A RESOLUTION relating to the Office of Sustainability and Environment; affirming The City of Seattle’s commitment to meet or exceed goals established in the Paris Agreement.
Thank you much the bill passed and there was signage we may there are some interest, I've been told, of taking the climate change resolution out of order. Councilmember O'Brien, would you like to address that? Yes, I'd move to adopt resolution 31757 as the first item under committee reports today. So I'm sorry, Madam Clerk. I didn't share that with you. So we're just making a motion to change the order. Just to be clear, this is not the subject of vote, and it's been moved in second. And so it's removed in second to move to place that agenda item. To agenda item number one. All those and any comments. All those in favor of that change. Vote I. I opposed. The ayes have it. So let's start with that particular agenda item. And Madam Clerk, can you read that went into the record. Resolution 317 57 relating to the Office Sustainability Environment, affirming the City of Seattle's commitment to meet or exceed goals established in the Paris Agreement. Thank you very much, Councilmember O'Brien. Thank you. So I'll go ahead and start by moving 31757. Thank you. I want to thank all the folks that come out today and have come out over the years in favor of Seattle taking bold action on climate change. It's it's the folks in this room and thousands of others throughout the city like you that have consistently elected elected officials in this city, those of us here and our predecessors that are committed to making taking bold action on climate change. Sometimes you make it easy, but it's a lot of hard work to do. And I really appreciate that. We know in this room the threats that climate change posed to our society, not just in our city, but around the world, and that we're already seeing some of those threats being realized, whether we're talking about ocean acidification, reduced snowpack, less clean drinking water, rising sea levels, increased storm activity. We know, in fact, here in the city of Seattle, we're already slated to invest hundreds of millions of dollars to mitigate those impacts. And that's in a city like Seattle. They can afford to do that. We know as cities around the country and around the world, especially in communities who had nothing to do with pumping the carbon into the atmosphere, are suffering the most and have no resources to mitigate it. We have an obligation and a responsibility to take that action. Now, a little over a week ago, Donald Trump took some unilateral action to remove the United States from the Paris climate accord, putting the United States in with Syria and Nigeria as the only two. Sorry. Nicaragua and Syria as the only two. The only three countries that are not part of the Paris climate accord. What you've seen since then is cities like Seattle, states like Washington move swiftly to collaborate with other jurisdictions around the country. And what's coming forward is a movement that I believe will demonstrate to the rest of the world that despite our elected president, Donald Trump, abdicating, abdicating the leadership role, the United States should be playing as the country that is most responsible for the cumulative emissions of carbon in the atmosphere over history. Stepping back from that leadership role that cities and states will step forward to demonstrate to the rest of the world that the United States will, in fact, live up to the Paris climate agreements through our own local and subregional actions. Now, the Paris Climate Accord calls for actions to maintain climate, a climate no more than 1.5 degrees above historical levels. And there's some question whether even that is enough. We also have questions about whether the actions outlined in the Paris climate accord are going to even get us to that 1.5. We know that we have to move aggressively and swiftly. Seattle has a very bold climate action plan that was adopted a few years ago in this resolution. Commits us to that. But that plan assumes actions at the federal level like increased fuel standards and automobiles. Some of those assumptions may no longer be true under this administration. What this resolution does is it asks our Office of Sustainability and Environment to go back and reevaluate that climate action plan, making new assumptions based on this administration's abdication of leadership on climate and figuring out what additional actions we have to take locally. And in addition, work with other cities and states to show leadership, as we've heard from others today. When you're in a hole, the first thing you want to do is stop digging. We have to stop the programs that are already causing damage at the top of that list, as you heard today. Public comment is the coal powered electricity that's generated in Montana but shipped into Washington state over wires. Now, in the city of Seattle, we don't use any of that coal generate electricity. But many of us are customers of Puget Sound energy for their natural gas. And the customers throughout the region use Puget Sound energy for their electricity. We want to see Puget Sound Energy shut down the Colstrip Power plant as soon as possible so that Washington state can be coal free electricity throughout the whole state. We also need to prevent new investments in fossil fuel infrastructure from being built. And if we are truly going to be a leader as governor, Inslee joined wanted to join with Governor Cuomo from New York and Governor Brown from California in stating that we will not we will not be in making these investments and instead will live up to this Paris climate accord. It's critically important that these new infrastructure projects not be built. We call upon the state to not allow the Vancouver oil export terminal to be built. The Colombo methanol export facility cannot be built. We also look around the region to the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion up in British Columbia and ask that that expansion not take place either. And then we need to do more investments right here locally. We need to increase the adoption of solar, especially as the price and efficiency comes up. In this climate, we can have we can figure out how to generate so much more electricity. If those empty roof tops were covered with solar panels, we need to continue to invest in walkable, bikeable, transit friendly neighborhoods so that folks have