Category: City Council

City Council, Development, Mayor Wilson

Housing Fee Reduction Sought By Developers Is Back On, Thanks to Deal Brokered by Councilmember Foster

 By Erica C. Barnett

City Councilmember Dionne Foster has introduced a bill that will give developers a break on mandatory housing affordability fees for two years, with the goal of spurring projects forward at a time when housing development is stalled.

Under the deal, which is similar to one that fell apart earlier this year, developers who already have projects in the city’s development pipeline will get an 80 percent break on MHA fees for the next two years, a reduction that could get some of the 30 or so  projects that are currently stalled moving forward. Developers of these projects would have two years to get to the foundation inspection stage, a requirement designed to make sure they actually build the projects quickly.

In a concession to affordable advocates who argued that the MHA “holiday” would inappropriately reduce funding for affordable housing, the legislation exempts non-vested projcets in the Central District, the ChinatownInternational District, and much of Southeast Seattle from the proposal, ensuring that no developer can propose a new project in those areas while the lower fees are in place. Two of the 30 stalled projects are in this area, but both are on vacant land.

The legislation would also allow developers to propose new, or non-vested, projects—in addition to projects that are currently proposed but not moving forward—in 2027 only if they meet two conditions: At least 25 percent of their new units must be two bedrooms or larger, and their project has to reach the foundation inspection stage within three years after they get their building permits. Those projects will get a 60 percent cut to MHA fees, except for “legacy homeowners, who would get an 80 percent reduction as  in MHA fees to develop on their own property.

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“This feels really important because we have a lot of projects that are stalled and permits that are trending down, and this is an opportunity to take action,” Foster said. “I’m really excited about two-bedroom requirement. … I think that’s an example of something that helps address a gap in the market, knowing that we definitely need more family-size units to meet the needs of Seattle renters and Seattle families, and I hope that will have an impact.

Mayor Katie Wilson’s office was not involved in the deal, and in fact had been working on a parallel track, headed up by Councilmember Eddie Lin. When an earlier effort to reach a similar agreement fell apart after affordable housing developers withdrew their support, Wilson announced she would  convene a task force of stakeholders including advocates, labor, and market-rate and nonprofit to broker an MHA compromise, among other policies to spur new affordable housing construction.

Developers, who have been seeking a temporary break from the fees, for months, have argued that Wilson’s drawn-out timeline would have effectively killed the projects that are currently in the pipeline.

MHA fees, which fund affordable housing, have been on the decline as development has slowed, dropping from $74 million in 2021 to $47 million last year. (Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story erroneously said MHA brought in $22 million last year; we regret the error.)

Foster said the work Wilson’s office did on their parallel MHA strategy was “critical. … I see this proposal as taking on a time-sensitive. immediate, short-term approach and I think there’s lots of additional changes that we need to make to support housing and affordable housing production. There’s certainly no shortage of issues for us to all work on, so I think the mayor’s task force will be a really important part of that.

In a statement to PubliCola, Wilson said her task force will “work on multiple fronts to accelerate the production of housing and prevent displacement, including short and long-term updates to MHA. I respect Councilmember Foster’s decision to move forward now with a proposal for a temporary MHA holiday, similar to the one we were developing together this spring. While the Council deliberates, my focus is on the work of the Housing Production Task Force and lining up our next set of key actions and policies.”

Foster’s proposal also includes a resolution that says the council “intends to consider and act on legislation”  that would apply MHA requirements to neighborhood residential areas—former single-family zones, where small apartment buildings are now allowed. Currently, these areas are exempt from MHA. Foster says her proposal is different than former councilmember Cathy Moore’s plan to impose existing MHA requirements on all neighborhood residential areas because it is less prescriptive; the resolution includes a number of possible carveouts, for example, it says the council may consider charging lower fees for denser development.

MHA, which went into effect citywide in 2019, allowed developers to build slightly taller buildings in exchange for variable affordabl-housing fees. The program, part of the Housing and Livability Agenda adopted during the Ed Murray administration, is  based on the premise that new market-rate apartments can cause displacement of existing residents, so developers should have to pay for new affordable housing to offset their impact. The fees are higher in areas the city determined have less access to opportunity and higher displacement risk, making it more expensive to build new housing in, say, the Central District than Laurelhurst.

