← Back to City Council Digest

City Council Regular Meeting Auto captions

Monday, September 20, 2021

7:00 PM · 1h 11m
Topic tracked across meetings:
Amendments to Sign Code AB 8140 7/7
Planning Policy Commission · Nov 12, 2020 Economic Vitality Commission · Mar 11, 2021 Planning Policy Commission · Apr 22, 2021 City Council Regular Meeting · May 25, 2021 City Council Regular Meeting · Jul 27, 2021 City Council Regular Meeting · Sep 7, 2021 City Council Regular Meeting · Sep 20, 2021
Section
Topic
1. CALL TO ORDER
1a
First for Roll Call Vote: Walsh
6. INFORMATIONAL UPDATES
6a
2021 PFAS Update ID 0956
packet pp.5–20
Topics: Water
Staff report:
The purpose of this informational update is to provide the Issaquah City Council with the latest information regarding the City’s progress in addressing the presence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) in our groundwater and our drinking water.
7. CONSENT CALENDAR
7a
Accounts: Payables and Payroll of Sept. 20, 2021, $ 6,163,165.72 ID 0891
Carried 7-0
Approve · packet pp.21–51
Topics: Budget
Staff report:
Finance Department P.O. Box 1307 Issaquah, WA 98027 PH: 425-837-3050 www.issaquahwa.gov
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7b
Minutes: City Council Regular Meeting, Aug. 2, 2021
Carried 7-0
Approve · packet pp.53–57
Staff report:
CONSENT CALENDAR b) 08-02-21 City Council Regular Meeting Minutes Page (0000)
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7c
Amendments to Sign Code AB 8140
Carried 7-0
Adopt Ordinance · packet pp.59–164
Topics: Land Use
Staff report:
Purpose: The purpose of overhauling the City's Sign Code is: 1. Consolidation and Consistency. The City has two sign codes and one sign design section which will be combined into a single integrated sign code. These codes are: IMC 18.11, Signs; Central Issaquah Development and Design Standards, or CIDDS, Chapter 9, Signs; and the Sign Design section of the Olde Town Design Standards. In merging the various codes into a single, unified code, the approach is generally to create consistency across similar areas, while preserving differences that reinforce neighborhood character. 2. Compliance. In 2015, the US Supreme Court decided the Reed versus the Town of Gilbert, Arizona case, also known as Reed v Gilbert. The decision changed the way temporary signs, especially non-commercial signs, may be regulated to preserve freedom of speech. Content may no longer be used in determining which sign…
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7d
Temporary Transfer of Well #5 Water Rights into State Trust Water Rights Program AB 8214
Carried 7-0
Authorize · packet pp.165–201
Topics: Water
Staff report:
Well No. 5 is currently an active well source in the City's water system. However, over the past few years, groundwater quality concerns related primarily to identification of trace levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) present in the deep aquifer from which Well No. 5 withdraws water have been identified. As per Council direction in June of 2020, the City is implementing a strategy which includes temporarily discontinuing the use of Well No. 5 due to these groundwater quality concerns. A separate presentation included as part of tonight's agenda provides the Council with an update to the overall strategy (ID 0956, PFAS Update).
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7h
2022 School Impact Fee Update AB 8236
Carried 7-0
Adopt Ordinance · packet pp.247–273
Topics: Land UseBudgetSchools
Staff report:
The Issaquah City Council adopted a School
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7i
Amendments to IMC 13.24.090, Regional Supply and Treatment Charge - Water AB 8238
Carried 7-0
Adopt Ordinance · packet pp.275–288
Topics: Land UseWater
Staff report:
The City's drinking water supply comes from two sources - groundwater and regional water purchased from Cascade Water Alliance. The City is one of seven member agencies of Cascade Water Alliance. RCFCs for 2021 and 2022 (without the surcharge) were already adopted by the Council on December 7, 2020 (AB 8034).
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7j
2022 ARCH Administrative Budget and Work Program AB 8248
Carried 7-0
Approve · packet pp.289–345
Topics: HousingBudget
Staff report:
ARCH is a partnership of King County and east King County Cities who have joined together to assist with preserving and increasing the supply of housing for low– and moderate-income households in the region. There are 14 other member cities (mostly concentrated in east King County) and representation from King County.
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
7k
SE 43rd Signalization Project Change Order AB 8250
Carried 7-0
Authorize · packet pp.347–349
Staff report:
On February 3, 2020, the Council awarded the construction contract for the SE 43rd Way Signalization Project (TR 031) to Rodarte Construction, Inc. in the amount of $5,916,078.65 (including sales tax).
Roll call:
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
8. REGULAR BUSINESS
8a
Proposed 2022 Budget: Mayor's Presentation Hear Presentation AB 8253
packet pp.351–352
Topics: Budget
Staff report:
n/a
8b
Affordable Housing Revenues Allocation AB 8249
Carried 5-2
Direct Administration · packet pp.353–365
Topics: Housing
Staff report:
SHB 1406: Affordable and Supportive Housing State Shared Tax In March 2020, the City Council adopted legislation, through Agenda Bill 7931 (Ord. 2903), to collect the Affordable and Supportive Housing State Shared Tax. This legislation provides the City with a share of the existing State sales tax revenue and did not result in any additional sales tax being imposed on consumers.
Roll call:
Moved by REH · seconded by WALSH
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Zach Hall, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
Opposed: Goodman, Hunt
9. GOOD OF THE ORDER
9a
Upcoming Council Meetings
0:00 so the next item we have on our agenda
0:02 this evening is an informational update
0:04 id 0956
0:06 it is the 2021 pfas update and i'd like
0:10 to invite public works director bob york
0:13 and eric viewer principal hydrologist
0:15 with fairline consulting to make the
0:16 presentation welcome bob welcome eric
0:21 well thank you mayor paulie good evening
0:24 council members and tonight we're
0:26 providing what's now become an annual
0:28 update annual presentation on the
0:32 pfest issue we've been dealing with
0:34 and pfas stands for
0:37 per and poly
0:39 floral alcohol
0:41 substances so
0:43 from here on out in the presentation
0:45 eric and i will be referring
0:47 to the
0:48 issue as pfas
0:50 so i'm glad to have eric uh on board
0:52 tonight to
0:54 be part of this presentation
0:56 eric's been working on the on the
0:58 groundwater investigation
1:00 characterization phase of this
1:03 for
1:03 a number of years now as we'll discuss
1:05 in a minute and uh so welcome eric
1:10 and next slide please tissue
1:16 by the way a quick overview of our
1:18 presentation
1:20 brief
1:21 background on how this pfas
1:24 issued
1:27 manifests itself
1:29 with the city and followed by eric's
1:31 presentation on
1:33 what our partnership's been doing with
1:35 eastside fire and rescue and ecology in
1:37 the city
1:39 an update on now emerging
1:41 into phase three
1:43 of that work uh i'll give you a quick
1:46 update on the city of visqual water
1:47 utility progress
1:50 and our efforts to address
1:52 the presence of pfas that finds itself
1:55 into our water supply
1:57 um then we'll briefly talk about up
1:59 upcoming
2:00 development
2:02 developments and drivers
2:04 followed by a quick summary and the
2:05 opportunity for questions and answers
2:07 next slide please tisha
2:13 most of you might recall we
2:15 discovered the president of pfas in our
2:17 water water supply back in
2:20 2015 due to the
2:22 requirement epa presented to us on
2:25 taking samples of unregulated
2:27 contaminants
2:29 and all of a sudden we learned what pfos
2:31 meant
2:32 as a result of that
2:34 discovery uh immediately the council
2:37 acted and
2:40 by mid 2016 we were treating the primary
2:43 source of the
2:45 problem which was well for
2:47 that's been
2:48 over the years looking back and
2:50 reflecting that's been a very successful
2:52 project albeit one we would rather not
2:55 have to put in in the first place but we
2:57 continue to
2:59 achieve non-detect levels even with the
3:02 lowest possible state-of-the-art
3:04 detection limits in the
3:06 water that's produced as a result of our
3:08 treatment of uh well for using granular
3:10 activated carbon
3:12 then over time
3:14 because the t fasts in our water and our
3:17 groundwater was
3:19 due to the presence of or the activity
3:21 related to firefighting foams we uh
3:25 developed a partnership with eastside
3:26 fire and rescue
3:28 and because we were one of the first if
3:31 not the first
3:32 in the state to all of a sudden uncover
3:35 a pfas issue department of ecology took
3:38 interest in
3:40 the city's situation and has been a
3:43 partner ever since 2018
3:48 the type of work that we're doing which
3:49 eric will quickly summarize well
3:52 started back in 2018 and continues on to
3:54 this day
3:56 then and
3:57 as you may recall in mid 2021
4:01 we looked at different options to deal
4:02 with the pfest present in our water
4:04 supply and
4:06 we came up with an option which i'll
4:07 discuss more in detail
4:09 in a moment
4:11 we are implementing the water utility
4:13 game plan
4:14 uh actually with expedited activities
4:17 that are within our budget
4:18 to meet the emerging
4:21 soon-to-be final martian and state
