This is a long one. But that’s unavoidable. Last week’s meeting consisted of not one, not two, but three issues that, by rights, should have had star billing at separate meetings. The fact that City and Mayor decided to jam all these into a single meeting was not exactly a win for local democracy. But please give it a whack because truly, it’s all important stuff. No. Really. š To keep it from being even longer, refer to the Waterland Blog article, which covered all the fun stuff. š
This Week
Tuesday: 6:00pm. There will be a meet n’ greet for the three candidates for new Police Chief at the Senior Center (2045 216th Ave.) The choice is that of the City Manager. However, in previous eras, there was a lot more public input on this key position.
Wednesday: I’ll be meeting with the City’ new Communication Consultants from Consor Engineering. Oddly, when I signed up, the City still had more than one open slot. After all the kerfuffle, apparently not every CM seems to feel the need. š
Thursday: Environment Committee Meeting (Agenda) Highlight: Compost Ordinance. (There’s a compost ordinance. Who knew, right? š )
Thursday: Transportation Committee Meeting (Agenda) Highlight: Transportation Improvement Program spreadsheet. These are always good to look at because it gives you an idea of where the City sees various needs. If you know of a particular problem andĀ don’tĀ see it on the TIP? Please contact the City. (And me. š ) But one other note, given the rest of the topics below. Remember: the TIP isĀ aspirational. It’s the projects we’d like to do. If you’re unhappy with the timeline on a particular project, recognise that the money we spend on a ferry or a 223rd Steps is money we won’t have to work on <fill in the blank>.
Thursday: City Council Meeting (Agenda) For ‘highlights’ see last week’s recap below. The most important issues will be second readings of items from the June 1 Meeting. However there will also be a Consent Agenda item on surveillance cameras at the Marina. Which, IMHO, should not be on a consent agenda. š
Friday: The final meeting of the now ended ‘Second Airport Committee’ known as the CACC. Spoiler alert: that failure means there will likely be no second airport in our lifetimes. And since there’s no cavalry coming over the hill, that means we need to do everything possible to start reining in Sea-Tac Airport. Enough is enough.
Saturday: Aviation Town Hall with Congressman Adam Smith, Senator Karen Keiser, Rep. Tina Orwall and Port Commissioner Hamdi Mohamed.
Last Week
Monday: 10:00AM Memorial Day Celebration at Sunnydale Elementary in Burien hosted by the Des Moines Memorial Drive Preservation Association. Come see the new utility wraps created by Des Moines artist Daniel Wend!
Here’s a gallery.
Tuesday: Citizens Advisory Committee. I only watched this because I don’t think any CM belongs at these things except as an observer. But, as in 2017, the thing is being chaired by the Mayor. His ‘state of the city’ and outgoing Chief Thomas’ ‘state of the police’ were worth watching. The meeting was dubbed a ‘meet and greet’ but I object to the Mayor’s use of his privilege not merely to provide factual background (great) but to continue to sell (which is why I don’t like electeds to be present.) Much of his speech continued to justify the hotel, and the Redondo Restroom, to re-brand the ferry as neither transit or tourism but rather as āa unique public park amenityā and to blame me for the poor ācommunicationā.
Thursday: June 1, 2023 City Council Meeting. (Agenda) Highlights below
Friday: Meetings with Congressman Smith’s office and UW DEOHS on Air Quality Monitoring. Here’s one project UW is working on for schools in Des Moines. š
June 1 City Council Meeting Highlights
Public Comment
- Several members of the public from the Marina District commented eloquently on the upcoming bond sale. I wish community members fromĀ other neighbourhoods would do so as well since it is everyone’s money.
- The Waterland Pride Group made an announcement of several events they have going on next weekend, which are on the list of PSAs. CM Steinmetz made a motion to donate $500 from our Hearts and Minds fund to the group which I could not support–for the same reason I did not support a similar ad hoc request by Mayor Mahoney last month. It’s just not right for the Council to give money toĀ non-profits of any kind that don’t ask. We have a system in place to provide grants for those who make a very simple request. But we have absolutely no business gifting money to any group ‘just because’.
Consent Agenda
- I pulled the item on Speed cameras in Redondo. Again, Consent Agenda items are supposed to be routineĀ (eg. pay checks) and require no discussion.Ā I voted ‘yes’, but shoulda voted ‘no’.Ā The item referenced speed camera studies which demonstrate the need. But the Council never saw the results. As it turned out (as usually happens) there were lots of questions. That’s why these kinds of things don’t belong on Consent. Ironically, if the administration simply provided the information I asked for I wouldn’t have to pull the item and things would move along faster. š
- The upshot is that they will be installing four cameras in two spots costing $265,000 a year.
- But the cameras will not come on line until at least August.