 

City Council, Crime, Economy, Mayor Wilson

This Week on PubliCola: Building a Less “Fragile” Seattle Economy, Addressing Gun Violence, and Is It Selfish to Live Alone?

By Erica C. Barnett

Tuesday, September 8

Greater Seattle: Late Press Conferences, On-Time Buses, Selfish Housing

In this week’s column, Josh tackled the media-generated narrative that blamed Mayor Katie Wilson, rather than SPD, for a delayed SPD press release; praised the new Denny Way bus lane for turning the L8 into the Gr8; and wondered whether he should take on several new roommates, in response to a Seattle Times column that blamed people who live alone (rather than Seattle’s endless refusal to densify) for the housing crisis.

Investigation Report: Trip to Strip Club on Civil Rights Office Trip Was Sexual Harassment

An investigation into some of the employee allegations against Seattle Office for Civil Rights director Derrick Wheeler-Smith found that going to a strip club with an employee on a city-sponsored trip constituted sexual harassment, but that misogynistic and transphobic texts did not. Employees accused Wheeler-Smith of discrimination and harassment earlier this year, and he has been on paid leave since March.

Wednesday, September 9

Saka’s Messy Transportation Bill Gets Messier

City Councilmember Rob Saka’s mostly nonsubstantive transportation safety legislation—rolled out hastily one day before the mayor announced executive orders on the same subject—became more bloated over council recess, but would still have very little real-world impact.

Controversial Group We Heart Seattle Makes City’s Official Volunteer Day Roster

We Heart Seattle, a group whose leader films vulnerable homeless people to promote a punitive, staunchly conservative agenda, got city approval to include one of its encampment “cleanups” in this year’s citywide day of volunteerism. The group is under state investigation for allegedly failing to properly train volunteers to pick up and dispose of needles and other potentially dangerous items.

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Thursday, September 10

Consultants, New Staffers Fill Out Mayor’s Communications Team

Mayor Katie Wilson, whose communications staff has seen high turnover through most of her term so far, has hired a permanent communications director and press secretary—along with a number of consultants, including one who’s getting$10,000 to write this year’s budget speech.

Maritza Rivera Overstates Gun Violence, Pushes Mayor to Pre-Commit to Handpicked “Focused Deterrence” Contractor

City Councilmember Maritza Rivera is insisting that Mayor Wilson commit in advance to hire a specific contractor, at a cost of $418,000, to implement a “focused deterrence” approach to gun violence. This approach has been successful in places where most shootings involve a small group of people, which may or may not be the case in Seattle—a city where fatal shootings are much rarer than in other cities.

Friday, September 11

Report Recommends Diversifying Seattle Economy; Wilson’s Plan Would Initiate that Process, But Slowly

A report from Brookings-affiliated researchers concluded that the city is far too reliant on a tiny handful of massive tech companies, and has failed to nurture startups and mid-size companies that could sustain the economy here even if the big tech firms shrink or move to Bellevue. The report, which includes counterintuitive data on Seattle’s economy and tax base, was the basis for a Wilson executive order that directs the city to figure out ways to implement its recommendations.

Also this week: I was on City Cast Seattle with guest host Brett Hamil and Seattle Times reporter Claire Bryan on Friday. Claire got us up to speed on what’s happening with Seattle Public Schools’ budget (and I went off about AI in schools). Then, Brett and I discussed my reporting on the real reason for the communications breakdown after the Bite of Seattle shooting in July. I’ll be a regular guest on City Cast in the future, so tune in!

This week’s episode of Seattle Nice features returning guest Daniel Malone, from the Downtown Emergency Service Center. He got us up to speed on how DESC’s Opioid Recovery and Care Access (ORCA) center is doing one year in (so far, they’ve had more than 10,000 post-overdose encounters), the 95-bed STAR shelter downtown that replaced the Navigation Center in Little Saigon, and the status of the Trump Administration’s efforts to defund the kind of permanent supportive housing DESC provides.