4:23 department of health
4:25 regulations
4:28 so with that next slide please i'll turn
4:30 it over to i think eric uh pure
4:34 um by the way eric works for a nissan
4:36 based company that has over 100
4:38 employees
4:39 right near downtown issaquah so go ahead
4:41 eric thank you
4:43 thank you bob and thank you to the city
4:46 council for being here and taking the
4:47 time um yeah so my name is eric viewer
4:50 i'm a principal hydrogeologist at
4:52 fairlawn consulting our
4:54 flagship office is on fifth
4:57 street i believe just uh it's actually
4:59 on the maps that i'll show you
5:01 and um i've been with the company now
5:04 for just over six years and it's all
5:07 going very well
5:09 bob gave a great introduction here um
5:11 i'm going to just kind of go through the
5:13 high level um where we've come from and
5:17 what we've done and where we're going on
5:19 the investigation
5:22 what has occurred i guess starting with
5:24 uh investigate the first year
5:28 the initial investigation that followed
5:31 the discovery fifas
5:34 focused on sort of a linear
5:36 profile downside to access the valley uh
5:39 the suspected cause was a triple f which
5:41 is aqueous film forming foam it's a
5:43 firefighting agent um it's a somewhat
5:46 tricky substance to handle and so it's
5:48 frequently trained with um there have
5:50 been sort of a number of generations of
5:51 detergents over the years
5:53 i'm not going to go sorry for the
5:54 details of that but suffice to say that
5:57 new detergents required new equipment
5:59 and
5:59 training events were done outside
6:01 and so you know
6:04 bob said one end of the pipe he's
6:05 basically once the water comes out of
6:06 the ground my job is everything that
6:08 happens before it hits that pipe um what
6:11 we've done since then as a partnership
6:14 between eastside fire and rescue the
6:15 city of assaquad and the department of
6:16 ecology
6:19 begin the process and then actually work
6:20 through a substantial amount of it of
6:22 characterizing the nature and extent of
6:25 pfas both in soil and groundwater
6:27 in the lower isoqua valley and so what
6:31 started out where i think is a
6:32 relatively simple conceptual side model
6:34 single release migrating linearly
6:37 sort of dude north has
6:39 actually added a lot of additional
6:41 detail
6:42 since we started that process we've
6:44 identified five areas of interest those
6:46 are all locations that had historical a
6:48 triple f training
6:50 we performed soil sampling in all those
6:52 locations starting with what's called
6:54 multi-incremental sampling was
6:56 essentially
6:57 a way to composite a big area of soil to
6:59 get a very robust characterization of
7:02 that soil and then we've installed 53
7:04 new monitoring wells those are both
7:06 shallow and what we call intermediate
7:08 but essentially deeper 60 to 120 feet
7:11 deep
7:13 evaluate all of these locations to sort
7:16 of begin to understand with greater
7:18 detail
7:19 what's happened what the site looks like
7:21 effectively from the surface down and
7:23 then how that ultimately affects the the
7:25 city's water supply
7:27 if i could get the next slide please
7:31 so uh this is just looking a little bit
7:34 sort of you know progress so we can see
7:35 where we're at
7:36 we've been very fortunate both the city
7:38 and efr work really well together to
7:41 secure funds for a lot of this because
7:43 of the nature of pfas
7:44 they're considered toxic at very low
7:46 concentrations
7:48 the work is fairly expensive the
7:49 analytical methods are
7:52 you know costly per sample
7:54 and um you know when you're drilling 60
7:56 to 120 feet down i mean the wells and
7:59 everything else it's all just the you
8:02 know the direct costs that add up pretty
8:04 quickly
8:05 so um this initially started with
8:07 department of commerce grants and then
8:09 uh the most recent round of work which
8:11 is uh reported as of march 2021 was
8:15 secured through
8:17 appropriation funding that was lobbied
8:19 by the city and efl and our jointly it's
8:22 a very successful project
8:24 what i want you to take away from this
8:25 slide i wish i had a little bit better
8:27 color popping on the wells on the in the
8:29 center and on the uh what's my right it
8:31 should be everyone else's right too it's
8:33 simply that you can see there is an
8:34 initial characterization done
8:35 immediately after the ucmr that's the
8:37 unmonitored contaminant rule
8:40 sampling at coi4
8:43 um so there's initial sort of
8:45 plume that was developed there there's a
8:46 lot of question marks there's relatively
8:48 little density in terms of where the
8:50 wells are placed
8:51 the work that we've done since then has
8:52 essentially filled that map in so that
8:54 is both in the plan view looking at the
8:57 density of wells across all the areas
8:59 that we think were affected and then
9:00 also
9:01 in the profile view so working from the
9:03 ground surface downward
9:05 and
9:06 what we have now are pretty well defined
9:08 areas that we think are affected both in
9:10 shallow groundwater and in intermediate
9:12 deeper ground water which is the
9:14 water that moves directly into well four
9:18 next slide please
9:22 so where we are now in that process um
9:25 we've done data collection in all five
9:27 areas of interest uh it looks based on
9:29 the preliminary data that we have
9:32 that um
9:33 there was a you know a event on the east
9:37 side of the valley that affected shallow
9:38 groundwater we don't see data that
9:40 suggests that that's moved into
9:42 intermediate ground water
9:43 on the west side of the valley we
9:46 identified locations at the former or at
9:49 the existing elementary school and dodd
9:51 fields and then also at the east side
9:53 fire headquarters facility that have
9:54 both shallow and intermediate impacts
9:57 um within those areas of interest that
9:59 we had we had impacts eastside fire has
10:02 the longest a triple f uh training
10:04 history and it also had the highest
10:05 concentrations in soil so the next stage
10:08 in the investigation and this is what
10:10 we're currently working through
10:12 is to actually begin designing a
10:15 remedial approach here so pfas are not
10:18 currently regulated by the state
10:20 they are
10:21 likely to be regulated soon like i
10:23 mentioned earlier they're considered
10:25 toxic at very low concentrations which
10:27 makes the remediation sort of difficult
10:30 the best way i can kind of describe that
10:32 is that the problem you're facing is
10:34 you're treating mostly clean media all
10:36 the time you can imagine if you were
10:39 i don't know trying to vacuum dirt out
10:40 of your carpet and your carpet is
10:41 already
10:42 99.999 percent clean and you're charged
10:45 with getting that last you know one
10:48 0.0001
10:50 percent of the dirt out how long you
10:52 have to spend cleaning it it's very
10:53 energetically intensive so
10:55 um the question is how do we do that in
10:58 a way that's cost effective and that
10:59 ultimately is going to restore the
11:00 aquifer to its highest beneficial use
11:03 um so what we have developed at this
11:06 initial stage is what's called a pilot
11:08 test which is a simple uh you know
11:10 simply saying that we're going to see
11:12 whether or not we get the desired
11:13 results with the approach that we think
11:16 is most likely to succeed and then if
11:18 that works then it would be scaled up to
11:20 a full-scale remediation approach and so
11:23 what you're looking at here is the west
11:24 side of
11:25 the headquarters facility um there's an
11:28 injection field which is shown with sort
11:30 of the overlapping yellow circles there
11:32 those would be direct injection points
11:34 and then we'll monitor groundwater once
11:37 the treatment reagent goes in and we
11:39 should see
11:40 a decrease in reported concentrations of
11:44 pfoss and groundwater it's been an
11:46 unusually dry spring so the water the
11:48 groundwater is actually the lowest we've
11:50 ever seen it
11:51 which is a little bit challenging for us
11:53 but it doesn't ultimately change the
11:55 overall design i just might have changed
11:57 the the installation approach if i could
11:59 get the next slide please
12:02 so i have uh this and one more so i
12:03 promise i'll be done soon
12:05 this is that same view that you're just
12:07 looking at with essentially a slice
12:09 through the ground heading from the
12:11 south west to the northeast
12:14 this shows again if you look at the the
12:16 yellow dots on the previous slide the
12:18 sort of pink box that's left of center
12:21 would be the injection
12:23 the treatment reagent is essentially
12:25 what's called colloidal activated carbon
12:26 it's just very very finely ground
12:28 charcoal
12:29 with some proprietary agents that makes
12:31 it sticky
12:32 and the idea here is that it retains the
12:35 phos in the subsurface so that it no
12:36 longer can leach into the aquifer and
12:38 migrate off site
12:40 if that is successful you know we would
12:42 hopefully see that as a as an approach
12:44 that can be scaled up to both uh do
12:47 full-scale remediation at this location
12:49 and then also the other locations we've
12:50 identified that are impacting the
12:52 aquifer
12:54 and
12:54 then there are other sort of you know
12:57 steps that we can take both
12:58 removal of unsaturated media or capping
13:01 the surface
13:02 to prevent infiltration to essentially
13:04 cut off all the available migration
