AN ORDINANCE establishing a new University District Parking and Business Improvement Area (BIA); levying special assessments upon owners of commercial, multifamily residential property, and mixed-use property within the BIA; providing for the deposit of revenues in a special account and expenditures therefrom; providing for collection of and penalties for delinquencies; providing for the establishment of a BIA Advisory Board; providing for an implementation agreement with a Program Manager; providing for the continuity of services and the transfer of any remaining funds from the current U. District BIA account that was established in 2015 by Ordinance 124761; and ratifying and confirming certain acts related thereto.
Actual Agenda Item two Council Bill 119779 Establishing a new university district parking business improvement area loving special assessment of owners of commercial multi-family, residential property and mixed use property within the value. Thank you so much. I moved past council bill 119779. Is there a second? It's been moved and seconded to pass the bill. Councilman, what else? You're the primary sponsor of the bill, so I am going to recognize you in order to address this item. Thank you. I will be missed by way of background, colleagues, as I mentioned several weeks ago, we have the new district area before us. The Community Economic Development Committee met on May 20th for an initial briefing and discussion of the bill, which would establish a new bank. Proponents of the of the Nubia, as well as central staff in the Office of Economic Development, presented to the Committee to describe the background and intent of the proposal. The legislation as transmitted does include a couple of changes to the way the bill is structured. It would have two additional business tenants who have triple net leases. As Councilmember Peterson mentioned earlier. So tenants who pay. Taxes, insurance and maintenance. It would also add one residential representative and I know we got an email recently asking about that. So there is one residential representative on the new in the new structure. On May 27, the committee held the required public hearing to discuss proposed amendments. And then we had planned to vote on those amendments in committee this week, obviously, because we have shifted things for the budget discussions to begin. We are now considering the amendments today. So we've talked about this a little bit in briefing this morning. I will just give a quick summary of the of the amendments and then hand it back to the House president. Amendment one, as we know, is technical corrections and clarifications with the addition of holding that UTEP at its current number of five seats on the advisory board. It also shifts contracting responsibility, which is an administrative change from FASB to OED. They have agreed to this and that was adopted in the VA policies in 2016. Amendment two is the shortens the term of the bill itself from 12 years to ten and the interim program manager position from five years to one year. As I said earlier this morning, the rationale for shortening that program manager contract is that other groups need the opportunity to bid. But as I said before and to my mind, there's already a competitive bid process that anybody who is interested could engage in. And if this passes or we would have to bid out starting in a year. And in my mind, there isn't a clear rationale for shortening the term by two years. So I will leave it there and. Turning back to Europe Council president. Great. Thank you so much. So we are I know there are the amendments as described. And so I want to make sure that we move through the process of those amendments. So this is what we're going to do. I appreciate because we're glad to see you addressing the underlying bill. I know, again, that Councilmember Pearson discussed this morning that he has a couple of amendments and so we're going to go through the process of that mandatory work. So I believe there are a total of. Let's see here, two amendments, both by Councilmember Peterson. So I'm going to go ahead and handed over to Councilmember Peterson to walk us through those amendments. And my request would be that we take them one at a time. So let's do Amendment one, and then we will have consideration and debate on Amendment One. And then we will consider amendment to Councilmember Peterson. The floor is yours. Thank you. Council President Gonzalez. And thanks again to Chair Morales, who accurately and fairly describes the underlying legislation. I really appreciate the collaboration with her throughout this process, and I appreciate the patient patience of my colleagues as we take a pause from the crises going around us here to to renew or reauthorize this business improvement area. There are ten throughout the city. This is one of them in the university district just to move the process along here, since we did discuss it at length this morning. I'd like to move to amend Council Bill 119779 by substituting version to be a version one F as presented on Amendment one on today's agenda. Second. Thank you. It's been moved and seconded, so the motion is properly before us. So Peterson Floor is yours to address Amendment one. Thank you. So this is full of technical corrections, for example, changing the the administrator from director of FEMA to the director of the Office of Economic Development. It does have the noncontroversial amendment in there about solidifying the existing membership of the University of Washington at five members. And so Yolanda Ho went through this yesterday or excuse me this morning and happy to answer any questions about that. This substitute will get the Second Amendment is where it gets more complex, but this is just the substitute with the technical corrections. Thank you so much, Councilmember Peterson. I was chuckling at your reference to thinking that this morning was yesterday, which seems appropriate for this day and age in terms of how quickly time seems to fly beyond us. So, colleagues, any questions or comments on the proposed substitute? Councilmember Lewis, the floor is yours. Thank you so much, Madam President. I just want to really thank Councilmember Gonzales, City Councilmember Ralston, Casper Peterson for the work that they've done on this bill as a member of this committee. I'm really glad that we were able to work on this critical reauthorization without any hesitation. And I'll say that on the matter of adopting. To be or not to be a side on voting yes for substitute to be so