- I was initially very skeptical of the original idea, which only included the north/south route. But the City later added the east/west Redondo Way, which I’ve always thought would be more effective.
- Regardless of how confident the Chief is as to the ticket writing potential, $265,000 is a lot of money. It was not good to show up without that traffic study. And I would hope that our next Chief will be more forthcoming with providing data–especially neighbourhood-based stats. I willĀ really wanna know how well these works–including how well each pair of cameras performs.
Public Hearing on Housing action plan
- As I wrote last week, the City and I disagree completely on the quality of the public outreach on our HAP. More than that, my colleagues and I disagree on some of the basic goals. The consultant’s report obviously skews towards the Council majority view–which resists the new middle zoning laws. This is unfortunate. We’ve gotta make it easier to open up various zones to allow for things like duplexes and ADUs (mother-in-law apartments)
- I am also deeply concerned that we should be improving the quality of existing housing, including in Pacific Ridge. At least rhetorically, I fully agree with the City Manager when he says that “substandard housing is not affordable housing.” But so far, our plan does not seem to address that. We need to find ways to update older apartments and houses–especially in terms of security and health.Ā
New Business
$26MM Bond Sale
This is also deeply problematic for me. We were voting for a single sale covering five projects in one night, even though the Council has not seen details on most of them. So I moved to hold the item over until the next Study Session in July, which everyone agreed was just common sense.
Had ya goin’ there for a minute, right? š
The only good news? It did not pass in one night. There will be a second reading at the next meeting on June 8. You should show up for that and here’s why:
The projects
- Flag Triangle–216th and DMMD
- Marina Steps & Plaza (New CIP/Subset of MCCIP0022)
- Redondo Fishing Pier (MCCIP0012) and Restroom (MCCIP0018)
- Redondo Paid Parking (TRCIP0017), and Marina, Beach Park Paid Parking (MCCIP0021) to be repaid with a combination REET1 and REET2, One-Time Sales Tax, and Parking Revenue.
Regardless of the merits of any of these projects, they should not be combo-ed together and under no circumstances should we be funding them before we know what they even look like! At the last Economic Development Meeting, the City Manager made it clear that he wanted to have this vote (the money) before talking about specifics. This. Is. Backwards.
Some fine print:
- This is massive. For some context
- It quadruples our outstanding debt
- It is as large as our entire annual General Fund.
- It is the largest cost adjusted bond sale in our history.
- The fee alone is $900k.Ā And there are no backsies.
- AFAIK each of these projects could be financed separately and at no financial penalty. It’s not like you get a bulk discount, and in fact, these bonds will be issued in separate tranches.
- Many of these projects the Council (or the public) have seen no drawings. We’re using this bond sale as our assent to -do- those initial studies.
- It is yet another complete re-design of the Marina Floor which not only changes the look, it changes the purpose, which was supposed to be all about ‘economic development’
- The Adaptive Purpose Building is now being put off for ten years. Wasn’t that supposed to be the money maker?
- It also intends to keep the existing sheds in place (which were previously characterised as ‘falling down’), despite their poor revenue potential vs. dry stack.
- Speaking of which, the narrative also mentions delaying any dry stack for a decade, which was the only real money maker all along. This implies that the City sees a dry stack not as a revenue “and” but as a revenue “or”… which was what DMMA seemed to be saying all along. We’re potentially leaving millions on the table. We should immediately do a fresh revenue study.
- It discusses expanding the Marina Steps into Parcel A–where the ’boutique hotel’ wasĀ originally supposed to go. Again, no drawings and no explanation as to lost economic opportunities.
- It also says nothing about the currently out of service boat launch–perhaps until the next stretch of the seawall is addressed in 2034? Or will it be re-built as a ‘make do’ (and then have to be replaced again with th proper design to accommodate dry stack in ten years?) in a cheap-o fashion and then need to be rebuilt as a proper negative lift in ten years.
- The item says that there is anĀ urgency to this sale because part of it will use ARPA money. No. Only the Marina Steps would use ARPA money. And besides, we have until the end of 2024 to use that money. Plenty of time to haveĀ drawings before we sell bonds.
- The City is also not exactly being 100% on the tax implications. No, the debt service is not coming out of your property taxes. But it is coming out of City money (in the form of commercial taxes) that could be used for other things. It’s still your money. Just as with the ferry, this is money that could be used for any number of other very worthy items that residents scream for literally every day.
- There are only two projects that are fully described infrastructureĀ projects and those are the only two I will support:
- Dock Replacement L.M.N
- Redondo Fishing Pier (not the restroom). And the pier has a State grant to offset most of the costs.
- And last but not least, in 2017, a previous Council voted to fund a sight-unseen paid parking system which never worked properly because (wait for it) it was not designed for outdoor use. Really. No. Really. This time? I want to see the system before voting ‘Yes’.
