District 7 Council Candidates Answer Key Questions
After researching all candidates in the District 7 Seattle City Council race, attending a number of Candidate Forums, and talking with the five we thought were best aligned with our values and downtown livability, we emailed each of them a list of five key questions and asked for short, succinct answers. Below are the answers we received, in alphabetical order, without edits.
1. Please explain your solution to the homelessness crisis, and how you will fund it.
Shelters and treatment, including due to the size of the current problem, FEMA style emergency dormitory shelters. But making streets, parks and outdoor spaces no longer an option. Given current spending levels, I am not certain than more revenue is needed. We need to have an independent audit of current spending and reallocate based on efficacy before we seek new revenue.
2. Please explain what you would do to achieve clean, safe streets, and traffic that moves, especially in downtown.
Allow police to enforce laws against “low level” crimes Prosecute them And as necessary, provide addiction and mental health treatment in jails rather than an either or choice Also address SPD retention and recruitment issues Starting with a supportive council
3. Would you support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment that will ensure that alleys really work for loading, waste, and deliveries? And, how would you address current projects?
Yes growth needs to take infrastructure and transportation into account
4. Would you support requiring Daylight/Health studies for large high-rise towers at Design Review to ensure adequate tower separation before project approval?
Yes
5. What is your position on the Waterfront LID, the possibility of another LID for the replacement of the Magnolia Bridge, and another LID for a cover over I-5 downtown?
I am a lead plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking to overturn it I would seek its repeal I would be outspoken against any attempt to impose a lid by resolution on Magnolia or any other neighborhood in this city
Funding for the bridge can start by cancelling the First Avenue Streetcar
1. Please explain your solution to the homelessness crisis, and how you will fund it.
- I have read over the report that Barbara Poppe gave the city in 2016 (when our homeless population was 6,000) and believe that our best answer to ending the homeless crisis is her report. Essentially, I want to have one overarching organization that looks after ALL of the homeless services we have in Seattle. That also includes management and communication between private and public services. My vision is to move social services to triage individuals in offices scattered around Seattle. Example - If Joe were to walk into this new office on 3rd/Pike and explain to them that he is about to lose his apartment because he can’t make rent, he would be walked over to the room of housing displacement/rapid rehousing and would be connected with services to help him be able to stay in his unit. Or if Alice were to come into the office and need help with health insurance, we would be able to walk her to the individual within this office that can help with signing up for health insurance. Or if Jerry walks in and needs opioid treatment, we would have someone that would be able to look into treatment centers that have openings.
What we need, are locations like the one above, which are scattered throughout the city (really the entire county) where someone can walk in, state what they need, and be helped there. We cannot continue to have people being sent to other offices and being lost throughout our paperwork filled system.
Funding comes from reallocating the current money we are already spending on our homeless crisis with minimal results. We would have initial costs to move offices, but we would recoup those with the money saved on services
2. Please explain what you would do to achieve clean, safe streets, and traffic that moves, especially in downtown.
I would expand the MID program that has individuals cleaning the streets in Downtown Seattle. However, above all else we need to ensure that sidewalks and streets are not being blocked by tents/objects and that people are not having to find needles in front of their storefronts. We need a City Council that will support our current officers and allow them to make arrests when warranted. I will be that City Council member. I do not believe that we should allow 3g of heroin or less to be a non-prosecutable offense. I support BEAT cops on the ground around Downtown to show a presence and that crimes will not be acceptable.
3. Would you support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment that will ensure that alleys really work for loading, waste, and deliveries? And, how would you address current projects?
Yes. We need to ensure that downtown alleys are accessible to all, especially when it comes to waste collection. I hear too many times that streets are closed off due to construction and garbage is not able to be collected that week, causing more of a mess. We need better communication with SDCI and SPU and ensure that car lanes being blocked by current construction are done so minimally and only when absolutely necessary.
4. Would you support requiring Daylight/Health studies for large high-rise towers at Design Review to ensure adequate tower separation before project approval?
