-Hello, I'm your host,
Brian Callanan.
In a rare move, a city council committee
has rejected a measure
promising more affordable housing.
The sponsor of that measure, Councilmember Tammy Morales
is talking to me about what happened
to her Connected Communities legislation.
Plus, she's weighing in on the city's growing budget concerns,
police hiring, and the questions you're sending in, too.
It's all next on "City Inside/Out: Council Edition."
-The way it stands now,
this is planning for more expensive housing
for the next 20 years unless the draft changes.
-All that and more coming up next
on "City Inside/Out: Council Edition"
♪♪
And here she is, Councilmember Tammy Morales joining me.
I very much appreciate the time.
-Good to see you. -Now, let's jump right into it.
We are speaking just after the Land Use Committee
that you chair voted not to pass
the Connected Communities legislation you sponsored.
This would cut red tape for nonprofits and community groups
to build affordable housing, give them incentives,
like the ability to build bigger buildings.
It's focused on areas of Seattle
where there has been a history of red lining.
It's proposed as a pilot program,
which would sunset in 2029 or when 35 projects are built,
whichever happens first.
I thought Councilmember Moore summarized one major point
from the majority of the committee in saying
that she'd rather use the Comprehensive Plan
the Council is working on to achieve this bill's goal.
-In my opinion, a more effective approach
to attaining city-wide neighborhood affordability
is to make the benefit of development capacity
generally available to all
and to do so through the draft Comprehensive Plan
currently before Council.
-You and your staff spent 2.5 years working on this bill
through five committee meetings
with a lot of partners from the community supporting this.
-Yep. -And here we are.
A no vote happens very rarely at the community --
at the committee level, I should say, in the Council.
Tell me what happened here.
-Well, what happened is that we had dozens
of community organizations, Habitat for Humanity,
El Centro de la Raza,
um, the Housing Development Consortium.
Many different organizations support this work,
particularly, because they are interested
in understanding what does it take to facilitate
more development quicker,
so that we can expand housing options across the city.
I think, all of us can agree,
we need more housing in more places in the city.
Um, the legislation would have allowed for cultural spaces,
more affordable commercial space.
So, I think, you know, this is really about ensuring
that we allow for that kind of mixed-income,
mixed-use development to happen in more places.
That was the intent.
There's a lot of support for that, uh,
including, I believe, from my colleagues.
-Okay. -So, um, I don't know.
-Oh. -Um, you know,
I worked hard to try to incorporate changes
that did address the concerns that they have,
as it relates to the Comprehensive Plan.
Um, you know, the plan that we have is already 2 years late.
-Mm-hm. -Um,
and we have a crisis right now.
We really can't wait for the passage of something
that is still a year out in order to really start
to address these challenges.
That's one thing. -Okay.
-The other thing I'll say is that many of the goals
that are included in the draft Comprehensive Plan
that we have right now, um, are, uh --
include language that I already added to the Comprehensive Plan,
so, that we could lay that vision...
-I see. -...for the future.
Um, whether it's increasing density for housing
or allowing more neighborhood commercial corner stores
in different parts of the city,
because we're really trying to
allow for better access
to essential goods and services. -Right.
-In all of our neighborhoods. -Mm-hm.
-Within walking distance, right? -Make it more walkable, too.
Or close to transit. Yeah. -"15-minute city" idea.
-Mm-hm. Yep. -So, those are amendments
that we had already included in the Comprehensive Plan
and are already working to draft
to -- to pass. -Yeah. Mm-hm.
-Um, so, uh, you know,
I am hopeful that we can continue
moving the Comprehensive Plan in the right direction.
-Okay. -Um,
why this particular piece of legislation
was not supported when it would have achieved a lot
of the things that my colleagues are interested in
is not a question I can answer.
-God, I guess I was paying close attention to this bill,
because it was the first piece of substantive legislation
that really the Council was working on
that was up for a vote this year.
So, the full Council will consider this bill on April 30.
Do you have any intention of trying to revise it any further
and try to get some support for it?
-Yeah, well, we'll be talking to the Councilmembers
who are not part of the Land Use Committee.