13:06 pathways so that we don't have anything
13:08 else that's that's making its way into
13:10 groundwater
13:11 next slide
13:14 so there's a lot of text here
13:16 it's just a a brief wrap up and bob did
13:19 earlier today send out
13:22 there there was some free information
13:24 prior to the meeting
13:25 all this is in reports that are in the
13:27 public domain so make sure you have that
13:29 link if you do want to look through the
13:31 details there's a lot more figures
13:32 there's a ton of data
13:34 but in essence
13:36 you know like i said the area that we're
13:37 evaluating here is quite large and we
13:39 have several historical training
13:40 locations
13:42 so we've made a tremendous amount of
13:43 progress
13:45 there are still a limited number of data
13:47 gaps that we think will be necessary to
13:50 do sort of i guess the total remediation
13:52 of the site um however
13:57 sorry tap my spacebar
13:59 at this stage you know we're focusing on
14:01 the location that has the longest
14:03 history of use and the highest
14:05 concentrations
14:06 both because that's the best one to
14:07 measure when you're testing technology
14:10 and also it has really the greatest
14:11 benefit in terms of return for being
14:13 restored first
14:15 and with that i am done
14:19 okay thank you thanks eric
14:21 that's a great summary
14:23 very technical
14:25 and eric did a good job trying to
14:28 provide the key key points of that
14:30 ongoing
14:32 investigation so
14:33 the goal here for what eric's doing is
14:36 and what we're doing as a partnership is
14:38 stop the source from continuing to
14:41 migrate into the
14:43 groundwater and therefore impact our
14:45 our
14:46 our wells
14:48 on the other side of the fence is
14:51 taking care of the problem when it
14:52 reaches our wells and
14:54 and that's what we are doing right now
14:56 with this
14:58 game plan that
15:00 the council approved
15:04 over the course of the middle of last
15:06 year
15:08 and we are
15:09 on on target to meet that game plan
15:11 which includes
15:15 deferring any
15:17 major capital expenditure
15:19 significant in nature to
15:23 way into the future um probably 10 or or
15:27 more probably even more
15:29 time frame than that and as you can
15:31 imagine with the supply chain issues
15:33 et cetera we we'd be hard-pressed
15:36 to uh
15:38 get anything going
15:41 as other
15:42 as we've seen with recent capital
15:44 project bids
15:46 so deferring that was a i think in
15:48 hindsight a wise maneuver and we took it
15:51 we're installing measures to allow the
15:54 blending of
15:56 purchase water from cascade water
15:58 alliance at a discount and groundwater
16:02 you'll hear more about that in a second
16:05 our main source of ongoing problems is
16:07 the well five in terms of pfas and and
16:10 actually a few other parameters so
16:13 we're taking advantage of
16:15 the opportunity that cascade offered us
16:17 to if we shut down one of our
16:19 independent supplies
16:21 in this case well five they will provide
16:23 us heavily discounted water to make up
16:25 that shortfall because they have
16:29 more water than they that they've
16:31 contracted for that they can possibly
16:33 sell so uh
16:35 that's our game plan that is now
16:38 imminently subject to council approval
16:42 ready to implement
16:43 and we will monitor the need for
16:45 increased water supply over time
16:48 but so far even with this
16:50 hot summer
16:51 um we haven't seen
16:53 the peak daily demands
16:56 um seem to trend upward
16:59 and
17:00 so we uh we still have a
17:03 long runway ahead of us in terms of when
17:06 we would actually need to worry about
17:09 the more expensive plan b
17:11 so next slide please
17:15 very quick background here's the
17:18 the interim game plan that we're uh
17:20 we're implementing
17:23 briefly bellevue
17:24 provides cascade water to cougar
17:26 mountain and south cove
17:28 uh cascade water alliance supplies it
17:31 ones our game plan is to uh
17:34 upgrade an intertie
17:36 near sr 900 to
17:38 allow
17:40 the
17:40 more constant use of cascade water in
17:43 the valley zone
17:45 we will
17:48 upgrade
17:49 with minor improvements the
17:51 gilman well four in that case to add
17:53 fluoride so we have a consistent
17:55 fluoride dose
17:57 throughout the city
17:58 of the optimal dose being around 0.7
18:00 milligrams per liter
18:02 the risen wells will also get fluoride
18:06 and also
18:07 we will raise the ph of the risden wells
18:10 which we're ready to do
18:12 in the next couple weeks
18:14 uh to make sure that we can play with
18:16 the lead and copper rolls and the reason
18:18 for that is when
18:19 the gilman well five
18:21 which supplies the
18:23 higher ph shuts down the risdon wells
18:26 are in a somewhat lower ph
18:30 the lower ph water than is optimal for
18:33 lead and copper roll compliance so
18:35 we are ready even as we speak to uh
18:40 take care of that by adding a
18:45 fda approved agent to uh raise the ph
18:48 sloppy of the
18:49 two risen wells the risen wells by the
18:52 way have never
18:54 shown any concentration measurable of
18:57 uh pfas in those two wells so we're
18:59 fortunate to have
19:00 two high capacity production models that
19:02 are
19:03 continuing to stay pfast free
19:06 x slide please uh tissue
19:15 we are implementing the game plan that's
19:17 an interim but that interim solution
19:20 requires a building the building
19:21 requires
19:23 permitting and so
19:24 our
19:26 our
19:28 plan improvements wouldn't be ready to
19:29 mid 2022 however
19:32 knowing that there's some emerging
19:36 department of health uh regulations that
19:39 will soon be final as early as
19:41 the fourth quarter of 2021
19:44 we've
19:45 within the budget that we had authorized
19:48 done a little temporary system
19:50 uh to uh which i'll talk about in a
19:52 second to uh
19:54 to make the risden wells raise the ph of
19:57 those wells and and therefore especially
19:59 given this time of year when
20:01 uh most of our irrigation requirements
20:04 are now diminishing our three
20:09 supply wells can serve
20:13 with enough capacity to deal with the uh
20:17 the winter season which is a merging
20:19 right now essentially the uh the
20:23 more wet weather season
20:26 one thing that's happened that actually
20:29 reverse trend in the last sample results
20:31 is that all five p5 levels have
20:33 increased slightly over time they do
20:35 have pfas in them
20:37 and that lower aquifer as eric mentioned
20:40 the pfas
20:42 was in the mid 30s it went to 50 that
20:46 created a concern about how high the
20:48 pfest was in our drinking water the pfas
20:51 has never
20:52 exceeded the epa health advisories or
20:55 any other
20:56 regulatory requirement so but we
20:58 nonetheless made revisions to how how
21:00 much well water came out of all five to
21:03 uh to blend a little more treated water
21:05 from well four into well five and
21:07 keep the pfast levels
21:10 below the uh
21:12 the uh
21:13 40 part petroleum detection limit that's
21:16 a part of an epa approved
21:18 method that's used for puddled water
21:22 now the numbers have gone from
21:24 50 to 40. i don't know if that's a trend
21:27 that will continue
21:29 and but they're still higher than what
21:31 we need
21:32 to have in order to meet the what's
21:34 called the um
21:36 sals or state action levels that will be
21:39 final again as early as december of this
21:42 year
21:44 those action levels that are implemented
21:45 by the department of health will soon
21:47 become the
21:48 action levels that ecology department
21:50 ecology will use for cleanup levels as
21:52 eric mentioned
21:55 next slide please
21:57 so we're on track to put this temporary
21:59 strategy into place um
22:02 the
22:03 temporary system's installed at the
22:04 risdon wells it's been
22:07 uh tested
22:09 the chemical
22:10 that we need to raise the ph has
22:12 actually
22:13 been delivered and is in our storage
22:16 facility
22:17 um we're essentially ready to go
22:20 um and um
22:22 so that's
22:23 part of the great news that's emerging
22:26 in terms of where we are
22:28 we're shifting we're ready to shift
22:30 our
22:32 talus to
22:34 our talus neighborhood to
22:36 cwa cascade water
22:39 on october 1st
22:43 and
22:44 that would be the same time we shut down
22:46 well five so the approximately the lost
22:49 well five production
22:51 is equal to the taoist demand so
22:53 again another
22:55 fortuitous
22:57 piece of information
22:59 to shut down well five we would
23:03 be super cautious and recommend that the
23:05 council
23:07 authorize putting the water right that
23:09 we have for well five into trust that's
23:11 fully reversible at any time
23:14 that's on your calendar as ab 82 14
23:17 tonight
23:19 we again we're ready to
23:20 purchase cwa water at that discount
23:24 that's in our
23:25 adopted rate study it's on our budget
23:28 and
23:29 as part of that
23:31 negotiation we
23:33 will
23:34 adopt
23:35 uh subject to council approval on ab
23:38 8238 we will add an rcfc or regional
23:42 capital facilities our charge surcharge
23:45 to our
23:46 new customers that hook up effective
23:49 october 1st
23:51 all this has been vetted
23:53 with cascades
23:55 officials and they're ready to
23:57 implement the game plan if the council
23:59 so desires the next slide
24:03 so in summary as eric
24:06 indicated in his part of the
24:07 presentation we're
24:09 continuing our
24:10 partnership
24:11 and making progress on our aquifer
24:13 investigations to the point where now
