AN ORDINANCE imposing a tax on engaging in the business of distributing sweetened beverages; adding a new Chapter 5.53 to the Seattle Municipal Code; and amending Seattle Municipal Code Sections 5.30.010, 5.30.025.K, 5.30.060.C, 5.55.010, 5.55.040.A, 5.55.060.A, 5.55.150.E, 5.55.165, 5.55.220, and 5.55.230.A.
Thank you. The bill passed and chair of the Senate. Please read the report from the Affordable Housing Neighborhoods and Finance Committee. The report is Affordable Housing Neighborhoods and Finance Committee. Jan Item one Constable 118 965 Imposing a tax on engaging in the business of distributing sweetness sweetened beverages. Adding a new Chapter 5.53 to the limits for code and amending Saddam's Code Sections five point 30.0 ten five point 30.25 point K. 5.30 .06. C. 5.50 5.0 ten 5.50 55.0. 45.50 5.0. 60.8 5.50 5.1. 50.80 5.50 5.1 65. 5.50 5.220 and 5.50 5.2 30. The committee recommends that the full council pass the bill as amended with the divided court with councilmembers Burgess, Johnson, O'Brien, Gonzalez in favor and councilmembers Herbold and so on. Opposed. Thank you. Before I relinquish the mic to Councilmember Burgess to present the Bass legislation. Just based on previous discussions, we have six six amendments. And so why don't we let Customer Burgess discuss the Bass legislation and I'll just keep working down the order. And Katherine Johnson did a good job during the prep time, so we already knew the order and the discussions. So, Councilman Burgess, one should lead us with the Bass legislation. Thank you very much. I'm going to walk through a brief timeline of how the council considered this legislation. I'll then talk about the basic motivation and justification for the tax. I'll read a section of the basic legislation and then yield back to Council President Harold to walk us through the amendments. So the Council began consideration of this matter in the spring of 2016, over a year ago, and that included meeting with various community groups. Public health advocates got green, for example, labor folks a wide variety of business interests. On February 21st of this year, Mayor Murray mentioned in his State of the City address that he would be forwarding this legislation to the council, and we received that on May one. The committee held for discussions of this legislation on May three, May 17, May 26 and May 31. In all of that work, what we found is that the scientific evidence is incontrovertible that sugar sweetened beverage consumption leads to negative health outcomes. Communities of color and young people are disproportionately targeted by the beverage industry's advertising and marketing campaigns. Black children and teenagers see twice as many ads for soda and other sweetened beverages compared to white children and other teens. Sugary drinks are the leading source of excess calories, far surpassing other snacks and sweets that may also have other nutritional benefits. Liquid sugar has zero nutritional benefits. Sugar sweetened beverage consumption is linked to the development of many serious chronic illnesses, including type two diabetes, obesity, heart disease, hypertension and dental disease. Daily consumption of just one sugary drink increases a child's chance of obesity by 55% and diabetes by 26%. These diseases disproportionately impact communities of color. Prevalence of obesity is highest among black adults, followed by Hispanic, white and Asians. Black and Hispanic adults are twice as likely to have diabetes than their white counterparts. Black adults are more likely to have cardiovascular disease. Sugar sweetened beverage taxes work. Other jurisdictions where these taxes have been imposed have seen a drop in sugar sweetened beverage consumption. Based on those facts the ordinance declares in Section one. That the city finds and declares that the expansion of access to healthy and affordable food. Closing the food security gap. Promoting healthy nutrition choices. Reducing disparities in social, developmental and educational readiness and learning for children. Assisting high school graduates to enter college. And expanding services for the birth to five population and their families are of utmost importance to creating a thriving and livable city for all of the people of Seattle. Therefore, through this ordinance, the city intends to exercise its taxing authority as granted by the Washington State Constitution, and is authorized by the Washington State Legislature to raise general revenue for the city and to use that revenue to provide broad based public benefits for residents by funding programs that achieve these purposes. Council President Herrell. This was adopted and recommended for passage by the committee. Thank you, Councilman Burgess, and thank you for your consistent leadership in this regard. We appreciate this. So we're going to start off with Councilmember Herbold. If you're so prepared to talk about what we will refer to as Amendment G. To Councilmember Herbold, you have the floor. Thank you. Let's get myself ready here. I thought we were taking these in order, but I can quickly get situated here, so I have two. I want amendment that accomplishes two things. And it is entitled Council Amendment G two and it is on the Goldenrod paper. First was some introductory remarks that both