Yes. It is known that human wellbeing is dependent on light, and natural daylight is the most energy efficient way to deliver light. We should look at having daylight studies on new developments throughout the City of Seattle.
5. What is your position on the Waterfront LID, the possibility of another LID for the replacement of the Magnolia Bridge, and another LID for a cover over I-5 downtown?
I do not support the waterfront LID or other LIDS for Magnolia Bridge or I-5. I believe in working together with constituents and state/city officials to fund projects. I do not agree with imposing additional taxes based on a vote by only the City Council and not members of the city/neighborhood in which the tax is being placed.
1. Please explain your solution to the homelessness crisis, and how you will fund it.
I believe the city’s role is to do everything in its power to address homelessness in Seattle. This is a crisis, and one that requires our undivided attention. In terms of where I spend my energy, leadership and resources to have the greatest impact, I would focus on the area in which I am strongest: I am the only candidate who truly understands the complexities and process that goes into more building affordable housing. I have spent my career successfully working on large housing and transportation projects, and I want to use my expertise in this area to scale up Seattle’s efforts to build more affordable housing more efficiently.
I am supportive of the Landlord Liaison program, rental and mortgage assistance and other programs to keep people out of homelessness because they are effective and cost effective. I would expand these programs and increase partnerships with non-government entities to provide no-strings funding to people that need immediate assistance when feasible.
Seattle is not going to be able to solve this crisis on our own. This is a regional problem that is going to require a regional solution. Seattle by itself will never be able to come up with the necessary funds to solve this problem alone. We can no longer ask our neighboring cities to do their part, it’s time we start telling them.
Seattle has less than ⅓ of the counties population and almost ¾ of the county's homeless population. It also has the vast majority of extremely low income housing units, services, and the county jail. While it made sense to concentrate services in the City that is home to the region's largest homeless population, this approach has gone too far and is now overburdening our cities resources. Tax payers are frustrated that they keep funding new housing and services with little perceived on-the-ground positive impact. I propose working with the State to force wealthy cities like Bellevue that are not doing their fair share to step up with us.
Wealthier suburbs must still plan for and fund their fair share of the region's housing and services targeted at the hardest to serve populations. For those which don’t, sanctions could include loss of the city or county’s ability to collect property tax or to receive their respective portion of the sales tax, gas tax or other state taxes. This would be no different than the sanctions used to enforce the Growth Management Act (GMA) pushed through in the 1990’s. As a council member I would lead the charge in Olympia to make this happen, because it's the right thing to do.
2. Please explain what you would do to achieve clean, safe streets, and traffic that moves, especially in downtown.
Here are a few policies I would pursue to curb property crime and address these issues in downtown:
-Prioritize bike and foot patrols in hot spots, and as resources allow, replicate parts of the 9 ½ Block strategy.
-Continue supporting and expand Seattle’s commitment to Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) to reducing crime through urban and environmental design and management.
-Street’s and public spaces are not appropriate areas to treat people with mental health and/or substance addiction issues. I would work with my colleagues to create enough temporary shelter with wrap-around services to allow Seattle to enforce our no-camping laws. I don’t think shelter needs to be concentrated in one area, or have a one-size-fits-all approach. I would advocate for some to the shelters to be built outside of Seattle, where land is cheaper and more abundant. For example, the state owned surplus land at Fircrest in Shoreline would be one potentially well suited property. I was at an event where Tim Harris of Real Change mentioned that moving everyone out of the Jungle was an issue for treatment providers and outreach workers that now needed to search more areas to reach those in need. While I don’t agree with re-opening the Jungle, I do think that large shelters would serve the same purpose.
-If someone commits assaults and robberies they should face jail time. There should be more support for inmates in jail and pathways to housing and career support upon release to break the cycle of recidivism.
In regards to steps to make downtown traffic more efficient, here are some key areas that need to be taken into consideration:
-Getting Third Avenue in Downtown and Westlake Avenue right in SLU are key to creating a city that functions for both surface-transit riders and pedestrians. A 16th Avenue Mall (Denver) type transit corridor in either location could be a wonderful addition to the city. I look forward to reading the Third Avenue Design Vision report to learn if this type of project is feasible for Third Ave.
