-Okay. Good morning, everyone.
Thank you all for being here today.
I am here with representatives from Puget Sound Sage,
from MLK Labor, from Disability Rights Washington,
and from Seattle Neighborhood Greenways
to announce that my office will be proposing
a transportation levy package of $1.7 billion
to fully fund every safety measure
that was proposed by every single city councilmember.
First, I do want to thank the Chair of Transportation,
Rob Saka, for leading on the effort to increase the levy
so that we can prioritize more and better sidewalks
and increase support for vision zero across the city.
However, over the past several months,
we've engaged with transportation levy communities.
We've engaged in the committee itself,
and I've heard loud and clear
from constituents across the city,
from people in every council district
during our public hearing
and during our public comment periods in committee
that voters want a bolder transportation levy.
They want a package
that prioritizes safety investments for everyone,
especially for those who are walking or rolling
or biking to navigate the city.
Seattle has had a goal to eliminate traffic fatalities
and serious injuries since 2015,
and yet just last year there were
167 fatalities in King County.
And while other parts of the country
are seeing traffic fatalities decrease,
Washington State saw an 11% increase last year.
Since January, we've had 14 fatalities,
7 of these were pedestrians on Seattle City streets,
7 were in vehicles.
These are people who were simply going about their day trying
to get to work, to groceries, to visit with a friend.
And these are deaths that could have been prevented
if we were bold enough to make sure
that we prioritize redesigning our streets.
When we design our streets to center universal accessibility,
everyone wins.
My team and I added up each of the proposed amendments
from city councilmembers
and increasing the chair's package
will cost the average homeowner about $48 a year
or about $4 a month.
That means for an additional $4 a month,
we can implement a levy package that prioritizes safety,
that incorporates all councilmembers'
transportation priorities without pitting modes of transit
against one another,
without pitting different city council districts
against one another,
and without pitting other priorities for our city's
transportation system.
There is a safety crisis playing out on our streets,
and it's claimed far too many lives in Seattle.
This council has the power to do something about it.
Relatively modest investments
in our community's health and safety
today will improve our city for decades to come.
On the other hand,
inaction and underinvestment puts people at risk
and you can't put a price on people's lives.
So as it stands,
the current levy proposal would force Seattleites
to make false choices.
Do we have bike lanes or do we have safe bridges?
Do we have road maintenance or improve transit?
Do we build new sidewalks or do we repair existing sidewalks?
We can and should do all of these things.
This council has a once in a decade opportunity
to shape our city's transportation infrastructure
to center mobility and safety for everyone.
We're in the middle of a local and national road safety crisis.
We can't afford to wait to be bold in the vision
of what we want our Seattle streets to look like.
Lives are quite literally depending on it.
So I want to introduce our next speaker.
As I mentioned,
we have folks from several different organizations.
Next we will hear from Christy Shimizu from Puget Sound Sage.
-Good morning, everyone.
My name is Christina Shimizu
and I'm the Executive Director of Puget Sound Sage.
The transportation levy presents council
with an opportunity to be bold
and not just do the same old thing.
Bold for BIPOC communities that have been dispossessed,
disinvested in, and neglected for centuries
and bold for all people of Seattle
who deserve a robust transit system
that meets the needs of all people and is accessible
and doesn't result in further harm to BIPOC communities.
It is indisputable that Seattle voters want a large
and transformative levy.
The polling others will discuss in greater detail
today show that over 75% of Seattle voters
would vote for a $1.7 billion package.
Seattle voters also want increased transit
without displacement.
Over 55% of voters would be more likely to vote yes
if the transportation levy included funding
to mitigate displacement caused
by transit expansion such as light rail.
Councilmember Morales has introduced an amendment
doing just that, asking for just $5 million,
a tiny amount in the scheme of the levy package,
for community led planning
in the Graham Street South End neighborhood
and the Chinatown International District.
Graham Street and the Chinatown International District
are both neighborhoods at some of the highest risk
of displacement across the city,
and both will be seeing new light rail stations
within the next decade.
And we know from experience in the Rainier Valley
that without large scale investment
in anti-displacement strategies by
and for our BIPOC communities,
light rail expansion equals gentrification
with higher income people initially attracted
by light rail moving into our neighborhoods
and ultimately using their cars,
not even light rail to get around.
