If you recall, 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 at SAFEWAY. Rite Aid. Sea-Mar. As you find locations, I hope you’ll let me know. 🙂
This Week
Monday: Meeting with Finance Dept. to ask budget> questions. Which means I better read the budget. 😀 Keeeeeeeeding. This year, the City made me a printed copy, for which I am thankful. 😀
Monday: Dept. of Ecology meeting on Aviation Emissions.
Tuesday: Speaking of which, the Port of Seattle is doing their Budget Study Session tomorrow. Their process is very different from ours. Due to their complexity, they have sort of a rolling process which starts in July. But this meeting matters because it’s the Tax Levy Presentation and it’s the start of the first Part 150 Study in nine years.
Tuesday: I am absolutely thrilled to make the following PSA:
Des Moines Historical Society
General Membership Meeting
Tuesday, October 25, 2022 at 7:00 p.m.At the first floor of the Des Moines Odd Fellows Hall at 728 South 225th Street.THE PUBLIC IS ENCOURAGED TO SHOW UP! This meeting is held in an accessible location.Join us for a lecture by Tim Robinson, Co-Publisher and General Manager of Robinson News. He will speak on the history of the Des Moines News and the importance of retaining newspaper articles. Newspapers have always saved a copy of each paper. At the end of the year, they are perfect bound into a large, heavy book for safe keeping. In Olympia and at UW Suzzallo library they microfiche copies of many publications. Microfilm is great for words and not so for pictures. Also, microfilm is not word-searchable so it is very time consuming to look up an item without an exact date.Learn about newer technologies that addresses these problems.
Thursday: City Council Meeting. (Agenda) (Video) Highlights?
- First Budget Reading. 2023 Preliminary Annual Budget
- Transfer of lease to new owner of Quarterdeck and extension of lease for another five years at $381/mo.
Last Week
Wednesday: Public Safety Round Table (Video)
Thursday: City Council Meeting. (Agenda) (Video)
Council Meeting Recap
City Manager Report
As usual, there were a couple of unscheduled presentations. And as usual, I’m gonna tell ya how annoying I find these, because I compartmentalise. I frequently go from things I absolutely hate to things I absolutely love, sometimes every five minutes. I know you don’t live your life that way, but that’s what these meetings are for moi.
SKHHP
South King County Housing and Homelessness Partners (SKHHP) is one of them. 😀 I was glad to hear from the Director on the organisation’s progress. On the other hand, I recall my predecessor remarking that it’s taking too long. And if it was OK for her? It’s OK for me. 🙂 Too. Slow. I asked a question about ‘inventory’ and it will be almost four years before we get an inventory of our housing stock–so we know how the quantity and quality our homes. Seriously? It’s taking four years to get a count? And the reason it’s too slow? Frankly, because some of the member cities want it to be slow. It’s as simple as that. It would be kind to say that some people are ‘cautious’. But sometimes? You can tell what people care about by how long various things take.
Consent Agenda
In addition to renewing our membership in SKHHP.
We also voted to end the City Manager’s Emergency Powers. CM Pennington gave a ten minute speech on the importance of emergency management and gave the City Manager such praise that Mr. Matthias joked “The check is in the mail, Vic.” Which was exactly what I was thinking. 😀
But seriously, ladeez and germs. Without giving a letter grade, I think it’s fair to say that every agency, from the Feds down to the dog catcher, were caught off guard by COVID. It takes nothing away from everyone’s great work to say that. And it’s just best practice to do a serious lessons learned after such a massive beat down. The facts are: We lost waaaaaaaay more people than other countries, we spent trillions to mitigate that discomfort, and now we’re going through the worst inflation in forty years.
Winter Farmers Market Fee Waiver: We also voted to waive the fees for the Farmers Market Holiday thing. Which is fine, but I shoulda pulled the item because we’re voting on this before they present to the Council and that drives me *Shazzbatt!
My Comments
Those of you who follow me know that I raised the need for a marina virtual town hall system and a Marina Committee at our last meeting. But the City Manager, and our ferry consultant, were quoted in the Puget Sound Business Journal on Wednesday and I urge you to read it. Their statements, and the implications of the article are so troubling they demanded a response.
The Mayor announced the cancellation of our RFQ and sweeping changes to our Marina Redevelopment plan at a community meeting with no microphone, and without the knowledge of the Council. (Do I need to remind people that in Council/Manager Government the Mayor is merely the presiding officer at the meetings and has no executive authority. They aren’t even supposed to send a Condolence Card without a vote of the Council.)
And in that same article the City Manager is quoted as basing the decision to move the proposed hotel site based on feedback from condo owners who were concerned about blocking their particular views. Wait, we moved a hotel based on some private complaints? Making that kind of land use change without involving the Council should not be tolerated for the reason I gave to close my comments:
If they did it once. They’ll do it again.
This is not how government is supposed to work.
Unquantifiable Value…
As I wrote, we will be voting to extend the current lease for the Quarterdeck for another five years. And the rate, which was $300/mo will go up to $381/mo. In the Agenda, the explanation is that the Quarterdeck is provides unquantifiable value to the community.
Look, I get the appeal of the place. Love it. Furthermore, if one breaks it down on a strictly per/sq ft basis, it’s not as weak it sounds.
However, for me, saying that the benefits of anything on the Marina are ‘unquantifiable’ is just wrong. Everything on the Marina Floor must be quantifiable, for the simple reason that the whole point of re-developing the land side is to generate $50,000,000 to pay for the real business of the Marina, aka “the docks.”
So forgive me, but saying that the Quarterdeck or SR3 or the Farmers Market or a new hotel or anything on that Marina floor is ‘unquantifiable’ is more than a bit cheeky.
What it’s really saying is that the City has unilaterally decided to shift the burden of those lands, which benefit a relative few, on to other parts of the budget in order to pay for the docks; or roads; or public safety; or human services; or any of those other core services that benefit everybody.
Ironically, I don’t mention CSR Marine because that’s the only business that actually has to be on the floor in order to run… you know… a marina. 😀 Everything else, should be delivering financial reports to the City Council before we offer subsidies, grants, and especially long-term leases.
$50,000,000
That does not mean I don’t love these things as much as the next person. It’s just the way you run a business–especially a public business that needs to find $50,000,000 it does not have.
Because lest people forget, the Marina is an Enterprise Fund; ie. a business inside a government. It’s supposed to pay its own way. That is the law.
Currently, the Marina’s real business (ie. boats) makes a modest profit. But there is zero money in there for dock replacement.
So, since the Council chose not to have the virtual town hall I requested, let me break this down for you using my ninja-like multi-media skills:
This is why I get snippy about rents and grants –not to mention ‘ferries’ and ‘hotels’ and ‘dry stacks’ and ‘adaptive purpose buildings’ and ‘year round farmers markets’ and ‘paid parking’ and every other darned thing on that Marina floor.
The largest bills in City history will start coming due soon. And without sounding unkind, do you see anything on the Marina floor that looks like it will make that nut? Because if not, it’s coming out of your pocket.