Note to readers: I will be out of town for most of the next two weeks, so look for my stories on the mayor’s new gun violence reduction strategy, further discussion of Dan Strauss’ proposal to ban unregistered RVs from Seattle, and the mayor’s budget announcement after I get back on Thursday, September 24!

Meantime, my birthday is coming up next week, and I would appreciate nothing more than a contribution to PubliCola, the independent news source you’re reading. Lots of options, from one-time or ongoing Paypal contributions to a P.O. box where you can send a check, can be found right here.

City Council, Crime

Maritza Rivera Overstates Gun Violence, Pushes Mayor to Pre-Commit to Handpicked “Focused Deterrence” Contractor

By Erica C. Barnett

City Councilmember Maritza Rivera misrepresented the number of fatal shootings in Seattle by an order of magnitude earlier this week, claiming at a council public safety committee meeting that “fatal shootings in 2012 were 211, and in 2024 there were 541. And post-pandemic, it increased exponentially.”

Councilmember Rob Saka chimed in, saying that gun violence was “the one unique outlier” among crimes that has continued to increase year over year.

In reality, according to King County data, there were 19 firearm homicides in 2012 and 21 in 2024. (Between 2012 and 2024, there were a total of 120 such homicides in Seattle.) Although that is an overall uptick of two deaths, the actual homicide rate was lower in 2024 than in 2012, despite a post-pandemic upswing, because Seattle’s population grew by nearly 200,000 in those 12 years.

The numbers Rivera cited appear to come from this March 2025 city audit, which found that there were 211 and 541 reports of shots fired citywide in 2012 and 2024, respectively.

So why does Rivera’s alarmist overstatement matter? Because she’s using those numbers, and other claims about the rising danger of living in Seattle, to pressure Mayor Katie Wilson to bypass ordinary contracting processes and sign a $418,000  gun violence prevention contract with Rivera’s handpicked consultant, the National Network for Safer Communities.

NNSC, a project of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, pioneered the concept of “focused deterrence,” in which teams of police officers, social service providers, and community leaders focus their efforts on young men deemed most likely to engage in gun violence, with services on the front end and the threat of increasing consequences, including jail, if they commit violent crimes.

Wilson has said she plans to make focused a key component of her gun violence strategy, which she plans to announce next week. But NNSC is not the only consultant the city could choose to contract with to implement focused deterrence, a concept that has been around for decades; Seattle has used versions of focused deterrence off and on since at least 2009, when the city first launched a “drug market initiative” that offered low-level drug offenders the choice of treatment or jail. 

The reason Wilson must hire this specific contractor, Rivera explained, is because unlike “some organizations” King County has partnered with, NNSC “includes law enforcement” by design. King County’s Regional Peacekeepers Collective focuses on preventing gun violence through public health interventions.

Rivera credited NNSC with reducing violent crime in cities including Baltimore, Philadelphia, Stockton, CA, and Chicago. On KUOW this week, she explicitly credited NNSC with reducing gun violence in Baltimore.

But Baltimore, as Rivera surely knows, actually stopped contracting with NNSC after two efforts at reducing gun violence in partnership with that contractor failed to show results. The current, successful model is a more comprehensive approach that includes a type of focused deterrence developed at the University of Pennsylvania, but also “community violence intervention, victim services, improved investigations, and sustained leadership from City Hall,” according to this overview.

It’s unusual, though not unprecedented, for a city council member to insist on hiring a specific contractor for such a large contract. (NNSC facilitated a symposium Rivera convened on gun violence earlier this year.) Rivera has continued to flog the issue, castigating Wilson via press release for telling KUOW that the city needs to be methodical in its approach to gun violence rather than rushing forward with a single “premature, very large investment in an out-of-state organization.”

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Failing to contract with NNSC, specifically, Rivera said, would send a message to “the people of Seattle” that the city doesn’t want to “stop future tragedies.”

Rivera’s resolution passed out of committee 3-0, with Eddie Lin abstaining.

