Get get that 3rd COVID Booster (the new ‘bivalent’ model.) Now. Deaths are slowly rising. Again, again, it takes about a month to achieve full efficacy. And the number of people who have had all four injections is now below fifty percent. Football, Thanksgiving. Christmas. I think you know where I’m going here. They’re doing walk-ins now pretty much everywhere. 🙂
This Week
Tuesday: Port of Seattle (Agenda) The Commission will give final approval to their 2023 budget.
Thursday: City Council Meeting (Agenda) Highlights include:
The City Manager Report will include the long-awaited Ferry Update.
The Consent Agenda will consider contract renewals of three more consultants, including the Ferry guy, the Marina consultant guy, and the engineer guy who helped us with the Des Moines Creek Business Park.
Executive Session (to review a public employee.) Spoiler alert: there is only one employee the Council is allowed to review. I can’t tell ya who it is, but the job title may or may not rhyme with Scarlet Tanager. 😀
On the Consent Agenda will also a bunch of sidewalk repairs. If you’ve seen the white chalk around town that’s them. I want to point out that the City tries hard to inventory all those cracks and so on, but you have to report them!!! Using the handy Fix-It Form. 🙂
Last Week
Monday: We handed in our annual City Manager Evaluation (which is supposed to be a semi-annual evaluation, but hey, whatever.)
Thursday: The turkey was dry. Not. For which I was (and am) extremely thankful. This is the first time in over two years I felt un-self-conscious about being at a ‘gathering’. Even watching that ridiculous game you all call (cough) ‘football’ was a total blast. (And besides, by watching that one game a year, I always collect just enough buzzwords to sound credible for the rest of the year. That Prevent Defense? Amazing! 😀 )
City Currents Magazine
The Winter City Currents Magazine is out and, as always, I encourage you to read it carefully. And when you do, please take another minute and look through at least one of the back issues.
Even though most of them are strictly black and white, I much prefer most of those older City newsletters, for several reasons.
First of all, the older ones just tended to be more informative. You take away all the advertisements from the ..er… ‘current’ version (which are fine, by the way) and there’s just less there there.
Also, the lack of ‘there’ reflects the fact that we’re just not doing as many programs as we used to. A decade ago there was a whole other ‘Rec and Roll’ magazine-inside-a-magazine (which was upside down and backwards to drive that point home for some reason) chock full of activities for kids and seniors.
But the biggest difference in recent years? Politics. Over the past 2-3 years, the magazine has been used by the Mayor not simply to recount various activities, but more and more for the explicit purpose of selling a particular vision. And you definitely should not want this.
Imagine…
City Currents Magazine, Spring 2021
Last year, Deputy Mayor Mahoney did a two-page article in the Spring 2021 City Currents to shill for a Ferry Pilot program. He asked residents to “imagine” a ferry program which had not been voted on or financed and in fact bore only a passing resemblance to the sixty day ‘pilot’ the City put into place this past summer at a loss of several hundred thousand dollars meant for long-term capital projects.
This year, Mayor Mahoney again asks the public to use their imagination, telling the public that we need to show “leadership and courage”, embrace “public/private partnerships” and make the Marina and City “more attractive to private developers.” I have absolutely no idea what any of that means or why it would be to your benefit to support those statements, because they are not proposals. Rather, they again describe a dream and a philosophy. I was elected to propose, and vote for, real things, not support dreams–or ideologies.
(Ironically, the most successful project the City has ever undertaken had no private investment whatsoever. You may have heard of it, it’s called The Des Moines Marina.)
We have indeed spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of public money on ‘planning’ the Marina Redevelopment ($225,000 alone in grants from the Port of Seattle.) It’s been five years now and I have to ask, do you see anything that looks like a for realz plan?
In November 2021, the Council voted to enter into an ‘exclusive negotiation’ on Parcel A–a hotel at the foot of 223rd.
Yet everyone gets blind sided September 27, 2022 with a totally new proposal for a hotel blocking the north end of the Marina.
Beyond the tiny problem of (almost) no one seeming to know what is actually going on (including yours truly) it seems to me that all of us are being asked to sign on, not to a specific plan, but rather to a particular philosophy and a totally unsupported dream. And whether or not you buy into that dream, it is simply inappropriate for the Mayor or the City Manager to use the City Currents to try to sell that dream.
What makes a proper city publication?
The City Currents is undoubtedly the most powerful public platform in the City of Des Moines. Despite living in the age of “the interwebs” it is still, by far the most widely distributed piece of ‘news’ about Des Moines–because it is the only print piece that is sent to every address–residential and commercial. Every address receives one, not just the 5,000 or so people who are active on various social media platforms. And a four-colour magazine sent to over 15,000 addresses expensive to produce–which means we only get to do it 3-4 times a year. For those reasons alone its contents should be chosen with great care, both in what we choose to include, but also in what we choose to leave out.
We have the practical obligation to fill every issue with as much useful information as we can.
But even more importantly, we have an obligation to avoid using any inch of it to promote any political agenda–and certainly not to try to sell the public empty dreams.
Get get that 3rd COVID Booster (the new ‘bivalent’ model.) Now. Deaths are slowly rising. Again, again, it takes about a month to achieve full efficacy. And the number of people who have had all four injections is now below fifty percent. Football, Thanksgiving. Christmas. I think you know where I’m going here. They’re doing walk-ins now pretty much everywhere. 🙂
This Week
Monday: We hand in our annual City Manager Evaluation (which is supposed to be a semi-annual evaluation, but hey, whatever.)
Beyond that? Not much. Except to say that this is what I’m having for Thanksgiving. Go ahead, judge me. 🙂 If you have any other things you wanna talk about? Marina, airport, roads, public safety, education, dry rub vs. brine? Real football vs. that strange game you play with that bean- shaped object? (206) 878-0578. Regardless, have an absolutely wonderful holiday weekend!
Last Week
Tuesday: 6:00PM Des Moines Housing Action Plan Open House at Highline College. See what we have going on with land use planning!