addressed the amendment as well as the minority opinion coming out of committee. The two amendments accomplish two things one reduces the tax rate, the per ounce tax rate, and the other tries to address the just disparate impact on low income people and people of color. These are the same objectives that I was seeking to accomplish in committee but was unsuccessful. The tax, if passed and enacted, will support a lot of great programs like addressing the food security gap with fresh bucks, food banks funding pre-K and Seattle colleges 13th year. I absolutely support those programs. However, this kind of use tax result in the tax burden being greatest on those with lower incomes. There's been dispute whether or not this is technically a regressive tax because people aren't required to buy sweetened beverages. Nevertheless, it remains that people with lower incomes will pay a larger percentage of their incomes on this tax than higher incomes. I'd go further to say that the bill, as it is currently proposed, is actually punitive because it is at a tax rate that is higher than alcohol, cannabis or cigarets. And that's why I proposed in committee the tax to be lowered to $0.01 per ounce. That amendment failed, but my new amendment proposes 1.2 $0.05 per ounce, and I will distribute a chart that will both demonstrate on the front page the total amount raised with this amendment with both parts, and then on the second page will demonstrate that this brings. The. Tax more in line with with alcohol. Basically, you can see that on the second part under sweetened beverage in the red, the last line for Coke two liter. This still results in a 32% reduction in use and is more in line with other jurisdictions that have passed a tax like this, the majority of them taxing at a penny an ounce. In addition, this tax, as proposed, has an additional layered, disparate impact on low income people and people of color. The Human Rights Commission today sent us a letter that stated The toolkit analysis made clear that the amended legislation, including diet sodas, addressed inequities inherent in the bill. Despite this, the Council excluded diet sodas from the legislation, creating a loophole that largely exempts wealthier individuals from the tax that more disadvantaged populations will experience. This will have a real impact on those who buy soda, regardless of the ultimate health impacts. And it's unfair to exempt sodas that are consumed by wealthier individuals while targeting those consumed by historically disadvantaged populations. So my second attempt to amend this legislation to address those disparate impacts since my efforts to remove diet of I'm sorry, add diet to the the products being taxed in committee did not secure the necessary number of votes . I'm trying to address the disparate impact on low income people and people of color by adding sugary coffee drinks, a higher cost product that are also more likely to be consumed by people with more disposable income. I drink diet soda. I drink sweetened coffee. I'm trying to actually tax the unhealthy product that I myself consume because I just don't think it's fair to spread to not spread the cost of food security programs and early childhood education programs to consumers like me. This is a primary principle of equity. We spread the cost of programs that some people use to everyone. So there's been some concern about by adding coffee and not including diet. Whether or not that gets to the revenue target that we're seeking to get. And I would propose by adding sugary coffee. If we get to a revenue target above $18 million a year and with about 7.4 million of that coming from sweetened coffees. And you can see on the second page of the handout, we make some calculations based on some studies on the amount of coffee that most consumers drink. We on average drink three cups of three, eight ounce cups of coffee a day per capita. Multiply that times 365 days a year. The National Coffee Association says that about 56% of people actually sweeten their coffee. And I figured I don't have a I don't have a citation for this, I must admit. But I extrapolated about one in five of those 56%. People might use Sirups to sweeten their coffee as opposed to to sugar. The number of adults in Seattle right now is 595,000 adults a year. And at a tax per ounce, it at 1.2 $0.05 per ounce. That results in about 7.4 additional million dollars a year. So I believe that hits the objective of the number of dollars raise. It still reduces the use of these products. It has a reduced impact on low income people and people of color. One thing I have heard a concern about is that this might negatively affect concern about milk in stores, in closed containers. I do have an alternate version of my of my amendment. I did not meet the 12:00 deadline. I literally heard about the concern about milk in stores at 1130 this morning. I'd be happy to distribute that alternative, but council would need to vote to waive the rules to hear it. So thank you, Councilmember Herbold. So at this point, we have a live motion on the table. I was a little unclear on your alternatives. So should we just let that. Remain silent for the moment and deal with your base amendment right now. So fine. So we have an amendment to basically reduce it to one point to