A RESOLUTION modifying the April 24, 2020, emergency order relating to capping restaurant delivery and pick-up commission fees.
Hi. My favorite in the post. Thank you so much. The motion carries, the resolution is adopted and the chair will sign it. And I ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation. All right, folks, this is the last item of business on our agenda, and that is new item 14. So I would move to adopt resolution 31945. Is there a second second? It's been moved and seconded to adopt the resolution. So is the sponsor of this resolution. I'll quickly address it first and then ask for comments. Colleagues, I already went through a very long description of what this resolution is this morning. So I don't want to belabor the point. This resolution ratifies the mayor's executive order on placing a 50% tax on third party delivery services. So this would apply to charges that are placed or passed on to a restaurant commission fee per online delivery or pick up order for the use of its services. That totals more than 50% of the purchase price of such online orders and would be prohibited until restaurants are allowed to offer unrestricted dine in service and the governor's stay home state healthy proclamation is rescinded or the mayoral proclamation of Civil Emergency, dated March 3rd, 2020 is rescinded, whichever proclamation is rescinded later. This executive order also makes it unlawful for third party app based food delivery platform to reduce the compensation rates paid to the delivery service driver to grant or to garnish gratuities as a result of this order going into effect during the duration of this order. Importantly, in terms of enforcement, the city attorney's office will be the primary enforcer of this executive order, as they are for all executive orders. Any person found to have knowingly violated this civil emergency order will be guilty of a failure to obey the measures emergency order and can be punished with a fine of up to $500 or or is otherwise provided by the municipal code. So that the context of the executive order is, is rather simple. We were trying to a collaboration with Councilmember Herbold and the mayor to keep the executive order narrowly focused to address the relationship between third party based app providers and and restaurant owners. This morning, I acknowledge that there will be a need for us to address the realities of the disparate relationship that exists between drivers and these third party delivery apps. Many of us on council have worked with Labor partners to lift up the stories of many of these drivers and other gig economy workers who are really working in and in a completely unregulated industry and have no protections whatsoever in this space. And so I think it's important for us to highlight that we recognize that that is an issue. Those labor standards is an absolute issue and need in the community. But this executive order is designed to be much more narrowly focused on, again, that relationship between these these apps and and the restaurants and the contractual relationship between those two types of entities. Nonetheless, we have included some language in this executive order to make sure that there isn't a negative impact to drivers as a result of that of of the implementation of this executive order. And looking forward to staying in contact with our labor partners to make sure that as they are interacting with workers, that they are organizing, that we hear directly from them, even if it's in an anecdotal fashion, whether or not this is having an unintended consequence on on that sector of the labor in our city. So I know there's much more to come on this. And I know that many of you on council have been working with many of the labor partners on addressing issues related to this particular worker population. So with that being said, I'm going to conclude my comments there because I've made a lot of other comments during a council briefing this morning and I am going to hand it over to Councilman Morales won't understand has an amendment to the resolution that was not circulated before today's new deadline. So in order for us to consider an amendment to the resolution, a suspension of the rules is needed. And so I'm going to if there's no objection, the council rules will be suspended to allow consideration of Amendment the. Was not circulated by noon today. So hearing no objection, the council rules are suspended and we can proceed with consideration of the amendments. I'm going to hand it over to Councilmember Morales so that she can make her motion. Yes, I move that. We amend resolution 31945 by substituting version two for version b1b as presented on the substitute recently distributed. Second. It's been moved and seconded to substitute the resolution confirmed for Dallas as sponsor of the substitute. I'm going to go ahead and hand it over to you to address the amendment. Thanks very much. This just incorporates both the the recital that Councilmember Herbold had had asked for earlier and then a couple of amendments that we added. So I want to thank Council President Gonzalez for adding language that my office requested to protect drivers from wage theft by a tip garnishing. As many of you know, last year DoorDash was found to be doing this to their drivers. And this will be an important protection to ensure that drivers are protected during this time. We've also added language to ensure that app based delivery companies don't discriminate against low income neighborhoods as a way to retaliate against the city. You may have seen that in San Francisco. This is what Uber Eats did completely cutting off the low income community of Treasure Island, which is just 15 minutes from the downtown San Francisco headquarters, even going as far as trying to organize the low income community against the city. So these are all incorporated in this new substitute. And I thank all of you for helping us to make sure that nobody gets retaliated against when we are trying to protect workers and protect low income folks. Thank you, Councilmember Morales, for those remarks. I consider all of these amendments to be friendly amendments and have absolutely no issue with incorporating them. I think they're they're good amendments and strengthen the executive order and the intent of the executive order. So thank you for that. Are there any additional comments on the substitute? A hearing nun. Will the clerk please call the role on the adoption of the substitute? Peterson. I