Wednesday: Highline Forum (Agenda) Updates on StART, Sound Transit, WSDOT SR-509. Highlight? The Port Noise Office announced that it would now officially encourage all airlines to voluntarily avoid reverse thrust on landing. Woo hoo! Not. (Note to newcomers, the reason I always sound snarky is because to sound measured and explain stuff in detail takes 5,000 words. In this case, pilots have, since forever, come in a bit too ‘hot’ and used reverse thrust to compensate. Ninety seven times out of a hundred it’s totally unnecessary, but the airlines leave it to ‘pilot discretion’ for the sake of safety. It’s loud as hell for residents, especially in Burien, and since about 1970 they’ve begged the airport to ‘do something’. After 50 years? This is the something; a strongly worded letter.
We got a presentation on the SMAP (pronounced Ehs-map) where the Dept. Of Ecology asks the City to pick a key drainage area to focus on water quality improvement. And our engineers picked? My neighbourhood. Psyche! 😀
The interesting thing (for me) is that the main technique for improving storm water quality is plants. You strategically plant certain species in the swales and they do the ‘filtering’. They remove all the goop we put into the storm drains before it gets to Puget Sound. What our crews will do is re-plant new species in these swales which are more efficient goop digester/filterers.
There’s actually a good example of a related principle, at the town home development on 216th and 14th Ave. The detention pond is lined with grass. The thing doesn’t work without the plants.
Thursday: City Council Meeting (Agenda) (Video) (more info below.)
Friday: South King County Housing & Homelessness Partners (SKHHP)
November 17 City Council Meeting
City Manager’s report
We got our first (and only) report on the Human Services Advisory Committee. I have no quibbles with the grant selections or the committee members, but the whole ‘advisory committee’ system needs an overhaul.
For one thing, this year we got the amount to a whopping one percent (uno, eins, singular) of our budget and considered that to be ‘success’. But it took that one-time ARPA money to get to that level.
For another, as I said, this is our only look at the program all year. And all the other programs we fund are no better. We get almost no look at Senior Services, Destination Des Moines, SR3, Farmers Market. But if one asks? How dare you! The thing is, we used to get four reports from each of these orgs every year and their work was on the web site so the public could see for themselves what’s going on.
Public Comment
I want to applaud the four people who provided public comment on the Marina Redevelopment. They all had different things to say, but all were extremely thoughtful.
The only problem? There were only four. The Council received close to fifty (50) very heartfelt emails on the subject and I know a bunch of people on social media said they were gonna show up. And…. only four people showed up. So let me say this clearly for people in the cheap seats.
If you want to change something big in local government, you definitely can do it, but…YOU. MUST. SHOW. UP.
This is physics. It is not subject to ‘compromise’. It just is.
You can whine about the unfairness of life or how things should be. But this is how things are in the same way there’s no point in getting upset about gravity. It only takes 15-20 people to change the Council’s direction, but it does take 15-20 people. You can social media yer ass off. You can write passionate letters that would make Shakespeare jealous. But unless you show up? Nothing will change. So whatever you’ve got going on? Sick dog, had to work late, fear of public speaking, soccer practice, hot yoga, those are the stakes in play. You’re asking the City to change direction on a ton of money. It takes effort to do that–and showing up is the work you need to do. So, if you don’t get what you want? Basically, It’s your fault for not getting 15-20 people to show up. I’m serious here. I want you to succeed, so I’m telling you how things are so you do. Let’s get cracking, here. 🙂
Consent Agenda
I asked to pull two items:
Flock Cameras, which silently read license plates as people drive by them. It’s a lot like a speed camera–basically, a computer finds that the associated driver has an outstanding warrant and then pings the Police Department. The PD is super-jazzed about the program as a force-multiplier. I had/have two concerns:
PrivacyIt’s just a matter of changing the software to do a lot more than just look at license plates. And, unlike most of you, I’ve actually been to true surveillance states (like the Soviet Union) many times and so I am that nervous nelly.
Efficacy Although the Chief promised to remove them if they are not successful, we have no specific reporting process in place to define what that is. I am all about providing specific metrics before starting any project. After watching the recent Ferry Pilot , with absolutely no measurable definitions of ‘success’ I am now even more skeptical of everything.
I also pulled an item which provides an ongoing consulting contract to train our staff on using our new accounting softwares. Having been a training consultant, I have to admit: I tend to be skeptical of training consultants. 😀
Public HearinGS
As we get near the end of year, we jam as much ‘stuff’ into each meeting. So this time we had not one, not two, but three public hearings. And since we don’t advertise them properly, no one shows. Careful readers will recall that the Mayor moved the meeting schedule around in order to accommodate a high school football game.
Property Tax Levy: I did something I almost never do, I voted for Rule 26a (to pass the ordinance in a single reading) because there is this weird deadline which would have cost us money if we hadn’t done so. However, that is no excuse for scheduling it this late in the year. This artificial emergency brought to you courtesy of high school football.
2022 Amended Budget: Why we’re finalising the 2022 Budget in November? Oh, like I’m supposed to know. 😀 (That was supposed to be a joke.) Actually, this is a normal part of the process. Your budget never lines up perfectly with actuals.
2023 Budget Second Reading: I voted no for a couple of reasons: This was the first year in my memory where no time was allocated for CM Amendments.
New Business
Suspending restriction on use of one-time money for operational expenses the third year in a row.
I voted no. And the City Manager chose to do that, when there was that ARPA money right there–which was meant for recovery.
The ordinance preventing the use of one-time money for salaries/ops dates to 2012. The Council rightly said that we had become addicted to using one-time money and were never saving for anything.
But… the Council wasn’t quite as brave as all that. They phased it in over five years. So realistically, we’ve only ever saved for future capital spending maybe three years out of the last 30. And now we have three years returning to same bad ol’ habit.
Frankly, this is my take on Des Moines. Traditionally, for a waterfront town, we’ve had very low taxes (really) which everyone likes. But since we annexed Redondo in ’96, there has been some ‘catastrophe’ here every 5-10 years… 9/11, Great Recession, COVID. And no matter who is ‘in’ we always seem to use the emergency du jour as an excuse to raid whatever savings account is handy. Over the years many of my colleagues like to say how ‘conservative’ they are. Maybe. But in reality, we’re just not great at saving. And that is why we never seem to have our own money for docks or busted fishing piers or a community center.
Legislative Priorities.