Meanwhile, our people,
low income and working class BIPOC communities,
most likely to use public transit are pushed out further
and further south out of our city altogether.
Low income BIPOC communities deserve access
to robust transit systems
and they deserve to remain in place to take advantage of it.
Councilmember Morales's amendment to allocate $5 million
to community led planning in these neighborhoods
will make a future without displacement more possible
in two communities that deserve it.
We call on the city council
to support this amendment as well as
to increase the overall size of the levy to $1.7 billion.
Thank you.
Next up is Corina Yballa from MLK Labor.
-Thank you and good morning.
My name is Corina Yballa and I'm with MLK Labor,
King County and Seattle's largest labor organization,
representing thousands of workers
across the city of Seattle and their unions.
I'm here today because we stand at a pivotal moment
in our city's transportation future.
Every day we navigate our streets, commute to work,
and build our lives around the infrastructure that supports us.
But years of underinvestment
have left us with crumbling roads and bridges
that hinder not just our mobility,
but our economic vitality
And no one feels more profoundly the inadequacies
of our growing city's transportation infrastructure
than the people who show up every day at work
to drive trucks and busses on our roads,
unload freight at our port, pave sidewalks and streets,
engineer solutions for the future, and so much more.
Back in March,
our members passed a resolution calling for a $1.7 billion levy
that builds more sidewalks, makes freight easier to move,
and repairs our bridges and roads.
This transportation levy is not only
essential for the repair and maintenance
of what we already have,
but also gives us the opportunity
to properly resource good union jobs and transportation
improvements that all of us stand to benefit from.
Through this investment,
we can help meet our climate goals by building
electric vehicle charging infrastructure,
invest in equity
through neighborhood greenways and safety initiatives,
and further connect our transit lines and bike paths.
We'd like to thank the many people
who've worked tirelessly
to create the transportation package that meets the need
and are especially grateful to Councilmember Morales
for her leadership and forward thinking.
We'd also like to take this opportunity
to thank Mayor Harrell for inviting labor
to help craft the initial proposal as part
of his kitchen cabinet and transportation
levee select committee chair Saka
for his amendments that propose
improve access to EV charging stations for Seattleites.
Together, we can ensure that Seattle remains a city
that works for everyone,
with roads that connect us and transportation
that moves us forward.
Next, I'd like to welcome up Cecilia Black
from Disability Rights Washington.
-Hi.
My name is Cecilia Black,
and I'm in a community organizer at Disability Rights Washington.
When I was 16, my family was in a massive car accident.
The driver in the other car, a 16 year old died.
Every person in my family sustained significant injuries.
I became a quadriplegic and my brother,
with internal injuries, was put into a medically induced coma.
When they take you out of a comma,
you can experience psychosis. And for my brother,
it was a family friend who sat by his side
and calmly talked him through it.
I don't think it's an easy thing to do.
Last week, that friend's son was biking in Seattle
when he was hit by a car.
Now, he and his wife are collecting recordings
from friends and family to play to their son,
who is now in a medically induced coma.
No one should ever have to watch a loved one go through that.
But also no one should ever have the experience
of being remotely prepared to do that twice.
We cannot keep normalizing car violence.
Between 2016 and 2020,
people with disabilities were involved in 4%
of total traffic accidents yet accounted for 53%
of people killed in Seattle.
When 60% of our streets are inaccessible due to broken
or missing sidewalks,
we have to put our bodies in the line of traffic
to leave our houses.
We need a transportation system that supports life.
Last week, all six council members
who submitted levy amendments,
Councilmember Saka, Nelson, Hollingsworth, Moore,
Strauss, and Councilmember Morales,
proposed additional funding for projects
that will make our transportation safer
and more accessible. But many of these amendments
were funded through cuts to equally vital programs.
We shouldn't have to choose between keeping pedestrians,
cyclists, or neighborhoods safe.
Whether we repair broken sidewalks or build missing ones,
I, as a wheelchair user,
will still have to navigate a broken,
inaccessible sidewalk network at the end of the day.
The bottom line is we cannot adequately address the issues
the council has highlighted as priorities
without increasing the size of the levy.
And the good news is, is this is what voters want.
Seattleites know what is at stake
and even in our expensive city,
a majority of voters want to be taxed more
for a better transportation system.
A poll conducted by Change Research found
that twice as many respondents preferred a larger
$1.9 billion levy
that invested in more sidewalk safety and transit
projects than a smaller $1.7 billion option.