Um, and there are some options for presenting the substitute
in full Council,
or even, you know, addressing --
introducing a slightly different version of it.
We're still trying to figure out what the right strategy is.
-Okay. This was disappointing.
Is that the right way to describe this?
I just wanted to make sure I got that across.
-That is definitely a way to describe it.
-Okay. Okay. -[ Laughs ]
-Thank you for sharing all of this with me.
I did want to talk a little bit more generally
about the best way to build affordable housing in Seattle.
I know you get a lot of e-mails on this.
I certainly do, too, I had a few viewers
who expressed some different views about this.
And I want to pass those along. Here's one.
There's one.
Another viewer who likes to speak out
for small landlords, writes this.
I think, both of these viewers are talking a little bit more
about market-based solutions
when it comes to affordable housing,
and this idea of making it easier
for privately-funded housing for small landlords,
how do you respond to that?
-So, we know that the city has been behind
in our housing production for years, right?
The city grew twice as fast
as was expected in our last Comprehensive Plan.
And we didn't build to accommodate that growth.
So, we're already behind, and we know that there's another,
you know, several hundred thousand people
coming to the city by 2030.
-Right. Right. -So, we have a lot of work
to do to catch up on the housing that we need.
The market-rate housing that's being developed
is appropriate for one segment of our community.
-Yeah. -But we have 40,000
homeless people in King County.
And they're homeless in large part,
because they can't afford rents.
You know, if the average rent is 17, $1,900 now,
um, that's a lot of money.
And if you can't afford to do that,
you know, you end up on the street.
So, there's a lot of work to do for the lower segments
of the market. -Okay.
-You know, the Seattle Housing Authority can build
for people below 30% of the area median income.
But workers, teachers, grocery workers, baristas, gig workers,
these are folks who need housing that is affordable to them, too.
-Okay. -And private developers
don't build that kind of housing.
-Mm-hm. -If that housing was, um...
-Could they not be incentivized further to build it or?
-Well, that's part of what Connected Communities is for.
-I see. Okay. Okay. -So, that is the goal.
Part of the reason that, um, we --
that private developers struggle with building housing
is because of some of the barriers that are put in place.
-Right. -The permitting process
takes a long time. -Yep.
-The design review process gets in the way.
Um, and so,
the Connected Communities legislation was intended
to eliminate some of those barriers
to make it cheaper for them to build housing.
-Right. -That's what we're trying
to figure out, is what is the right mix of incentives
that can make the creation of this housing easier?
-Yeah. -Um, and it doesn't
all have to be low-income housing.
It doesn't all have to be market rate.
Mixing incomes is a way to help cross-subsidize.
It's also part of what the social housing model does.
-Yeah, and we'll touch on that a little bit, too. Sure.
-So, that's what we're trying to achieve.
And, I think, um,
you know, we have to acknowledge
that not everybody can afford market rate,
and not everybody needs to be living in public housing.
There is a big gap in the middle,
and that's what we're trying to figure out.
-Anything you want to say to those small landlords out there?
I know this has been a brewing issue
over the past couple of months.
Anything to that group?
-Well, I think, you know,
we know that it is landlords, big and small,
who are providing housing to our community.
And there is an obligation if you're contemplating
being a landlord as a small business,
you still have responsibility to your tenants.
So, I think, you know, from my perspective,
if you have decided that this is a business
that you're going to run, then, you still have to be
held accountable for running your business, properly.
-Okay. Thank you.
You've raised a few issues about the Comprehensive Plan.
And I'd like to dive into that a little bit further.
I think, you've said a few times it doesn't go far enough
when it comes to increasing density in Seattle.
-Yeah. -Continues the status quo.
You made mention at a meeting back in March.
I wanted to show this map of these proposed regional centers
that the Comprehensive Plan is talking about.
These are key economic drivers for the city
where growth will be encouraged.
It left out, basically, all of your district
in Southeast Seattle and District 2.
There's basically nothing in South Seattle.
I'll sneak in a few viewer questions
to add to the setup here, if I may?
Robin asks...
Another viewer asks...
Please tell us if you could.
Where do you want to guide this Comp Plan discussion?