I was restricted from asking our lobbyist questions. My comment was that we’re tasking our lobbyist to spend time advocating for a second airport, which is a ridiculous use of City time/money. I was told that Senator Keiser and Rep. Orwall wanted it. And… love ’em both to death, but sometimes, even yer best friends are just plan wrong. And friends can tells friends that.
We also learned that the Chief really wants that Blake decision over-turned, which I found surprising. Because in all the talk about the much-hated police reforms, the overwhelming amount of press coverage was about pursuits–you know, where suspects simply drive away from officers. The Chief admitted that those were not as big a deal as has been advertised. What was not on the official agenda is something very much favour: clawing back some of the sales tax to Cities–specifically for public safety.
New Items for Consideration
I requested that the Council send flowers to Mr. Eric Clarke, the Manager of Water District #54 who was so brutally attacked while on duty last month. I hope he is doing well and I want him to know how much he is valued in this community. If you also would like to pass on your best, please contact the District here.
Executive Session
I can’t tell ya the details, but there may or may not have been a group of colleagues criticising me for my use of 1Pig Latin last week. Here’s the deal. If you think things are petty on the dais, just imagine what they might be like behind closed doors, where one is not allowed to even report the subject of the meeting.
It’s no accident…
As of this writing , there is no longer any way to send a public comment in writing, even though, until Friday, there were still multiple hyperlinks on the City web site to a non-existent Comment Form. (The ones I monitor have now been removed.)
I have written to my colleagues that we need to remedy this immediately and I will propose a system at our next (1, December) meeting.
Although this article begins with public comment, it is not about public comment.
404s
Despite my reputation for crankiness, I notice broken links (referred to as ‘404s’ in the web world) and usually do not speak up. How do I notice them? SPACE MAGIC! Actually, there’s an automated gizmo anyone can use to be notified when a web site has broken links. So I ‘saw’ when the City’s Public Comment form stopped working.
What I used to do was immediately report/nag/complain when I found a ‘404’ and… get eyerolls and heavy sighs about how hard everyone is working and stop being a pain, etc. And then I got in touch with my inner chakras and realised that I don’t have to find them. Because eventually, residents will. All I have to do is give them a reason to look. 🙂
No microphone
On September 27 the City had that Community Meeting with this slide. And among the dozen or so unethical and scary legal concerns, from one of the presentation slides it looks as though the SURPRISE! hotel extends over where the new $1,000,000 restroom is placed. I mean the cement hasn’t even cured it’s so new. And sure enough there is a new building labeled ‘RR’ which looks like ‘relocated restroom’.
So I post about it and I get all this ricketa racketa. I’m told by the City “Of course we’re not moving the new bathrooms.” The tone is obviously patronising. Like: How silly of you to assume that we’d do something like that, JC!” OK, I’m silly.
OK, I’m silly…
So I fire up a totally amateur program, Google Earth, to check. And sure enough, the hotel does plow through the existing bathroom. Silly my ass.
And… I get screamed at by the Mayor. This time, for not getting permission from the City first.
It’s not on the agenda…
In the past week I’ve received over fifty (50) emails from residents just furious about this new hotel location. So I tell residents to show up to speak at the last three meetings of the year. And then apparently the City just happens to to on social media to remind residents that “the marina won’t be on the agenda until 2023.”
But of course neglecting to mention that anyone can comment on anything the like at any meeting.
So like ten people call me the next day to tell me they don’t want to show up if they won’t be ‘allowed’ to speak.
Defensiveness
It does not bother me at all when people make mistakes. It does not bother me when the votes do not go the way I’d like. But we should never get defensive when residents point out bugs or mistakes.
And for anyone to get annoyed and say “Trust us… you’ll see” on large projects indicates a lack of regard. It would be like displaying the wrong price tag and then getting upset when the customer asked to pay what was clearly listed on the tin.
I get stroppy about it because most residents are so uninformed. They tend to take everything at face value because they do trust that the City runs as expected. It’s actually a compliment.
Priorities
In fact, we actually had a system whereby residents could simply put “Public Comment” in the subject line of an email. Or they could fill out the form and then the staff would cobble together a PDF, deliver it to the Council and then upload to web site. But, like Zoom, it created extra work for the staff.
The bottom line is that all this stuff (web site, public comment, outreach, etc.) takes up City resources. Staff have a certain number of hours/dollars to work with and perhaps they feel they can better serve the public using those resources in other ways, eg. public safety, roads, processing permits, etc.
Priorities
However, shorting things like public comment, Zoom, the web site, public engagement all just happen to lead to less transparent government. And so do all the tiny mistakes that, after a while, stop looking less like mistakes and more like a strategy.
Transparency, but its very nature, is meant to slow the process. And if you happen to like the direction the train is moving, whether consciously or not, you are simply not inclined to do things that might tend to reduce its speed.
Summary
You do a public meeting with no microphone… followed up by a private meeting with a proper sound system (which you do not want recorded!)
You put up a poster clearly showing a new hotel crushing into the new $1MM bathroom (and a clearly indicated ‘Relocated Restroom’).
You dump the electronic Public Comment system with no notice.
You make hundreds and hundreds of tiny mistakes over time, all of which tend to reduce public engagement.
You do all these things (and many more) and in every single case get defensive, dismissive, patronising and condescending when people notice?
It’s no accident.
1It may or may not have had to do with olicePay egotiationsNay.But lest one think I am some snitch, we generally have only two Executive Sessions a year. One to discuss a certain ‘Employee Review’. (Spoiler Alert: there is only one employee we are allowed to review. You can torture me and I won’t spill the beans, but his job title rhymes with Scarlet Tanager.) And… we only have two contracts to review, which are either the Teamsters or the Cops. So stressing about this stuff is ridiculous. How ridiculous? The last time we had an Executive Session on anything else, my colleague CM Achziger announced the subject from the dais. I have yet to attend one of these things that was of any use to the public. Or…. maybe I did. I’ll never tell! 😀
As of this writing , there is no longer any way to send a public comment in writing, even though, until Friday, there were still multiple hyperlinks on the City web site to a non-existent Comment Form. (The ones I monitor have now been removed.)
I have written to my colleagues that we need to remedy this immediately and I will propose a system at our next (1, December) meeting.
Although this article begins with public comment, it is not about public comment.
