A RESOLUTION regarding a voter-proposed Initiative Measure concerning health, labor, and safety standards for Seattle hotel employees; authorizing the City Clerk and the Executive Director of the Ethics and Elections Commission to take those actions necessary to enable the proposed Initiative to appear on the November 8, 2016 ballot and the local voters' pamphlet; requesting the King County Elections' Director to place the proposed Initiative on the November 8, 2016 election ballot; and providing for the publication of such proposed amendment.
Agenda item one Clerk File 314352. Report of the City Clerk on the Certificate of Sufficiency for initiative number 124. Concerning health and safety standards put to check to protect hotel employees in Seattle. Okay. So how we'll proceed is I'll sort of describe a narrative of this clerk file. Actually, this is the Clarke file, so I'll do that for the resolution. I think it's on the Clark file, which is basically a report of the Clark file, which is sort of a routine part of it sort of proceeding. I'll just. I think then that's a I think that's just a resolution vote. That's just a hand vote. Right. The clerk file has been visually filed now. And if you'd like, I can read the report of the full council for resolution 31683. Yeah. So this one sector, I know it's a little scanty on this part, so I think I just called for a vote. I don't have to do a roll call on that. Right. I'm a clerk file. Oh, no, no. Okay. So on the we'll talk about the resolution in a moment for for the clerk file. Are there any comments on the clerk file? So all those approving the clerk file, 3143584352. I'm sorry, but I. I oppose. No, the ayes have it, and the clerk file is now filed. So read the next report to the full council, which is the resolution that accompanies that, please. Agenda item two Resolution 31683. A resolution regarding a voter proposed initiative measure concerning health, labor and safety standards for Seattle Hotel employees. Authorizing the City Clerk and the Executive Director of the Ethics and Elections Commission to take those actions necessary to enable the proposed initiative to appear on the November eight, 2016 ballot. And the voters and the Local Voters pamphlet requesting the King County Elections Director to place the proposed initiative on the November eight two, 2016 election ballot and providing for the publication of such proposed amendment. Okay, here we go. So let me do this. Let me describe sort of a narration of where we are. And then at some point my intent is to move for approval of the resolution. But before I describe the narrative, we can certainly have any comments or any questions or any other motions that my colleagues think appropriate. By the way, I wanted to thank all my colleagues for the extended public testimony that was 40 minutes over are a lot of 20 minutes. And thank you for your indulgence, because we certainly do treasure it when people come down to testify. So on July 8th, the King County Elections Department notified our clerk that the initiative Measure 1 to 4 had sufficient valid signatures. And from that point, the clerk had 20 days from that the from the night from the date notified to transmit the initiative together with her report to the council at a regular meeting. And today the clerk city clerk has introduced the report of the certificate of sufficient sufficiency of our initiative. Measure 1 to 4 in clerk file through 14352. That's the action we just took. Now, after the introduction of the initial initiative, the Council has 45 days to decide whether to do one of the following. Number one, the Council can pass the initiative as a bill otherwise referred to as doing that council manically. The Council can send the initiative to the voters. Or three pass an alternative bill and send both the alternative bill and the initiative to the voters. And voters would have a choice at that point. Any measure for the November 8th, 2016 ballot in November ballot must be submitted to the King County elections by August 2nd. So that's next Tuesday. So that's sort of where we are. And I would sort of take the license to say that the process by which we would do that count semantically, certainly we have not had a lot of time to review this this issue. And we've had many discussions in the last week or two about the bill as at in whole. So a little bit about the substance of Initiative 124. Specifically. And you heard some really great testimony as to what it does. But let me just sort of reiterate some parts and introduce some parts that haven't been discussed, disclosed. First, the hotel employers would be required to provide employees who work alone in a guest room, a panic button. And we heard descriptions of how that is offered in other jurisdictions, hotel employers must record accusations that a guest has committed an act of violence against an employee and maintain records for five years. Guest accused of an assault or sexual assault or sexual harassment may not return to the hotel for three years, and each guest room will have a sign advising that the law protects hotel employees from violent assault and sexual harassment, and that employees have panic buttons. And employees reporting an act of violence by a guest will be assigned a different floor or work area and must be given paid time to contact the police and consult a counselor. Second part of it protects the hotel employees from injury. And we we hope that there be a reduction of workplace injuries by limiting an employee to 