five, the actual rate and the other subset of components that Customer Herbold described, just to make sure our discussion is live, is there a second? It's like, okay, it's been moved in second. And so would anyone else like to address the amendment proposed by Councilmember Herbold? Councilmember O'Brien. Thank you. Councilmember Herbold, I want to start by just thanking you for you've spent a lot of work trying to kind of thread the needle on this. And I really appreciate that. I'm not going to support the amendment, though. And the reason for me is that what I think is the most punitive of what's happening here is the way the beverage companies like Coca-Cola and Pepsi target billions of dollars of advertising to persuade people to consume a product that we all know is unhealthy for communities and the way that they disproportionately target low income communities and communities of color, as Councilmember Burgess outlined in his opening comments. And that is having severe negative impacts on communities. And we know that we've seen around the country how an appropriate tax can help reduce consumption of this product. But we also have heard from community leaders who come from these communities that are being targeted, who are living with the negative health impacts of folks consuming these sugary beverages and have said, look, we are open to this. In fact, we're here embracing this. As long as you ensure that you make the investments back in our community so that our community members have equal access to healthy foods, and that food security gap is closed. And once we open the access for those products, what folks tell us time and time again is our community members will choose healthy products if we have access to them. This bill is a balancing act for sure, but I believe the current legislation at 1.70 $0.05 with the direction of focusing the investments on access to healthy foods and closing the food security gap is a bill that I'm going to support, as is not this amendment I would support , including diet beverage. We try that in committee. I don't believe there's an amendment before us today, but if it came up today, I certainly would support that again. I do not support making exemptions for other products beyond what's already in the bill. And I want to just take a second to thank the community members who've worked so hard, especially those representing communities of color and low income communities, to help us do the best we can to get this right so that we can have those positive outcomes. Thank you. Councilmember Brian. So we still have a motion for an A. We have an amendment in a second. Is there any other comment before we vote on the Casper Herbold amendment? Ready for vote? Everybody. Okay, so it's been moved in second to lower the tax rate to 1.2 $0.05 from the base legislation. All those in favor say I and raise your hand. Okay. I'm sorry. I was just so we have to. I said it, but I. I don't know why I said it. I was trying to get some rhythm. I'm not voting for us. All those opposed. Say no one. Raise your hand. No, no. So it fails. It's 66262, two, no less. Eight counts, six or two. Okay, so let's move to the second one. That's just getting too much. Mike Tyson, thank you. So I have a lot of paperwork in front of me, guys. I know. So I have an amendment here and I want to address it. And I'm not naive to think that I have an overwhelming support, but I want to address some comments. So you should have a copy of B4, which is an exemption for handcrafted beverages that during public comment took some criticism that I will describe why I'm supporting it or that fails or not. Will, will, we'll see. But I want to talk I want to address some of the concerns. So just to keep it alive, I move to through Amendment four, which is an exemption to handcrafted beverages. Is there second? Second. Thank you. So you guys are slow on my second. By the way, this notion of let me back up that when this tax when I first started researching this tax, which was quite some time ago, when I looked at what other cities were doing, I was not even a proponent of it. Then for this very same reasons we heard today that it seems to be taxing poorer communities. It's regressive and in it just didn't feel right in my heart. And so I started looking at the. Researcher looked at the tobacco industry and looked at how the tobacco was sort of being taxed and looked at what are referred to as sin taxes and try to get a little better educated on how it can reset community norms and reset behaviors. And then I looked at all of the benefits of what we can do as a city when the state and the federal governments don't seem to be fulfilling their obligations. And then I changed my outlook on this and became a supporter of what I was calling a soda tax. And it was that a soda tax? We called it that. And when I saw the one proposal and it brought up all the bottles of soda, that's what I thought when I met with labor. I then became aware of the impact on jobs, which incredibly. Concern to me. And it was, quite frankly, in my office where we thought about this retraining dollars, the 1.5 just didn't magically appear. It came when we started looking at what we can do with the 13th year in retraining many of these workers, which, quite frankly, in this