404s
Despite my reputation for crankiness, I notice broken links (referred to as ‘404s’ in the web world) and usually do not speak up. How do I notice them? SPACE MAGIC! Actually, there’s an automated gizmo anyone can use to be notified when a web site has broken links. So I ‘saw’ when the City’s Public Comment form stopped working.
What I used to do was immediately report/nag/complain when I found a ‘404’ and… get eyerolls and heavy sighs about how hard everyone is working and stop being a pain, etc. And then I got in touch with my inner chakras and realised that I don’t have to find them. Because eventually, residents will. All I have to do is give them a reason to look. 🙂
No microphone
On September 27 the City had that Community Meeting with this slide. And among the dozen or so unethical and scary legal concerns, from one of the presentation slides it looks as though the SURPRISE! hotel extends over where the new $1,000,000 restroom is placed. I mean the cement hasn’t even cured it’s so new. And sure enough there is a new building labeled ‘RR’ which looks like ‘relocated restroom’.
So I post about it and I get all this ricketa racketa. I’m told by the City “Of course we’re not moving the new bathrooms.” The tone is obviously patronising. Like: How silly of you to assume that we’d do something like that, JC!” OK, I’m silly.
OK, I’m silly…
So I fire up a totally amateur program, Google Earth, to check. And sure enough, the hotel does plow through the existing bathroom. Silly my ass.
And… I get screamed at by the Mayor. This time, for not getting permission from the City first.
It’s not on the agenda…
In the past week I’ve received over fifty (50) emails from residents just furious about this new hotel location. So I tell residents to show up to speak at the last three meetings of the year. And then apparently the City just happens to to on social media to remind residents that “the marina won’t be on the agenda until 2023.”
But of course neglecting to mention that anyone can comment on anything the like at any meeting.
So like ten people call me the next day to tell me they don’t want to show up if they won’t be ‘allowed’ to speak.
Defensiveness
It does not bother me at all when people make mistakes. It does not bother me when the votes do not go the way I’d like. But we should never get defensive when residents point out bugs or mistakes.
And for anyone to get annoyed and say “Trust us… you’ll see” on large projects indicates a lack of regard. It would be like displaying the wrong price tag and then getting upset when the customer asked to pay what was clearly listed on the tin.
I get stroppy about it because most residents are so uninformed. They tend to take everything at face value because they do trust that the City runs as expected. It’s actually a compliment.
Priorities
In fact, we actually had a system whereby residents could simply put “Public Comment” in the subject line of an email. Or they could fill out the form and then the staff would cobble together a PDF, deliver it to the Council and then upload to web site. But, like Zoom, it created extra work for the staff.
The bottom line is that all this stuff (web site, public comment, outreach, etc.) takes up City resources. Staff have a certain number of hours/dollars to work with and perhaps they feel they can better serve the public using those resources in other ways, eg. public safety, roads, processing permits, etc.
Priorities
However, shorting things like public comment, Zoom, the web site, public engagement all just happen to lead to less transparent government. And so do all the tiny mistakes that, after a while, stop looking less like mistakes and more like a strategy.
Transparency, but its very nature, is meant to slow the process. And if you happen to like the direction the train is moving, whether consciously or not, you are simply not inclined to do things that might tend to reduce its speed.
Summary
You do a public meeting with no microphone… followed up by a private meeting with a proper sound system (which you do not want recorded!)
You put up a poster clearly showing a new hotel crushing into the new $1MM bathroom (and a clearly indicated ‘Relocated Restroom’).
You dump the electronic Public Comment system with no notice.
You make hundreds and hundreds of tiny mistakes over time, all of which tend to reduce public engagement.
You do all these things (and many more) and in every single case get defensive, dismissive, patronising and condescending when people notice?
This was done with Google Earth Pro (GEP.) GEP is very rudimentary and I have the drawing skills of an 8-year old. But GEP does allow one to draw boxes to scale. So all the ‘buildings’ are about 35ft high (the zoned limit.) I actually started this project to see if the September 27 Skylab Presentation does or does not block the new bathroom we just built for $1MM. (See the ‘RR’ in their drawing? That means ‘relocated restroom’.)
#1. This is a flyover from the North Entry.
Former Mayor Don Wasson’s house is now the Beach Park lawn nearest the north entry. The Cliff House and Mariner condos are across the street (in white.)
#2 This is in front of the Quarterdeck looking NW towards the proposed hotel.
And… the hotel does cut into the new $1MM bathroom (which is why it is marked as “relocated” in the Skylab drawing.) So…does that mean a smaller hotel? Or does it mean the bathrooms really would need to be moved?
#3. Now we fly up again to take in the Adaptive Purpose Building
The initial cost estimate of the APB is $4MM. It will replace the sheds and provide dry stack storage.
In addition to the dry stack storage, 27 September presentation calls for tearing down the harbormaster’s office, moving SR3 and the farmers market into the APB, and if there’s room left, possibly some office space or shops or whatever. Hence the name ‘adaptive purpose’.
An example of indoor dry stack boat storage
#4. Flying up to take in the view against the South Shores condos on 22rd and Cliff Ave.
#5. Here is from a more southerly vantage point so you can see both the empty space behind CSR and then SR3.
Now: what to do with those two empty spots?
The consultant report talks about the potential of up to four restaurants. But those spaces could also be used for a second dry stack storage–and dry stack storage is not a “maybe it will pencil out, may it won’t” deal. Dry stack is, like in-water moorage, a true moneymaker.
#6. And finally pulling out to take in the entire area.
By the way, the green in the east bg was the originally planned site for SR3 on 223rd and Sixth Ave. It’s just there for reference.
The Blank Canvas
I know this is so ugly it will drive some people nuts. I’m not trying to be anti-anything. I just want people to understand what goes where and most of us seem to ‘get’ visuals like this about 1,000% better than long text descriptions. And again, the City has already budgeted for a professional to do an aesthetically pleasing rendering so you can ask them to get on the stick. 🙂 Marina Redevelopment Town Hall ARPA Proposal.
What I really wanted to be able to do was see a blank canvas. As I wrote in a previous article it kinda drove me nuts that we were building things one piece at a time, ie. we’re not committed to Quarterdeck, SR3, now the new bathrooms. And that is making the architect have to work around all this ‘stuff’. What could we do if we just had a clean sheet and could design exactly what we want! And then it occurred to me: We can do exactly that, because we own all this! We don’t have to work one piece at a time. We don’t have to sell off anything. Instead, we could create a single, unified design.
