishing the rainy day and emergency funds with a payroll tax on our largest companies and the highest income earners. We're doing this with the knowledge that this is a smart fiscal policy, a way to jumpstart our local economy, prevent flatlining our local economy, and support our community and family members. This is how we help stand up and respond to the crisis in front of us. This week, we're directing $14 million in community investments, including youth focused diversion programs and community led public safety programs. We'll be allocating 3 million for participatory budgeting process so that community can better engage with the city. Specifically, the black and brown community can engage with the city in a directed way to make sure that our future efforts will craft a 2021 2022 budget. Investments and investments. We've done this on the heels of adding tens of millions of dollars to the Seattle Transportation Benefit District package to focus on frequency and transit trips, recognizing that we want essential workers to be able to get to their jobs and that we provide essential services across our city. We have done all of these things in a way to help center our families and community members who've been calling in and asking us for an anti-austerity approach. We have been trying to invest back into the community to respond to this crisis. So to be very clear, all of the steps we have taken have been in alignment with community, our most vulnerable and working families. No one is signing with Jeff Bezos. We are increasing funding for our community, part of our community members, where possible, and recognizing that we will do much, much more when Jumpstart Progressive Revenue comes into play in just two years. At this moment, our city is identifying ways to fight back austerity budgeting. We have committed as a council that we will not succumb to an austerity budget and we will not allow programs to be pitted against each other. We knew that there was going to be tough choices, but ultimately we crafted a budget that addresses the economic impacts of the COVID crisis. We've made new investments in our social safety net programs. We've invested in homeless services and COVID relief for families. We've made meaningful down payments to following communities. Call to defund the SPD by raising investments in community safety programs and scaling down our current state budget. We came together collectively and put Seattle residents and workers priorities and their values at the forefront of our discussions. We crafted a mid-year budget that lifts up anti-austerity efforts as we respond to COVID and caring for our most vulnerable. As I mentioned at the beginning of today's budget deliberations, the speedy inquest that we started in June has been very helpful in finally reckoning that we have much more work to do to invest in community and divest from an over invested and expanded police budget. But this process and our deep analysis has always been centered on the fact that we cannot do it all in a summer budgeting process. We're using a deep racial equity analysis, and we are bringing folks to the table who are from community to help us look at the years upon years of community strategies and priorities and calls for action to put those into place, a path to be put into place to really lift up bipoc communities. Local governments have continued to double down on the disproportionate investments in police and jails and courts and prisons. And that is what the status quo has always been. The Black Lives Matter movement is not new. But what's new is the way in which we're responding to their calls for action. This is our beginning. This is our effort to show that we're taking first and important steps to right historic wrongs, to begin building that trust back with community, and to make it clear that today is only the first step in that process. We have to be real about what is possible in this summer 2020 rebalancing process, and our teams and our community members that we've been working with around the clock have helped to provide much of the much of the input on the package in front of us to do what is possible this cycle and sets us up for what must be done in the upcoming months and years. The speed package voted on today is one step of a larger plan that encompasses the 2021 budget cycle, which starts again in just a few weeks. We are ensuring that funding for community organizations is actually being allocated dollars out the door so that organizations can scale up and engage in the participatory budgeting process and community led research project that we know we need in order to make sure that our community remains safe and that especially black and brown communities are safer when we demilitarize and reduce the police presence in communities, especially communities of color around Seattle. We need time to scale up to make sure that those larger volumes of work that community organizations are going to take on occurs. And this is our process. This is our commitment to scaling it up by investing the money that we will pass on Wednesday. It is our effort to scale up the organizations that have been calling for community organizations to really be at the forefront of responding to what communities need to be safe. That's housing, food assistance, childcare assistance, and other strategies that have been led by black and brown communities that actually invest and create safety. So today, again, is one step in the process. It says it sets us up for the continuation in the 2021 process, which again just starts in just a few weeks. And we will truly be led by the Community led research project to help undo centuries of harm, harmful systems that have continued to be funded over years or years. It will take time for us to get there, but we are acting with urgency today and setting us on the right path to correct these historic wrongs. I hope folks continue to work with us as we are intentional in our efforts to build trust, to be honest about what is possible here today, and to build that process for a truly re-envision community safety program and services going forward. What's important today is that we haven't just said no. What's important is that we have said, we will walk with you. We will walk with you in community to recreate a truly community led public safety model. What's important is that we have not just stood in the way or blocked the road. We are walking with community. We are identifying barriers together. We are pointing to those barriers or blockades and collectively putting the blocks together to get around them, to get around what has previously been insurmountable by working collaboratively with community and with