country, we're going to have to do more and more retraining, some manual jobs for other types of jobs. And this has to be very intentional in our country. So so that's so that became part of the base legislation. When I look at what the city is known for as sort of a coffee capital, to say that this is an elitist exemption is, quite frankly, offensive. And you don't do your constituents a great service by calling it an elitist tax. I think it's an exemption when we look at the 1500 small coffee shops that are affected, the demographics we're trying to target. We have close to 1700 coffee shops, most of them just small moms and pops that I thought this was not the target product or the what we were trying to do to remedy obesity. So it seemed like a smart exemption for where we are trying to head. And so we proposed it. And that was my logic. And that continues to be my logic, to continue to focus on the products we think are causing the most harm and not for it to be as all encompassing as it sort of became. So that's my amendment. Are there any questions or any statements that I don't like to say either for or against the amendment? Councilman Beck. So here, before. I really have more of a question at this point, and I'm trying to deal with the logical perhaps inconsistencies here, but you're talking about 15 to 1700 small coffee. They call them a coffeehouse or some independent. But you just brought this forward this morning. How does how do we distinguish these 1500 small businesses from the other small businesses that are offering sodas? If what's happening here is that we're saying we're trying to this is a public health model that we're trying to really bring forward. And if we're saying anybody who is offering, you know, the syrupy plungers that still sugar, it's still going into people's system, how is it that we can say, well, one's okay and one's not? You know, fair question. And I do want to clarify a point that Councilman Gonzalez made this morning. I keep using the reference to coffee shops, but it certainly covers many more products than the coffee shops. It covers. It covers bubble tea as an example, which is a popular drink at the Chinatown International District. So there's 1700 coffee shops, of which I said around 1500 or so were just small ones. So I think you're asking the question, how does if I am sympathetic toward the small businesses that are doing hand paws, why would I be sympathetic toward the small grocery store that has the canned sodas in there? That's a good point and one that I would say that probably is a weakness in my position that that when I traveled around the world and I was in Japan just a couple of weeks ago, quite frankly, we are known as the coffee capital. That's part of our core competency. People fly here to taste our coffee, not just Starbucks or Tully's or Seattle's best, but the whole I mean, we created created a hub. And so I have a little partiality, I guess, toward our core competency when I think about coffee shops is probably why I keep inadvertently referring to coffee shops . But I do look at the small businesses and quite candidly we are being as progressive progressives as possible and we very easily I mean, if we are as progressive as we say, we could very easily tax bottled water. Right. We could very easily exempt a small grocery stores on the corner that do a certain amount of revenue and said they are exempted as well. We may end up doing things like that in the near future. So. So. So I don't have a a policy argument as to why small stores aren't exempted from the surtax or their sweetened beverage tax. Any other questions or concerns? Okay. So I'll call for a vote. And I don't see overwhelming enthusiasm, but that never stopped me before. You know that all those in favor of amend amendment be for. Please raise your hand and say i, i, i i. That's 8 to 0. I think all those opposed say no and raise your hand. No. Okay, so that's not passing. We move to Amendment A, which is councilmember, whereas and by catch my words before I do, let me get some forewarning on the order. I should have done that at the beginning. So we're my plan is to go. Councilman Moore as Councilman O'Brien, Councilmember Brian and Councilmember Burgess in that order. So I think you know what the subject amendments are. Sorry I didn't do that at the beginning. Councilmember Whereas the microphone is yours. Thank you. Council President I'm going to briefly make some comments, some of that I will be repeating what I shared with you this morning. But before I begin, I do want to thank Councilmember Herbold for all the work that she did on looking at the reduction. But also I was very impressed that she wanted to make sure that milk based beverages did not get the exemption. I'm inclined some point to revisit that issue someday. So I want to thank you for your work on that. The amendment I have proposed will declare that food banks and meal programs are an acceptable use of funds under the spending plan. As I mentioned this morning, this is a groundbreaking opportunity for the city to create a dedicated funding source specifically to ensure everyone in our communities have enough to eat. For the past several years, local food banks have reported double digit increases in the number of people seeking their