-Most people are pedestrians at some point during the day, no matter how they access the city. As our downtown grows, we need to widen our sidewalks to accommodate the growing number of pedestrians.
-Getting Light Rail right is important, including paying close attention to station access issues as we develop downtown/SLU stations in areas with major topographic challenges and street grid challenges.
-I would also like to see increased communication between SDOT and business/residents of downtown and reinvigorated alleys to create new pedestrian options where practical.
3. Would you support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment that will ensure that alleys really work for loading, waste, and deliveries? And, how would you address current projects?
I am in favor of making sure our alleys remain functional. This is something we need to work through in a practical way with all stakeholders including the DRA.
4. Would you support requiring Daylight/Health studies for large high-rise towers at Design Review to ensure adequate tower separation before project approval?
I would be open to considering this after vetting it with all stakeholders to understand any potential benefits and unintended consequences. Many of the current issues we face, including tower separation and alley width issues, are due to previous councils’ lack of foresight, understanding, and willingness to adequately vet zoning changes. For example, the area around Escala seems like it was zoned with commercial space in mind, but allows residential uses which has created many of the challenges we face today.
5. What is your position on the Waterfront LID, the possibility of another LID for the replacement of the Magnolia Bridge, and another LID for a cover over I-5 downtown?
I am against the current process for imposing a LIDs which does not give voice to the people that will be most impacted. As someone who was directly impacted by the waterfront LID, I have a personal understanding of people’s frustration with how the process works. The process needs to be fixed before considering future LIDS.
Please explain your solution to the homelessness crisis, and how you will fund it.
We need a regional response to the regional problem of homelessness. Seattle taxpayers alone cannot foot the bill. I support an increase in the amount of available permanent supportive housing. Plymouth Housing, a leading provider of permanent supportive housing, has a 94% success rate keep people housed once they get them into a permanent supportive unit. I am encouraged by Amazon's recent gift of several million dollars to Plymouth to build 800 additional units of permanent supportive housing. Lets put City resources on the table to leverage State and County matches, along with private contributions, to continue to scale up permanent supportive housing.
Additionally, I have a strong and consistent platform for bringing accountable and thorough performance auditing to City Hall. King County has saved $127 million from performance auditing over the last three years. Seattle can realize similar savings.
2. Please explain what you would do to achieve clean, safe streets, and traffic that moves, especially in downtown.
I support business district foot patrols by an increased and supported Seattle Police Department. I also support increased cooperation with the State to site and streamline a new UW teaching hospital at the University of Washington.
On traffic, I support building out our network of light synchronization technology. While most major arterials have dynamic light synchronization systems, most side-streets remain out of the overall network. Without the feeder streets plugged in the synchronization network is worthless. We need the whole network to be plugged in.
Moreover, I support a renewal of the Transportation Benefit District (TBD) which has expanded transit service dramatically resulting in a considerable reduction of congestion. We need to expand the TBD to make sure public transit is a viable option for commuters, and reduce the amount of single occupancy vehicles.
3. Would you support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment that will ensure that alleys really work for loading, waste, and deliveries? And, how would you address current projects?
Yes. A livable downtown is only possible if we maintain our working alleys. I will support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment, and I would work to make sure current projects adopt its principals to get into compliance.
4. Would you support requiring Daylight/Health studies for large high-rise towers at Design Review to ensure adequate tower separation before project approval?
Yes, it should be part of the overall environmental impact study before a policy is approved by the City.
5. What is your position on the Waterfront LID, the possibility of another LID for the replacement of the Magnolia Bridge, and another LID for a cover over I-5 downtown?
The Waterfront LID process should have been conducted with greater buy-in and consultation from the community. The original proposal was broad, ambiguous, and required an unfair share of the project be paid by downtown residents. Moreover, it was unclear whether downtown residents would be on the hook for impact fees. Many of these issues were addressed through a compromise that only came after considerable neighborhood organizing and litigation. That is not the kind of process we should expect. These policies should be based on collaboration and working together.