City Council, homelessness, Transportation

Saka’s Messy Transportation Bill Gets Messier; Controversial Group We Heart Seattle Makes City’s Official Volunteer Day Roster
Councilmember Rinck wanted to know why Saka gave the council just one day to propose amendments to legislation he hasn’t even formally introduced yet.

1. While much of the city council was on vacation, transportation committee chair Rob Saka apparently spent his two-week summer break padding out his already messy Vision Zero legislation, which is now much longer—but no more substantive—than the draft he introduced as an “information item” in late August.

Saka first rolled out his three draft bills one day before Mayor Katie Wilson issued several substantive executive orders on traffic safety, in what seemed like a clear attempt to get ahead of the mayor’s announcement. (Saka declined to participate in the mayor’s event, which two of his colleagues attended). At his committee meeting on Tuesday, Saka emphasized the fact that his legislation technically came out first.

“I suppose great minds can arrive at some of the same intersections as we appear to have done and aligned on from a legislative and executive perspective, and that’s a good thing. I’m pleased to see additional complementary actions from the mayor,” Saka said. 

But Saka still hasn’t formally introduced his legislation, which remained an “informational item” on Tuesday’s agenda. And his latest draft bills remain almost entirely nonsubstantive, requesting reports from the Seattle Department of Transportation, issuing recommendations on truck side guards to protect cyclists and pedestrians, and giving SDOT the “authority” to do various things that it already has the authority to do. Even sections that appear to require SDOT to produce various reports are essentially just requests, since SDOT does not answer to the city council. (Generally speaking, if the council really wants a department to do something, they pass a budget “proviso” that conditions funding on whatever action the council wants.)

One thing that can be said for Saka’s legislation: It’s definitely longer now, with more statements of purpose than there are letters in the alphabet. Ordinarily, these kinds of statements are known as “recitals” and they occur at the beginning of a bill to establish the purported reasons the legislation is necessary. (See, for instance, the 23 “whereas” clauses used to justify the 2024 ordinance reinstating a ban on “prostitution loitering.”)

But in an unusual twist, Saka is proposing to give each of these individual statements more force by including them in the bill as official findings, which could be used in the future to interpret whether legislation complied with the council’s intent.

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To put this in concrete terms: Saka’s proposal, everything from A., affirming that Vision Zero is “effective,” to Z., stating that 26 percent of streets lack sidewalks, to CC., affirming that the city supports union labor, would have the force of law. Item L., affirming that “Each life lost or constrained due to crashes represents not only loss and grief for affected loved ones but an individual’s unrealized potential,” would be become part of the ordinance itself.

Editor’s note: This story originally said the findings section of Saka’s Vision Zero ordinance—the one with Sections A through CC—would go into the Seattle Municipal Code. In fact, they would become part of the adopted ordinance, but not the municipal code. Findings have more weight than recitals, but less than a law such as a speed limit. We regret the error.

Saka wants to pass his bills out of committee on September 17, which means that even though he hasn’t formally introduced them yet, any amendments are due today. Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, sounding incredulous, said yesterday, “I’ve never seen an amendment deadline for a piece of legislation that has not formally been introduced yet.”

Councilmember Eddie Lin said he would like to hear from SDOT before voting on the bill, but Saka said there was no need. “In fact, it’s pretty standard practice, when we talk about who’s at the table, to have our central staff at the table, sometimes community at the table, but not having the executive branch. This is a legislative effort. This is a legislative effort, I want to underscore,” Saka said. The rest of the council will now have to decide if they want to give Saka his way or put the legislation off until after the budget—or indefinitely.

2. This year’s citywide day of service—rechristened “Show Up, Seattle!”—includes an encampment “cleanup” event hosted by We Heart Seattle, a local group whose founder, Andrea Suarez, regularly teams up with right-wing influencer Jonathan Choe on videos where they harass and shame unsheltered people.

Former mayor Bruce Harrell’s office rejected We Heart Seattle’s initial application to participate in the day of service in 2022, but since then, they’ve gotten the OK every year.

That’s despite a controversial reputation and accusations that they frequently throw away people’s possessions and occupied tents.