5000 square feet of guest room cleanings per 8 hours per workday. This initiative provides information on hazardous chemicals and control chemicals to protect employees from hazardous contact or exposure to chemical agents. There's another section of it which is improves access to medical care for low income hotel employees. And I think you heard testimony about how important that is. In order for employees to afford family medical coverage, large and growing employers must pay full time, low wage employees by the 15th of each month in addition to wages or a salary of either $200, or the difference between the monthly premium for the lowest cost. What was described as a goal level policy available on the Washington Health Benefit Exchange and 7.5% of the amount in employees wages that exceeds 100% of the federal poverty level. So this is is this amount is separate from the minimum wage required. There's another part, Section four, that prevents disruptions in the hotel industry. So when a hotel ownership changes, the outgoing employee shall, within 15 days, provide the new owner with employment information on current employees. And the incoming hotel employer will main show maintain a preference of hiring lists of current employees and hire from that list from the date of ownership transfer six months after the hotel is open under the incoming employer and there's another Section five which is enforced enforcing compliance with the law. So retaliation, make it very clear, is clearly prohibited. Employers may not interfere with employees rights under this law or discharge or discriminate against employees asserting their rights. And this includes communications regarding employees citizenship or immigration status. Employers are entitled to preliminary relief and reinstatement. Employees have a private right of action to enforce these rights and are entitled to costs, reasonable attorney's fees and expenses if they prevail. I didn't describe all of what of the components of 124, but I sort of wanted to give the least the public sort of a summary of some of the important components of 124. Before I actually move adoption 431683 of the resolution which has the effect of placing it on the ballot in November with any of my colleagues like to say any words or comments regarding initiative 124. Councilmember Herbert, please. Thank you. Private businesses can and do create internal policies to ask customers to leave their businesses from issues ranging from public inebriation, verbal outbursts, property destruction and shoplifting. Businesses can and do regularly ask their customers to leave their businesses. Businesses need to be able to do that in order to protect their business interests. But if hotels had a similar policy regarding sexual harassment to protect its workers, we wouldn't be here today. 53% of hotel workers have experienced harassment. A similar case could be made to the initiative's provisions for panic buttons and maximum workloads. It's precisely because employers don't have policies to protect their workers that workers themselves have had come together to propose a law that they must. Women, immigrants and other people of color are entitled to safe and healthy workplaces. And though it's certainly inspiring that they have, it's unfortunate that these courageous women have had to add to their already heavy workload in order to campaign to pass this law, which in more fair workplaces would already be a workplace policy. Thank you, Councilmember Herbold, Councilmember Brian. Thank you. Council President Harel, I appreciate your overview of this legislation. I will certainly be supporting this resolution. You know, in the course of the work that citizens have done to bring this to our attention, to gather signatures, write the legislation. I've heard a lot of stories from folks who work in this industry and the experience they've had. I've heard those stories in reading media accounts over those stories from public testimony here, heard the stories from the people who work in this industry outside this room, informing me and others about what that experience has been like. And I want to just commend those who've been willing to come forward and tell their stories. And the workers who have done that are a powerful group of people that have showed a lot of courage to speak for the conditions that they're facing today, knowing that they potentially risk retaliation. And their courage means a lot. Well, this is a group of courageous and powerful people. We know that the majority of people working on this are women and women of color. Often folks that are recent immigrants to this country and that population is often at a higher risk of being exploited by employers. Now, I want to believe that the majority of employers would not want to stand for this. But we continue to see incidences and hear stories of this happening. Making this initiative critically important. Nobody in our community or anywhere, frankly, should have to trade off the ability to to earn a living, to support their family with threats of sexual harassment or abuse. Nobody should trade off the ability to support their family with the physical harm of repeated physical stress on their body. And these workers, like all, should have access to a robust health care system and job security. And this initiative, I believe, takes us in the right direction on all those. And I'm proud to vote yes on this resolution. Thank you, Councilman Brian. Councilmember Gonzales. You almost said I did. Yeah, I. Heard