thrown over the guardrail.

If she had not been aware and started running, she probably would have been hit much sooner in the skid.

And we are so fortunate that she was only banged up and bruised and only spent about three hours in the emergency room, but that easily could be everybody.

And before we begin, I'd like to say a few words about public comment and participating at our meetings.

We do not allow individuals to disrupt our meetings.

This includes talking out of turn or without permission, interrupting or making sounds when someone else is talking or approaching council members or sort of city employees who are staffing the meeting.

And if a person does disrupt this meeting, I will give a warning.

I'll end the person's remaining comment time or ask the person to leave the meeting room for the rest of the meeting.

My hope and personal request is that we can be civil and polite to each other.

I think we're all smart enough to be able to express our opinions without being insulting or demeaning.

And uh so before we begin with roll call, I want to explain that our deputy is remote, but he is with us online.

And our council member Bargava is going to be about 10 minutes late, I believe, due to traffic.

Uh, would you like to do roll call, city clerk?

Thank you, Mayor Robinson.

Here.

Council Member Hamilton.

Here.

Councilmember Lee.

Here.

Councilmember New England.

Here.

And Councilmember Simaduria.

Thank you.

Councilmember Simon DeWaria, would you please lead us in the flag salute?

I flash allegiance to the flag.

And to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God.

Justice world.

Okay, we have um three proclamations tonight.

The first one is East Side Welcoming Week proclamation.

We have Samuel Rodriguez accepting that if you'd like to come up and have a seat here.

Good to see you again.

Good to see you, man.

Um thank you.

Councilmember Lee, I have the proclamation right here for you.

I'm sorry, I forgot to sign it.

Okay, hold on for one second, everybody.

I got it's like trapped in this folder, and I can't sign it.

What's that?

Okay, I know he has a copy, but I need to.

Oh, it is.

Is are you telling me it's signed?

Because it is magically.

Okay, now I gotta jam it back in.

Just hold on.

Okay.

Thanks for your patience.

Go ahead, Councilmember Lee.

Thank you, Madame Mayor.

Uh Wes Welcoming Week has been celebrated in solidarity on the east side since 2016.

With the cities above you, Issaqua, Kirkud, Ramon, and Samamish, seeing this as an opportunity to honor the history, achievements, experiences, struggles, and contributions of immigrants and refugee people to the social, economic, educational, artistic, and civic life of our country.

And West, we recognize that many immigrants and refugees continue to face systemic barriers, shifting policies, and discrimination.

And we commit to fostering a community where all community members can feel safe, supported, and fully included.

And whereas East King County is one of the most racially and ethnically diverse region in Washington State, with 37% of residents coming from places outside of the United States and 40% of residents speaking a language other than English at home.

And whereas immigrants and refugee community members have historically faced significant challenges in building a new life in the United States, often navigating limited resources and systematic barriers along the way.

And whereas immigrants and refugees community members are especially impacted by the current federal regulatory environment, facing fear, harassment, uncertainty, and trauma, regardless of their legal status.

And whereas federal policy changes are also affecting many human services programs, limiting vital resources to immigrants and refugee community members, and many other people in need, and impacting their education, employment, income, food supply, housing, and well-being.

And whereas it's important to counter many of the negative stereotypes regarding the contributions of immigrants and highlight that 36% of new businesses are immigrant-owned, that American agriculture relies heavily on immigrant labor, and that undocumented immigrants paid over $96 billion in fertile state and local taxes in 2022 alone.

And whereas, despite the ongoing challenges, East Welcoming Week will continue as part of the region's annual celebration, honoring the contributions of immigrants and refugees, and highlighting the vital role communities play in fostering equity, inclusion, belonging, and a sense of welcoming.

And whereas there are many ways to celebrate Eastai Welcoming Week, including amplifying the voices and experiences of immigrant people, uplifting them to share their stories, or attending welcoming week events, visit Cside for All for a list of all region, regional events.

Now, therefore, I conradely, on behalf of the mayors of Bellevue, Issaqua, Kirkland, Redman, and Summer Mitch Washington, jointly proclaim September 12th through 21, 2025 as Eastside Welcoming Week, and invite the community to engage in opportunities during Eastide Welcoming Week and beyond to learn, connect across different across differences, and take joint action to achieve a welcoming, equitable, and inclusive community.