I know back in March, Cleveland High School
actually hosted a public event
to talk about this. -That's right.
-Maybe some of your concerns about what's planned for
your district or not planned for your district,
and what you're hearing from your constituents, too.
-Sure. That's a lot. -It is.
-So, I think what we're hearing, in general,
as a reaction to this Comp Plan,
is that it doesn't go far enough.
In the last couple of years,
the Planning Department has done community outreach,
and, you know, the vast majority
of comments that they heard from people
is that we need more housing.
We need more housing that is affordable to workers.
People want to be able to walk to a corner store,
walk to a grocery store, credit union, coffee shop.
And right now, a lot of our zoning
doesn't allow for that kind of
neighborhood commercial development.
-Yeah. -Um, so...
And that was in the original version
of the Comprehensive Plan draft
that the Planning Department sent to the Mayor.
We learned just this week that a lot of that stuff
was stripped out.
So, the way it stands now,
this is planning for more expensive housing
for the next 20 years unless the draft changes.
And so, I would encourage your viewers
to send in their comments.
We are getting a lot of comments as Councilmembers,
but we're not the ones who make the change.
So, let me find the e-mail, just to make sure.
-Okay. -We have until May 6
to send comments directly to the Department,
and you can send your comments to
OneSeattleCompPlan@seattle.gov.
Whether you want to see more senior housing,
whether you like town homes or don't like town homes,
if you want to be able to walk to a corner store,
they need to hear directly from our neighbors.
And they need to hear by May 6.
So, that those comments can get incorporated
into the final version. -Thank you.
I'll make sure to get that all set up,
so, that people are putting in those e-mails.
Again, we're talking about getting some comments in
on the Comprehensive Plan.
With regard to specifically
what's happening in District 2, though,
I thought, this was really interesting.
Can you jump back on that regional centers idea?
Because it looks like economic development is a part
of this Comp Plan, perhaps more than we've seen before
in plans in the past.
And it really seemed, like, at least a good part
of your neighborhood in your district was left out.
-So, the regional centers, I will say,
are actually defined by the Puget Sound Regional Council.
-Okay. -So, they're the ones
who decide, where is the economic activity happening?
What does it look like?
Is it an opportunity as a place to grow?
-Okay. -So, I have also started
these conversations with PSRC,
because I sit on the Growth Management Policy Board.
-Okay. -Um, but yes,
the South End has been left out
for a long time as an intentional place to grow.
And given what we know about District 2,
which is that is an area of high risk of displacement
and low access to economic opportunity,
it is my belief that we need to be intentionally planning
to create a regional economic center in the South End.
What that looks like, I don't know.
-Okay. -Um,
but, for example, in the last few years,
we've had the Odessa Brown Children's Clinic has opened.
I don't know that we need to become a medical hub,
although, the South End does lack medical facilities.
-Yeah. -But a building like that
brings hundreds of jobs
to the neighborhood.
Good jobs. -Mm-hm.
-Hopefully, union jobs. -Sure.
-And so, these are opportunities for our young people,
for folks who are underemployed,
for people who need economic opportunity in their community,
and that's what I'm hoping we can start to drive toward.
-Okay. And a lot still ahead with that.
Again, let's get those comments in by May 6.
We're talking about the Comprehensive Plan here.
Appreciate the back and forth on that.
Just a last housing issue as we go through here.
I want to touch again on social housing.
You brought this up earlier, social housing.
Seattleites voted for this last year.
There was I-135 establishing this
Public Development Authority to develop, own,
and maintain publicly-financed, mixed-income
social housing developments.
So, the PDA, as I understand it,
has some trouble getting off the ground
in terms of securing its operational funding
from the city and the state as well.
There's a group collecting signatures right now
to try to set up a more stable funding mechanism.
I'm going to put that off to the side for a little bit.
I just wanted to get this basic idea of what this was all about.
There was an e-mail I got about this as well.
One writer actually threw in -- Pete threw this.
Why does our government not incentivize development
of workforce housing?
I know you were a champion
of this social housing measure last year.
What does the future of this program look like?
-Well, it's a bright spot, in my opinion.
You know, we passed the Social Housing
Public Development Authority.