thank you so much. Great. Thank you so much. Any other comments or questions on the substitute bill? Okay. Hearing none, I would ask that the clerk please call the role on the adoption of the substitute together. Macheda I. Peterson. All right. So what? I. Strauss. I. Juarez. I verbal. I. Lewis high Morales. I President Gonzalez. I. Nine in favor and opposed. The motion carries the substitute is adopted and version two B of the bill is before the City Council. I understand that there is another amendment. This is Amendment two, which is, I think, described as a little trickier. Councilmember Peterson And so we will now hear from Councilmember Peterson as he formally moves consideration of amendment to. Thank you. Council President I move to amend council bill 119779 as presented on amendment two on the agenda. Their second. Check it. Okay. It's been moved and seconded to consider Amendment two and consumer protection. I'll go ahead and hand it back over to you to address the proposed amendment. Thank you. And again, I want to echo the comments of Councilmember Morales in terms of what the status quo has been over the last five years with the business improvement area in the University District. The legislation that was developed did have stakeholder engagement. And so there are there are already very important improvements in what we're voting on today. So the bill and the substitute adds a prevention of economic displacement as part of the mission of the DIA. That is new and important considering the rapid changes that have been going on in the University District to prevent displacement as part of the CIA's mission. It also re institutes term limits. On the members of the Ratepayer Advisory Board and has a few other improvements as well to what the existing situation is. Now one of the changes though is that it moves from a five year vigor to a 12 year vigor, and the bayous across the city have different lengths . The 12 year bill did raise some by more than doubling, and it raised some concerns from some small business owners who wanted to not see it more than doubled. So there is no magic to go and my proposal to go from 12 to 10 years. It's just that we're doubling it. It's consistent with ten year term and some other bids in the city. And it's some of the small businesses that wanted to reauthorize that, only five years, seven years. So the ten year was I was doing that as a compromise. The other issue is how the program manager is selected to operate the clean and safety programs and economic development programs and prevention of displacement programs of the DIA. Currently, the Ratepayer Advisory Board looks at that every year and decides who that is. This would open up the process for a competitive process. It's a $1 million contract. The I think there is agreement in general that that competition can can bring a healthy outcome and gets more stakeholders and community driven organizations to get involved in potentially managing the the the request for proposal is a very thorough process that can become time consuming. So just in the last week, I changed this concept so that to start this in the first year, this competitive process is what this amendment is, is to speed it up to start sooner with only one year from now to change it from an RFP to an RFQ, a request for qualification. So that is. So I've amended my amendment. It's already in there before you as a request for qualifications in that first year so that the Office of Economic Development can do it in a more streamlined fashion. There were concerns raised during public comment that even that is not what's wanted by a lot of folks out there. So. But I believe that having this competitive process have it the giving the ability to community based organizations to compete for that program manager position is important. This amendment combines those two things going from a 12 year to ten year and also having an RFQ process in year one. Happy to answer questions. Thank you so much. Colleagues, are there any comments or questions on Amendment two? Okay. I'm not seeing or hearing anyone with any questions. So I'm council member, so please. Looks like you're still on mute, Councilmember. Silent. Okay. I want to say that I'm planning on voting yes on this amendment. Appreciate it. Councilmember Herbold, we can hear your conversation in the background. Thank you. Go ahead, Councilperson. Thank you. I'm planning on voting yes on this amendment. You know, the thing is, the business improvement area is a very strange structure in Seattle. They are funded by property taxes, only paid by commercial property. And then the so-called democracy of the bay gives the commercial property owners a vote roughly proportional to the amount of property that they own. So the more you own, the more votes you get. So it is reasonable that small businesses who have no meaningful say in the operations of the Beehive would ask for changes and things like time limits. I'm not convinced. My office is not convinced that this amendment will make a substantive difference, but I will support the request by the smaller businesses in the Bay and vote yes on. Any other questions or comments because we're a mosquito. Thank you. House Member Peterson, I want to thank you for. Walking through with our staff. With my staff, the. Response to the questions that I sent. And Councilmember Morales. So I'm wondering if you had any additional thoughts about this amendment as well. At this point, I know that we've heard concerns from community members with initiating a review process one year after via authorization instead of five years, which is included in the base legislation. I fully support the supplemental efforts that have been put forward, but these concerns centered around the critical need to provide folks on the ground to support small businesses in trying to weather the impacts of COVID, especially women and minority owned businesses in the neighborhood. So in addition, there's a desire to immediately initiate a hiring process for the executive director, which would have to be put on hold for one year should this amendment pass via board. And ratepayers have agreed to a five year RFP included in the base legislation. But there are concerns about, in our view, just one year later, they are worried that this amendment will introduce uncertainty about who the operator will be at a time when continuity is important for relationships built. With small businesses. As they grapple with how to sustain from the impacts of COVID. And UDP has been