WEBVTT 1 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:00:02.410 --> 00:00:21.450 Alright, I'll call the order the 7 October 2026 meeting of the Seattle Ethics and elections commission. We have present online Commissioner Kai Smith, vice Chair of Asso, myself chair Shermer, and present there in the room. Commissioner Evans Smith. 2 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:00:21.450 --> 00:00:39.300 Got a few items on the agenda today. I don't believe we have any written public comment. Is that correct cliff? Yes. Moving to our 1st action item adoption of the September second. 3 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:00:39.300 --> 00:00:59.300 2026 commission meetings. Hopefully all the commissioners have had a chance to read over those minutes. Are there any comments, questions, revisions before we put that to a vote? See none. Is there a motion to adopt the. 4 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:00:59.300 --> 00:01:02.198 September second meeting minutes. 5 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:01:02.198 --> 00:01:04.169 So moved? 6 "Kai Smith" (2958941696) 00:01:08.709 --> 00:01:12.974 Okay. Okay. 7 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:01:12.974 --> 00:01:21.775 All commissioners in favor, say I or raise their hand to adopting the September second minutes. 8 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:01:22.308 --> 00:01:34.837 All right. All pose like all commissioners are in, all commissioners present are in favor, so the minutes from the September second meeting are adopted. 9 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:01:34.837 --> 00:01:50.790 Moving on to our second action item, the democracy voucher outreach fund for 2027 and Wayne, thank you for providing that information sheet. You want to just give us a quick bit of background on this action item. 10 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:01:50.790 --> 00:01:53.618 Yes, I'd actually like to invite Renee. 11 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:01:53.618 --> 00:01:54.371 If she has. 12 "Kai Smith" (2958941696) 00:01:54.371 --> 00:01:55.755 Like to join. 13 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:01:55.755 --> 00:01:57.629 Hello, Renee? 14 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:01:57.629 --> 00:02:12.131 Hello. Hello, commissioners. Thank you for allowing me to attend remotely. I have a trip. I'm heading out on tomorrow, so lots to do ahead. Did you want me to go ahead and get started on the, just overview of the memo and. 15 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:02:12.131 --> 00:02:15.957 Yeah, I think just the brief background would be helpful for the commission. 16 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:02:17.073 --> 00:02:36.680 So, as it is written in the memo, but essentially after the 2017 cycle, we had a external group do a review of aspects of the program, very comprehensive and they talked to the public, people who were running, folks in the advocacy community. 17 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:02:36.680 --> 00:02:56.680 And one of the recommendations, was to expand our outreach ability given that the staff are fairly focused on just simple program administration and handling incoming calls and concerns from the public. So we initially the commission initially approved a hundred and $50000. 18 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:02:56.680 --> 00:03:16.680 Initial grant and over time that, I don't want to call it a grant, it's actually a full request for a proposal, so this is an actual contracting opportunity. We only pay on work completed, invoiced. So then the last time it was updated was ahead of the, the 2025, which was a citywide. 19 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:03:16.680 --> 00:03:35.130 Mayoral for $300000 and that was actually a little above what we had anticipated increasing the budget to just looking at the CPI, the consumer price index. So. 20 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:03:35.130 --> 00:03:55.130 A lot of the outreach contractors, you know, have got deep, long, long routes in this community and we definitely have been relying on them to do a fairly significant amount of work on the program's behalf, and some of that is detailed in the memo here. 21 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:03:55.130 --> 00:04:15.130 And, at the end of each election cycle, we do publish a, a report of activities and in there is a summary of a more detailed summary from the community to organizations that we engaged with for each of the years. So for at $300000, we do cap the contracts at. 22 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:04:15.130 --> 00:04:26.834 $30000 each, so that would give us an opportunity to fund up to ten organizations for the 2027 cycle. 23 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:04:29.411 --> 00:04:34.031 In other words, we're not asking for an increase for this year. 24 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:04:34.031 --> 00:04:35.315 Let's get on. 25 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:04:35.315 --> 00:05:00.821 RFP activities typically have already begun by this point in our preparations for an election year, and so that's, that would be, if there's any questions about it, it would be great if I could try to try to address them in this meeting just so we can get that ball rolling, they're already have been inquiring on whether or not we're gonna be running another RFP, which is a public process. 