There are other details I did not talk about, eg. the blue line along the south edge of the Marina Floor. That’s the south seawall, which will soon need to be replaced–just like the north seawall this past year. More cranes! More permits! More $$$$ 😀
As we get more details, and when I can find an 8-year old to help me learn Google Earth better, I’ll add in the complete animation so you can ‘fly around’ yourself.
If you spot any errors or have any questions, please let me know, so I can make corrections. (Eg. In the latest Skylab drawing, the Adaptive Purpose Building has been split into two pieces, basically covering the same area. My drawing skills have not progressed to where I can split my ‘APB’ into the two separate things. Maybe tomorrow. 🙂 )
There has been a lot of concern recently concerning Marina Redevelopment and the master sums up my feelings about the situation. Plus, listening to a great song always helps calms me down when I’m upset about things like this. 🙂
If, like me, you are not happy with things, below you will find:
Policy Solutions (the things the City can do to move things in a better direction) and then
Your Action Items: the things you can and should do to make that happen.
Two Issues
But before we get to that, to answer one very popular question, according to the City Communications Director, the new bathroom will not need to be moved. (Even though the September 27, 2022 Skylab Presentation clearly shows that happening.)
But for me that raises two issues…
The presentations we’ve had so far are so confusing and filled with conflicting ‘stuff’ that you cannot tell what’s what.
Why on earth are we building this, literally, “One piece at a time.”?
Say you find your little bit of heaven—your DREAM property? Who builds the bathroom first and -then- starts building the other rooms? No one does that. Instead, you’d get the architect to come up with your complete DREAM DESIGN to go with your–dream property. You’d get the entire thing together -before- you started building. Johnny’s song is no joke. You build any big project one piece at a time and you get what you deserve.
SOLUTIONS
The solutions are really, really simple. They’ so simple, I fear you won’t believe me.
Just get twenty people to go to City Council and demand this: “Stop all landside development until the City does three things.”
Immediately implement the Marina Town Hall we already voted for in 2021 https://jcharrisfordesmoines.com/marina-town-hall-arpa-proposal/
Reinstate the Public Planning Commission we had until 2013 to give residents a seat at the table on all land use.
Reinstate the Marina Committee we had for decades when the Marina was first built.
All of these can be done now and implemented in January with no impact on the docks or the hoist projects. But we need this approach to create a Marina footprint that truly serves the interests of the public.
Why?
Each of the above has a very specific purpose. At bottom, this is all about zoning. And zoning has veeeerrrrry specific laws. You can’t go to the City and say “Don’t block my view!” or “Don’t build a hotel!” or “Build a hotel here, but not there!” Or, “I like everything except…” That’s really not how zoning works, and besides those are band-aids, not really solutions.
You’re not asking why we would want a hotel. Or if we even need a hotel. You’re not considering that a developer may not want to build in a particular spot or what impacts it might have on the entire area. Zoning is supposed to be the process that allows the entire community to answer those questions and plan for the future.
The fact that we’re the only city in the area without a public planning commission should tell you something about all our land use decisions.
The solution is to get back to having a fair process and let that get you where you want to go. That’s what those solutions will do. You can’t cut corners and expect things to work out right on such a long term project. Electeds come and go. City officials come and go. You need to ‘get it in writing’.
The Virtual Town Hall is a first step. It’s the method we should use for every important land use decision in the future. It lets everyone visualise the project in advance. And the really good news? We already budgeted for it over a year ago, so there’s nothing holding us back from doing it today.
A Planning Commission (PC), which every other city has, is the place where members of the public get to have input on the actual design of the City. The PC would organise the town halls, gather input from the public, advise the Council on what you want. And it would do it not just for the Marina, but for every planning decision. No. More. Surprises.
A Marina Committee, like our other Council Committees, brings everyone concerned about the Marina to the same table. The Marina is now the essential public square for the entire city. No more preferential treatment for any single constituency. No more ‘in-private’. No more uncertainty as to when or where you can engage with the City and the Council on issues of concern. A Marina Committee creates a single public place where all stakeholders can go, every month, to plan for Marina-specific issues.
I urge you to read the above, attend all of these and give public comment in support each of these ideas. If we get started now, we can have a better process started IN JANUARY, with no delay to -anything-. But you must start SHOWING UP and you must ask for these specific things…
Get get that 3rd COVID Booster (the new ‘bivalent’ model.) Now. Deaths are slowly rising. Again, again, it takes about a month to achieve full efficacy. And the number of people who have had all four injections is now below fifty percent. Football, Thanksgiving. Christmas. I think you know where I’m going here. They’re doing walk-ins now pretty much everywhere. 🙂
This Week
Tuesday: 6:00PM Des Moines Housing Action Plan Open House at Highline College. See what we have going on with land use planning!
Wednesday: Highline Forum (Agenda) Updates on StART, Sound Transit, WSDOT SR-509
Thursday: City Council Meeting (Agenda) (more info below.)
Friday: South King County Housing & Homelessness Partners (SKHHP)
November 17 City Council Meeting Preview
City Manager’s report
We will get our first (and only) report on the Human Services Advisory Committee. This is outrageous.
Consent Agenda
We’ll vote on Flock Cameras, which silently read license plates as people drive by them. It’s a lot like a speed camera–basically, a computer finds that the associated driver has an outstanding warrant and then pings the Police Department. The PD is super-jazzed about the program as a force-multiplier. I always have privacy concerns because a) it’s just a matter of changing the software to do a lot more than just look at license plates. And b) unlike most of you, I’ve actually been to true surveillance states (like the Soviet Union) many times and so I am that nervous nelly.
Public Hearing
As we get near the end of year, we jam as much ‘stuff’ into each meeting.
2022 Amended Budget: Why we’re finalising the 2022 Budget in November? Oh, like I’m supposed to know. 😀
2023 Budget Second Reading: I will vote no for one simple reason: There has been no time allocated for CM Amendments.
New Business
Suspending restriction on use of one-time money for the third year in a row. I will vote no.
Legislative Priorities. I was restricted from asking our lobbyist questions.