services. However, the city has only been making inflationary adjusted investments to most program budgets. This leads to programs continuing to try to serve more people with less resources. I hope today my colleagues will join me in approving this amendment to establish our commitment to basic food access across the city and across our communities as they shared this morning. Everyone in this city should have a right to eat. I want to thank Councilmember Burgess and other council members who work with me on this, that when we went back and looked at the priority in the spending plan, that we did focus on public health, nutrition, food scarcity and access to healthy foods. However, as you can see in my amendment, I wanted to include community based investments to expand food access and to include such as food banks and meal programs that may seem insignificant to some people that it needs to be said, but it does need to be said. The ink does need to be on the paper because I believe and I'm sure our community groups believe as well, that food banks and meal programs are the heart and soul of community based investments. And as I shared this morning, we had an emergency food situation when the food bank closed down in Greenwood and moved to Snohomish County. Therefore, the North Helpline Food Bank had to absorb much more people, even though they should not have accepted some people based on their zip code. They did it anyway because they didn't want to turn people away. We spent two months trying to find $25,000 just to open up that second food bank. With the help of the mayor and the president and some of my other colleagues, we did secure $20,000 from the mayor's office in HST. And we now have the Bitter Lake Food Bank, which is the North Help Line edition. And I say this because this is real time, real life, present day situations where people are going hungry. I know we spend a lot of time talking about nutrition and what sugar does to our diet, but there are communities where people don't eat. They don't have the luxury of saying, I'm going to have a bubble tea, I'm going to have a Diet Coke, I'm going to have a latte. They don't eat. So what we know now from Bitter Lake will serve 188 people per day. That's well over to well over 1200 people and duplicated people. My goal today is to secure a revenue source, a secure funding source for food banks and meal programs. We have never made a financial, economic or tax revenue commitment to food banks or meal programs. And it's time we make a moral commitment that in this city everybody eats. We have an opportunity to dedicate a revenue stream to make sure people, families and those experiencing hunger and the wonderful folks that run and maintain food banks have a opportunity and can rely on a revenue stream and a source that we make a financial commitment to such a basic human right, which is food. As I shared earlier, a lot of our food banks, not just North Help Line. Do more than just provide food. They provide an information. Social services for Medicaid. Medicare. Housing, Eviction Prevention. Rent Assistance. Food Day Packs. Hygiene Packs. North Helpline has a clinic that's open five days a week. We provide baby food, diapers, infant needs, baby formula, orca cards, transportation vouchers. We also provide language assistance. And we work with all of our constituents in the immigrant community. So what I'm saying is, is that people don't just go to food. Banks for food is often a central place, that people go for everything because that's all that's the only place that they can go. And while I respect the process with HST, I just don't think it's fair that food banks have to get in line. Pardon the pun, every year to beg for $38,000 to run to to deliver food to people again. On a personal note, I think the most difficult question we faced as a society is, again, whether or not we have a diet soda, a latte. I think the most difficult question we face next to homelessness is that we simply don't have food for our people, and that's unconscionable. So I'm hoping today that my colleagues will vote and approve my amendment. Thank you. Thank you, councilmember suarez. So I'm going to construe councilmember walls as comments as a motion to amend a which adds food banks to the list of potential expenditures and it has been seconded by Councilmember Rowback. So any other comments before we call for the vote? Thank you again, Councilman. Whereas all those in favor of amended a vote I in raise your hand. I opposed. Okay. So we're one for three. Here we go. Okay. So, Councilmember O'Brien, you are up, sir. Great. I'll go ahead and move. Amendment D, which is on the pink sheet. Changing language under subsection B of section three. Is there a second? Thank you. We talked about this at some length at the briefing this morning, but I'll just go over really quickly. The language under subsection B says the remainder of the net proceeds from the beverage tax shall be used to support in order of priority, and that the first priority is where the language will be changed. The new language would read Expanding access to healthy and affordable food, closing the food security gap, and promoting healthy food choices through programs including but not limited to and then a list, a series of six programs. As we