Sign Lynn Robertson, mayor, and the rest of the mayors of the other cities.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Lee.

And Mr.

Rodriguez, I was fortunate to be able to attend the event she put on Sunday at Crossroads Community Park.

And we did a very good job, I'm sure you'll talk about it.

So please go ahead.

Good to see you.

We know that we cannot do this alone.

And in many levels, our business get to connect with many of the different entities to bring to everybody an opportunity to collaborate, to educate, to promote, because we know that when everybody is part of this, we all get to benefit and celebrate our differences.

Currently, our company has about 1,500 small businesses in the United States.

I'm sorry, correction.

In Washington State alone.

Okay.

And we know that with the support of cities and everybody alone, we are able to bring much more of these various opportunities to grow together and to benefit for all the differences that we have in common.

I honored for sure.

Or work today shows up that people are listening to us.

And I appreciate you very much for this.

Thank you.

Great, thank you.

Stick around.

We'll do two more proclamations.

We'll come back for pictures.

Thank you, Mayor Deputy Mayor and Council for supporting us today.

Thank you.

Please speak more.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off.

Oh, no, no, no.

That's all I had to say.

Thank you.

All right, thank you for all you do.

Um, all right.

Next proclamation is Hunger Action and Awareness Month proclamation read by Councilmember Bargava, and it will be accepted by Philip Peters, Executive Director of Renewal Food Bank and Regina Gupta Development and PR manager of Renewal Food Bank.

So thank you for coming out.

Go ahead, Councilmember.

Sure, thank you, Mayor.

And whereas food needs remain one of the most important, most common reasons for King County residents to contact social service providers, and whereas Hispanic, Black, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander residents and people with disabilities are disproportionately impacted by food insecurity both locally and across the nation.

And whereas in Bellevue, approximately one in four school-aid children experience food insecurity, putting their health, development, and academic success at risk, and whereas children facing hunger are more likely to experience developmental delays, experience academic challenges, and encounter social and behavioral challenges.

And whereas Bellevue is committed to building a future where no one goes hungry, where every resident has access to healthy, culturally responsible, affordable and sustainably produced food.

And whereas the city recognizes and commends the vital role of food banks, emergency and hot meal programs, farmers' markets, and hundreds of volunteers, faith organizations and social service agencies who work tirelessly to combat hunger and support neighbors in need.

Now, therefore, I, Vishal Bargova, on behalf of Mayor Lynn Robinson and the City Council and the entire city council for Bellevue, Washington, do hereby proclaim September 2025 as Hunger Action and Awareness Month.

In Bellevue, Washington strongly urge all residents to pledge to take action against hunger in our community, whether it be by fund or food donation, volunteering, or advocacy.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

Thank you so much.

My name is Philip Peters.

I'm the executive director at Renewal Food Bank.

I'm Ragini, and I'm the development and PR manager at Renewable Food Bank.

Thank you so much to the City of Bellevue for welcoming us back here.

It's an honor to serve the community alongside all of you.

We want to say a special thank you to the human services staff as well as the mayor and the city council.

And a special thank you to the executive leadership team who just recently came and volunteered and spent the day with us at the food bank.

Your partnership has been critical to the success and to the growth of renewal.

Thank you for coming in person and volunteering with your own hands and providing essential human services support that keeps our doors open for this community.

As you know, we continue to serve about 500 families, about one 1,500 people in a week.

And we proudly welcome everybody.

We have never turned anybody away.

Our communities, our families are mainly immigrants and refugees living in the Crossroads neighborhood in Bellevue.

And they are coming from all over all over the world, Southeast Asian countries, Latino countries, and Eastern European countries, a lot of Russian Ukrainian going on in our premises.

We specialized in high quality and culturally relevant food, which respond to very specific needs of our neighbors.

We also continue to give away personal hygiene items, bad food, baby food, and baby formula.

Since the last time we came before the full council, new challenges have emerged.

Our partners are struggling as changes in federal funding cascade through our ecosystem.

Our customers must endure heightened harassment because of the color of their skin and the languages that they speak.