Executive Session
I can’t tell ya the details, but it may or may not have something to do with the olicePay ontractCay. And if this sounds a bit phoney baloney, please understand: My belief is that you, the residents, want more police. But there is simply no path to get there if we cannot talk openly about how to pay for it.
Last Week
Monday: Dept. of Ecology briefing on their upcoming plan to identify communities most impacted by pollution. and set up monitoring to move towards legislation which protects us. (Spoiler alert: I’m pushing for Des Moines. 🙂 )
Tuesday: Port of Seattle Commission Meeting (Agenda). The Commission approved their 2023 budget.
Tuesday: King County Flood District. Ditto. The group voted to approve our 2023 budget.
Friday: 11:00AM Veterans Day celebration by the Des Moines Memorial Drive Preservation Association at Sunnydale School in Burien. (Check out their web site for some great history on Des Moines Memorial Drive. 🙂
One piece at a time…
There has been a lot of concern recently concerning Marina Redevelopment and the master sums up my feelings about the situation. Plus, listening to a great song always helps calms me down when I’m upset about things like this. 🙂
If, like me, you are not happy with things, below you will find:
Policy Solutions (the things the City can do to move things in a better direction) and then
Your Action Items: the things you can and should do to make that happen.
Two Issues
But before we get to that, to answer one very popular question, according to the City Communications Director, the new bathroom will not need to be moved. (Even though the September 27, 2022 Skylab Presentation clearly shows that happening.)
But for me that raises two issues…
The presentations we’ve had so far are so confusing and filled with conflicting ‘stuff’ that you cannot tell what’s what.
Why on earth are we building this, literally, “One piece at a time.”?
Say you find your little bit of heaven—your DREAM property? Who builds the bathroom first and -then- starts building the other rooms? No one does that. Instead, you’d get the architect to come up with your complete DREAM DESIGN to go with your–dream property. You’d get the entire thing together -before- you started building. Johnny’s song is no joke. You build any big project one piece at a time and you get what you deserve.
SOLUTIONS
The solutions are really, really simple. They’ so simple, I fear you won’t believe me.
Just get twenty people to go to City Council and demand this: “Stop all landside development until the City does three things.”
Immediately implement the Marina Town Hall we already voted for in 2021 https://jcharrisfordesmoines.com/marina-town-hall-arpa-proposal/
Reinstate the Public Planning Commission we had until 2013 to give residents a seat at the table on all land use.
Reinstate the Marina Committee we had for decades when the Marina was first built.
All of these can be done now and implemented in January with no impact on the docks or the hoist projects. But we need this approach to create a Marina footprint that truly serves the interests of the public.
Why?
Each of the above has a very specific purpose. At bottom, this is all about zoning. And zoning has veeeerrrrry specific laws. You can’t go to the City and say “Don’t block my view!” or “Don’t build a hotel!” or “Build a hotel here, but not there!” Or, “I like everything except…” That’s really not how zoning works, and besides those are band-aids, not really solutions.
You’re not asking why we would want a hotel. Or if we even need a hotel. You’re not considering that a developer may not want to build in a particular spot or what impacts it might have on the entire area. Zoning is supposed to be the process that allows the entire community to answer those questions and plan for the future.
The fact that we’re the only city in the area without a public planning commission should tell you something about all our land use decisions.
The solution is to get back to having a fair process and let that get you where you want to go. That’s what those solutions will do. You can’t cut corners and expect things to work out right on such a long term project. Electeds come and go. City officials come and go. You need to ‘get it in writing’.
The Virtual Town Hall is a first step. It’s the method we should use for every important land use decision in the future. It lets everyone visualise the project in advance. And the really good news? We already budgeted for it over a year ago, so there’s nothing holding us back from doing it today.
A Planning Commission (PC), which every other city has, is the place where members of the public get to have input on the actual design of the City. The PC would organise the town halls, gather input from the public, advise the Council on what you want. And it would do it not just for the Marina, but for every planning decision. No. More. Surprises.
A Marina Committee, like our other Council Committees, brings everyone concerned about the Marina to the same table. The Marina is now the essential public square for the entire city. No more preferential treatment for any single constituency. No more ‘in-private’. No more uncertainty as to when or where you can engage with the City and the Council on issues of concern. A Marina Committee creates a single public place where all stakeholders can go, every month, to plan for Marina-specific issues.
I urge you to read the above, attend all of these and give public comment in support each of these ideas. If we get started now, we can have a better process started IN JANUARY, with no delay to -anything-. But you must start SHOWING UP and you must ask for these specific things…
A 'private' community presentation by the Mayor to the DMMA membership. I include a transcript, which the DMMA objected to but whatever, because the Mayor revealed a number of items that should have been part of the September 27 public meeting. Must read....
I wrote in my Weekly Update that the Futures Report was useless and I demonstrated this by posting a page from yesterday (11/06/2022.)
And below are pages from the version updated 1today. And what I learned, today, is this:
The Ferry Update that was scheduled for November 17 has been pushed back to December 1st.
That November 17 meeting now includes
Our Legislative Agenda–where the Council proposes ideas we want to push to our lobbyist and State, Federal electeds, is also on the 17th. First we’ve heard of that.
Apparently, the 2nd Budget Reading is still on the 17th, but unlike past years, there is no mention of amendments. In every year since I’ve been watching, the City and Mayor would block out time for CMs to research possible amendments and discuss.
We’re also having a public hearing on the 2022 budget–which never seems to have been locked down earlier in the year.
A vote on our Human Services Funding. For the third year in a row this is the only time the Human Services Advisory Committee has presented any information to the Council–at the meeting where we approve the budget, of course.
December 1st is, again, the Ferry Update and then renewals of three related consultants:
The Ferry consultant
The Marina consultant
The ex-City engineer who shepherded the Port’s acquisition of SR-509 surplus over to the Port for Des Moines Creek Business Park West. (Why we’ve been paying someone to do this for the past six years is beyond me.)
And on December 8, which is our last meeting of the year is…
Farmers Market Report. Again, this is the first report we’ve received.
The City Manager Performance Review (which is actually supposed to be twice a year, but never mind that for now 😀 )
Look, I’m not disparaging any of the items on these Agenda. But the fact that these things show up out of the blue does make the whole thing take on a level of theatre.