discussed before, there was language about public health in that opening line. It's still public health. Nutrition programs are still listed as one of the programs that can be could be funded. And also those public awareness campaigns, capital investments to help promote healthy choices. The impetus behind the change in this language, some argue it's just a wordsmithing that was to really center that top priority of focusing on expanding access to healthy, affordable food and closing that food security gap. It also says including but not limited to. So this is not intended to bind anything for matter to just prioritize to the committee that will be making recommendations that this is a top priority for us. Thank you comes from Brian you've made a motion and it has been second and any further comments all those in favor of amendment D vote I in raise your hand I oppose the ayes have it. Councilman Brand, I would like to go through it for Amendment F. Yes. So Amendment F speaks to the community advisory boards role in evaluations. I will go ahead and move that to the second floor. Moved in second. If this is a little more technical in nature, we have a whole section on evaluations, as we do with lots of innovative legislation like this, which I fully support. This simply adds a sense within that paragraph about evaluations that says the evaluator will collaborate with a sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board to develop the evaluation, hopefully self explanatory beyond that. Very good. And thanks for talking about that this morning during briefing, are there any further comments? Just council member back? Sure. I'm certainly going to support this. I want to ask whether we can specifically ask for diet drinks to be looked at a year from now, as well as this handcrafted beverage that we discussed earlier and doesn't have to be in the legislation. But I would just like to get the sense that if we're going to have this evaluation, that we include these other options as we are seeing how this tax works or doesn't work for people in our city. My amendment doesn't address that. I personally would certainly support that, although I don't think it's timely at this point to put anything in here. I don't believe that any language in the bill around evaluations prohibits us from having conversations about doing that and including that. And so my suggestion would be to work with you offline as we move forward and to see if there's support to do that. Thank very much all those. So we have a motion a second all those in favor of amended F say I and raise your hand. I oppose I have it so amended amendment F is approved. Amended I Councilmember Burgess, thank you. This is an amendment to section 5.53.030. This is the section of the ordinance that imposes the rate and this is amending sub paragraph two by adding the language where a product is produced from more than one concentrate. The rate on each component shall be calculated proportionately so that the combined tax on the total yields the 1.75 per fluid ounce charge on the resulting beverage. This is a technical clarification, mostly to guide the rulemaking authority. As the rules are developed for the concentrates service, I would move. Amendment one excuse me amendment I. Second. Any further discussion on the amendment proposed by comes from Burgess. All those in favor of amended amendment. I raise your hand and say I. I opposed. The ayes have it for amendment. I that, I believe concludes all of our amendments. So in a moment here, we're going to close some debate. I think Councilmember Burgess would like to take his home, as I always say. Thank you very much. So a couple of thank you, colleagues. Thank you to each and every one of you for engaging, especially in the last month or so on this legislation. As is true with much of the legislation we pass here, it's a balancing act between what's the right thing to do. What's the what's the evidence, what's the Science Show? I know on the diet issue, we had a very healthy discussion at committee, and I think several of us agreed that there's really no right or wrong answer on that issue. We chose to go without the diet this time. I think the most persuasive of that to me was that the scientific evidence is just not there yet, but it may be in the next few years, and that's why I think would be worthwhile for those of you who remain to revisit that topic sometime in the future. But I want to thank a few folks who have played a really key role in advancing this legislation, Dr. Jim Krieger and all of his public health colleagues in the medical profession. Thank you for your strong and unwavering advocacy that Coleman and your advocacy in Washington State for healthy kids. For how many decades now I don't remember but a long time thank you to got green and the other community groups especially people coming out of communities of color and advocating forcefully yet respectfully the whole time on this has frankly been very impressive. So thank you for lending your voice to this effort to Save the Children Action Network. Thank you. You guys are active all over the United States for children. You've been active in Seattle for many years now, and we appreciate that, too, Mayor Murray, for proposing the original legislation and his two staff