But let us be clear, we're undaunted.

We know that our work is more critical than ever, and we will press forward with greater passion and empathy than ever before.

It takes a whole community to provide food security for our neighbors by coming together as a whole, bringing together the faith-based community of the policymakers and business leaders, we can radically change the outcomes for those experiencing food insecurity.

As Margaret Mead said, never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, you two stick around, we'll do the picture after.

Okay, and then we have um Councilmember Newenhouse reading a proclamation for National Service Dog Month, and we have Hennessy Owensby, the puppy raiser with canine companions for independence with Kevin the Fifth, the service dog, and we have some other people, so you can introduce yourselves when you get your chance.

But go ahead, Councilmember.

Thank you, Mayor.

And Kevin V has been very patient thus far.

So I'll get right to it before he's probably ready for dinner, actually.

Whereas the Americans with Disability Act of 1990 legally recognized the role of service animals, individually trained dogs that perform specific tasks for individuals with disabilities, ensuring their civil rights and access and public accommodations.

And whereas despite the growing demand, there are only approximately sixteen thousand service dogs trained through accredited programs nationwide.

And whereas service dogs bring bring proven benefits to people with disabilities, offering greater independence, safety and confidence, and enabling full participation in education in careers, volunteerism, and community life.

And whereas in Bellevue and throughout the region, service dogs help adults, children, veterans, and seniors lead fuller lives by assisting with daily tasks, providing companionship, and fostering inclusion.

And whereas public understanding and respect for service dog etiquette, including recognizing their working role and supporting the rights of handlers in every space, strengthens community awareness and accessibility.

And whereas National Service Dog Month offers an opportunity to educate our community about the invaluable contributions of service dogs and to honor the partnerships that allow individuals with disabilities to thrive.

Three minutes, and not only three speakers are allowed to speak to any one side of a particular topic.

And then one final reminder is that in compliance with Washington state campaign laws regarding the use of public facilities during elections.

No speaker may support or oppose a ballot measure or oppose support a candidate for an election, which includes one's own campaign.

Anyone speaking on that will be asked to stop.

The South Kirkland Park and Ride is the only location identified in the city of Kirkland for light rail by ST3.

And um the CKC and other East Rail sections are going to support and do support now vital component of ensuring that our communities are able to reach late rail and other mass transit.

Um with the current boundary split, King County Metro will have to seek permitting through both of our jurisdictions and duplicate a lot of different review processes to see this site developed.

Uh King County Kirkland is committed as the permitting agency after these are approved uh to seeing the site develop consistent with regional transportation goals.

Um we believe this is a an important transportation link, and we'd like to make that as efficient and affordable as possible for all involved.

They'll this will help deliver mutually beneficial regional transportation projects and will demonstrate the collaboration between Bellevue and Kirkland in support of those schools and working as one region.

Uh tonight I see that I ran a little out of time, sorry.

Um thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight.

The city of Kirkland supports these, and we hope that you do too.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The next speaker on our list is Keith Goodman, who is joining us virtually.

Mr.

Goodman, can you hear me?

Yes.

Perfect.

Your time begins now.

Okay, thank you.

Uh we have at least two topics uh related to public transportation on the agenda today, and one is the 69k pass-through funding from Metro, which of course I support.

I support public transportation through taxes and voting.

And the issue that I don't think you can use the funding for this, but I would like the council to support uh the re-establishment or restoration of Route 226 along North Up Way and Northeast Eighth Street.

It was eliminated on September 1st after being in place for at least two decades.

I've been told by neighbors it's longer.

And uh right now the neighborhoods of Lockmore, Bretonwood, and part of Tamishanter uh need to walk 20 to 30 minutes up a steep hill to get to the nearest bus stop.

Um I just I've sent email to most of the members, and I will send email to the RAST.

Um, and I I thank you for uh considering uh helping the neighborhoods to uh get restoration of Route 226.

North Up Way and Northeast Eighth Street are our main avenues of uh for access to our neighborhoods, and to not have the bus on there uh just uh is is quite inconvenient and actually a burden for many of the people who live in that area.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker on the list is Sue Mercer.

Good evening, council.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak to you about five different things.