26 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:05:00.821 --> 00:05:19.939 Thanks. This is, this, these activities are always, you know, I'm always very interested in them, I think it's a really important part of what our staff does. And so, want to thank the staff for and our contractors for the hard work that they've been doing and appreciate putting some of that information. 27 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:05:19.939 --> 00:05:43.587 Regarding their efforts in the memo scene sort of the output of all that hard work. So just want to express our appreciation to the staff there. I do have a couple questions in the $30000 cap. I remember that from the previous cycle, can you just explain to the commission the some of the reasoning behind that cap on. 28 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:05:43.587 --> 00:05:45.239 In the individual. 29 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:05:45.239 --> 00:06:12.328 Contracts. It, it's a number that gives them a chance to do a fair amount of work. These organizations as we all know, are fairly underfunded to begin with. We're also just trying to manage our voucher fund, our voucher budget itself. So this is, this has been a sweet spot for us. We have had some contracts come in that have asked for smaller amounts. Maybe their organizations that won't do. 30 "Kai Smith" (2958941696) 00:06:12.328 --> 00:06:12.998 Zoom. 31 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:06:12.998 --> 00:06:35.210 Some of the bigger capacities and and we always welcome especially if they're 1st timers and it's a chance to have outreach conducted in an area that isn't one of our ones that we do see repeatedly, some of the larger groups that are probably known to most of you in this meeting. Did that help? It's just it's a, it's a number. 32 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:06:35.210 --> 00:06:45.093 That works. Yeah. No, that's helpful. And I want to open up any other questions from the other commissioners or or comments on the outreach fund. 33 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:06:45.890 --> 00:07:01.249 Yeah, thank you for putting the memo together. The, couple just for tactical things the in the memo it says during these years the program budgeted $900000. Did we actually budget 900000 or did we spend 900000? 34 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:07:01.249 --> 00:07:29.195 Well, if they, we've had a couple that have dropped out, so we didn't actually end up spending the money. We had some that were under they under invoiced us, they didn't complete the full $30000 worth of work, so, it's just simpler to point out the amount of money we put out there. The amounts that are, that the under spends are, they're very small, one in here and there. 35 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:07:29.195 --> 00:07:54.259 Gotcha. Okay, thank you. And then the, I think the maybe the broader thing broader question I have is the I appreciate sort of the output metrics in the memo. So engagements, distribution, digital outreach activities. I I sort of in my, in my world they tend to look past the outputs to the outcomes, and. 36 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:07:54.259 --> 00:08:14.259 And what I don't actually seen here and I'd be curious about is, is after having spent not nearly the full $900000 but a lot of that over the years, have we seen a rise in targeted populations using democracy vouchers? Have we seen overall? How are we measuring not just that posted work, but that the work actually. 37 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:08:14.259 --> 00:08:35.219 Actually translated to real outcomes for our city for the dollars. Yeah, are you familiar with Jen Gearway and Brian mccave? Those are the George Town professors who do a lot of studying the program. Yeah, they're the ones after 2017. They came back to us along with Berke and said you need to do more outreach. The donor pool. 38 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:08:35.219 --> 00:08:51.239 Use people are using vouchers look more like cash donors public. Yeah. And what we've seen since then is we have had that problem go away to act, we are seeing more voucher users looking more like the people on the bus than. 39 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:08:51.239 --> 00:09:11.239 Yeah, cash numbers. That's great. I love to hear that I would love if the memo also should be updated just to have some of those numbers just to be curious because I, I do think and and I'm not sure if this, this memo is directly related to my question last month probably was, but I think especially as we're moving into this period of life. 40 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:09:11.239 --> 00:09:27.760 The austerity in the city I think it's gonna be very important that we can justify expenditures of expenditures like this so the more the more outcome metrics that we have better, great, thanks. 