Like the 06/04/2023 Weekly Update, this is another long one. It’s also late! Again, 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. 🙂 To keep it from being even longer, refer to the Waterland Blog article, which covered all the fun stuff. 😀
This Week
I’m taking a break.
But call me. (206) 878-0578. You know… any little thing. 🙂
Last Week
Tuesday: 6:00pm. There was a meet n’ greet for the three candidates for new Police Chief at the Senior Center (2045 216th Ave.) The choice should be announced by the City Manager on Thursday (June 15.) However, in previous eras, there was a lot more public input on this key position. For those who missed it, here are the three candidates.
Wednesday: I met with the new Communication Consultants from Consor Engineering. One thing I learned is that every Cm signed up to speak with them, which was good. The two women were very nice, but the conversation (inevitably) kept falling back to various things we could (and should) do ourselves. Web site. Public engagement.
Thursday: Transportation Committee Meeting (Agenda) (Video) 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 and don’t see it on the TIP? Please contact the City. (And me. 🙂 ) But one other note, given the rest of the topics below. Remember: the TIP is 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: Environment Committee Meeting (Agenda) (Video) Highlight: Compost Ordinance. For me these meetings point out in very subtle ways the reasonable differences between electeds. I hear smaller ideas like ‘compost ordinance’ and my first impression will be positive, while my colleagues are more focused on possible pitfalls. But then on other issues (like passenger ferry) it’s exactly the opposite. People, right? 😀
Thursday: City Council Meeting (Agenda) Recap below.
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. Coverage from SeaTacNoise.info
Saturday: Aviation Town Hall Meeting with Congressman Adam Smith, Senator Karen Keiser, Rep. Tina Orwall and Port Commissioner Hamdi Mohamed. You can watch the video and read a review at SeaTacNoise.Info.
June 8 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 from other neighbourhoods would do so as well since it is everyone’s money.
Consent Agenda
- Cm Steinmetz pulled the item on security cameras at the Marina. What I keep bringing up with all these cameras is data retention. ie. how long do we keep surveillance videos of any kind. I keep getting promised information on this and… never get it. Why I care? Glad you asked. Any decent data geek can search for every embarrassing bit of text you’ve ever written on-line. It never goes away. Video? Audio? Much harder. But with the advent of AI, that has become possible. In other words, it will soon be possible for even dinky local governments to search through video of any embarrassing thing you’ve ever done that was caught on camera anywhere. And we all do embarrassing things, girlfriend. The easiest way to avoid people taking advantage of that data is to have a strict policy where it gets trashed after xx days.
Public Hearing on Housing action plan
This passed 6-1. I was the lone vote against and for one basic reason: It is a plan that is no plan. The State mandates that we pass some set of ‘goals’ but specifies no firm strategies or targets. It is up to us how sincerely we try.
Now, the Comprehensive Plan reviews we do every year do address those issues the old fashion way: with zoning and code. The HAP is supposed to be the Council leading the staff to move in certain clear directions.
All this document did was to say we want to do things like ‘reduce regulatory requirements’. Bold thinking. 😀
Sorry, but the current HAP has no substance. And frankly, that is because my colleagues are fine with the status quo. The thing is, we talk about how much we want to improve housing options. But the fact is, the only substantial work we tend to do to improve housing is based on State mandates–which all cities despise.
What is frustrating to me is all the misinformation. I heard this week from a wonderful, pro-tree resident who has been told that “all these new housing laws will remove even more trees!” Which is completely backwards.
In fact, it is our City’s current policies which have reduced tree cover in Des Moines to below 29%. We do very little to encourage homeowners to plant trees and nothing with commercial property. So over time, the only remaining large stands of trees are in parks or WSDOT property. You can read about our tree inventory here. Three years ago I asked the authors of that report (the Port of Seattle, ironically) if they could create a strategy to help us solve the problem. Still waiting.
The answer: Re-instate the Public Planning Commission we abandoned in 2013 as a cost-saving measure.
New Business
$26MM Bond Sale
Please see here for specifics on the projects.
This discussion began almost two hours into the meeting, which meant it was probably never gonna go well. (When was the last time you had a discussion this challenging when you were already tired.) In this second reading, I made a motion to approve only the moneys to rebuild the Marina docks and the Redondo Fishing Pier and hold off on the rest.
Several reasons:
- From day one, the parking systems we’re replacing did not work correctly. Therefore we should see the new version before we authorise money. Sorry. The money is small enough that we can wait on that.
- The Redondo Restroom (which is as crazy expensive and unattractive as its twin at the Marina and which I do not like being moved) is open to other financing in the next year (ie. various grants). Again, we can wait on that.
We are screwing the future
This is one of those deals where, as a former consultant to large businesses I struggle. I was actually being nicer than usual. There was simply too much animus in the room for me to stop and fact check some of the blather I heard regarding even the mechanics of bonds. And you should care about that.