And then there is this: Although we will have had about the same number of full meetings as in past years, we’re continuing a trend which goes like this:
Jam a ton of stuff into the beginning of the year. Which makes those meetings performative.
Keep long stretches of the calendar empty. Which makes those meetings performative.
Then round out the year by cramming a ton of stuff at the very end. Which makes those… (you get the idea.)
Also there’s this: We’ve had fewer committee meetings this year than any time since I can remember. COVID, schmovid, most of these meetings have become rote. The notable exception has been public safety. However that has been mostly in response to events: upticks in crime, and the increased community activism in Redondo (way to go community. 🙂 )
One of the many things that makes this state of affairs troubling is something CM Steinmetz has gone on about more than once: education. Most CMs are not subject matter experts. And frankly, most of us do not take outside education classes. So, every committee meeting is one of your few chances to learn the material. And if you don’t know the material, you can’t meaningfully question what is being presented to you. The best you can do is, “use your common sense”… and then vote ‘yes’ on whatever is put before you. That’s not how this is supposed to work. One has to have opportunities to develop a baseline of expertise.
Our current system gives the staff the authority to cancel meetings when they have nothing to present. That’s just the tail wagging the dog. After all, they are supposed to be Council-led committees.
1Yeah, the document header says it was updated November 4th. But it was not there on 11/06/2022. I just happened to click on it today in response to a reader question. So it could not have been uploaded before (11/07/2022.)
Get get that 3rd COVID Booster (the new ‘bivalent’ model.) Now. Deaths are slowly rising. Again, again, it takes about a month to achieve full efficacy. And the number of people who have had all four injections is now below fifty percent. Football, Thanksgiving. Christmas. I think you know where I’m going here. They’re doing walk-ins now pretty much everywhere. 🙂
This Week
Monday: Dept. of Ecology briefing on their upcoming plan to identify communities most impacted by pollution. and set up monitoring to move towards legislation which protects us. (Spoiler alert: I’m pushing for Des Moines. 🙂 )
Tuesday: Port of Seattle Commission Meeting (Agenda). The Commission will approve their 2023 budget.
Tuesday: King County Flood District. Ditto. The group will vote to approve our 2023 budget.
Friday: 11:00AM Veterans Day celebration by the Des Moines Memorial Drive Preservation Association at Sunnydale School in Burien. (Check out their web site for some great history on Des Moines Memorial Drive. 🙂
Last Week
Tuesday: 6:30PM Highline Schools Listening Session at Mt. Rainier High School, with Superintendent Dr. Ivan Duran and District #5 Director Azeb Hagos. I made a comment at the end of this week’s meeting which I fleshed out here on Facebook. This has nothing to do with the merits of Prop 1. It’s truly for information only. But the HSD ballot info on the tax implications was not exactly ‘clear’. So please read and attend this meeting.
Thursday: Public Safety Committee Meeting (Agenda) (Video)
This was a very action-packed meeting–and in fact the first Committee meeting I’ve seen in many years that actually went over-time and I encourage everyone to watch it.
The first discussion was on Code Enforcement, which is always a crowd-pleaser.
The topic shifted to Flock Cameras, which silently read license plates as people drive by them. It’s a lot like a speed camera. Basically, a computer finds that the associated driver has an outstanding warrant, it pings the Police Department. The PD is super-jazzed about the program as a force-multiplier. I always have privacy concerns because a) it’s just a matter of changing the software to do a lot more than just look at license plates. And b) unlike most of you, I’ve actually been to true surveillance states (like the Soviet Union) many times and so I am that nervous nelly.
There was also a discussion about placing a speed camera in Redondo. The City is limited by State law to where it can place speed cameras. The State can allow an special exception for a camera in a specific spot (and Mayor Mahoney and I both testified for that in Olympia last year.) But we did not get that permission.
What the City is proposing is to designate a couple of parcels as some form of park land. On the plus side, it sounds good. On the other side? The State can just also allocate us a ‘slot’ for a speed camera in the next legislative session in April, so we may not need that ‘loophole’.
Regardless, the thing that I’m impressed by is the recent organisation by the Redondo community. That is what makes things happen. And my message to readers from that neighbourhood (and others) is this: If I sound in any way ‘pessimistic’ about the City Attorney’s plan, that is not the case. I just know that things often don’t go to plan and you’ll need to keep going. We should still be testifying for those speed cameras in Olympia, just in case. And you may find that a speed camera is not the be all, end all. What matters is to keep at it.
Catch and release
I also want to say a few things about the Chief’s recent press campaign, which has included multiple press releases about quick releases of people arrested after violent offenses from King County Jail. We’re all fed up with the ‘catch and release’ vibe coming from the County. But I’m also not exactly sure how those press campaigns will improve the County court system and I think it would be better if whenever any part of the Administration does press that they explain it to the Council first.
In the second instance, where the Water District #54 employee was brutally attacked, I know the man, his injuries were even more severe than it might appear from the video going round, and I encourage everyone to send their best wishes to him via WD54.
Now, the larger picture is that civil servants like him truly areessential workers. It takes years to develop the skills and certifications to keep our drinking water safe. And if we don’t keep them safe, they can’t keep us safe.
So my interest is in seeing if there is anything the City can do to help all our essential workers avoid a repeat of that situation.
My calendar? It’s wide open.
This article has an important update today (11/07/2022)
This a snapshot from our Future Agendas Report taken today. Every City has some form of official calendar like this. I’ve written about this issue before but it’s worth re-visiting because it’s not exactly getting better.
First off, there are no meetings on November 10th. (They were moved to November 17th weeks ago.) But even more important, there’s no there there. It’s usually not filled in with anything meaningful, literally until the week of the meeting.
Also, at every meeting, the Council is blindsided with unannounced presentations and proposals, including the one at our last meeting where we were expected to vote on an ordinance with zero notice.
No other nearby City functions like this. No public corporation would function like that. Every other City Council I’m aware of dedicates at least some time periodically fleshing out their future meetings calendar. We never do. So it is the case that we have (cough) ‘planning meetings’ in April for items that never actually get on the calendar.
(In fact, there are items the Council voted on last year, which still haven’t made it to this year’s calendar.) The entire Council calendar is truly a black box.
And if the Council itself has no idea what’s coming, there is no way in hell that residents can become engaged.