41 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:09:28.617 --> 00:09:35.330 Good questions. Other questions or comments from the commissioners? 42 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:09:37.776 --> 00:09:57.776 Renee, just real quickly, I know from from the past when we voted on the outreach fund, it seems like we get some of the same participants or contractors. Is that something you're seeing sort of the same players on the outreach RFPs like submitting for the RFPs? 43 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:09:57.776 --> 00:10:30.229 I would say a good portion of them are folks who have repeatedly been the top folks who've submitted their proposals. We do, we do have a lot of, I I don't know the percentage, but it would be a majority, I would say. Like, for instance this year, we had a very small, amount, and we were focusing on district five and two of the folks who had successful proposals were. 44 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:10:30.229 --> 00:10:40.108 Organizations that we have worked with in the past, some, some months another one we've worked with almost every year. Yeah. 45 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:10:48.979 --> 00:11:03.974 Alright, if there's NO other questions from the commissioners, we'll vote to approve the 2027 democracy voucher outreach funds, so is there a motion to approve the outreach fund? 46 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:11:06.438 --> 00:11:09.670 So moved. 47 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:11:09.670 --> 00:11:11.794 Is there a second? 48 "Kai Smith" (2958941696) 00:11:11.794 --> 00:11:13.898 Second. Okay. 49 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:11:13.898 --> 00:11:23.052 All commissioners in favor of voting to approve the 2027 outreach fund, say I or raise your hand. 50 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:11:24.293 --> 00:11:54.472 All right, all commissioners present voted in favor, NO opposition, NO extensions, so the vote is approved. Moving on to our 3rd action item. This is the council on governmental ethics law conference. Wayne, thank you for providing us with the robust schedule for the conference. Looks like it's jam packed full of items. Do you want to just give us a brief overview of the conference? 51 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:11:54.472 --> 00:11:59.909 Yes, this is the conference that meets annually. It's mainly all the regulators from around. 52 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:11:59.909 --> 00:12:32.751 The country who deal in the world we deal with campaign finance, ethics, stream of information, the lobbying. We all get together in a city, it trans it moves from year to year. And this is as you can see, it's a very stacked agenda, so that's I just want to let you know we are hoping to send somebody again this year. If it looks like we're not gonna have to funds, we won't send somebody, but right now it looks like we will. So this is the opportunity for you to approve the spending, so I'm asking you to do that. Yes. 53 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:12:32.751 --> 00:12:56.509 Thanks Wayne. I I do think it's important for, for the staff to, you know, stay engaged, meet with other jurisdictions, see how they're handling ethics issues. I know some of our previous ethics matters, we've relied on your knowledge of how other jurisdictions handle things to inform our decision making. So you know we kind of looked at other jurisdictions and see how they're. 54 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:12:56.509 --> 00:13:16.772 Working with things and the development of ethical issues especially with social media and technology as things are evolving, I think it's good to stay abreast of these issues. So I think it's important work, happy that we're sending someone in and hopefully we have the budget to do so. Questions comments from any of the commissioners? 55 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:13:16.772 --> 00:13:35.909 Where's that, still sort of getting my bearings here? Where where where do the funds come from that we're approving funds for this? This is our, this is from our annual, this is the annual budget. This is general funds, so, ok, got it. So, but I guess the question is, if we're approving. 56 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:13:35.909 --> 00:13:55.909 Is there something for us to compare against in the sense of like, do we know the total budget from which this gets approved? You you said if we have enough money, you'd like unless we're like running, if it looks like at the end of the year we're not gonna have enough money, we won't send something. Okay. If we'll have enough money, we can send something. It's in December. 57 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:13:55.909 --> 00:14:01.396 Yeah. Okay, thank you. 58 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:14:03.536 --> 00:14:07.976 Other questions or comments? 