In addition to arguing that homeless people “refuse” treatment, Suarez has railed against Narcan distribution and argued for “banning tents” on the grounds that they “enable” homeless people to keep living outside with addiction. (A 2022 story in Willamette Week quoted Suarez saying that giving people food and clean needles amounted to “coddling” a baby in his “crib.”)

The group’s Gresham, Oregon-based co-founder, Kevin Dahlgren, pled guilty last year to identity theft, theft, and misconduct after stealing from at least one unsheltered person as well as the city of Gresham.

We Heart Seattle is currently under a state investigation for allegedly failing to train its volunteer staff on how to properly pick up and dispose of hazardous materials, including needles. Suarez has portrayed herself as a victim of state overreach, using the investigation as an opportunity to fundraise for the group.

A spokesperson for the Department of Neighborhoods, which now sponsors the day of service said We Heart Seattle met the criteria to qualify for its day of volunteerism.So far, just four people have signed up, although don’t be surprised when the group posts—as it did last year—that the city-sanctioned event was a “truly epic” success.

City Council, housing, Mayor Wilson

Greater Seattle: Katie Wilson is to Jimmy Carter as Zohran Mamdani is to Barack Obama

By Josh Feit

First of all, a quick followup to an item from a couple of weeks ago, when I wrote: “Trump’s Case Against US Olympian David Hearn for Vandalizing the Reflecting Pool (since abandoned by Trump’s own DOJ) > North Seattle Couple’s Case for Recalling Katie Wilson.”

Yup. Last week, King County Superior Court Judge Patrick Oishi dismissed the request for a recall. At a confusing hearing last Thursday, August 27, Oishi told the petitioners their case was “befuddling.” For starters, they missed a filing deadline and then withdrew their request. Seems like the Trump analogy was spot on. And in what seemed even more similar to Trump’s endless mishegas, the couple then claimed they had more info. Oh brother.

Barack Obama > Jimmy Carter

Speaking of Wilson and analogies to presidents, let me alert you to this one: With her econo-travel  aesthetic, earnest policy brain, lefty-populist comfort zone, socially-awkward-bookworm personality, and (from what we hear about her behind-the-scenes leadership style) prickly isolation on the 7th floor—Wilson is Seattle’s own Jimmy Carter. If this analogy isn’t tracking for Gen Zers and Millennials, ask the internet about solar panels, sweaters, and thermostats. Carter, an outsider who was a elected during America’s post-Watergate call for goodie-goodie governance, eventually started to tank in the polls during his presidency. I initially thought Wilson’s high-wattage smile and unbridled joy in civics would confound the naysayers, critics, and bitter media. But—recall effort or not—recent polling indicates this mayor is in trouble.

Thanks to Wilson’s socialist label and sudden, surprise rise, the analogy that used to come to mind was more encouraging: Wilson was Seattle’s own Zohran Mamdani. But Mamdani veers toward a presidential analogy of his own. And it’s the opposite of a one-termer like Carter who got mired in “malaise.” Mamdani’s soaring popularity, confident charm, and big-ideas agenda make him like Barack Obama, an incorrigibly popular two-term president.

As Mamdani continues to wow the public and generate hope with his own gleeful project of sweeping governance (sweltering subway stations as pools of sustainable energy being the latest Mamdani lightning bolt) a pal in New York asked me why Wilson was having so much trouble in Seattle. I don’t think this fully explains it, but the fact that he’s a he and she’s a she has evidently allowed the media to normalize an unbridled condescension, giving their anti-Wilson bias free rein.

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50 > 0

Protesting density, liberal Boomers and Xers often quote Joni Mitchell’s famous line, “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.” Unwittingly, their knee-jerk “Development=Bad” mantra prioritizes car-dependent lifestyles. By stalling new housing development, they are locking pervasive car culture in place, thwarting the density needed to create walkable neighborhoods and expanded transit service. I derisively call it Joni Mitchell Politics.

So, as summer comes to a close, let’s applaud the Seattle Office of Housing and City Councilmember Dionne Foster’s pro-housing politics. Thanks to legislation they passed earlier this summer, OH used $6 million to acquire the site of a former gas station, mini-mart, and parking lot on East Montlake Place E. in the upscale Montlake neighborhood to build 50 below-market-rate condos. There’s currently zero affordable housing in the pricey area.