In April,
the city's own polling by EMC Research showed
that the only effective argument against renewing the levee
was that it did not go far enough,
dropping support for the levy by 23%.
Rarely does the city's funding needs align so closely
in public opinion.
Council can't walk away from this moment.
Councilmember Morales this is an opportunity to seize this moment
and pass the transportation levy
that can adequately meet our city's
vast transportation needs.
I want to introduce Clara Cantor,
an organizer from Seattle Neighborhood Greenways.
-Thanks, Cecilia. Can you hear me?
Is that picking up? Okay. My name is Clara Cantor.
I'm a community organizer with Seattle Neighborhood Greenways.
And our next transportation levy must meaningfully tackle
the safety and equity and mobility and climate
challenges that our city is facing.
And like some others have mentioned before,
polling shows
that Seattle voters recognize those great needs
and are willing to pay to fix and address the system
that we're moving in every single day of our lives.
A poll conducted by Change Research found
that 79% of Seattle voters
would approve a $1.7 billion levy like is proposed here
and that 2/3 of those would go even higher,
preferring a larger $1.9 billion levy when told
that it would build more sidewalks
and more safety projects across Seattle.
According to the city's own polling done by EMC Research,
the only argument against renewing the levy
that caused a significant dip in support
was that it didn't go far enough and invest enough in walking,
biking, transit, and the climate.
Voters understand what's at stake here
and the council needs to capitalize
on this unique moment.
But so far, what we've seen,
council amendments have been proposed
to pit vital programs against each other,
and we shouldn't have to choose between safe routes
for kids walking and biking to school
and equity focused safety programs.
We shouldn't have to choose between building
and repairing our sidewalks.
We shouldn't have to choose between public open space
and protected bike lanes.
We need all of those things and polling
shows that voters will pass a levy that funds them.
I also want to speak specifically to two
of the items in this package
that councilmember Morales has proposed that are
really close to my heart personally.
One is the $15 million for the equity focused
neighborhood safety program,
which reverses a proposed 38% cut to a vital program
that was crafted and pushed by SDOT's
own Transportation Equity Workgroup.
This program is small,
but it highlights and prioritizes community ideas
and increases the equitable distribution of safety
focused spending in Seattle.
It would have an outsized impact on starting
to right some of the historic and ongoing disinvestment
that BIPOC and low income communities in Seattle
have had for decades.
I'm really grateful to see the funding here
for those communities and for our communities,
especially in the South End. The other one I want to mention
specifically is $20 million for protected bike lanes
with an emphasis on South Seattle projects.
I live in the South End and I mostly get around on my bike
or sometimes riding the bus,
and currently there's no connected protected way
for me to get around the South End.
There's no connected bike network for the majority
of South Seattle.
There's no way to get between our cultural centers,
our business districts, our schools,
and even areas that are expected to see significant growth
in the coming years.
I'm also a parent of two very young kids,
and trying to get anywhere with my kids
on the back of my bike has put in really stark reality just
how unsafe I feel most of the time I'm on my bike,
how very few places in my neighborhood
I can get to in a way
that feels safe enough to have my kids with me
and like I'm not endangering their lives and mine.
I'm left taking these roundabout 45 minute routes
that hop up on the sidewalks
and going up and down steep slopes
just to avoid the direct routes
that would probably take me half the time
if they felt safe to bike on. The primary reason for that
is the lack of investment in South Seattle,
particularly in safe streets.
It started decades ago when we chose to build our highways
and our high speed freight routes on top of
and through BIPOC communities and low income communities
and it continues today.
Every time our city makes decision after decision
after decision that prioritizes high speed traffic
over community lives.
30 people have been killed in car crashes
in my neighborhood in the last 5 years.
30 people.
Each one of those numbers
is a person with a family and friends and neighbors
and a community, and families in the South End deserve better.
This amendment is a very small step
in prioritizing communities in South Seattle
so that our streets are safer for everyone.
We're tremendously excited
that Councilman Morales has proposed this amendment
to increase the size of the levy
and build more sidewalks and safety projects across the city
and that other council members have expressed their support.
Ultimately, whether this levy passes
or not is not up to council.
It's up to Seattle voters and voters
have shown that we support investing
in a transportation system that gives people choices for
how to get where we need to go safely, conveniently,
and affordably, and most importantly, without dying.