So, that entity exists, as you mentioned,
it is waiting for the contract and the funding,
so, that they can really get set up.
But this is an opportunity
for us to really add
an important component
to the sort of portfolio of how housing gets built in the city.
Social housing is permanently affordable housing.
And like I was saying before, for a mix of people, you know,
so, it has the benefit of, within each building,
providing high-quality housing for low-income renters
and for, you know, middle and higher income.
-Right, it can actually go above the area of median income
for some people. -And the intent there --
Well, there's several intentions with that.
One is to provide housing for a mix of people
within one building.
The second is to -- that is permanently affordable.
The second is to sort of eliminate that class segregation
that you get when lots of low income people
are in public housing and lots of high-income people
are in market-rate housing.
That doesn't create healthy, vibrant community.
-Yeah. -So, putting folks
in the same space with the same high-quality
kind of apartments
is an important goal of this as well.
-Okay. -And then, the last thing
I'll say is that in social housing,
the rent is proportional to income.
-That's right. -Right, so,
everybody who is in the building
pays 30% of whatever their income is.
-Right. -And the intention there
is to try to cross-subsidize, um...
-So, that the higher rents can help pay for the lower?
-Right, and help pay for operations
and maintenance costs and that sort of thing.
So, it has a lot of benefits.
-Yeah. -Um, not the least of which
is really just creating permanent affordability
for folks, so that we stop pushing people out of the city.
-Are you concerned about the dollars,
though, and getting this thing really started?
It just sounds like it's had a tough time
getting off the ground.
-I will say, you know, the initiative
that passed last year passed by 60% of the vote.
-Right. People clearly were wanting this.
-People want to see something like this happen.
I think, it is incumbent upon the elected officials
who are managing this contract process to get busy.
-Okay. -So, you know,
we were able to put, uh,
I think, it was $200,000 in from the city.
-Mm-hm. -My office worked
with Frank Chopp to get another
800,000 from the state.
-Mm-hm. -This entity has been waiting
for a year now for that funding,
and they need to hire staff.
They need to hire a CEO.
They need to start their fundraising campaigns.
-Right. -So, we need to get busy
and support their success.
-Okay. We will see what happens there. Thank you for that.
And as we're talking about money getting spent,
the Council has jumped into its budget process
here in April, earlier in the year than it ever has,
at least in recent memory.
Councilmember Dan Strauss was talking about this.
He is the Chair of the Select Budget Committee.
He called the first meeting of that committee
and audit of the budget.
-This is the review
and examination of our city budget
that has not been done before.
The definition of audit
is a review and examination of your work.
So, for anyone who wanted an audit of our budget.
This is it.
-You've spoken out about your concerns regarding the budget.
You wrote a piece in the Seattle Times' Op-Ed page
that said, "Unless the city does its work
to find progressive revenue,
we're looking at an austerity budget for this year
with some cuts to some critical programs."
You also said, some of your colleagues
have acknowledged the need to keep an open mind on revenue.
As we get into this budget process,
we're a couple of months after you had that Op-Ed in the paper,
do you think those minds are still open?
What are we seeing?
-Uh, I don't know yet.
Um, what I will say --
What I will say is that we are
at the beginning of the process of having a really,
much better understanding of what --
what our situation is.
So, we've had --
We had the economic revenue forecast
that came out yesterday. -Yeah. Mm-hm.
-The reality is that, as a city,
we are pretty limited in ways to raise revenue.
-Right. -So, you know, whether it's --
Depending on the kind of services that we have,
whether it's capital or operations or programs
or contracting out with human service workers
to work on our behalf. -Right.
-We have an obligation to provide
these essential services to our community.
And we have limited ways to pay for that.
-Right. -So, that's going to be
the challenge that we have.
If revenue from property taxes
and sales tax and B&O tax,
if all of that is fairly stable,
but the cost of providing these services is going up,
then, we're going to have to figure out how to fill that gap.
-Okay. -And so, you know,
the progressive payroll tax,
the JumpStart tax we passed several years ago,
has been able to backfill
a lot of that.