A tale of two amateur graphics
Here are two of my totally childish-looking Google Earth renderings of the Marina floor. They areĀ not super-accurate (for the simple reason that the City won’t show us enough info to make them accurate. š )Ā Purple is the ‘223rd Steps‘, Green is Parcel A, where the original boutique hotel was gonna go. (You can see why developers preferred not to try to force a teeny hotel into that small space.)
So… the image on the left is the original idea–Parcel A would be the hotel and the 223 Steps would wind down in front of the South Shores condos. The image on the right is what happens after this bond sale.Ā The City isĀ verbally proposing to expand the width of the 223rd Steps north into Parcel A. To which I say, “WTF?” š IĀ guess the argument is that widening it will make for an easier ADA slope? Maybe. But I’d sure like to have, oh I dunno, aĀ drawing. š
But it also takes some of that land off the table for commercial development, which, according to the City back in 2021 was supposedly the whole point of landside development. Remember? “The land side must pay for the water side.” At least $12.7 million dollars of this debt service must be paid for with Marina money. How onĀ earth does that happen with a Marina that currently, according to the City, barely breaks even? And fun fact, the next round of Marina spending we’re pushing off into 2034 will make this bond sale look tiny. Because that’s when the rest the sea wall and the dock replacements will need to be done. Again, we’re pushing all the real pain off into future people. As previous Councils did to us. (Who says we have no ‘tradition’ in Des Moines. š ) But all kidding aside, I don’t think that’s very nice of us and spoiler alert, I cannot, in good conscience, vote for it.
Analysis
We’re conflating a ‘bond sale’ with yet another re-design of the Marina Floor which you cannot see and cannot understand. And by ganging the financing of these projects together (and approving all the financing–including fees up front), we’re preventing any of them from being properly reviewed. Not only has the City not learned from the ‘hotel’ kerfuffle, it is responding by doubling down on the behaviours the public made clear it did not appreciate.
More than that, we’re basically catering to the status quo at the cost of the rest of the City, both now and in the future. Ironically, the current Marina Redevelopment was initiated by the DMMA, but it’s hard to see where any of it benefits the boating community. Actually, itās part of a longstanding conversion of the Marina into a nondescript “Waterfront Park that will be neither fish nor fowl.
- It won’t encourage boaters
- It can’t generate revenue
- And worst of all (to my mind) it won’t look nearly as good as it deserves to because there will be no input on design (like in a normal city with a public planning commission.)
Because the awkward discussion we never have is that, although the various projects the current administration has built (eg. the former Van Gasken Park, the ‘beacon’, etc.) are ‘nice’, they’re not particularly special. There isn’t one of them that holds a candle to a building like the Masonic Home orĀ the public art generated by our great local artists (see above). And there’s no excuse for that. We get one shot at this Marina. One big reason to open up the process is to make sure that every square foot of it is a true work of art!
And all of it is being conducted with a stunning amount of public money.
Remember this? That’s exactly what every Mayor says about their pet projects. Do. Not. Believe. It.
As I’ve said before, this is the Des Moines Creek Business Park v2.0. It is not designed to make money. As with the ferry, it’s actually going to lose money. They are selling a belief that all this stuff, from SR3 to the ferry to the steps will somehow act as some kind of ‘magnet’. It’s as ridiculous as this video where the Mayor tells the public that the seal hospital with drive ‘tens of thousands of eco-tourists’ to Des Moines. Which is what Mayor Sheckler said about the DMCBP a decade ago (‘Thousands of FAA employees will have lunch in our town every day!’) Hoo boy.
For all the grousing the Mayor has done about ‘people being against change’ it appeases those people 100%. As did the DMCBP a decade ago. It looked shiny, offended no one, and screwed the rest of the city out of millions in revenue permanently.
As will this, unless the public takes action.
Protocol Manual
We had a first reading on a new rules of procedure, being renamed the Protocol Manual. You say potayto, I say potahto. š The best thing I can say about it is that the current Draft is not as terrible as the first three. But the whole thing was unnecessary. We could (and should) have had a Study Session, with each of our suggested amendments thoroughly debated and just tweaked the current document. What really grinds my gears is that the idea of an ‘update’ came about at our 2022 ‘planning meeting’ and the process that emerged was nothing like the Ad Hoc Committee. There was no ‘consultant’ input from each Cm. If you read the agenda item, the new Protocol Manual is essentially a re-formatting of the old one, with several personal vendetta items (including a ‘dress code’ which no other cities seem to have) followed by twenty pages of scolds to Cms and the public about ‘the first amendment’.