24:15 we're trying
24:17 fairly innovative
24:18 for p facilities uh remedial
24:20 technologies and
24:23 the issaquah water system
24:25 is on track
24:27 schedule and budget to meet the state
24:29 action levels in advance of the deadline
24:32 which essentially means
24:34 less than 15 parts per trillion but
24:37 really
24:38 if i based on all the results today we
24:40 expect non-detect pfas and all our
24:43 supply sources
24:45 at the lowest
24:47 state-of-the-art
24:48 epa approved detection limits
24:51 as soon as we shut well five off and
24:53 shift the cascade bar
24:55 next final slide efficient
24:59 eric and i stand ready to answer
25:01 any questions the council might have
25:02 thank you
25:04 bob eric thank you for the presentation
25:06 on both of those water topics not just
25:09 the issue that we're working with
25:10 department ecology but also our own
25:12 supply side as well you do have a couple
25:14 of questions we'll start first with
25:17 council member hall
25:18 followed by council member mertz
25:22 uh thank you this is councilmember hall
25:24 and director york eric thank you very
25:25 much for the thorough update i really
25:27 appreciate it appreciate it i actually
25:29 don't have any questions about pfos or
25:31 the pfos partnership the temporary
25:33 strategy certainly seems to be in line
25:35 with
25:36 our discussion from last year and also
25:38 with emerging information from the pfos
25:40 partnership so that looks good to me
25:43 from slide 10 which kind of had the map
25:46 of the water supply
25:49 routes into our different neighborhoods
25:50 i just had a question out of curiosity
25:52 for director york when
25:54 the spar booster pump station is
25:57 complete and we have the um
26:00 uh redundancy created into the squad
26:02 highlands water system i'm just curious
26:04 where that line would be drawn
26:07 so that we would have you know cascade
26:09 water supplying these coal highlands but
26:11 then also a line from another well i
26:13 would assume so i'm just curious where
26:15 that would fit thank you
26:17 then let me
26:18 take a stab at the
26:21 short-term answer when spar
26:23 gets done and we have redundant feed our
26:25 immediate plan is to
26:27 keep on feeding
26:29 the biscuit islands with cascade water
26:32 however we do have the option of doing
26:34 both so uh the booster pump station will
26:38 can take fluoridated
26:41 groundwater or a combination thereof and
26:44 we have complete um
26:47 ability to feed with a groundwater a
26:49 blend or cascade water so but our
26:52 immediate game plan as i
26:57 envisioned it was to for now to keep the
27:00 cascade water going to
27:03 the highlands for number for one reason
27:06 that pressure of the cascade water is
27:09 already
27:10 substantially higher than our
27:11 groundwater or valley water so i save on
27:14 pumping costs or we save on pumping
27:16 costs by doing that
27:18 but there's complete flexibility at that
27:20 point uh
27:21 council
27:22 member hall thank you
27:24 thank you director eric it looks like
27:25 council member hall got his question
27:27 answered let's go to council member
27:28 mertz
27:29 thank you madam mayor this is council
27:31 member mart
27:32 so uh so i understand our efforts
27:37 change our water supplies
27:40 um but the farallon stuff today
27:43 uh seemed new to me
27:45 and so
27:46 um i have a question about
27:49 um that looks like i see things about
27:52 permeable reactive barriers and
27:55 three-dimensional models of water flow
27:58 and that all looks expensive
28:00 and so my question is what's the
28:03 relationship between the farallon
28:06 mitigations that you presented today
28:09 and any
28:11 expenses associated with that kind of
28:13 stuff
28:14 going forward when you talk about our
28:16 strategies i was i was well aware of us
28:19 buying water and shutting down pump five
28:21 and all that kind of good stuff but the
28:22 big science project kind of caught me by
28:24 surprise
28:26 wow
28:27 well i could take that or eric can as
28:29 eric mentioned
28:32 much of the work that's been done so far
28:33 or almost all of it essentially
28:35 everything that fairlawn has done has
28:37 been
28:40 paid for by
28:41 external sources first department of
28:43 commerce and now
28:44 even on an ongoing basis the department
28:47 of ecology
28:49 so uh
28:50 it sounds expensive
28:53 but so far it's been paid for by
28:55 largely external funds
28:58 now is there an expectation that a part
29:01 of our
29:02 water policies going forward will
29:05 involve
29:06 uh expenses for mitigations other than
29:08 where we get our water these this thing
29:10 looks very interesting but uh you know
29:16 you want um i'll answer that i'll try to
29:18 and mayor paulie and others can chime in
29:20 but uh
29:21 yeah it could get expensive that's why
29:23 we're doing all this in preparation this
29:25 investigative work early to try to see
29:27 what remediat remediation technologies
29:31 make sense um
29:33 but we have to weigh that against the
29:35 cost of continuing to treat the pfas in
29:38 the water so there's a lot of upcoming
29:42 revelations occurring that will occur
29:44 about our
29:45 strategy that
29:48 involve looking at different options but
29:50 at some point i think ecology will want
29:53 the
29:55 issue of our groundwater dealt with
29:58 uh over time
30:01 eric do you want to add anything or
30:03 mayor paul actually yeah thank you
30:05 director york that was great um
30:08 councilmember martz we're in a really
30:11 unique position in that we're not under
30:13 any order to manage you know the
30:15 contamination and so far
30:18 uh we have had very willing partners in
30:20 order to make sure that
30:22 we are participating in a study that
30:24 will provide information to the benefit
30:26 of epa and doe so
30:30 it's a liability for us
30:33 but we don't have a good answer on what
30:35 lies ahead it is such a big question
30:37 mark across the country as to
30:40 what will be required of all
30:42 fire district military bases airports
30:45 anyone who use this product and whether
30:47 or not the liability lies under circle
30:50 with cradle to grave where this is the
30:52 contaminant that the manufacturers
30:54 may have to pay for a significant amount
30:57 so we're very very early days i think
30:59 one thing we can do is make sure that
31:01 during the budget conversations that are
31:02 coming up over the next few weeks that
31:04 we highlight what our expenditures may
31:07 it is while it is a issue affecting our
31:09 groundwater and falls under public works
31:11 this is really under the environmental
31:13 umbrella of the work that bob does
31:18 all right so thank you
31:21 i am not seeing any other questions at
31:24 this point in time uh director york and
31:27 eric thank you so much for coming
31:28 tonight
31:29 and i just really want to express my
31:31 gratitude as well for participating in
31:33 this extremely unique one-of-a-kind
31:36 pilot project
31:38 um i'm used to in my previous life
31:40 sitting at tables with three consultants
31:42 three lawyers and three property owners
31:43 trying to point fingers at each other
31:45 and figure it out and somehow this team
31:47 got all the lawyers away from the table
31:49 and got a great consultant and we're all
31:51 working together and that is something
31:52 we should be very very proud of so thank
31:54 you very much for all of your work on
31:56 that
31:58 i am going to
32:02 nice to see you eric nice to see you
32:06 so there is no action requested on this
32:08 information informational item
32:11 but as director york mentioned council
32:13 action is being sought on two related
32:15 items under the consent calendar today
32:17 and that is where we're moving next the
32:19 consent calendar was distributed to
32:21 council in advance and if authorized the
32:23 items on the consent calendar will be
32:25 considered together and approved by one
32:27 motion i would like to invite council
32:30 member dee michelle
32:32 make a statement um on the payables for
32:35 influence the choice council member d
32:37 michelle
32:39 uh thank you mayor paulie
32:44 i would like to state for the record
32:46 that i am currently employed with an
32:47 entity that is included in the city's
32:50 payables influence of choice i currently
32:52 fill the role of temporary executive
32:54 director of influence of choice the city
32:57 serves as a fiscal agent for this agency
33:00 in the disbursement of a federal grant
33:03 grant funds are being disbursed under
33:05 this month's accounts payable i have
33:07 asked for advice from the city attorney
33:09 as to whether this warrants a conflict
33:11 of interest and have been informed that
33:13 i am not legally required to be excused
33:15 from voting as the city is carrying out
33:18 a decision that was previously made by
33:19 the council
33:21 however for the sake of transparency i
33:23 would like to declare this employment
33:25 and have my statement entered in the
33:27 minutes thank you
33:30 thank you councilmember d michelle
33:32 have the payables and payroll been
33:34 reviewed
33:35 yes
33:37 they have this is council president
33:39 thank you very much
33:41 does any council member desire to remove
33:43 any item from the consent calendar and
33:45 consider it under regular business and i
33:47 am keeping my eye on the chat
33:49 if any council member would choose to do
33:51 that
33:55 i am not seeing anything can i get oh
33:58 council president hunt a motion please
34:01 thank you president heinz i move to