Um, but we're going to have to look at
how we expand that tax
or contemplate some of the other ideas
that were created by the Revenue Stabilization Task Force
that met 2 years ago. -Right. Right. Right.
-So, they came up with several different ideas.
-Mm-hmm. -I think, it is going to be
incumbent upon us as a Council
to look at ways to increase revenue.
We're going to have to make cuts.
Those are going to be very hard conversations.
My hope is that we do as little harm as possible
to our city workers and to the services
and the end user of those services,
because we have to keep in mind that any cut we make,
there's a person at the other end of that
who will be impacted by it.
So, my approach going into this
is to do as little harm as possible.
-Got it, and in terms of that amount we're talking about --
$240 million.
That's grown just a little bit, I will say,
over the past week or so, because the Council
recently approved some raises for city workers.
Increase between 4-5% until 2026
for some 11,000 workers out there.
I know this added a little bit to the city's budget deficit,
but I know it was a move that you
and other Councilmembers supported here.
Can you tell us why?
-Well, because it's not a raise.
It is a cost of living adjustment.
So, there's a difference, right?
A raise is a merit-based adjustment.
These are dealing with the fact
that we've had record-high inflation
for the last couple of years, a 10-year high, I believe.
-Mm-hm. -Um, and so,
wages haven't kept up with that.
And these are, as I said,
workers who are providing essential services to the city.
So, you know, we all deserve to have a cost of living adjustment
so, that we can pay our own bills,
and our city workers deserve the same.
-Yeah, I did want to talk about another issue
when it comes to personnel.
The city is also in negotiations
with the Seattle Police Officers Guild with an agreement
that would give these rank-and-file officers
a 23% raise.
And Council President Sara Nelson is trying to boost
officer hiring in other ways, too,
by improving and streamlining
the hiring process, as she puts it.
She brought up in a recent meeting
this idea of changing the entry test
the Seattle Police Department uses,
from the National Testing Network exam
used in bigger cities, like, San Francisco.
68% of applicants pass that.
To the Public Safety Test or PST,
which has a 90% pass rate
and is used by several agencies in our state.
-Applicants apply to multiple jurisdictions.
And having -- And so,
when they take the PST test once,
it's on file, and they can designate
which agencies get that score.
And if they have to use another test that nobody else is using,
that is, you know, that's a disincentive
to include Seattle in their application process.
-What are your thoughts about this idea
of the city streamlining its police hiring process
as Seattle keeps losing more officers than it can hire?
-Well, what I'll say about the test in particular
is that the reason Seattle uses that test
is because we've been under a consent decree for 12 years.
-Yeah. -And we've been under
a consent decree, because of the biased policing
in our force. -Mm-hm.
And the use of force, too. Yeah.
-Use of force, unconstitutional policing.
-Right. -And so, there is
a very valid reason
why we use a different test,
because we do have higher standards.
We want to make sure that we're screening out officers who have,
you know, poor judgment or have some other issues
that may contribute to an increase in use of force,
unnecessary use of force. -Got it.
-So, I don't believe that using a test that is easier to pass
and doesn't screen that out is an appropriate step.
I understand that we are several hundred officers down from
where the force has been in the past,
but that's not because of the test, necessarily.
It's just because the training and the academy process is slow.
You know, it takes a year to get through the academy.
There are a lot of places along the way
that contribute to the length of time
it takes to bring people in.
Um, uh --
And so, maybe, there are some adjustments in how we,
you know, tweak the timeline there.
-Yes. Okay. -But I don't think
that making the test easier
for officers to pass
is the right approach. -Got it.
And just this whole idea of streamlining the process,
overall, I think, the Council has been
contemplating a few ideas.
Let's make sure we reach out to these recruits
potentially sooner.
Let's talk about some more hiring bonuses
and things of that nature.
Any ideas there, because you've heard
these briefings as well as I have,
the Seattle Police Department is at its lowest staffing level
since the 1990s,
and that just doesn't seem right to a lot of people.
Help me out with that idea of trying to build up
the police department to where it needs to be.
-Well, I think, you know,
I think, what we have seen nationally
is that there is just a decline.
This isn't -- -Yeah, it's not
just a Seattle problem. -This isn't unique to Seattle.