want. I. Strauss. Hi. Purple. Hi. Suarez. Hi, Luis. Hi. Morales, I. Michaela, I was thinking first. I. Nine in favor, none opposed. The motion carries and a substitute is adopted in version two of the resolution is before their council. The Council. Are there any additional comments on the resolution as amended? Councilmember Peterson, the floor is yours. I just wanted to thank the council president for doing so much outreach to the various stakeholders. Thank you. I think it's not. Councilmember Lewis, I see your hand. You are next. And then Councilmember Mosquito. So thank you, everybody, for bringing this forward. And I look forward to voting for the substitute again today now that it is the the official resolution. I just wanted to flag that going forward based on our conversation this morning, I am interested in working with folks potentially on some kind of hazard pay ordinance. I've been talking to some of our partners at the Teamsters and work in Washington about the possibility of pursuing some additional legislation. As we discussed this morning, I just want to flag my interest in that. I want to flag my interest in that to the community as well. Who is watching this afternoon and concerned about some of the things that aren't addressed by the order. And just wanted to let everyone know, you know, I, for one, am interested I'm sure some of my council colleagues are interested and I look forward to having that discussion this week. Councilmember Lewis customer. Thank you, Council President. You know, I think that this effort is really important to make sure that workers are protected. And I also want to make sure that we're underscoring the intent to reduce the fees that these large companies are imposing on small businesses. I think council president has spoken well about that concern. Right now we want to make sure that our smallest businesses are not having additional fees imposed on them. And we've heard stories both anecdotally and we've seen some data that indicates that it is a hardship for many of these small businesses, these restaurants, to have that be imposed on them. So I think that this will be helpful. But the second part that we're talking about here is the food that our small businesses are creating have to be delivered to the homes of residents across the city and would not be done without the work of those who are on these app based platforms. I'm concerned that the original drafting of this executive order by the mayor's office didn't include a more robust conversation with the Teamsters, with folks that work in Washington, and additionally with some of the folks who've been reaching out to our office in an effort to engage in a robust conversation. For example, the folks at Postmates, who I think we're looking for some solutions as well. I am appreciative of some of the language that you were able to get included in here to make sure that the ordinance or the order is clear, that we don't want to see reductions in wages. We don't want to see reductions in gratuity. And as we also commit today to wanting to work with stakeholders, specifically Teamsters 117 and we're in Washington and there's a few pieces that I'd like to call our attention to. We've heard repeatedly that there's been ongoing training that's been offered to the fleet, if you will, of individuals to do the delivery. But this has not been accompanied by adequate PPE. So that's an ongoing issue that we know to see is personal protective equipment for all of these individuals who are delivering food to our community members. It's already been mentioned the desire to see hazard pay for these workers, and I fully support that. Access to restrooms is something that we've talked about being a concern for, not just those who don't have a place to use the restroom in their own home because they are houseless. But also for workers just like this, folks across the city who need access to clean, accessible restrooms and looking forward to making sure that the folks who are providing this service, delivering food, can also access restaurants in a safe way that also works for our small businesses. I appreciate the language that Councilmember Morales has put forward in conjunction with Council President Gonzalez to make sure that there is not a reduction in delivery services, especially in communities of color, in those lowest wage communities, and that we ensure equity across the city by your location amendment. And then finally, I think the council president has spoken well about this, but our concern, I think, remains around enforcement. And I think we'll be looking for also to provide additional information, because we know that people will reach out to all of us as sort of the default agency where they seek information. So looking forward to making sure that's very clear to folks how to report if there are either unintended consequences or issues that might have cropped up that have not been fully addressed. So again, I want to thank the folks who've been working to highlight some concerns that are ongoing. And I think the full commitment from this council, as you've heard, is to make sure that we address issues like PPE, training, hazard pay, and that we're intentional about coming back and working with all of you. Teamsters, both states working in Washington, others who've reached out to our office. And I appreciate that this is one one piece of the pie or one step as as has been described today to make sure that our smallest businesses, those restaurants really don't have this being imposed on them. That's critical. And I'll support the the ordinance with all the work that you've done, council President and with the amendments that you've included. Thank you so much. That's very silent. I thought I saw you raise your hand. There we go. Okay. Just confirming you are up next. Thank you, President Gonzalez. I will be supporting this today. And I want to also reiterate the points that have been made by some other council members about the need to explicitly look out for the interests of some of our most vulnerable workers, workers who are not even recognized as employees who are misclassified as independent contractors. I certainly support having an executive order to protect small business restaurants from being gouged by big app based delivery companies. Just as I've supported and helped organize for small business rent control. However, I am in solidarity with the concerns that are being expressed by working Washington by the Teamsters and by other community organizations that represent worker interests . That