34:03 approve the consent calendar as it
34:04 appears in this evening's agenda
34:06 thank you and deputy counselor president
34:08 second
34:10 thank you very much so i'm going to get
34:11 the city clerk to do the roll call vote
34:15 starting with council member walsh
34:18 aye
34:19 member d michelle
34:21 aye
34:22 councilmember goodman
34:26 councilmember hall
34:28 aye
34:30 council president hunt
34:31 aye
34:33 councilmember martz
34:36 deputy council president ray
34:39 at 7i zero nays
34:42 thank you very much city clerk that
34:44 passes unanimously
34:45 the next item of business on our agenda
34:48 this evening under regular business is
34:50 ab-8253
34:52 the proposed 2020 budget and uh council
34:56 will be hearing this evening's
34:58 presentation and received copies of the
35:00 proposed budget
35:02 by email today
35:05 so community members and dedicated city
35:07 council i am pleased to present my 2022
35:10 proposed budget for the city of issaquah
35:13 soon after the pandemic reached king
35:15 county in 2020 we started to forecast
35:18 significant dips in our revenues
35:21 we needed to reduce our services to
35:23 match our expected revenue levels and
35:25 that meant taking a hard look at the
35:27 community's priorities and making some
35:30 very difficult decisions
35:32 now nearly two years later as the
35:34 economy recovers from the kovid 19
35:36 pandemic we are seeing a stronger than
35:39 expected financial performance when
35:41 compared to what the city assumed a year
35:43 ago
35:44 with much of this strength coming from
35:46 one time or in other words
35:48 non-sustainable sources
35:51 my proposed budget leverages these
35:52 one-time funds to not only help isaqah
35:55 recover from the pandemic but also make
35:57 essential investments in our community's
36:00 top priorities
36:02 meanwhile this proposal also includes
36:04 modest revenue increases and commits a
36:06 conservative amount of ongoing costs to
36:09 meet issaquah's long-term needs
36:12 my 2022 proposed budget which totals
36:15 146.6 million
36:17 includes 61.4 million for the general
36:20 fund and 22.7 million in capital
36:23 investments
36:25 i'd like to thank our city council
36:26 members for a very thoughtful and robust
36:28 discussion earlier this year that helped
36:31 identify funding priorities based on our
36:33 strategic plan
36:35 as well as feedback from mississippi's
36:37 most recent community survey as you'll
36:40 see throughout this proposed budget the
36:42 funding priorities for the year include
36:45 mobility
36:46 growth and development
36:48 community engagement
36:50 public safety and human services
36:53 quality of life enhancements
36:55 equity diversity and inclusion and data
36:58 driven decision making
37:00 first and foremost i'm committed to
37:02 providing the needed resources to keep
37:04 issaquest safe
37:06 a key focus of my proposed budget is to
37:08 restore funding for public safety needs
37:11 following covet 19 budget reduction
37:15 this added capacity means our police
37:17 officers can now also help support other
37:20 city schools such as improving mobility
37:22 moving forward
37:24 in addition i propose adding more
37:26 non-commissioned public safety positions
37:28 to the department that will help with
37:30 reporting
37:31 data analysis and building connections
37:34 within our community
37:35 in total the proposed new positions
37:38 include a sergeant
37:39 corporal
37:40 officer
37:42 crime prevention analyst and behavioral
37:44 health coordinator
37:46 similar to police agencies throughout
37:48 our region and nation issaquest police
37:51 department is facing recruitment and
37:53 retention challenges
37:55 to support this essential department we
37:57 are hiring a limited term position to
38:00 help the team find and retain quality
38:02 employees
38:04 while the city continues to recover from
38:06 the pandemic i am confident that this
38:08 spending plan for 2022 will meet our
38:11 community's needs and ensure our
38:13 financial sustainability
38:16 moving forward
38:17 i look forward to working with our
38:19 dedicated city council hardworking staff
38:21 and our passionate community members to
38:23 finalize an adopted budget this fall
38:26 we will now put our schedule up on the
38:28 screen
38:29 which
38:30 and i will let tisha the city clerk do
38:33 that before i proceed going through the
38:35 dates can we have that shared on the
38:37 screen
38:43 i show that it's
38:44 being shared mayor is it visible oh
38:47 sorry yeah you know what thank you city
38:50 clerk my notes were in front of it
38:53 oh my goodness all of these remote
38:55 meetings so much fun
38:57 so the schedule includes an overview on
39:00 september 28th
39:02 a community meeting on september 29th
39:05 and public hearings on october 4th and
39:07 november 15th
39:09 the liberations will take place
39:11 throughout october and november with an
39:13 adoption scheduled for november 15th so
39:16 thank you for allowing me time to
39:19 discuss the 2022 proposed budget
39:22 the next item of business this evening
39:24 is ab-8249
39:26 the affordable housing revenue
39:28 allocation
39:30 and we are looking for some direction
39:32 this evening for the administration
39:34 this is the first time this item is
39:36 before council and i'd like to invite
39:38 deputy city administrator andrea snyder
39:41 to present this item thanks andrea
39:45 thank you mayor paulie this is andrea
39:48 snyder the deputy city administrator and
39:50 thank you to
39:52 nutitia who's pulling up the slides
39:54 appreciate that always
39:58 next slide please tisha
40:04 the purpose for our discussion tonight
40:06 that the administration is asking city
40:08 council to determine the next steps
40:11 regarding the
40:12 revenues collected for the purposes of
40:14 affordable housing and i'll be referring
40:16 to those revenues by
40:18 uh the state bill that they're often
40:20 referred to by their their numbers
40:21 that's the
40:22 1406 and house bill 1590
40:27 which city council adopted those
40:30 those revenues
40:33 last year
40:34 and
40:35 the essential question for you this
40:37 evening to consider is
40:40 should the city keep collecting these
40:42 revenues until more cost information is
40:45 available for the transit oriented
40:47 development and opportunity center
40:48 project that i'll be referring to often
40:51 as podoc
40:53 or should the city consider allocating
40:56 some of those funds
40:58 now
40:59 to other efforts and we're going to talk
41:01 a little bit later about what some of
41:02 those alternatives and options are
41:05 should city council want to consider
41:08 allocating them with this budget cycle
41:12 so just a little bit of background and
41:14 reminder because we have not talked
41:15 about the todoc in a while
41:18 since 2016 the city has been engaged in
41:21 this public-private partnership to build
41:23 165 plus units of affordable housing
41:27 that also includes the supportive
41:28 services that's the opportunity center
41:31 part of this project
41:33 it is the city's single largest effort
41:35 regarding affordable housing and trying
41:37 to increase the supply
41:39 that we've been directly involved in
41:42 and
41:43 the city has committed in the past to
41:46 waiving permitting fees as we do for
41:47 affordable housing projects and that we
41:50 would seek certain funds
41:52 to subsidize the construction of the
41:54 opportunity center and as i think most
41:56 of you recall we've received
41:58 excuse me three million dollars in state
42:00 grants towards that effort to subsidize
42:03 the opportunity subsidize opportunity
42:05 center construction
42:08 so um
42:11 thank you uh also as a bit of an update
42:13 into where we are with the tod project
42:15 right now we're still in conversations
42:17 with the property owner to negotiate the
42:19 purchase and sale agreements
42:21 once we
42:23 have that purchase and sale agreement
42:24 signed which we anticipate to occur this
42:26 fall
42:27 then the city's chosen developer team
42:30 will be able to
42:31 finalize design for the project and get
42:33 updated construction costs for the todfc
42:36 project
42:38 as for more background the revenues that
42:40 we're talking about this evening
42:43 the first revenue is at 1406 and that's
42:45 the adopted state shares
42:47 state shared sales tax where the state
42:51 has been collecting the same sales taxes
42:53 they have for years from the city of
42:54 issaquah but
42:56 have uh offered a portion of that
43:00 sales tax back to the city that we can
43:03 use to fund affordable housing projects
43:06 the acquisition of affordable housing
43:08 the operation of affordable housing and
43:13 as well as tenant rental assistance
43:15 those funds can go towards tenant rental
43:17 assistance and the city adopted those uh
43:20 back in in 2020 and has been collecting
43:23 since we've collected 179 thousand
43:25 dollars to date per state law we are
43:28 limited to collecting
43:30 uh something to the tune of a hundred
43:32 and uh
43:34 twenty two thousand dollars per year
43:37 the other funds that we're talking about
43:39 this evening uh hb hb 1590 those are the
43:44 adopted affordable housing sales tax
43:47 revenues
43:48 and those are
43:50 accumulating at a much higher rate
43:52 that's 995 000 that we've collected to
43:55 date since adoption
43:56 and we've been holding on to those funds
43:58 not allocating them in wishes to partner
44:01 with king county
44:02 on um
44:04 how we can ensure some of those benefits