Right? -Right.
-Cities across the country
are having a hard time recruiting officers.
In part, I think, because
the idea of what it means
to be an officer has changed.
The interest, I guess, is diminishing.
I will say here in Seattle,
in particular, we've had, I am assuming,
that we're having a hard time in part,
because of the culture of the Department itself.
-Okay. -We have, you know,
lots of women, in particular,
who have, um -- -Made some complaints. Yes.
-Who have sued the Department... -Legal complaints. Yes.
-...for discrimination and harassment.
And when 50% of the population doesn't feel like
they're welcome in a department,
it makes it hard to contemplate
how you start to address those recruitment strategies.
So, I think, there are some,
you know, process issues that could be addressed,
but I also think there are some cultural
and departmental management issues
that need to be addressed, so, that people are
more interested in coming to the department.
-Thank you. A lot's going on there, for sure.
And I appreciate you engaging with that.
I did want to talk about another labor issue
that's coming up here in the month of April,
Seattle's gig worker minimum wage law.
The Council passed this measure in 2022
with input from app companies, drivers, and advocates.
It went into effect here in 2024.
But when it did, companies like DoorDash
put this $5 fee in place, which local restaurants say
has really hurt their orders.
Council President Nelson is talking about this as well,
wants to make some changes to this law,
maybe reducing the mileage rate reimbursements,
or maybe reducing the overall minimum wage.
And I knew you've raised some concerns about that,
including, we don't have any hard data from the app companies
when it comes to how much this law
is affecting them financially.
Can you talk about this issue?
-Yeah, well, I haven't seen the legislation.
I don't know that it's even
drafted yet. -It's still in process, yes.
-But what I will say in general is that Seattle is a labor town.
You know, this is a union city.
Protecting workers is important.
We passed a minimum wage law 10 years ago,
because we understand that workers deserve a living wage,
and they deserve protections.
And so, when we hear about app workers being retaliated against
or, you know, being cut off of the app for whatever reason,
it really raises red flags.
I think, for me, the crux of the issue here
is that these workers deserve a minimum wage.
-Okay. -And, you know,
for the companies to add a $5 fee onto the cost
also seems retaliatory.
So, we'll see what the legislation looks like.
I'm looking forward to engaging with that,
but I think, you know,
the main issue for me is making sure
that these workers are protected,
and they're not retaliated against.
-Thank you. Briefly, another important issue for you.
Transportation, Vision Zero, the city's dedication
to prevent traffic-related deaths,
which have been on the rise in our state.
The Seattle Department of Transportation
Director Greg Spotts presented the proposal
for the new Move Seattle Levy
the voters will consider this fall is down in Rainier Beach
back here in April, joined by the Mayor,
several other community members.
A $1.35 billion proposal here,
going to be the largest in Seattle history.
And I know the Council is reviewing this.
Some ideas, some big picture ideas
about where you want this conversation to go.
-Yeah, well, I will say that, you know, for me,
the priority is pedestrian safety,
safety of our streets and sidewalks.
And in the South End, we have the highest rate
of traffic fatalities in the city.
And we have some major arterials.
We have sidewalks that are incomplete or crumbling.
And so, for me, the real priority
is going to be around pedestrianization
of roads and sidewalks. -Mm-hm.
-How we ensure that we are building out.
I think, right now, it's estimated it would take
400 years to build all the sidewalks
that we need in the city. -Yeah. Right, right.
-And that's because of the particular cost
of doing it a particular way.
I'm excited that Director Spotts
does seem to really be prioritizing safety
and is willing to look at alternative ways
of creating safe pedestrian pathways for our neighbors.
-Mm-hm. -So, you know,
that's a key issue for me.
Connecting our pedestrian networks,
our bicycle networks, so that people can get around the city
and get out of their cars is going to be
an important priority if we're really going to meet
our climate change goals as well.
So, a lot of systems that are connected
through our transportation levy, and they all have to be
considered and supported. -All right. Thank you very much.
This is Councilmember Tammy Morales from District 2.
Thank you very much for joining me.
-Thanks for having me. -Thanks to everybody watching
on "Council Edition."
See you next time.
♪♪