AN ORDINANCE relating to the organization of the Office for Civil Rights; amending Section 3.14.910 of the Seattle Municipal Code to change the end of the Director’s term and remove an outdated subsection requiring a racial equity toolkit.
The Report of the Community and Economic Development Committee Agenda Item one Council Bill 120000. An Ordinance relating to the Organization of the Office for Civil Rights amending Section 3.14.910 of the Seattle Municipal Code to change the end of the director's term and remove an outdated subsection requiring a racial equity toolkit. The committee recommends the bill pass. Like so much Councilman Morales, as chair of the committee, you are recognized in order to provide the committee report. Thank you, colleagues. So this is a bill that would, as the clerk mentioned, extend the term of the Office of Civil Rights Director from December 2021 to December 2022. And just by way of a little bit of background to try to give you some context here, in 2017, councilmembers heard a variety of concerns from stakeholders that the Office of Civil Rights Structure and authority within the executive branch could possibly limit its ability for the department to fulfill its mission. And so the council at that time passed an ordinance that provided that the next Office of Civil Rights Director would be confirmed by council with just cause removal protections and a limited term that would end in 2021. So the reason for this extension is kind of a twofold. The first, some of that work is still continuing, and so there is an interest in that transition that would be implemented by that legislation, having a consistent director, stable director leadership position for the next year until that work is complete. And the second reason is that extending the term is one of the measures that could provide greater independence. And by which I mean, it would allow for the directorship to have staggered terms with the appointing authority. So that's part of the two of the reasons why this extension for one year is being requested. The intent here is not to continue to extend the directorship, but to just extend for this one year. I also want to take a minute just to express my strong support for the implementation of Racial Equity Toolkit recommendations that came out of this work. As a former human rights commissioner, I participated in the extensive process that culminated in that report. And it did include input from community members, from workers, from other human rights commissioners at the time. So I'm eager for that work to get completed. And I do want to thank Councilmember Herbold for bringing forth the original slide in 2017 to examine how we can strengthen the Office of Civil Rights. And as I mentioned, this was passed out of committee with a recommendation that it do pass. Thank you. Councilmember Morales, are there any comments from council members on this bill? House members, what is your hand up? Oh, that might be a holdover. It looks like it was a holdover. So, yes. Councilman Morales, thank you for recognizing myself as the author of the slide that led to the work of recommendations from led by OCR and delivered to the Council. I think in late 2019 I was also the sponsor of the legislation that we are amending today and just mentioning that, just to let my colleagues know that as the sponsor of that legislation that created a term and created a requirement for a just cause reason for termination that I do in fact support this legislation. That there are no further comments. Will the clerk please call the roll on the passage of the bill? So why aren't? Yes. Strauss. Yes. LEWIS Yes. Morales As there are, I think. PETERSON Yes. Council president pro tempore vote yes. Seven in favor. Nine opposed. Thank you so much. The bill passes and the chair will sign it. Will the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf? Item number two. Will the clerk please read item number two into the record?