44:06 come back to issaquah and one of the
44:08 ideas that was discussed at the time of
44:10 adoption by council was that we would
44:12 use some of these funds to help
44:15 fund and subsidize the construction of
44:16 the opportunity center
44:19 and so
44:20 since uh 2020 we have been
44:24 collecting these taxes tax revenues and
44:28 setting them aside
44:29 and
44:32 again both sources of these fundings may
44:35 be able to
44:36 support affordable housing and also may
44:39 be able to help pay for
44:41 some of the waived
44:43 permitting fees that the city has waived
44:45 to support the affordable housing but
44:48 we can waive those fees but we still
44:50 have to pay
44:51 a portion of those fees back according
44:53 to state law so these revenues can be
44:55 used for that as well
44:56 uh next slide please
44:59 thank you so the
45:00 proposal before you this evening and
45:03 is that we could the city could continue
45:05 to collect the affordable housing sales
45:08 tax revenues
45:09 and return to council once the estimates
45:12 for the podoc project have been updated
45:15 the last that we heard
45:17 was an old estimate from several years
45:19 ago about three years ago that the
45:22 construction for the tu for the
45:23 opportunity center would be about five
45:25 million dollars
45:26 and we know that construction costs have
45:28 increased since then um
45:30 and so
45:32 we would be getting updated
45:34 construction estimates in the first
45:38 quarter of next year that's when we
45:40 would anticipate that so the proposal
45:42 would be that we would hold on to these
45:43 affordable housing sales tax revenues
45:45 and return to council once we have a
45:47 better idea of what those construction
45:48 costs are
45:50 and then
45:52 come back and discuss with council and
45:54 consider what options for allocations of
45:56 the remaining or future funds
45:58 from these revenues so that's the
46:00 proposal the administration has for you
46:02 this evening next slide please
46:06 there are some alternatives for your
46:08 consideration so instead of
46:11 holding on to these funds continuing to
46:13 collect them and not allocating them at
46:15 this time the alternatives are of course
46:17 that we could use a portion of the 1406
46:20 funds to fund tenant assistance programs
46:23 we could
46:25 city council could direct us to provide
46:27 a portion of the 1406 funds and or the
46:30 1590 funds to arch in exchange for other
46:33 services or as an additional
46:35 contribution to the trust fund
46:39 or we could
46:41 city council could prefer that the city
46:44 keep the revenues collected to date from
46:46 the 1590 funds but remand the ability to
46:48 collect the tax
46:50 and all future revenues back to king
46:52 county in support of regional efforts
46:55 are some alternatives for your
46:57 consideration this evening also i'd like
47:00 to point out that these alternatives
47:02 still exist
47:04 whether you make the decision tonight
47:05 and provide direction tonight or whether
47:08 you would like the administration to
47:09 come back in the winter
47:13 first quarter of next year to discuss
47:15 this after we have a better idea of what
47:17 those cost estimates for construction of
47:19 the opportunity center are
47:21 council may be able to choose multiple
47:24 choice and choose all of the above if
47:26 you if you choose um
47:28 this this winter
47:30 so that's that's really the um
47:33 the question tonight is we're asking
47:34 council to direct us if you would like
47:37 the if you would like to consider
47:39 allocating some of these funds at this
47:41 time and that's something that we would
47:42 need to come back to with more
47:43 information during the budget process
47:46 that we're just kicking off this evening
47:50 next slide please
47:56 so at this time the administration's
47:59 recommendation is to continue to collect
48:02 the affordable housing sales tax
48:03 revenues without allocation at this time
48:06 and return to council once we have
48:10 more refined cost estimates more updated
48:12 cost estimates
48:13 for
48:14 the podoc project in
48:17 the first quarter of next year
48:22 as for timing and next steps
48:24 if council were to agree with the
48:26 administration's recommendation we would
48:28 of course continue to collect those
48:30 revenues we would get those updated cost
48:32 estimates and returned to council in the
48:34 first quarter of next year to discuss
48:36 use of funds and those
48:38 options for allocating the funds
48:41 council prefers the
48:44 to discuss those alternatives now and
48:46 consider allocating those revenues now
48:48 then
48:50 we would need to look to amending the
48:53 proposed budget during the budget
48:55 discussions that are occurring in the
48:58 next few weeks
49:03 and next slide thank you so as i stated
49:06 before the administration's
49:07 recommendations to continue to hold on
49:09 to those
49:10 tax revenues without allocating them
49:12 continue to collect them and return to
49:15 council again in the winter
49:18 or early part of next year
49:22 any any questions
49:24 so andrea this is the mayor i just want
49:26 a clarification you have uh two things
49:29 here one is a recommendation to continue
49:31 to collect that is time sensitive
49:34 and you have a second question which you
49:36 want to get some direction and that is
49:38 whether or not
49:40 the council wants to
49:42 wait for additional information to the
49:43 allocation
49:45 or make an allocation in which case they
49:47 could do that during budget so
49:49 uh we'll take questions and then maybe
49:52 we break it out into those two subjects
49:54 because i'm not sure the continuation of
49:56 collection may have as many questions as
49:58 the allocation so
50:00 we'll start to structure our
50:01 conversation that way and we're going to
50:03 start with council member walsh
50:06 thank you madam mayor this is council
50:08 member walsh
50:09 so andrea first of all thank you for the
50:11 presentation and um pulling this
50:14 information together um i know we talked
50:17 earlier today but i want to just bring
50:19 it to light um
50:22 in trying to evaluate
50:24 the the use of
50:27 these
50:28 affordable housing revenues and how we
50:31 might allocate those one of the options
50:34 presented is potentially arch funding a
50:38 regional coalition for housing and so i
50:41 was wondering if you could talk through
50:44 the different ways that we fund arch and
50:47 the difference between the
50:48 administrative funding and the housing
50:50 trust fund and what the city's planned
50:53 approach is for that housing trust fund
50:57 um for this upcoming year so that we
50:59 have a better understanding of what
51:02 what our
51:03 planned
51:06 funding level is and what our different
51:08 options are in that realm thank you
51:12 great thank you councilmember walsh
51:13 again this is andrea snyder um
51:16 the
51:17 the city funds arch in two ways and so
51:21 there was some information in your
51:23 packet this evening on the consent
51:25 calendar
51:26 um about how we fund arch the first way
51:29 that you approved over consent today is
51:32 the administrative fee and so that
51:34 covers some of the overhead costs of
51:36 arch and providing affordable housing
51:38 and the programs that they provide
51:41 that is uh
51:43 that's the what you approved this
51:45 evening would be part of the 2022 budget
51:49 there's also the housing trust fund
51:51 which really goes towards
51:54 helping fund the construction of
51:56 affordable housing
51:58 and typically arch
52:00 at this time of year would ask us for a
52:03 contribution
52:05 and would
52:06 would name that contribution for us to
52:08 consider in this budget process they
52:11 have not done so yet
52:13 because they are looking at changing
52:15 their formula for
52:17 how they spread out the costs of
52:20 providing housing across the other
52:22 member cities and they haven't come to
52:24 an agreement on that formula yet and so
52:27 they are going to be
52:29 accepting project apple project
52:31 applications for that funding this fall
52:35 the board will be taking a look at that
52:37 and then come back to the city's
52:39 again q1 of 2022 for their housing trust
52:43 fund contribution requests and to
52:48 finalize that new formula that they're
52:49 trying to change so all of that is still
52:52 in the works regarding the housing trust
52:53 fund
52:54 we could use 1406 or 1590 funds
52:59 to contribute to the housing trust fund
53:01 certainly
53:03 does that answer your full question
53:04 councilmember walsh
53:06 um one more thing that i think we talked
53:08 about earlier was there
53:11 is an amount in the
53:13 2022 budget where we've already
53:15 anticipated an amount and that
53:18 i believe is planned to come from the
53:21 general fund at this time
53:24 the budget the proposed budget is not
53:26 proposing it's
53:28 coming out of these housing funds is
53:29 that correct
53:31 that is correct so um what we have done
53:34 in the proposed budget for 2022 is
53:38 kept it basically the same as the city
53:40 has done in the past and so in the
53:43 adopted budget for 2021 we
53:47 council approved 175 000
53:50 that would go towards the housing trust
53:52 fund
53:53 contribution
53:55 from the general fund
53:56 and so we've kept that hundred and
53:58 seventy five thousand dollars as a
54:00 placeholder until we have more
54:01 information from arch and then we would
54:03 return to council and have another