59 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:14:08.588 --> 00:14:41.296 I just I agree with what you were saying earlier Commissioner Shermer about, just some of these topics are really timely and they're topics that we've gotten public comments kind of related to. So, if, if feasible I think it would certainly be valuable to send a representative and perhaps receive some sort of report back, which I'm assuming they do, after the conference at some point. 60 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:14:41.296 --> 00:15:05.354 I think in Seattle as being really a leader in a lot of this, are we ever invited to be on these panels or not just attendees but participate? Yes, I was on panels last year. I've generally been on a panel many years but not every year, so yeah. Okay, great. Mainly around public finance, those. Yeah. 61 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:15:05.354 --> 00:15:13.097 So, would you be the individual who would attend? 62 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:15:13.097 --> 00:15:29.735 Yes. Okay. That's why that's why I bring it to you just because if it was something on staff I could just approve them going. That's one of the things you would trust me to do as the director. But where it's me, I don't like to spend the money on myself without you all approving it. So yes. 63 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:15:29.735 --> 00:15:33.795 Understandable. 64 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:15:33.795 --> 00:15:41.990 Like I moved to approve if there's money left over for someone to go through. 65 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:15:41.990 --> 00:16:01.394 Yeah, so NO further questions or comments. We'll, we'll take a vote to approve the expenditure for the Denver ethics law conference. Is there a motion to approve the funds? Is there a second? 66 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:16:03.110 --> 00:16:08.393 All commissioners in favor, say I or raise their hand. 67 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:16:08.393 --> 00:16:11.012 All right. 68 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:16:11.012 --> 00:16:45.148 That looks like all commissioners present vote in favor, NO extensions, NO objections, so the motion passes. That is all of our action items for voting. Moving on to the discussion items. We have the late filing penalty letter for the Julie for Seattle D five campaign. Thanks Wayne for sending that around. Do you wanna throw us in a little bit on the background there? I think today may have been the deadline for the appeal or payment of the of the penalty, correct? 69 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:16:45.148 --> 00:17:11.389 Yes, and the payment has already been received. We've received it, processed it already. This is just here for your awareness. Miss Kang did not report norf frankly, did the campaign tell us with all the clarity that we needed, what was going on early in the year? Probably reached out to them at some point because it is just the two weeks, so we have a lot of opportunity to reach out to them. Like, did you spend anything on your web. 70 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:17:11.389 --> 00:17:29.279 Website, they told us that NO, they've not. But it turned out that they had. Well, not that they'd spent money that they had the person who was helping them was someone who was in the business of doing that. So that was basically an in kind contribution. So they went back and reported it after we. 71 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:17:29.279 --> 00:17:45.179 Came to that as well as the PDC. So yes. Can I, as, as a person who's volunteering campaigns are here, if, is, is the issue, is what's that issue here with the fine? The fact that the people who did this. 72 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:17:45.179 --> 00:18:04.469 Do this professionally. So I had it been a teenager who knows their way around coding, who set up the website as a volunteer for the campaign, that would just be regular volunteer activity. Right, ok. Great. I should point out though that it was that that was one of them, but also the fact that Annabelle Lee, she is related. 73 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:18:04.469 --> 00:18:21.839 To the person who did the work, she was actually paying for the hosting fees. So there was a monthly fee, so she was literally paying that out of pocket guy. So that was that should have been reported. Yeah. And when you go through these campaign expenditures, something. 74 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:18:21.839 --> 00:18:43.396 I found interesting from the letter that it sounds like you looked at the expense report and you knew they had a website, but you didn't see any accounting for that. So that's sort of how this came to play, right? Okay, well Holly, great job. Yes yes, thank you Polly. 75 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:18:43.396 --> 00:19:00.234 Other questions, comments on this item? Well it sounds like there's NO appeal and the penalty has been paid so thanks for the update on that way and moving on to our second discussion item, the Lebby workgroup. 