we cannot stop with this executive order because we need to fully address the needs of workers, either in the restaurants or the interests of delivery drivers who are risking their lives to help people statewide or for very little compensation. And in the absence of any kind of protective equipment and hardly any protective equipment, and as working Washington have said, you know, they are an organization that has helping organizing the delivery workers who will be directly impacted by orders such as these and as well as restaurant workers and workers with other industries. And, you know, to quote working Washington from their letter when they expressed concerns about this executive order, they say the delivery drivers are among the lowest paid workers in the city, with rates as low as a dollar 45 per hour. After expenses on DoorDash and restaurant workers are at least protected by Seattle's minimum wage $18 an hour minimum wage that our movement fought for. But because delivery workers are often misclassified as independent contractors, they like even those many of those protections, many of the worker protections. And I really strongly agree with working Washington's letter that, you know, and in fact, there may be some of these demands earlier on and also by the grassroots strike of Instacart workers and the working Washington letter actually reiterate some of the demands made by the grocery strike up interests Instacart workers and called from the Instacart strike worker strike statement all of and work in Washington. They are urging that those council really push for requiring a hazard pay surcharge of $5 per delivery. And if they say if that is for some reason not possible to enacting the emergency rules and you can, as an alternative, explore imposing a parallel 15% cap on the share of delivery fees and service charges and an opportunity to take the workers to help the workers providing the service. I also would say that I strongly support the work that is being done by the Office of Labor Standards, but we have to make sure that as a council we do we stand against any kind of budget cuts. And this discussion has come in the context of the Amazon legislation that we have to oppose any kind of budget cuts, because the budget cuts will impact departments of city departments like the Office of Labor Standards, who, if they have their staffing or their staffing, is not able to be augmented, then the investigations that the workers rely on will not be able to be carried out in a timely manner. Thank you. Councilmember Sawant. Councilmember Strauss. Thank you, council president. I'll make this brief. I appreciate our work to protect small businesses, and we need to also identify how we can protect our workers who are delivering these foods. We need to take into consideration how we can protect good actors such as Postmates and follow up with Teamsters and work in Washington to identify ways that the people who are keeping us all living their lives as normal as possible. When I was in a miracle, I was red carded as a wildland firefighter, and firefighters, when they're just at the station, receive one rate of pay. And when you have fire under your feet and smoke in your lungs, you will see because you're putting your life on the line, a hazard on behalf of the rest of the community. And I think that we need to have pay for our workers here, here in the city making making it so that we can live as close to life to normal as possible. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Strauss. Councilmember Herbold. Thank you. I just want to underscore one of the points that's been made. It will be with passage of this emergency order. Unlawful for a third party app based food delivery platform to reduce compensation rates paid to delivery service drivers or garnish gratuities as a result of this order going into effect . I want to take some responsibility for the fact that I was an early advocate for us to use the the the the vehicle of an emergency order to address this issue quickly and was assured that we would deal separately with some of the issues around minimum compensation for for delivery drivers who are not otherwise considered employees. I think it's really important to recognize that. With this act that we are about to take. We are not only helping small businesses, but we are helping the the people who are considered employees under the law of those small businesses. We know that in Seattle, the majority of employees actually work for small businesses. And so it's really important to recognize that this is an act that is designed to make it possible for small businesses to continue to employ people. Many of the businesses in my district who came to me about this this emergency order, as was passed in San Francisco, told me that they were considering that the Paycheck Protection Program, what we referred to as TPP, which was a paycheck protection program, was going to be the thing that was going to come to their rescue and allow them to continue to pay their employees. And it's because of the the failure of the Paycheck Protection Program to meet the needs of small businesses that they are then reaching out to the Council on on this issue related to capping service charges so that they can continue to pay their employees as well as stay open. So many thanks to Madam President Gonzalez, as well as the mayor's office and working quickly to pull this together and look forward to continued work to address the needs of the drivers and and moving quickly on that. But I am also again reassured that the the order before us makes very clear what's what is not lawful and what the process is for our city to have the city attorney enforce emergency orders that are violated. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Herbold, well said. I don't have anything to add to that. I appreciate you highlighting those those points. Colleagues, any other comments before I go ahead and close this out? Okay. No other comments. So I'm going to go ahead and ask that the clerk call the roll on the adoption of the resolution as amended. Peterson. I. So what I. Strauss I. Herbal. I. Juarez. I. Lewis. I. Morales. I. Let's get to. I. I think in Polish. I. My favorite on a post. I thank you. The motion carries the resolution is adopted as amended and the chair will sign it. I'd ask that the clerk be the fix my signature to the legislation. Colleagues, we have one last item of business on the agenda, and that is a letter that Councilmember Lewis circulated during the council