54:05 conversation about you know is the
54:07 hundred and seventy five thousand dollar
54:09 placeholder is that the correct amount
54:11 um is arch asking uh for more or less
54:14 and to have a conversation with council
54:16 about that once we hear more from arch
54:20 thank you thank you
54:22 great you got your answers let's go to
54:25 councilmember d michelle
54:28 uh thank you um
54:29 [Music]
54:30 so looking at the package tonight
54:32 and looking at the arch work plan that
54:35 they uh sent to us
54:37 there was um
54:40 there was at least in the work plan
54:42 there's an item in there where they are
54:44 going to help us with our todoc project
54:48 and um so beyond that i mean already we
54:52 are getting some
54:54 service back for the funds that we
54:56 contribute
54:57 uh but beyond that has arch made any
55:00 commitment to the tod
55:03 oc project um want to get when we get to
55:06 the construction phase of that
55:08 thank you
55:11 uh yes instead of just nodding i i will
55:14 verbalize my answer and say yes they
55:16 have committed uh some of the funds that
55:19 they have for construction of projects
55:21 as part of the financing for the podoc
55:24 project
55:27 councilmember j michelle that answers
55:29 your question
55:31 great we'll go to deputy council
55:33 president ray
55:34 thank you mayor paulie this is chris ray
55:36 this may be a really silly question but
55:38 i'm going to ask it anyway can we give
55:41 if we give arch more money than they ask
55:44 for is that create a problem for them or
55:47 um can they
55:51 i'll just leave it right there
55:54 i uh thank you
55:56 great question uh
55:59 and i apologize if you can hear my dog
56:00 barking in the background
56:03 yes uh
56:05 they
56:06 other cities have chosen
56:08 to contribute uh
56:10 to arts that's beyond what they've
56:12 requested
56:18 i'm not sure if it's just me but is
56:20 andrea frozen yeah she's frozen and and
56:23 it was right at right at the good part
56:25 too
56:26 well maybe with her camera off we'll be
56:29 able to
56:30 get her back here andrea are you able to
56:33 talk to us even if we can't see you
56:36 so can you hear me now yes we can great
56:39 so sorry about that
56:42 yes so uh art other cities have chosen
56:47 provide additional funding to arch um
56:50 and
56:52 and so that's something that issaquah
56:54 can always choose uh the board helps
56:57 decide what a formula they call it
56:59 parity to to um
57:02 to determine what's kind of an equitable
57:04 thing to charge across the member cities
57:06 but member cities can always opt to
57:09 provide more in funding i think you know
57:11 if that were the case um whether it
57:13 comes to whether issaquah if you want to
57:16 consider providing more funding than
57:17 what they've requested does that go
57:19 towards the construction of affordable
57:21 housing does that go towards kind of the
57:23 management of the program side of
57:25 affordable housing those would be things
57:27 that we'd need to discuss in the future
57:29 if you wanted to go that route
57:32 great thanks um just kind of a follow-on
57:35 question to that
57:40 what
57:42 are there any restrictions on either
57:44 1406 or 1590 on
57:48 on using the funds for construction
57:50 versus operating costs or
57:53 can we split them across the two
57:56 kind of cask cost categories
58:01 both are both 1406 and 1590 can be used
58:05 towards the construction acquisition and
58:08 maintenance of affordable housing
58:10 there are slight differences though in
58:12 other areas and what they can fund for
58:15 example 1406 can go towards tenant
58:17 rental assistance
58:20 whereas 1590 can go towards mental and
58:23 behavioral health services
58:25 and that's one of the reasons why
58:26 council had decided when uh council
58:29 adopted 1590 was
58:31 to consider using a portion of those
58:33 funds to help pay for the opportunity
58:34 center which will have uh behavioral
58:36 mental health services
58:39 great thank you
58:42 i'm not seeing any other questions and
58:45 the motion does have
58:47 two pieces to it so i'm just to check in
58:49 with the city clerk before the council
58:52 provides comment or deliberates it
58:55 should we have somebody make a motion
58:59 that would be ideal
59:01 great deputy council president ray
59:05 um i'd like to make a motion i'm
59:07 actually going to take these as uh i'm
59:08 going to take them as parts
59:10 so i move to direct the administration
59:13 to continue to collect the affordable
59:14 housing sales tax revenue
59:18 and do i see a second i'm looking in the
59:20 chat
59:27 that's remember walsh
59:30 thank you second
59:32 it's been moved in second deputy council
59:34 president ray would you like to speak to
59:36 your motion yeah thank you i i
59:39 i think there's a lot that we can do
59:42 with the sales tax revenue given the
59:45 flexibility in 1406 and 1590
59:50 and the reason i separated these into
59:51 two
59:53 discrete buckets is i like the idea of
59:56 the city having some control right now
59:58 over
59:59 the collection and directing of the
1:00:01 revenues for affordable housing
1:00:04 and so i would like to continue with
1:00:06 this revenue collection part of it for
1:00:10 thank you i give the second council
1:00:12 member walsh an opportunity to comment
1:00:14 oh did i get that right oh i see
1:00:16 councilmember d michelle also seconded
1:00:18 it so i'll go to her next but
1:00:19 councilmember walsh comments
1:00:21 thank you um yes i i think it would
1:00:24 behoove the city to continue to collect
1:00:27 the affordable housing sales tax
1:00:29 revenues we have some specific projects
1:00:31 whether that's arch or
1:00:33 todoc or other affordable housing
1:00:37 opportunities within the city
1:00:40 i think could be useful for that funds
1:00:42 that being said i think
1:00:44 myself and others in the city have
1:00:46 certainly said hey we're willing to talk
1:00:49 to king county and
1:00:53 consider this revenue source in the
1:00:55 future
1:00:56 but until we can enable that
1:00:59 conversation and understand how that
1:01:02 might be used and how
1:01:04 uh our particular projects are affected
1:01:07 um i think it behooves us to continue to
1:01:10 collect the affordable housing sales tax
1:01:12 revenues thank you thank you
1:01:14 councilmember walsh councilman michelle
1:01:15 did you want to comment
1:01:17 um i i think council members ray and
1:01:20 walsh said it very well and i'll be
1:01:21 supporting the motion
1:01:24 thank you very much is there a council
1:01:26 president hunt comment
1:01:30 thank you this is council president hunt
1:01:32 i have a
1:01:34 different take on this i appreciate that
1:01:37 they're separated out
1:01:39 on the collections the continuing to
1:01:42 collect the affordable um
1:01:44 [Music]
1:01:46 housing sales tax there are two one is
1:01:49 sbh1406 which is the pass-through state
1:01:52 tax and that one i think we should
1:01:54 continue to collect however i
1:01:57 do have concerns about
1:01:59 hb-1590 the king county um
1:02:03 the king county
1:02:07 also a sales tax and my concern about
1:02:09 this one is really that i think king
1:02:11 county is in a better position to
1:02:14 leverage this kind of funding when we
1:02:16 initially talked about this
1:02:18 some cities decided to go ahead and
1:02:22 take the attacks and use that for
1:02:25 local projects or to have more
1:02:28 ability to decide what happens in some
1:02:29 cities decided to
1:02:31 to not do that in which case king county
1:02:33 began collecting the tax and since then
1:02:35 they've begun a regional
1:02:38 effort against corp um to support
1:02:40 individuals experiencing homelessness
1:02:42 and i think they're in a better position
1:02:46 act on the scale which is a regional
1:02:48 scale for the problem
1:02:50 so um i
1:02:54 i think homelessness is a regional issue
1:02:56 they are positioned to
1:02:58 address it in a regional way and they've
1:03:00 begun that work with the tax that
1:03:02 they've been collecting um
1:03:05 since some of the cities did not go
1:03:07 ahead and implement their own tax i also
1:03:10 uh revisited the conversation we had
1:03:12 last time and um
1:03:15 which was around a year ago now october
1:03:17 of 2020
1:03:18 and at that point um the
1:03:21 king county council member balducci
1:03:24 wrote an email to us and was very
1:03:26 supportive of the tod
1:03:28 and i think
1:03:31 recognize that
1:03:33 like us she they would need to have a
1:03:35 vote to actually formalize that but i
1:03:37 don't expect that we're going to have
1:03:39 more confirmation than a very very
1:03:41 supportive email that we did receive as
1:03:43 well as
1:03:45 as well as
1:03:47 an earmarked amount of money that
1:03:49 they've put aside as well for this
1:03:50 project so i think that um i think we
1:03:54 as much confirmation on this from the
1:03:56 county as they're actually able to give
1:03:59 and so
1:04:00 from my perspective i i don't think we
1:04:02 should continue collecting this and i
1:04:04 think we should be
1:04:05 um in a part of a regional solution
1:04:10 and then lastly i think if the tod
1:04:12 succeeds you know we'll be getting state
1:04:15 we're getting state grants already we're
1:04:17 having arch help us so it's a regional
1:04:19 effort as well and
1:04:21 i think being a regional
1:04:24 or um being a part of the regional
1:04:25 solution is really the way to go so i
1:04:27 won't be supporting this because i
1:04:29 don't think we should continue to
1:04:31 collect and not allocate
1:04:32 1590.
