Notes from Shoreline council meeting February 22, 2021

Pam Cross, reporter

Shoreline City Council Meeting

February 22, 2021

Notes by Pam Cross

Deputy Mayor Scully called the remote meeting to order at 7:00pm.

Mayor Hall was excused for personal reasons.

Report of the City Manager, presented by John Norris, Assistant City Manager

Winter Weather

Snow response recap

COVID-19

King County cases continue on a strong downward trend.

Our region, consisting of King, Snohomish and Pierce Counties, remain in Phase 2 of the Healthy Washington Plan.

COVID-19 update

COVID-19 case and recovery metric update

Please continue to protect our community

• Wear a face covering, especially indoors in public settings regardless of the distance between people.
• Wash or sanitize your hands regularly.
• Maintain six (6) feet of distance, indoors and outdoors.
• Outdoor gatherings with a limit of 15 people from two households.
• Get tested at the first sign of illness.
• It is safest to stay at home.

City Hall remains closed to the public. Most services can be accessed online, by phone, or by drop off. For more information visit shorelinewa.gov/remoteservices

COVID-19 Vaccinations

Although there is information available on Shoreline’s website, people are encouraged to go to CovidVaccineWA.org for the most up-to date information on eligibility and locations providing vaccines.

The City is currently updating its Transportation Master Plan (TMP).

The TMP supports all forms of travel – by foot, bicycle, skateboard, scooter, stroller, wheelchair, transit, motorcycle, automobile, etc. The TMP will guide local and regional transportation investments and define the City’s future transportation policies, programs, and projects for the next 20 years. You can contribute by taking the short survey available at shorelinewa.gov/tmp through Feb 28.

Proposition 1 will appear on the April 27 ballot for park improvements and park land acquisition. Learn more about it at shorelinewa.gov/prop1

Public Reminders

The PRCS/Tree Board will hold a remote meeting February 25 at 7pm. For additional information go to shorelinewa.gov/calendar

Council Reports

Councilmember Chang attended the King County Regional Transit Committee meeting. They are beginning to plan for restoration of services. Take a survey to provide your input about routes you use. Search for “metro route to recovery” before March 8 to locate the survey.

Metro service guidelines prioritize equity, productivity (how many riders) and geographic value. Based on these priorities, the North End (including Shoreline) ends up with no new routes at all. Yet future bond measures will be countywide. We have been given large growth targets by King County. But no increased transit. Metro needs to coordinate routes with the growth targets. We can’t plan on growth without more transit.

Councilmember McGlashan attended a session at AWC (Association of Washington Cities) Action Days. Representative Fey spoke about transportation and it appears the State Legislature is pushing through a transportation program this year. But since they are under court order to work on the culverts, he didn’t know how much of the budget will come to the cities.

Sound Transit is getting some of their routes back but funding is a concern. Lynnwood Link shouldn’t be affected, but others north of that will.

Councilmember Robertson: The North King County Task Force had another meeting. Although scheduled to open in December, the North King County Enhanced Shelter at the Oaks is still not hosting any clients. They are still prepping the building and getting the old systems updated. The fire inspection process is continuing. The enhanced shelter is still weeks away from hosting residents. They have hired a manager who will be working to get the whole team in place.

The task force was convened in the summer to locate this shelter. Now they are looking into what their purpose will be going forward.

Councilmember McConnell had a meeting with the National League of Cities Transportation and Infrastructure Services (TIS) Committee focused on inequities of public transportation that the pandemic has brought into focus.

Public Comment

Adel Sefrioui, Vice-President Evergreen Point Group (small, multi-family developer) offered their perspective why development has failed to move forward in the MUR-70 Zones.

Jackie Kurle, Shoreline, supports the homeless but expressed the need for more transparency from the City. For example, letters from the City concerning the North King County Enhanced Shelter at the Oaks project should be widely distributed instead limited to the immediate neighbors.

Approval of the Agenda

Agenda adopted by unanimous consent.

Approval of the Consent Calendar

Consent Calendar approved unanimously by roll call vote.

Action Item 8(a) Action on Ordinance No. 919 – Amending Title 2 of the Shoreline Municipal Code to Create a New Chapter 2.70, Compensation and Salary Commission, to Establish a Salary Commission for Elected Officials

Don Mortiz, Human Resources Director, made the brief presentation

This was last discussed at the Jan 25, 2021 Council meeting.

