Sept. 23, hundreds packed Seattle City Council chambers and an overflow room for their first chance to offer public testimony on Mayor Jenny Durkan’s proposed 2019-20 budget, and potential council amendments to it. Some 140 people and groups signed up to offer testimony in what turned out to be a frequently emotional four-hour marathon that hopefully left council members — at least those who weren’t looking at their phones all evening — a lot to think about. To her credit, Councilmember Sally Bagshaw chaired the hearing with a notably fairer and more restrained hand than council President Bruce Harrell employs in contentious council meetings.
Four months after the abrupt repeal of the Employee Hours Tax, subsequent developments are underscoring just how hard it will be for local governments to find money to seriously address our region’s affordable housing and homelessness crises.
by Geov Parrish
It’s been four months since Seattle City Council, in apparent violation of the state’s Open Public Meetings Act, abruptly decided behind closed doors to repeal the compromise Employee Hours Tax (EHT) it had unanimously passed only a month before. Since then, a lot has happened on the homelessness front locally — almost none of it positive, from the standpoints of saving lives or getting people off Seattle’s streets.
Mayor Jenny Durkan’s announcement that she wants the city to come up with a plan for “congestion pricing,” to toll surface streets in downtown and South Lake Union, is only the latest in a growing tradition of city policies that are meant to sound and feel good, but that are deeply delusional and throw Seattle’s working poor under the bus – in this case, literally. Continue reading OPINION: Congestive Failure→
Amplifying the Authentic Narratives of South Seattle