a sense of urgency. On Wednesday, you will see us take action on some final votes, including an on loan bill amending efforts to get out the $3 million to community led research project to desegregate SFPD precincts from patrol operations to. Pass the COVID relief bill that is jump start and to amend our efforts to make sure that there is community relief that is being provided and not just a veto that stands in our way. That will happen on Wednesday. Again, this is just the first step in a very long process that has been long overdue. So I want to thank the community organizations who've been working with us to really come up with the strategies and the individuals. Obviously, we've talked a lot about King County equity now and decriminalize Seattle everyday march, but I want to pull out some specific names and helicopters Shiseido, Jackie, Bang, Shawn Flats, Isaac, Joy and Kira, Oliver, Andrea Richie. From across the country, we have Councilmember Jeremiah Ellison from Minneapolis, New York, Councilmember Brad Lander. Awesome City Councilmember Greg Cassar We have folks from San Francisco who provided us with ideas and strategies. Supervisor Jason Walden. We have organizations within the city that have been working to lift up how we can identify non sworn individuals and really invest in making sure that community and the city servants have supports that they need that are not embedded within SPD. So I want to thank individuals like Allison Eisinger, Floyd Gayle and Lisa Dugard, who've been working with us on how to de-politicize or sorry the police or demilitarize our homelessness response system. We have Katie Garrow and Nicole Grant from MLK Labor, along with Sean Van Dike and Kenny Stewart, who work with the Coalition for City Unions, who constantly said that they would be willing to help think through these next steps and have provided tremendous feedback and especially want to thank the folks who've been shouldering much of this work. A lot of our colleagues have already commented on this, but thank you to the people who've been working day and night shouldering this work. And I mean physically their shoulders probably hurt from the amount of work that they have been doing over the last few months. Our central staff, the clerk's office, council communications, our legislative staff, and all of our council members. But I want to specifically call out our central staff team by name because we appreciate yourself. Allie Penalty, Tom Meisel, Lisa Kay, Ostrov, and then COG from. Brian Goodnight. Calvin Chao. Carina Bull Ring Dos Amy Gore. Jeff Sims. Tracey Ratcliffe. Yolanda Hull Whish-Wilson Eric McConaghy. Carlos Lugo Kettl from Carroll Freeman. Patti, we're in Deputy Director Dan Itr and director Eric Pearson said we appreciate you. We know that this was a ton of work and I will be looking forward to hearing your feedback along with all of our council colleagues, feedback about how we can continually improve our process going into the fall budget. And with that, just a huge amount of appreciation for our teams. Some of you have already mentioned all of your incredible staff, but I also want to say thank you to the folks that have possibly reached out as well, not just to my staff, but directly to me. Thanks to Cody, writer and Brown, Thomas and Casper Gonzalez, his office, Cristina and Alex and Customer Referrals Office, Lakeisha and Alexis and Councilman Morales. His office. Peter and Councilmember Strauss. His office and Jonathan and Councilmember. So once office was reaching out as well and especially want to thank Aretha Basu and our office. She has been part of the organizing efforts in the past years and deep roots in community with King County Equity now and decriminalize Seattle and was on the forefront of inviting community partners to our table so we could hear directly from those most impacted. Thank you for your leadership in this effort. Along with Sage, all three.
Speaker 1: Who are.
Speaker 0: Angel, who is always at the forefront of pulling together the analyzes and feedback. Thank you. Along with Buddy Cuevas, who led our committee discussions and is going to continue to be our shepherding us through the select budget efforts and Erin House for your ongoing feedback and helpful engagement, especially as it relates to the federal dollars. We greatly appreciate all of your work to all of our council offices, even the folks that I did not name, but just want to see how much I deeply appreciate you. And we have set a budget, a set of package budget in front of us that truly reflects our council values centered again on anti-austerity, equity, transparency and collaboration while there's two more votes to come. Just wanted to get those last thank you again and I will be short going forward. Thank you very much. As I mentioned previously, I promised the public that there would be many, many words and thoughts shared with them publicly, and I have fulfilled that promise. So with that being said, I want to thank you all for your ongoing patience and engagement on these important issues. I do think it's an important thing that the council is moving forward in a in a unified fashion on this issue. I think it gives us a clear place to start the conversation in the coming weeks and over the next several months and really do appreciate the that that opportunity to be unified in this effort. So thank you so much, Councilman Musketeer, for your leadership on the issues facing us through the Budget Committee. And we will we will be back at it in about seven weeks. So here here we go. Without further ado, folks, let's go ahead and take a vote. I'm going to go ahead and close out debate on this particular bill. So I am now going to ask that the clerk please call the vote on the passage of the bill as amended.
Speaker 1: Peterson I.
Speaker 3: So want. No. Strauss.
Speaker 1: Hi. Yes.
Speaker 3: HERBOLD. Yes. Lewis.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 3: Morales. Yes. Macheda. I. President Gonzalez.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 3: Seven in favor, one opposed.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Madam Park. The bill passes as amended and the chair will sign it and assist the clerk. Please affects my signature to the legislation. Okay. Will the clerk please read agenda item 11 into the record? Agenda Item 11 Resolution.
AN ORDINANCE related to the City’s response to the 2020 COVID-19 crisis; amending Ordinance 126000, which adopted the 2020 Budget; changing appropriations to various departments and budget control levels, and from various funds in the Budget; imposing a proviso; and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts; all by a 3/4 vote of the City Council.