alternatives to burning fossil fuels. We need to draft rapid adoption of electric vehicle infrastructure, not just in the wealthier neighborhoods, but throughout the city of Seattle. Electric vehicles are moments away from being the most cost effective vehicle that anyone can own. And we need to make sure our city is ready to embrace that when our consumers, our residents are ready to buy and use those electric vehicles. We need to make sure that we continue to build the most efficient, build energy efficient buildings in the world. And we need to take actions like labeling gas pumps. Thank you for coming out and testifying for your ongoing work on that and to the young folks in the audience. Thank you for your activism. You're absolutely right. When you look at us and say that our generation has not done enough well, will we hang on here for a few more years? We're going to do as much as we can, and we know that we're going to still leave a lot of work to you and your colleagues . And we hope we can at least keep this ship turned in the right direction so that you have less work to do. Colleagues, I really appreciate working with a bunch of folks who care passionately about the climate. I'm lucky to spend a lot of time working on this, but it's it's so much easier to do. And it's a council who firmly believes in this. So thank you for your support. It's time. That's very strong. I want to say thank you, Councilmember O'Brien, for your leadership on this and for all of you who've come out today. This is critically important, and I am just delighted to be a co-sponsor of this legislation without going back in and repeating everything that Councilmember O'Brien just said. I just want to add my voice to the fact that it's absolutely shocking and inexcusable that our president of this United States has withdrawn us from the Paris Accord. And as Mike mentioned, the idea that we are in the company of Nicaragua and Syria as being the only two in the world that are not signing up on this is just embarrassing to me. But it gives us the opportunity to lead as a city. And we're joining wonderful cities across the United States who have already stepped up. I appreciate what Mayor de Blasio said in New York. It's a sad state of affairs when localities have to do what the federal government should be doing. But we know the cavalry's not coming from the other Washington right now. So stepping up just as Pittsburgh and parents did. Again, our president tried to divide Pittsburgh and Paris, and instead the two mayors came together and said, we're going to put aside parochial politics and embrace the global challenge of fighting climate, climate change. So, you know, God bless the people that are working so hard, coming together and saying we're not going to be cowed by this president . And I just really want to recognize the fact that Portland and Vancouver, B.C., and our friends in California are doing a lot of work. We want to be joining them. So again, thanks to the young people who came out and to all of you, because you're the ones that are helping us make a difference. Councilmember Swann. Thank you, President Harrell. I want to thank all the activists to Seattle and Councilmember O'Brien for bringing this resolution. Donald Trump and the billionaire class are dangerously out of touch with the urgent need for dramatic action on climate change. And they are out of touch with the majority of humanity, which is now very clear. This is not 30 years ago when there was an actual debate about climate change. Most of humanity is very clear about the dangers of climate change. Trump's rejection of the Paris climate agreement, unfortunately, as weak and inadequate as the agreement is, is a really important example of how out of touch he is. The Paris Climate Agreement only had voluntary targets and at the time it was passed. You will all remember fellow activists that we were worldwide. Activists were outraged by how ineffectual it turned out to be. But Trump's rejection of even this ineffectual agreement means that he has no intention of having even limited goals. And it's also a reminder of how intense is the nexus between his billionaire dominated administration and the oil lobby executives. And consistent with all this. Just today, Trump bragged on social media about having opened a new coal mine. So these resolutions such as these are extremely important, but more and more important is the activism that goes behind it. I really appreciate that the resolution goes farther than the Paris Climate Agreement, and it pushes for the Seattle City Employees Retirement System Board to divest from fossil fuels like Trump's new coal mine. And everyone here should support the fossil fuel divestment campaign by 350 and indigenous activists in our city to truly invest the resources of the world in transforming production and transportation towards clean energy. Resources, in my view, will require a socialist economy where resources are democratically owned by working people and resource use is democratically decided and dictated by human and environmental need, not by the greed of an elite. The Top End is dictated by the creation of living wage jobs in the renewable energy sector. However, until we go to such an economy, campaigns like the divestment campaign can have a huge impact. And that is exactly what our movement needs. And I'll vote yes on this resolution. Thank you. Any further comments before I call for the vote? Outstanding comments. I simply say that when Azura turns 44, he and I will continue to fight on climate change. Where the rest of you will be too old to do it. I'll see you there. And with that, I move to adopt resolution 31757. Second, it's been moved. And second, that the resolution be adopted. Any further comments? Those in favor of adopting the resolution vote i. I. Those opposed vote no. The motion carries the resolution adopted chair will sign it. I'm probably not on here. I want to make. Just a little clarification about Nicaragua and Syria. Nicaragua did not approve join because they didn't think it was strong enough. Syria, of course, is being shredded by lust for fossil fuels and that's why they didn't join. Thanks for the clarification. Like anyone else like. I'm just saying, we have to go back. Thank you for that clarification. Okay. Please read. We've held agenda item number one. So please read the report of the Affordable Housing Neighborhoods and Finance Committee.