Farewell Rule 26…
CM Steinmetz took to social media with a series of personal attacks in response to my comments about ‘Rule 26a’. It is unfortunate that any colleague cannot respect that we all will feel passionately about certain issues. I believe that this really matters. The fact that that $26 million bond sale was on last week’s agenda with a motion to pass it in a single night was, in itself a bad thing. It strikes me as a truly tone-deaf attitude by the City as to the enormity of the issue, especially in light of the Mayor’s recent article on improving ‘communication’ in the latest City Currents Magazine.
The new rules will make it even easier to pass even massive ordinances like this in a single night. Being dismissive of my concerns will not change the fact that these new rules of procedure are yet another step backward in terms of transparency.
Hell, the Waterland Blog covered the meeting and didn’t evenĀ mention the bond sale or the new rules, which are not only the most impactful items on the agenda. I don’t blame their reporter. It’s simply too complex for any casual observer to understand. Without a real beat reporter, someone who has spent years learning theĀ contextĀ the only reporting you can do will be the simple stuff. And I say again: when you only cover the simple stuff, it enables the darkness. People will naturally see these articles and assume everything is going along okeedokee.
You can say what you want about moi or this blog, but… aĀ lot of people find out about the stuff thatĀ really matters (like the bond sale) through me,Ā not via external web sites like the Waterland BlogĀ or the City’s crummy ‘outreach’.
Amendments
All of these were/are mine–except the first one which was CM Achziger’s. The ones marked Fail/Pass were discussed last week. The rest will be discussed on June 8. Hope to see you there.
- Competing offices. CM Achziger feels that councilmembers should be able to simultaneously hold another elected office. He is alone on this one. But lest you think I’ve gone over to ‘the dark side’, I am, in fact, more ‘conflict-averse’ than everyone else. I object to the very common practice we’ve had of electeds and their spouses being board members on multiple ‘groups’ the City engages with. If I had my druthers none of that would be allowed. Long ago our City grew far beyond any Cm’s capacity to multi-task like that. We’reĀ not a ‘small town’ anymore. (This week’s packet alone was no joke to study.) Once you are elected to our City Council, your entire focus and loyalty should be on our City Council. Fail 1-6.
- 5.0f If a Councilmember is deemed (by a majority of the Council) to have published an āerror of factā on social media they are supposed to correct it. I cannot tell you how much I object. Fail 2-5.
- 5.03g A Councilmember may be censured for engaging in conduct which a majority determines has āunderminedā the Council. Whatever that means.
- 5.03h Councilmembers were allowed to use City letterhead to write letters of recommendation. I asked for this to be removed. Pass 4-3.
- 5.07a We’ve had a longstanding rule that, if you write the City with a concernĀ and cc a member of the Council, that CM is supposed to be included in the email chain. ThatĀ neverhappens.I wanted language to insure that it happens. Fail 2-5.
- 7.02 re-instate City Manager mid-year performance review.Ā The Mayor told me that this was already in the DMMC. Sure. But over there the review is a (wait for it) ‘committee appointed by the Mayor’. That is as bogus as the Ad Hoc Rules Committee. I wanted the mid-year review to be the same as the end of year review. Fail 2-5.
- 7.04 (new) every Councilmember is entitled to a timely response to their request for information (research) from the City Attorney on any issue relevant to an Agenda Item. The entire Council will be ccād. Fail 2-5.
- 7.06 It is unethical for Councilmembers to publicly criticize staff. That needs to be struck. Simply too vague.
- 7.06a (new) any Councilmember is entitled to meet directly with the HR director on a confidential matter such as health. Fail 2-5.
7.06a (new) every Councilmember is entitled to a timely response to their request for information (research) from the Administration. If the request is deemed to require more than one hour of staff time, the CM will be informed and the request will be referred to the full Council as to whether or not to proceed. Fail 2-5. - 7.06b (new) any Councilmember is entitled to meet directly with the HR director on a confidential matter such as health. Fail 2-5.
- 8.05 Recordings. For some reason there is no mention of video. every meeting of any City business should be video recorded and kept in perpetuity, regardless of the RCW.
- 8.06F The City manager will provide all meeting materials to be presented at least 24 hours before the meeting.
- 8.06K Ordinances. Re-instate second reading.Ā Do notĀ add a Rule 26b. If there is a real need we can suspend that with 11.05.
- 8.06 (new) following each meeting, public comment and any materials included at the meeting which were not on the Agenda will posted on the City Web Site with a notification.
- 9.01 āIf needed, an Ad Hoc committee may be appointed by the Mayor for the purpose of review and advice to the Council.ā Strike this. No more Ad Hoc’ Committees appointed solely by the Mayor.
- 11.01 D. (Dress Code) Strike. No other city has this.
- 11.04 D. (Donating time) Strike. Cms shouldĀ be able to donate time.