That said, I do believe some level of LID is appropriate. The Waterfront Park is going to significantly increase downtown property values, and I believe it is fair that a portion of the project be paid by the Waterfront Park as burden sharing. The Waterfront Park is a new amenity, not the replacement of existing infrastructure. I support the modification to the proposal that lowered the overall residential LID commitment to $20 million (out of a project total of $712 million) spread over 4,600 condominiums and banned the use of LID money to pay for cost overruns. I will insist as a councilmember that the LID amount not be increased and will strictly enforce the ban on using LID money for cost overruns.
Moreover, I do not support the use of a LID to replace the Magnolia Bridge, as I do not believe LIDs should be used to replace existing infrastructure. I do not support the use of a LID to cover I-5 since that project will presumably have federal and state funding given that I-5 is an interstate.
1. Please explain your solution to the homelessness crisis, and how you will fund it.
My core values on the issue of addressing homelessness are as follows – I refer to them as the ‘four pillars’ approach: 1) prevention (both long term and immediate), 2) Harm reduction for those currently experiencing homelessness 3) Housing (rapid re-housing, transitional housing, supportive housing and permanent housing) and 4) enforcement (not criminalizing the status of homelessness but holding offenders responsible regardless of homeless status).
I adopted this approach/belief after being a founding member of the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) initiative in the Belltown neighborhood of Seattle. The program focused predominantly on people who were homeless, addicted, had co-occurring physical and mental disabilities and were mostly unemployed. The scientific based study showed a recidivism reduction of 66%, a significant increase in housing, significantly improved psycho/social qualities and no increase in cost compared to the ‘trail, nail and jail’ approach used for the previous 3 decades.
I believe that the City’s role in addressing the homeless crisis — thus far unfulfilled — is to offer clear and unwavering leadership and a clear plan toward resolving the homeless crisis, all the while respectful of the fact that homelessness also impacts communities and businesses. We do substantially fund fragmented approaches to address chronic homelessness and its co-occurring conditions, specifically mental illness, emotional and substance abuse disorders, but we lack a consolidated, holistic strategy. The bottom line: We do not have a clear plan. While there are important, data driven assessments at our disposal, we lack a comprehensive and courageous approach which balances the objective to stabilize the lives of homeless people with public safety and humanitarian objectives. Allowing car camping and other laissez faire approaches is not a ‘Program,’ nor fair or effective to either the businesses and residents impacted, or the homeless Seattleites themselves. I have always been a strong supporter of preventing homelessness, rapid re-housing and the policy of ‘housing first.’ I believe that the gold standard to address homelessness is permanent supportive housing. While we invest a lot of tax dollars in this great city, we likely need more investments, but — unlike the current approach — they must be smart, effective and data driven.
2. Please explain what you would do to achieve clean, safe streets, and traffic that moves, especially in downtown.
Transportation of people via dependable means is paramount as both a business and quality of life necessity. In addition, freight mobility through and into the region is essential. Innovating and maximizing this core Council responsibility of ensuring adequate safe and usable streets requires local leadership and regional cooperation to achieve, as well as working WITH corporations and operators of transportation systems toward mutually agreeable solutions. Everything must be examined and researched, with some more readily and proven solutions able to be implemented sooner than others: How we design our building/residences (loading docks/storage lockers for packages delivered to tower residents, etc.) hours of operation, hours of delivery, as well as alternative work schedules for employee must be examined and continually reevaluated for adjustment. Public transportation, car-pooling, safe pedestrian accessibility and evaluation of our current bike lane needs will be among my priorities. Consistent with my core values, this evaluative process will require both existing and new data analysis, particularly to ensure that our tax dollars are spent to achieve the highest benefits to the most people, balanced against serving those with access and functional needs. I have first-hand experience as the Chief Deputy and second-in-command of the King County Sheriff’s office, which oversees the operation of Metro Transit Police and Sound Transit police that serve the area but more importantly directly serve the 52,000 daily riders (and increasing) that patronize the transit systems.