the whole. Oh, coming out. I heard all of this. I'm. So I guess one's a no brainer for me. It's it's obvious that I'll be voting yes on this resolution in support of sending I 124 to the voters in November. And I want to talk a little bit from the heart about why. So I grew up in a low income family in central Washington, an immigrant family. My parents were from Mexico. I grew up in a monolingual, Spanish speaking household. And one of the jobs that I did growing up and to pay for my way through college is working at a hotel. And I got the easy job. I got to check in people at the front. I got to occasionally have to fold towels and fold sheets. And I had to do the occasional off the clock work and go pick up donuts for the guests at 5:00 in the morning. And that was all while I was in college. I got the easy jobs because I spoke English. And because I was born in this country and I recognize that that's a privilege, even within my own oppressed category. And I have since then. After I went to law school, I dedicated my career to representing victims, survivors of sexual assault, sexual violence and sexual harassment. And all of them were women. All of them. Most of them were monolingual Spanish speakers, and most of them were undocumented. And I saw firsthand and heard stories firsthand in our own city, stories from dozens of women who would come to my office completely deflated, shattered, and frankly, without hope, because what happened to them after they had the courage to stand up against that type of awful workplace behavior, was that they were fired. Or they were subjected to even worse harassment. I have no reason to believe that the hotel industry is an outlier as it relates to the pervasiveness of sexual harassment and sexual assault in the workplace that may not be condoned by hotel owners or proprietors, but we need to make sure that hotel owners and proprietors are doing the right thing. And I believe the passage of I 124 is the right thing for our workers and particularly for our women of color who work really, really hard to provide this great service to guests and tourists who spend time in hotels. And, you know, when I walk into a hotel, it's the first thing I think of when I watch these hotel workers in the hallways. I see the pride that they have in their work. But I also see the fact that they are oftentimes by guests in hotels, relegated to feeling like they are third class citizens. And that's wrong. So I am really excited about this particular initiative. I'm excited about supporting this initiative, and I will be proudly casting my vote in favor of this particular resolution. Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember. So what? Thank you, President Harrell. I would like to thank hotel workers and their union unite here local eight for all their leadership in putting this ballot initiative together. I've done this sort of work myself and I know what an incredible task that is. Aside from the courage and determination that you need, hotel workers are constantly at risk of sexual harassment and assault. And it's precisely because those jobs are invisible jobs. And many of the largest hotels are notorious for failing to protect the housekeepers in order to coddle the continued patronage of wealthy guests no matter the crime they commit. Hotel workers in Unite Here need to be commended for doing all the work to bring forward this ballot initiative to defend themselves against these assaults, particularly attacks against women. They wrote the legislation. They gathered tens of thousands of signatures to put it on the ballot with few resources and without the wealthy donors that are normally needed to pay for signature gatherers. They have shown leadership to accomplish something that the city council and the mayor could have and should have done years ago. I am glad to support the request of the hotel workers to place this on the ballot today. But I would also add that the City Council has lost an opportunity to show the kind of leadership that these hotel workers have shown. Last week, only Councilmember Juarez and I supported amending the introduction and referral calendar to introduce the clerk file. We just voted on a few minutes ago. The result is that today the Council does not have the opportunity to adopt AI 124 directly into law, and our only choice is to put it on the ballot. I am, of course, glad that the City Council is voting today to put it on the ballot, but I personally regret not having the option to vote to adopt this directly into law because I do not think that hotel workers who are already working such hours and are already struggling against such odds should have to now additionally campaign for this from now until November to have these basic protections put into place. However, I have no doubt that they will work hard from now until election day. And you have all my support. Thank you. Any other comments from any of my colleagues before I move the legislation are seeing then I will move to adopt resolution 31683. Any further comments? And thank you for all those very inspirational words and stories. Those in favor of adopting the resolution vote i. I. Those opposed vote no. The ayes have it and the motion carries. The resolution is adopted. By adopting this resolution to place initiative measure 1 to 4 on the ballot. The report of the report of this certificate of sufficiency is now closed. So thank you very much for your testimony of be on the ballot next report into the to the agenda please.