Since Shoreline’s incorporation, salaries for Councilmembers have been set by Council action thought enactment of an ordinance. At the January meeting, Council was supportive of amending the Shoreline Municipal Code to create a Salary Commission and directed staff to bring back proposed Ordinance No. 919 for adoption.

Proposed update to Ordinance 919

DISCUSSION

No additional discussion.

VOTE:

Passed unanimously by a vote of 6-0


Study Item 9(a) Panel Presentation on Police Accountability: Legislative Activity in Olympia and the Uses and Limitation of Data

Introduction of panel and presentation by Jim Hammond, City Manager’s Office

The panel consists of Jaqueline Helfgott, Devitta Briscoe and Sharon Swanson.

Jaqueline Helfgott, Professor at Seattle University, and Director of the school’s Crime and Justice Research Center.

Helfgott talked about the use and limitation of data. We need to capture usable data for how people process through the criminal justice system from beginning to end. But it is hard to coordinate data across systems of police, prosecuting attorney’s office, and jails because they all focus on different things. Also, there are different laws in different states, like the legality of marijuana, which makes it difficult to compare cities. Different cities follow different groups, based on the makeup of their population. This makes a randomized study impossible to do. There is not enough funding to attempt a coordinated approach.

Hammond: We’ve looked at traffic stops. In Shoreline, 6% of residents are POC, yet tickets to POC are 10% of the total. However, stops for Shoreline residents are 1%.

Helfgott: we would need to know more about the variables of each traffic stop. Traffic stop rate could be indicating people driving through Shoreline.

Hammond: Shoreline biannual survey asks how satisfied are you overall, with the enforcement of laws, crimes prevention, how safe do you feel. Is this information helpful? Or would you ask other questions?

Helfgott: We ask Seattle residents some of the same questions although Shoreline is more focused on broader community public safety. Seattle has scale items allowing us to rate one area against another. Shoreline taps into some of the same areas, but the data is much more limited. We are talking about 900 respondents in Shoreline vs 10,000 in Seattle. These are randomized surveys sent to a percentage of residents.

DISCUSSION

Is there a standard approach to the question of when we might have enough evidence to show a potential a problem?

Helfgott: I am a researcher who measures data but I do not make policy recommendations. It is up to policymakers to determine at what threshold they want to act.

Are there resources to tell us what kind of questions we should be asking and what kind of data we should be collecting to do a better job?

Helfgott: In Seattle there is a police crisis template that is very detailed about how police make decisions. Not many cities have this. You can always look at what other cities have done to collect their data.

Devitta Briscoe, community advocate who is assistant director of Not This Time and part of the Washington Coalition for Police Accountability, is active in the current state legislative session

Briscoe: Five years ago I lost my brother, Che Taylor. Andre Taylor (Che's brother) and his wife Dove founded Not This Time soon after his death. Police attempted to make his arrest but he was shot within 9 seconds, then handcuffed, and left to bleed out. He did not have a weapon, was not resisting, and had his hands up.

We pushed Initiative 940 requiring mandatory de-escalation, mental health training, independent investigations, and the rendering of first aid. Although it passed, violent incidences of deadly force did not decrease at all. Investigations are still not transparent or fair. This brought Not This Time to join the Washington Coalition for Police Accountability.

The priorities include changing police culture, clarifying public expectation of officer behavior, and prohibiting neck restraints, police dogs attacks, tear gas, no-knock warrants, use of military weapons, hot pursuit, shooting at moving vehicles. We don’t want to eliminate police dogs, but we need to prohibit attacks including biting. De-escalation should be first and deadly force a last result. We need better police training, hiring, and accountability. We also need Independent investigations - not by another law enforcement entity.