At one of the first meetings I had with the City Manager, I asked to see an example of his administration’s planning calendar. He looked puzzled and said there wasn’t one. That cannot be the case. There has to be a planning calendar. It may not be public facing, but you cannot run a business our size without a working calendar.
It must be seen that the administration finds this climate of ‘need to know’ preferable. The less information one shares, the less opposition one will receive.
Wanna hear an irony? I hear from peers in other cities that doing these Weekly Updates simply helps people push back against me. I actually tell people what I think, where I’m going, what I plan to do. How stupid is that? (Or so goes the argument.) I don’t know how to respond to that except to say this: If you really believe in ‘democracy’ you cannot treat this like a poker game. You have to be open.
Democracy is information
I do not think it is a coincidence that democratic government in America has been so tightly linked with the free market. A free market provides great results–but only when all sides have access to the same information. That’s the key: buyers and sellers all knowing exactly the same things. That is how you are able to get to the fair price for anything you buy or sell.
But that is also the weakness. If one party has information the other side lacks? The game is up. The incentive to have an ‘edge’, to know something the other guy does not, to ‘play your cards close to the vest’, is almost irresistible. And that is what leads to the cynicism most of us feel today.
Politics is exactly the same. If one side has more information, of course they can (and will) run the table. But then it’s not democracy; it’s a poker game.
We have a terrible Futures report because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have a terrible Futures report.
We have a terrible web site because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have a terrible web site.
We have such poor public engagement because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have poor public engagement.
But on the other hand, if you think things here are going great, than all of the above is just sour grapes. It’s only ‘bad’ because you’re not the one running the table, Harris! 😀
Look, just talking about a blank Future Agendas Report is probably too abstract for most people to care. Residents will (rightly) demand to know about Crime! Taxes! And all their other immediate concerns.
But a City Council is about planning and oversight. It’s not meant to react to events. We’re supposed to create policies to prevent crime, to make sure the roads don’t fail, to make sure there are all sorts of things taken care of in advance. And I don’t know how we can say we’re doing that properly if the entire Council (and you) don’t all have access to the same information. Without that, it’s not a free market; you can’t be sure you’re getting the best deal and there can be no accountability.
Update: 11/07/2022: At some time today, the Future Agendas Report was updated to include the preliminary agenda for the 11/17/2022 meeting. QED.
This article has an important update today (11/07/2022)
This a snapshot from our Future Agendas Report taken today. Every City has some form of official calendar like this. I’ve written about this issue before but it’s worth re-visiting because it’s not exactly getting better.
First off, there are no meetings on November 10th. (They were moved to November 17th weeks ago.) But even more important, there’s no there there. It’s usually not filled in with anything meaningful, literally until the week of the meeting.
Also, at every meeting, the Council is blindsided with unannounced presentations and proposals, including the one at our last meeting where we were expected to vote on an ordinance with zero notice.
No other nearby City functions like this. No public corporation would function like that. Every other City Council I’m aware of dedicates at least some time periodically fleshing out their future meetings calendar. We never do. So it is the case that we have (cough) ‘planning meetings’ in April for items that never actually get on the calendar.
(In fact, there are items the Council voted on last year, which still haven’t made it to this year’s calendar.) The entire Council calendar is truly a black box.
And if the Council itself has no idea what’s coming, there is no way in hell that residents can become engaged.
At one of the first meetings I had with the City Manager, I asked to see an example of his administration’s planning calendar. He looked puzzled and said there wasn’t one. That cannot be the case. There has to be a planning calendar. It may not be public facing, but you cannot run a business our size without a working calendar.
It must be seen that the administration finds this climate of ‘need to know’ preferable. The less information one shares, the less opposition one will receive.
Wanna hear an irony? I hear from peers in other cities that doing these Weekly Updates simply helps people push back against me. I actually tell people what I think, where I’m going, what I plan to do. How stupid is that? (Or so goes the argument.) I don’t know how to respond to that except to say this: If you really believe in ‘democracy’ you cannot treat this like a poker game. You have to be open.
Democracy is information
I do not think it is a coincidence that democratic government in America has been so tightly linked with the free market. A free market provides great results–but only when all sides have access to the same information. That’s the key: buyers and sellers all knowing exactly the same things. That is how you are able to get to the fair price for anything you buy or sell.
But that is also the weakness. If one party has information the other side lacks? The game is up. The incentive to have an ‘edge’, to know something the other guy does not, to ‘play your cards close to the vest’, is almost irresistible. And that is what leads to the cynicism most of us feel today.
Politics is exactly the same. If one side has more information, of course they can (and will) run the table. But then it’s not democracy; it’s a poker game.
We have a terrible Futures report because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have a terrible Futures report.
We have a terrible web site because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have a terrible web site.
We have such poor public engagement because it is to the Administration/Majority’s advantage to have poor public engagement.
But on the other hand, if you think things here are going great, than all of the above is just sour grapes. It’s only ‘bad’ because you’re not the one running the table, Harris! 😀
Look, just talking about a blank Future Agendas Report is probably too abstract for most people to care. Residents will (rightly) demand to know about Crime! Taxes! And all their other immediate concerns.
But a City Council is about planning and oversight. It’s not meant to react to events. We’re supposed to create policies to prevent crime, to make sure the roads don’t fail, to make sure there are all sorts of things taken care of in advance. And I don’t know how we can say we’re doing that properly if the entire Council (and you) don’t all have access to the same information. Without that, it’s not a free market; you can’t be sure you’re getting the best deal and there can be no accountability.
Update: 11/07/2022: At some time today, the Future Agendas Report was updated to include the preliminary agenda for the 11/17/2022 meeting. QED.
t of all, the older ones just tended to be more informative. You take away all the advertisements from the ..er… ‘current’ version (which are fine, by the way) and there’s just less there there.
Regardless, the thing that I’m impressed by is the recent organisation by the Redondo community. That is what makes things happen. And my message to readers from that neighbourhood (and others) is this: If I sound in any way ‘pessimistic’ about the City Attorney’s plan, that is not the case. I just know that things often don’t go to plan and you’ll need to keep going. We should still be testifying for those speed cameras in Olympia, just in case. And you may find that a speed camera is not the be all, end all. What matters is to keep at it.