I'm going to pass it back to
Councilmember Morales for questions.
-All right, we're going to take a few questions.
-Councilmember Morales...
I know when Councilmember Saka
wanted to make amendments, I think $1.55 million,
so this will increase that.
Can you go through again the bullet points
of what changes you wanted to add to this
that makes that proposal different
and what the status is now?
-Sure.
So what we saw at committee
last week is that there's a lot of energy around vision zero
around increased sidewalks.
There's energy around freight, bridges.
But at the $1.5 level that's being considered by the chair,
in order to do one of those things,
we have to take money from the other.
So the difference is that we've added all of those things
together to see how much it would cost,
how much it would increase the levy,
and it does come out to about $1.7.
So there's no difference between what I'm proposing
and what amendments were submitted last week.
The difference is that we're putting them all
together to say we can do all of it
and voters have demonstrated
that they're interested in doing all of it.
-What happens from here?
Does Council have to vote on it before it goes to the voters?
-Yes.
So procedurally,
what happens is that we vote on the amendments
next week at the committee meeting on Tuesday.
Then it goes to full council.
Once it passes full council,
which I believe the intent is to vote on July 9th,
then it goes to the November ballot and voters
will have a chance to weight in.
-This is still going to be the biggest levy poll
in history for the city?
-That's right. -Thank you.
-What do you say to property owners who have to pay this tax?
Seattle is already one
of the most expensive places to live in the country,
and you started at 1.4 something billion, 1.55, now 1.7.
Some people will say now you should have gone to 1.9.
What do you say to the property owners have to pay this?
-Well, I'll start by saying you can't put a price on safety.
What we're talking about,
as many people have referred to,
is the fact that people are dying on our streets
literally every day.
And so what we're trying to do is demonstrate
that we can actually make our streets safer.
It's going to cost money to invest in better sidewalks,
better infrastructure.
And really, this is basic infrastructure
that we're talking about.
So going up to the 1.7 comes to about $48 a year,
about $4 a month.
And I think people are willing to pay $4 a month.
We've had thousands of emails from constituents
from across the city saying
that they want to see us increase the levy.
We had dozens of people come
and testify at our committee meeting
last week saying the same thing.
And we had a lot of people who lost loved ones
come to committee and say my husband would be here
if we had protected bike lanes in the South End.
My child would be here if we had safer crosswalks for them.
So again, this is about basic safety infrastructure
and everybody deserves that in this city.
Whether you're driving a car or you're commuting by bike
or you're a person in a wheelchair trying
to get to a bus stop,
you deserve to know that you can navigate the city safely
and that's what we're trying to do here.
And voters have demonstrated that they're willing to pay.
-I don't think anyone dispute the arguments over safety,
but there's some trust problems here with the city council
because the new Seattle levy didn't deliver
what was promised.
Voters were upset about that.
Now you're asking for the biggest tax increase
in the city's history.
What do you say to the voters who say you failed last time,
why should we give you a second chance.
-Sure, I guess I'd say two things.
One is that I think the previous levy probably over promised.
It was very specific about very particular projects
that would be delivered.
And sometimes, you know, things happen
that that particular project can't be delivered.
So that's one thing.
The other thing I'll say is that since that levy was passed,
inflation has gone up 67%.
And so a lot of it is related to the cost
of building these projects.
This levy, while that inflation accounts for a lot of the reason
why we're asking for more funding,
but it also will give SDOT greater flexibility
so that we have a list of proposed projects.
But if it turns out that one project is stuck
and we can't deliver on something,
we will still be able to meet the goal of achieving, you know,
a certain number of sidewalks or a certain number of bike lanes
or increasing freight mobility to a certain extent.
So part of the goal here is to give a little more flexibility
so that we can deliver what we need for our community.
-Have you heard any support from your colleagues
on the council yet with your amendments?
-Yeah.
So I am speaking with everybody one on one.
We do have interest.
You know, there's still some interest
in tweaking a little bit,
but I will say that what everybody heard in committee
last week from every part of the city is that our constituents,
regardless of where you live,
our constituents are interested in having a levy
that meets the safety goals that we have as a city.
And again,
we had people coming from every neighborhood in the city
to demonstrate an interest in increasing safety.
Great. Thanks for being here, everybody.
Appreciate it.