Under Seattle’s Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda, adopted in 2015, high-income communities like Montlake that lack affordable housing are known as “high opportunity” neighborhoods.

In her summer wrap-up newsletter, Foster noted the housing win: “Through acquiring property in a high opportunity neighborhood in Montlake we are locking in a future for affordable homeownership in a neighborhood that currently does not have affordable homeownership.”

Josh@publicola.com

City Council, Transportation

Wilson Proposes Substantive Vision Zero Improvements—One Day After Councilmember’s Hasty Attempt to Upstage Her

By Erica C. Barnett

Mayor Katie Wilson signed an expansive, substantive executive order last week directing the Seattle Department of Transportation to implement and expedite a list of, Vision Zero projects designed to improve public safety by building new protected bike lanes, improving pedestrian visibility at intersections, prioritizing projects on “high-injury” streets like Aurora Ave. N and Rainier Ave. S., and installing more automated speed enforcement cameras, along with at least a dozen other executive actions.

The legislation also directs the city’s lobbyists to support a grab bag of potential state legislation that includes granting legal immunity to cities that make street improvements after a fatal crash (as Seattle Bike Blog noted in their coverage, the potential for liability can prevent cities from making safety improvements, which could be seen as an admission of guilt) as well as lower drunk-driving limits and local authority to prohibit right turns on red.

Speaking on Friday outside Cleveland High School, not far from a recently “daylighted”  intersection where SDOT removed parking to make crosswalks more visible, Wilson called it “especially meaningful to be here near Cleveland High School, where the safety of young people traveling to and from school is top of mind.” 

One question Wilson politely deflected—although it appeared to be top of mind for many of the reporters at the press conference—was why city council transportation committee chair Rob Saka wasn’t at the event. (“I look forward to working with the transportation committee chair,” Wilson said.) Committee vice-chair Alexis Mercedes Rinck, along with District 2 Councilmember Eddie Lin, was there, but the putative transportation leader for the executive department was nowhere to be found.

 

In fact, Saka declined to participate in the press conference. He even rolled out his own traffic safety legislation, in the form of two draft proposals introduced as informational items because they were still unfinished, one day before Wilson’s announcement. It sure looked like an attempt to upstage the mayor’s executive orders, and Saka’s pointed absence from Wilson’s event only highlighted his rushed attempt to shine the spotlight on himself.

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Saka said the draft bills will look different when he actually introduces the bills in September, and a commitment to introduce a third bill mandating safety guards on city contractors’ trucks to protect pedestrians and cyclists from potentially deadly side-impact crashes.

Saka’s legislation, which got coverage on KOMO, Seattle Bike Blog, and KIRO’s John Curley Show, among others, is mostly nonsubstantive. It “authorizes” the SDOT director to do things like “incorporate, as appropriate, traffic safety best practices consistent with Vision Zero and the Safe System Approach” and gives SDOT’s chief engineer the “authority” to make various safety improvements to city infrastructure.

It also codifies a change Bruce Harrell’s transportation director, Greg Spotts, made in 2023, designating SDOT’s chief engineer as the person in charge of traffic safety, and would put 19 statements about transportation in the Seattle Municipal Code, including a statement about the value of human life and one affirming that the city values partnerships with other transportation agencies.

During a meeting about Saka’s proposals last week, Rinck and Councilmember Dionne Foster both questioned Saka about what his legislation would actually do, and why he proposed adding what amount to statements of principles, like a commitment to Vision Zero and the Safe Systems approach, to the municipal code. (Ordinarily, these kinds of statements are included in recitals—”whereas” clauses—or nonbinding resolutions.) Saka responded that “the intent here is to codify the current existing policy as the new baseline, as the new baseline that SDOT is fully free to… iterate, improve, make better.”

Asked if she considered her proposal more substantive than Saka’s, Wilson smiled and said she thought the two were compatible. “I look forward to working the transportation committee chair… to improve road safety.”