76 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:19:00.234 --> 00:19:26.248 Alright, that is just, I think in the last couple days we got IMI report from uncommon bridges. We'll be sharing that with you soon as well as the other members of the working group and then we'll decide what happens to it. Do they wanna, could we ask them to present it to us, to the city council? So yeah, that all those things are to be decided at some point, but yes, they are done with the work. 77 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:19:26.248 --> 00:19:41.875 And, and when, thanks for that update and the and the I guess the next part of that process, whether it's presented to the commission or to the council, is that a decision that the that we make or is that something that the workgroup is making? 78 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:19:41.875 --> 00:19:52.519 I think it will be the work group, obviously like you're in control of one of the members of the workgroup, so, you know, if you have a strong feeling, a disposition that I did one way or the other, you could let me know then. 79 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:19:52.519 --> 00:20:18.216 But yeah, I I think it would be interesting I mean both honestly makes sense and in my opinion, it would be interesting as commissioners is, you know, even if it's informational to see kind of learn about the process of it. You know, we've been hearing reporting from yourself throughout, but once we have the finished product to digest and understand a bit, it would be interesting to maybe just have a high level presentation at at the least. Yeah. 80 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:20:18.216 --> 00:20:21.355 Okay, we'll make sure that happens. 81 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:20:21.355 --> 00:20:35.316 Other comments from any of the commissioners on this item? Alright, moving on to the democracy voucher program report. Renee, is this you? 82 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:20:35.316 --> 00:21:01.499 Yeah, that's me. Pretty brief report, things are winding down for the 2026 cycle. Our two candidates are getting closer to their maximum campaign valuations, but so far NO one has quite got there. There has been very little IE activity at this point, so that isn't quite a factor in how campaigns are. 83 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:21:01.499 --> 00:21:21.499 I'm getting close to the cap, the voucher returns pretty much consistently we're seeing all the paper vouchers in the majority and we are seeing a little bit of an up uptick in the campaign replacement form, activity, but it is, like I said, it's a, it's a little sleepy. 84 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:21:21.499 --> 00:21:44.479 Right now. I do want to just kind of mention broadly some things that are happening cause 2027 is around the corner and planning for that. Again, thank you for the approval for the spending for the outreach fund that really helps. We are already meeting with our printing and mailing vendor to start to order paper and do really exciting things like figure out how much. 85 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:21:44.479 --> 00:22:04.479 Message we need to purchase and all of that. We'll also go through all the artwork for the voucher mailer and see what changes we need to make for the district elections. We already have a district five candidate for 2027 who has registered a committee with our office and is going to be in the. 86 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:22:04.479 --> 00:22:26.479 Gotcha program, so that will all start getting updated on our website soon. So there are those things and then also with our new IT employee, we've already been able to make some great changes to our online portal, which was functioning, but not quite as well as we wanted to. 87 "LeBeau, Rene" (4198045440) 00:22:26.479 --> 00:22:55.048 Too so she's been great to have some insight in inside help with that. Otherwise, yeah, we're just gearing up for 2027 and pretty, pretty excited about it actually, so, I'm trying to think if there are, yeah, much else? Any questions about what's happening currently or for next year? 88 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:22:55.048 --> 00:23:07.632 I don't think there's any questions. Thanks for the summary. Thank you. All right, moving on to our last item executive director's report, Wayne. 89 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:23:07.632 --> 00:23:20.436 There's not really much going on here. Nothing I don't have any major snaphouse job bringing you or anything like that. Yes. The ship of state sales off. 90 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:23:20.436 --> 00:23:33.936 All quiet, ok? Correct. That's good. Any, any final comments from any of the commissioners for the get of the order? 91 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:23:33.936 --> 00:23:46.990 No, just thank you for, thank you Renee for the updates as always and thank you staff for bringing together a great meeting. 92 "FAS SMT 4080" (879339008) 00:23:46.990 --> 00:23:49.187 Plus one. 93 "Jonathan" (251964160) 00:23:49.187 --> 00:24:03.556 That concludes the agenda. Our next meeting is 4 November 2026 Hope to see you all there. And with that we will conclude the meeting and we are adjourned. Thank you everyone. 94 "Vivian Vassall" (880841728) 00:24:03.556 --> 00:24:06.029 Thank you. Thank you.