operating with the interim for the last two years and waiting for reauthorization to search for a new executive director. One year authorization would not allow the UDP to attract a candidate and would introduce even more uncertainty. So in addition to shrinking the term for the VA from 12 years to ten years, which runs counter to the outcomes of the community engagement, where there's a majority of stakeholders have. Supported a 12 year. Process, I'm concerned about those issues and right now I'm leaning towards voting. No on. This amendment. I just wanted to hear if there was any. Feedback from that, those questions or concerns, and wanted to flag for you my concerns on that. Councilmember Peterson or Morales. Any response to that? Councilmember Morales is on mute. Yeah. So what I will say is that there are a couple of so these have been restructured a little bit. I don't necessarily ten years or 12 years to me is not significant. Enough. Difference, candidly. I think for me, the part that I struggle with an amendment to is really about shortening the term for the program manager, in part because if we are talking about increasing the responsibility at OED within a year when it is a, you know, fairly small department with a small budget and will be taxed even more during this budget crisis, the idea of of setting that precedent of them moving so quickly. When we have other videos that might also want to move in this direction. I am really worried about the capacity of the departments to carry this out and just the question about, you know, the existing program manager. I understand that, you know, other organizations might be interested in getting to take that role, take on that role and those responsibilities. But there is nothing preventing them from doing that now. And so creating this trust, this just doesn't it's just not I just don't see a clear rationale for creating this extra process right now. Thank you, Counselor Morales. Any other questions or comments on Amendment two? Councilmember Herbold, please. Thank you. So for many, many years, we've heard from businesses in the district about their concerns about the structure of the BIA. The perception that the University of Washington has an outsized role as compared to other businesses. So I really appreciate the fact that the bill addresses this. And given that there have been, you know, many years of concerns that I've heard from from businesses that don't feel well represented by the BIA. Normally, I would have been inclined to support amendment too. The problem is, and I acknowledge I may have missed some correspondence, but I've looked in my my. My emails. There are about 5000 in the inbox, but I have only found one email in support of this amendment. And so I'm. When I'm look. Working on legislation that is intended to sort of buck the status quo and address concerns that folks who don't feel represented have identified. I, I really need to hear from folks to just sort of confirm for myself that this is a problem that many people feel needs addressing. And so given the fact that there has only been one person that I can find that has written in support of Amendment two, I'm not inclined to vote in support of it. Thank you. Councilmember Herbold, any other comments or questions? Okay. Hearing on I would just say that I am of the same mind as Councilmember Herbold on this one. I have had an opportunity to dig through my inbox as well and have seen that an overwhelming number of people are expressing support for the virus as a whole and with really specific requests to not support Amendment two . And and in particular, we have a letter from and quite a number of nonprofit organizations in the district who have expressed concerns about this and renewing called in today specifically for purposes of supporting the VA, but expressing their collective concerns on this particular amendment. So at this point, I don't feel that I can support Amendment two. And I also take to heart the comments made by Councilmember Morales in terms of the additional burden this will place on OED in the context of a potentially restricted budget, that, you know, those resources are going to be a little bit more limited than usual for OED in terms of executing on the intent and purpose of the VA. I do appreciate the the sponsors interest in and trying to sort of right size this issue for smaller businesses. And but unfortunately for the reasons that I've just stated, I don't I don't think that I can support this amendment at this juncture. So with that being said, I'm happy to give you the last word, Councilmember Peterson, if you have anything else that you'd like to add before I call the roll. Thank you. Council President I just want to thank my colleagues for their comments and their valid points and certainly the situation with the interim executive director, the need to make that permanent. And COVID has created complications regarding this. But I, I, I really hope that the public can see that, you know, even if this amendment doesn't pass, there are improvements. We have better representation. We have better governance built in prevention of displacement. And I hope the public can see here is a city council that is collaborating, that is focused on the basics when we when we can do that during these crises. And I just want to thank my colleagues for their grace during this. Thank you, Councilmember Peterson. Appreciate those words and reminders to the general public. Okay. So we're going to go out and close out debate on this particular amendment. So I'm going to ask that the clerk please call the role on the adoption of Amendment two. Must get to. Must get out. I sorry. No. Pietersen. I. So what. I. Strauss now. Suarez. No. Her Herbold. Mayor Lewis. Yes. Morale is so. President Gonzalez now. Three in favor, six opposed, the motion fails and the amendment is not adopted. Colleagues, are there any other further comments on the bill as amended? I'm sorry. This is a substitute bill. So it's not amended. Is there any further comments on the bill? Okay. Hearing none, I would ask that the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill. Let's get up. I. Petersen. I do want. Strauss. I. Juarez. I verbal. I. Louis. Yes. Morales. Yes. President Gonzalez I nine in favor. Opposed the bill passes and the chair will sign it and I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation. Okay, folks. Adoption of other resolutions. We're in the homestretch here. So I am going to ask that the clerk please read item three into the record.