Sharon Swanson, Association of Washington Cities (AWC) staff member who is tracking police accountability legislative proposals in Olympia

Swanson: AWC supports 4 of the 5 issues mentioned by Ms. Briscoe. Police reform is one of our legislative priorities. Our main priority is to ask the State to set a standard for use of force while preserving the ability of local jurisdictions to have more restrictive standards if they choose to. AWC values local control, but with the number of jurisdictions involved, law enforcement should be a statewide conversation. Zip code should not determine how you interact with law enforcement. We are in favor of the vast majority of these reforms and then will work on the specific language. Two police chiefs have asked to be included and we need that perspective. We have to know we are getting the language right, that the adopted language can be trained to, and case law has to be involved. My role has been to facilitate those conversations about HB 1054 (establishing requirements for tactics and equipment used by peace officers) and HB 1310 (concerning permissible uses of force). We are trending in the right direction

DISCUSSION

Should we assume that what will come out of this will be a hybrid?

Swanson: There are about 15 separate bills addressing tactics used, what and when use of force can be used, liability, duty to intervene, audit criteria added to investigations - there will be many bills that pass.

HB 1202 (addressing meaningful civil remedies for persons injured as a result of police misconduct) would hold the city independently liable for actions of law enforcement. How would that affect cities that are contract cities, like Shoreline?

Swanson: You will have to ask your City Attorney. It will depend on the contract wording and what the City’s involvement is in police operations. AWC does not support this bill. Cities do not control all of the things they could be held accountable for. Cities don’t control training, who is fired, or whether they stay fired. It increases liability in areas we cannot control. We need a compromise.

Collective bargaining makes it difficult to discipline and/or dismiss an officer. It appears that the WA Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs support more control given to chiefs. Is that concept in any of these bills?

Swanson: Yes the Sheriffs and Police Chiefs want to allow for more authority and autonomy of management but this doesn’t appear to be moving forward. There will need to be a larger conversation about the role of collective bargaining and unions, but it hasn’t taken place. It would have to be at the State level because the ability for collective bargaining for State employees is provided by statute.

Is there any thought about expanding the concept of mental health teams like RADAR?

Swanson: AWC supports this type of program, either ride-along or available to law enforcement when needed. The conversations are taking place but at this time because of the financial needs to expand the programs, we may need to get to that later.

We rely on the police for everything. From your perspective, should we be focusing solely on police accountability, use of force and police culture? Probably yes, but where do these other things come in?

Briscoe: We need to think about the totality of circumstances. We can’t expect officers, even with mental health training, to take the place of social workers. While there are no bills focused on that, we need to continue the conversation that will push for services like RADAR.

HB 1203 requires community oversight boards. Are there positive examples of these community boards in other areas? What are the concerns that WAC has about this?

Swanson: there has been a lot of work on this bill, but the problem is it would be a mandate. Some cities have their own oversight boards and they don’t want to recreate what they already have. Some mayors and city councils feel that this is their role, especially disciplining officers. How will we pay for it? Right now the cost is too much. Citizen involvement is a good idea, but may not work in every jurisdiction where there aren’t that many people interested in going that far. It’s a lot of responsibility. Maybe we should think about starting with a pilot program. It may not work as proponents think it will.

Briscoe: HB 1203 is not on our priority list and I don’t know of any examples.

Hammond: this will be addressed at the Council meeting next week.


Study Item 9(b) Discussing Ordinance No. 920 - Repealing and Replacing Shoreline Municipal Code (SM) Chapter 3.01 – Fee Schedule, Ordinance No. 921 - Establishing a Fee Schedule for Impact Fees, and Resolution No. 471 - Adopting a Fee Schedule

Margaret King, City Attorney, made the presentation

About the Fee schedule

Impact on budget ordinance

Ordinance 920 would repeal and replace the existing SMC3.01 to provide for adoption of the City Fee Schedule by resolution and amend certain sections of the SMC to ensure correct citation based on this modification. Impact fees for parks, transportation, and fire are specifically excluded and instead are adopted by separate ordinance.

• Ordinance 911 would adopt the parks, transportation, and fire impact fees for 2021.
• Resolution 471 adopts the 2021 fee schedule.

No action is required tonight. We are looking for staff direction regarding the proposed modifications to the fee schedule structure.

DISCUSSION

Even though we are moving towards a resolution-based process for adopting fees, Council will be the one to adopt them, right?

Ms.King: correct

Council agrees this can to come back on the Consent Calendar at the March 15 meeting.

Meeting adjourned.

Attend meetings, review materias, make comments: Information HERE