But these are unquestionable:
- We are latching onto 30 years of at least $1.3x million in annual bond service debt and at least a $750k brokerage fee (could be higher.)
- The only comfort I heard was that we might be able to refinance after 10 years. Woo hoo. Last time I checked a refi does not make debt go away. And a refi tends to work best when interest rates are low. Do you see interest rates going down any time soon?
- But those fees, and that 1.3x million a year are monies we won’t have to spend for other projects. In other words, I sure hope those Steps and all the rest really are the ‘highest and best use’ of your money. Because $1.3MM sure could help with all the other stuff people ask me about every day of the week
- Then, in 2034, when the sheds and the rest of the docks are falling down, and the other 60% of the seawall needs replacing (oh, you thought we were done with seawall replacement? 😀 ) we will need to find even more than this $26,000,000 to do fix all that hard infrastructure work.
- And that matters because the Marina is a money-loser. Read that again. The only reason the Marina appears to run “in the black” is because we never properly recognise those future expenses on our financials.
I use this analogy a lot but it still works. If you don’t acknowledge that your roof will need replacement every 15 years, you never save for it and then need to get a loan when it fails. Bonds are like getting a loan every time you need to repair something–except that you get to transfer the monthly payments to the people who move in after you leave. And there’s nothing they can do about it. If homeowners could get that deal, they’d never save to repair anything. They’d just pass on every repair bill to someone else.
- None of these projects make money. The original, primary goal of landside development was to generate revenue and make the Marina self-sustaining. Gone.
I ended my objections by saying, “We are screwing the future.” In 2034 we will still have more outstanding debt than we had in our darkest periods–and then those future residents of Des Moines will be asked to more than double that debt load.
Suckers. 😀
As I often say, very few people at the local level care about the future. That’s why tree cover continues to decline. A large part of it is because the vast majority of decision makers (and voters) are older. As a former Mayor so famously said, “Quit complaining. None of us are going to be here in ten years!” The reason we had to bond out the current two docks–and then tack on all this other nonsense–is because previous Councils did exactly the same thing to us. We get the government we deserve.
The answer: Re-instate the Public Planning Commission we abandoned in 2013 as a ‘cost-saving measure.’ (Is there an echo in here? 😀 )
Protocol Manual
We had a second reading on a new rules of procedure, being renamed the Protocol Manual, which began round 8:35PM.
At the beginning, due to the length and stress of the meeting, the Mayor sensibly suggested we end the meeting early and pick it up next time. This was voted down. One of my colleagues said, “Let’s just get this done.” Another said, “We just need to push through this.”
For the two residents who found some inner strength to stick around (as well as our enthusiastic alien viewers from Planet Zatox), recognise that the format of this process was determined exclusively by the Mayor and the other two members of the Ad Hoc Rules Committee (Buxton, Steinmetz.)
The Mayor insisted we go through the document sequentially–and once we’d finished a section, there was no going back. So we began this second reading at Section 7.05 and pushed forward 1Dear Friends. Once more unto the breach. 😀
In keeping with that theme, some of us who are not moi kept voting for extending the meeting. The Mayor called out each section and then just assumed that only I would offer amendments (true). Almost all of which were voted down.
The one amendment I made which passed (4-3) was to add the following new rule 8.06R:
- 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.
I mention this because most people do not know that the Agenda Packets are where the City stores all the presentations, letters and public comments. Every letter or email you send between meetings gets attached to that document after the meeting. But the City did not tell people that.
Some people take me to task for cynicism (shocking, right?) But when adding even that small bit of transparency requires a real discussion–and still only yields a 4-3 vote, I dunno what to tell ya.
I would encourage people to watch this part of the meeting because it got into the heart of the differences between how we view government.
We slogged on until just before 10:00PM where the City Attorney reminded everyone that it would take a super-majority to continue on. Which wasn’t happening.
So, we ended up pushing this whole thing into the next meeting anyhoo.
Following the meeting, at least one of my colleagues indicated a desire to go backward to a previous section and add new language at the next meeting because it’s “important.”
Democracy in action. 😀
And one last thing: among the many changes which are sending transparency and democracy down the pan was the removal of the whole “second reading” system of passing ordinances. Which means that items like the bond sale, Housing Action Plan, and indeed the Rules of Procedure would, without a majority vote to extend, all pass in a single night.
The fact that the majority, despite clearly being exhausted, insisted on trying “just get it done”, shows exactly why we need at least some guard rails, like a second reading.
There’s this failure to accept some basics of behavioural economics:Â people perform better and act more fairly under the right circumstances. When they’re not tired. When they can watch the video. When they get that second chance to weigh in.
If you need a reason to watch the next meeting (June 22 6:00PM), here’s one: The final section to be discussed? Dress code. Until someone shows me otherwise, we’re about to become the only city in WA which attempts to enforce a dress code for its city council.
1Yeah, Henry V this was not. 😀