Keeping our streets safe also involves public safety measures. I view our current situation with property crime to be a crisis. The economic drivers of this criminality will not be solved overnight, and will require rigorous, long-term programs, inter-agency cooperation and initiatives. I was part of the comprehensive 911 patrol staffing and deployment analysis at SPD called Neighborhood Policing, and the key to having the capacity to undertake emphasis and proactive enforcement is adequacy of staffing according to a scientific model. It is clear we have neither staffing adequacy nor science behind our current police deployment system, a problem exacerbated by nearly a decade of Council inconsistency on budgeting to a baseline of 911 patrol resources.
If elected, I will come to my position with both experience and a track record of collaboration and inclusive leadership. I have been fortunate enough to work with myriad criminal justice agencies – both prosecution and defense – as well as businesses and business organizations – like the Seattle Chamber, DSA and BOMA - and, most important, all those who live, work and drive in our city to enlist their ideas on how to address these complex challenges. My hands-on experience has shown me that meaningful progress is realized only through close and constant coordination between all involved and impacted public and private institutions, through cooperation and respecting all opinions. We must begin by passing unequivocal and enforceable laws, and ensuring clear pathways to reaching our aims. The absence of clear, enforceable laws and realistic policies - we currently have a system of maintaining a broken status quo - is the hallmark of our current Council, and will be the primary focus of my efforts of change.
3. Would you support a Downtown Alley Code Amendment that will ensure that alleys really work for loading, waste, and deliveries? And, how would you address current projects?
Yes! Working with the City and County for 35 years, I saw how easily isolated codes, regulations, and agencies could become burdensome and redundant and cause unnecessary hassle and inefficiencies for consumers and ordinary people. We need to look at consolidation and coordination to better manage our current Downtown projects to ensure loading, deliveries, etc. have access to the alleys they need and that other businesses, venues, and vehicle traffic get clear and direct information regarding the usage and timing of use for alley space. Streamlining the process for loading and disposal services Downtown will save everyone time and help mitigate traffic, but that can only happen when we work with the businesses, community groups, and residents who actually work and live Downtown and rely on functioning alleys and updated regulation to keep them accessible and know the nuances and details of what this legislation needs to look like to work.
4. Would you support requiring Daylight/Health studies for large high-rise towers at Design Review to ensure adequate tower separation before project approval?
Yes. New development needs to help the communities impacted, and if it will not do that, it shouldn’t be built. Period. Conducting these kinds of analyses and studies will allow us to actually understand the long-term effects and impacts of a proposed development and act for the benefit of the community.
5. What is your position on the Waterfront LID, the possibility of another LID for the replacement of the Magnolia Bridge, and another LID for a cover over I-5 downtown?
I do not like city-imposed LIDs unless a very clear and definite economic benefit is received by the community and area impacted. I believe that community/geographic/neighborhood LIDs that are initiated by the actual people in the area affected are much more resilient and clearly more fair, transparent, and accountable.
The Magnolia bridge is essential infrastructure and should be replaced just as the Lucile Street bridge was replaced in the 80’s, the 1st Avenue South bridge in the 90’s and the 16th Avenue South bridge more recently. The Magnolia Bridge is the top transportation priority in District 7, yet elected leaders have not saved a single penny for its replacement in the 20 years since the earthquake. Being a City Councilmember means taking on our challenges and responsibilities and making the tough calls. That means fixing the bridge now. Not next year, next election cycle, next councilmember. TODAY. That’s why I fundamentally support a one-for-one replacement of the Magnolia bridge and making its replacement a priority for the whole City Council. The original bridge was financed via various sources including the Port of Seattle and BNSF and I would work vigorously to develop a financing package reflecting the original.
Update 7/10: The Seattle Times has a Yes/No/Maybe format for asking candidates questions, check out the responses from District 7 candidates here.