members who who worked on this the most, Robert Feldstein and David Mendoza. And then finally to Sarah Day on my staff who did all of the work and was really very detailed and would come back from meetings and would plop down in her chair and say, So, Tim, I'm going to argue both sides of this because everybody has great arguments and then we had to sort through all of that. Thank you, Sarah, for your very good work with that. I think we're ready to vote. Thank you very much, Councilmember Burgess. Any further comments? Councilmember Herbold. I've tried to get the primary sponsor the last bite at the apple, but you're recognized. Thank you. I just wanted to say I'd really hope to get to a place where I could support this bill. I offered amendments to address my concerns about the punitive nature of the tax to make it more in line with other products that we tax, that we want reductions in use, as well as the disparate impact on people of color, jobs and small businesses. I specifically offered amendments that were designed to preserve the goals that I shared with my colleagues, namely the revenue target of 50 million identified by got green, making sure that we only included products with a demonstrated negative health impact by taking out diet and putting in sugary coffee. And three identifying a rate of tax that preserved a 32% impact on reduction of use. I'm really disappointed that my efforts were not successful in convincing my colleagues and consequently, sadly, I'll be voting against the tax despite my strong support for the programs it intends to fund. Thank you, Councilmember Herbold. And I'm going to recognize Councilman, whereas we actually do have a minute or two, because after we vote, I'm going to have to move us at ease for a while while central staff prepare some legislation so we have a moment to catch my words. You are recognized. Thank you very much. First of all, I want to I'm glad to see that the chair and the committee approved adding funds to support workers in any potential displacement of jobs due to the decrease in the consumption of some sugar sweetened products. I want to thank Councilmember Burgess for making sure that we talked about an adding the 1.5 million funding for retraining and placement programs for workers adversely impacted by the tax. And a particular. Thank you to the Teamsters. To Lilly Cordova. Lilly got back to me the information that I was concerned about, the number of jobs by classification that could be affected by the decrease in sales. She actually broke that down into drivers warehouse fleet, mechanics, production, merchandizers, merchandizers, etc. and also what particular companies? Columbia distributing Southern wine and spirits. Shasta. Safeway. Pepsi. And Coca Cola. And also I learned and was listening to public comment. And again, I want to thank Lily because she got this information to me quickly that there were people in Philadelphia that did lose jobs between 16th May 2016 and May 2017 when they did pass this. Now. The reason why I'm saying this is because I think that we should rely on facts and the record. In Philadelphia, there was a job loss of about 140 jobs, mainly sales reps, drivers and merchandise positions. And those companies were Pepsi, Coca-Cola and Canada. Dry, I believe. So we met with the labor folks. We met with the Teamster folks, and we met just about with everybody, including the food groups in the food banks, in the community groups. And I'd like to say it's it's nice when everyone can come together and at some point we can agree to disagree, but know that we're doing something for the greater good of our city and our people. So thank you. Thank you for those words, Councilman. Whereas so we're going to call for the vote now, assuming there are no further comments, will you please call the roll on the passage of the amended bill johnson. Hi. Suarez. AI O'Brien. Hi. Bakeshop. Hi, Burgess. Hi. It's Gonzales. I Herbold President. Harrell I. Seven in favor want to post. So. The. Bill passes as amended and share with Senate. Once the bill as amended is ready for signatures, it should be ready for signature in a few moments. So at this time, we're required to do it in open session. So we're going to be it is ready. See, that was well done. Wow. People can clap now. All right. Yes, we can clap now. Thanks very much. So the bill passed and Cher will sign it in open session. And is there any further business cover for the council? I see a couple of hands, Councilman Burgess. First, I move to be excused on June 19. Second June, and it's moved and seconded. Council member Burgess be excused for June 19th. All those in favor say I oppose. The ayes have it. Council member Gonzalez I move. Sorry, I move to be excused from the full council meeting on Monday, June 12th. June 12th it's been moved and segment Councilwoman Gonzales be excused for June 12th. All those in favor say I opposed the ayes have it. Councilmember O'Brien. I moved to be excused on June 19th, and I'm not telling you where Council member Burgess and I are going. To move in segment. The council member can be excused for June 19th. All those in favor say I oppose. The ayes have it. Any other business to come for the council? I want to say that we stand and your neighbor and have a great rest of the day.