1:04:34 thank you council president hunt
1:04:36 councilmember martz
1:04:38 thank you madam mayor uh i will be
1:04:40 supporting this this evening and i think
1:04:43 um i appreciated councilmember
1:04:45 balducci's comments a year ago but i i
1:04:48 think the intervening year has told us
1:04:50 why it's a good idea for us to keep this
1:04:52 money close at hand right now because we
1:04:55 basically said
1:04:57 uh you know we'd be happy to put this
1:05:00 money into king county
1:05:02 if we can get some sort of memorandum of
1:05:05 understanding from the county and the
1:05:07 county hasn't had the time to do that
1:05:09 because they've been really busy trying
1:05:10 to do the pieces that they're trying to
1:05:12 do right which is buying properties and
1:05:15 and converting properties and we are the
1:05:17 tiniest little fish at the east end of
1:05:20 the county compared to all the other
1:05:21 work that they're doing so i think that
1:05:23 that just reinforces the wisdom of the
1:05:26 decision a year ago to keep this money
1:05:28 close at hand for right now uh and have
1:05:30 it available for the things that are
1:05:32 important to us while we did commit to a
1:05:34 regional you know regional partnership
1:05:37 we just said that this project we feel
1:05:40 you know we we feel that we have
1:05:41 opportunities um that uh are in line
1:05:45 with uh affordable
1:05:47 uh housing efforts in the county and so
1:05:49 we're gonna we're gonna resolve some of
1:05:51 those before we put money back in and i
1:05:53 just i feel this last year has shown the
1:05:55 wisdom of making that decision thank you
1:05:57 thank you councilmember martz and i'm
1:06:00 gonna check in with councilmember hall
1:06:02 our goodman we have a request for second
1:06:04 round of comments and i wanted to give
1:06:05 you an opportunity to comment first if
1:06:07 either of you would like to
1:06:09 go ahead and unmute yourself
1:06:13 uh sure this is councilmember hall just
1:06:15 to say um
1:06:17 that i think councilmember martz reached
1:06:18 into my brain and pulled out the exact
1:06:20 words that i want to say so ditto for
1:06:24 thank you councilmember goodman before i
1:06:25 move to a second round
1:06:30 i don't remember goodman here
1:06:32 no i don't think i have any comments
1:06:33 right now i feel the
1:06:36 i feel the same way i did a year ago i
1:06:38 don't like the strategy i don't like the
1:06:39 way it happened and um
1:06:42 my only heartburn is that we've got
1:06:43 these two tied together so
1:06:47 thank you councilmember goodman
1:06:49 councilmember michelle
1:06:51 uh thank you uh just a slightly
1:06:54 different take on this um
1:06:57 i i support what the county is doing and
1:07:00 the strategy that they're using in
1:07:02 buying up
1:07:03 hotels and motels and turning those into
1:07:07 residential you know
1:07:10 accommodations for people who are
1:07:11 experiencing homelessness and at the
1:07:14 same time
1:07:16 i want to hold on to the money locally
1:07:18 um i don't know that there will be a
1:07:20 place in issaquah where the county's
1:07:23 strategy will actually be applicable
1:07:28 my knowledge of people who are in
1:07:30 homelessness is that it's very very
1:07:32 difficult for them to leave their local
1:07:35 community their local network um the
1:07:39 things that they are used to
1:07:41 and to move somewhere else and so if we
1:07:44 go with the county's
1:07:46 strategy we're saying basically that
1:07:48 anyone from issaquah who's experiencing
1:07:50 homelessness
1:07:51 who would be a part of that program is
1:07:53 going to have to move
1:07:55 i would much rather see our dollars go
1:07:58 to permanent
1:08:01 affordable housing and the behavioral
1:08:03 health services that would go along with
1:08:05 that project
1:08:07 and so
1:08:08 i think the county is doing a great
1:08:09 thing
1:08:10 i support it completely but for the
1:08:12 people of issaquah i want to hold on to
1:08:15 that money and
1:08:16 spend it here locally
1:08:18 so that our people experiencing
1:08:20 homelessness could possibly have better
1:08:23 services right here
1:08:24 thank you
1:08:26 thank you councilmember d michelle i am
1:08:28 not seeing and i will give it a few more
1:08:31 seconds anybody else with follow-up
1:08:33 comments which means i will
1:08:36 re-read the motion
1:08:38 and call for the vote
1:08:40 uh it was moved and seconded to direct
1:08:43 the administration to continue to
1:08:44 collect the affordable housing sales tax
1:08:47 revenues
1:08:48 uh city clerk do you want to do the roll
1:08:50 call vote
1:08:52 yes starting with council member d
1:08:54 michelle
1:08:58 council member goodman
1:09:01 councilmember hall
1:09:04 council president hunt
1:09:08 council member mark
1:09:12 deputy council president ray hi
1:09:16 council member walsh
1:09:19 that's five eyes who knows
1:09:22 thank you that passes five to two and
1:09:25 now i'm looking to see if i could get
1:09:28 somebody to make a motion for the second
1:09:33 deputy council president ray
1:09:36 um i moved to direct the administration
1:09:38 to not allocate the affordable housing
1:09:41 uh sales tax revenue at this time and to
1:09:43 return to the city council once cost
1:09:45 estimates for the dod
1:09:47 opportunity center project have been
1:09:49 updated
1:09:50 thank you councilmember d michelle
1:09:52 second
1:09:54 it's been moved and seconded and i'll go
1:09:56 to the motion maker first deputy council
1:09:58 president ray
1:09:59 um thank you mayor paulie chris wright
1:10:02 this one to me
1:10:03 was really in alignment with the spirit
1:10:06 of when we um adopted this sales tax and
1:10:11 we're working
1:10:12 saying
1:10:13 we want to do it we wanted to get the
1:10:15 opportunity center and the tod built and
1:10:18 we wanted to support that
1:10:23 negotiations with king county can
1:10:25 continue and
1:10:28 bear fruit then then that's great that
1:10:30 was always our intent but i think this
1:10:31 way we have a little more control over
1:10:34 and we're better positioned to fund this
1:10:38 important
1:10:41 development in the community thank you
1:10:45 councilmember g michelle
1:10:48 so we're now in uh september and if um
1:10:52 the projections are correct we will get
1:10:55 cost updates at the very very latest by
1:10:57 march
1:10:58 of 2022 so that means we have to be
1:11:01 patient
1:11:02 again at the out at the out
1:11:05 outside
1:11:06 uh six months maybe less hopefully four
1:11:08 months
1:11:09 um and i think we can wait that long
1:11:11 we've been waiting for this uh project
1:11:14 for a number of years i want to see it
1:11:17 through to the end
1:11:18 and i am willing to wait to get those uh
1:11:21 projected cost
1:11:23 estimates thank you thank you uh
1:11:26 councilmember walsh
1:11:29 thank you this is councilmember walsh um
1:11:31 i'm trying to understand how
1:11:35 how to approach this um
1:11:38 my perspective is that
1:11:40 general fund money
1:11:43 and so looking at like the affordable
1:11:45 housing
1:11:46 uh revenues that has a limited scope of
1:11:50 what it can be used on whereas general
1:11:51 fund money

Attendance

Council / Members (7)
Barbara de Michele
Stacy Goodman
Zach Hall
Victoria Hunt
Tola Marts
Chris Reh
Lindsey Walsh

Motions and votes (3)

Direct Administration to continue to collect the affordable housing sales tax revenues. (Opponents: Goodman, Hunt).
Moved by REH · seconded by WALSH
Carried 5-2
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Zach Hall, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
Opposed: Goodman, Hunt
Direct Administration to not allocate the affordable housing sales tax revenues at this time and return to the City Council once cost estimates for the TOD/Opportunity Center project have been updated. .
Moved by REH · seconded by DE MICHELE
Carried 7-0
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh
APPROVE THE CONSENT AGENDA AS PRESENTED. a) ID 0891 - Accounts: Payables and Payroll of Sept. 20, 2021, $ 6,163,165.72; Approved. b) Minutes: City Council Regular Meeting, Aug. 2, 2021; Approved. c) AB 8140 - Amendments to Sign Code; Adopted Ordinance No. 2952, repealing and replacing IMC 18.11 - si…
Moved by HUNT · seconded by REH
Carried 7-0
In favor: Barbara de Michele, Stacy Goodman, Zach Hall, Victoria Hunt, Tola Marts, Chris Reh, Lindsey Walsh