Parking, potholes, traffic lights, mental health, permits for construction, uh, and uh permits for parking lots so that they don't have um holes where people like myself can fall in.

And the example of that would be at LA Fitness, where Walmart used to be, or where um uh Kmart used to be.

They have these areas where they've got uh landscaping and they've got curbs around them, and you can trip over that and fall into so I would like permits for parking lots to be flat so that elderly people won't fall into holes.

Uh also I just remembered that uh occasionally I see where our watering of the foliage we have, like on 148, uh the water is being wasted.

And I never remember, I mean, I think about it as I'm driving by, and then I forget to call and tell whoever is in charge of the watering to make sure that that water faucet's working properly.

We do need to conserve water, right?

We're still in a drought.

Um so I've been paying taxes for over 56 years now.

And I love bike lanes, but bike lanes should not eliminate parking.

And the area I'm speaking about is between Southeast 16th and Southeast 20th on 156th.

I think that could be uh solved by making the bike lane smaller so that there is parking, because that parking needs to be there for the garden, which is right across the street on the corner of Southeast 16th and 156th.

Um I spoke to um the person who does the resurfacing, but I didn't speak to the pothole people this morning.

And um I will try to go out and use a fluorescent thing and outline the potholes on Southeast 16 so they can get filled before they resurface in case it doesn't get done, and Southeast 16th isn't anywhere near as important as Southeast 22nd.

I think my time's up.

I'll try to write some stuff out and email it to you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The next speaker is Heidi Dean, who's joining us on late.

Miss Dean, can you hear me?

I can.

Your time begins now.

Thank you.

Good evening.

The term gaslighting isn't a formal diagnosis with the within the DSM five.

Um, but rather it's describes a specific type of manipulative psychological abuse that causes a person to doubt their own reality perception and sanity.

Um it involves actions like outright lying, denying events that have occurred, trivializing a person's feelings, and making them question their own memory and sanity, with the goal of controlling and altering the victim's thoughts, actions, and self-perception.

You might be wondering why am I giving you a primer on gaslighting?

And that's because I'm tired of being on the receiving end of this type of behavior from our own city staff.

Many of us in neighborhood leadership are, and so are a number of people uh within the Bellevue uh business community with whom I've spoken, people who might actually surprise you.

The gaslighting behavior needs to stop, and the only people who can stop it are you, the members of the Bellevue City Council.

Last night I attended the HOMA virtual info session.

Uh and when the QA session began, I was subjected to gaslighting.

So were other neighborhood leaders and members of the Bellevue downtown commercial property owners uh community.

I was literally told that things I had witnessed previously with my own eyes and ears had not happened.

And the same uh the uh the staff has done this to numerous people from my community club board when they've asked the same question because we all heard the same thing.

Um development services was tasked by the planning commission to do additional outreach between May and September because both the PLESH committee and the NHCC had expressed that engagement had been inadequate for HOMA, and not only did the staff not do that engagement last night they engaged in gaslighting behavior about that lack of effort during the meeting, and yet they told us that tomorrow night they'll go back to the planning commission and ask for a date to be set for the HOMA public hearing.

Wow.

So I have brought this repeatedly to the attention.

I I've sent information to Miss Carlson.

I spoke to her predecessor, Brad Miyaki.

I have tried reaching out to the department heads about this.

One department head acknowledged the problematic behaviors of an individual and then turned around and told me to stop attacking their employees.

So if those people aren't going to address this issue, it becomes your responsibility to do that.

You represent the residents and the small businesses and the business community of Bellevue.

Are you okay with gaslighting?

Are you okay with your residents and your business community being treated so disrespectfully?

Because Bellevue has become a case of the tail, the staff wagging the dog, and that is you and the boards and commissions.

And I have to ask what you're going to do about it, because we also saw this with the new court.

Thank you.

Uh the next speaker on our list is Alex Zimmerman.

Thank you.

Yeah, my name is Alex Zimmerman, and I want to speak about agenda today about very strange, unique trespass rules.

What do you make?

25, 559.

This rule is so unique because I have 6,000 trespasses.

Yeah.

5,000 I speak, and five times you prosecute me, yeah, baby for 30 years.

This rule is very unique because it's trespassed not only for six months.

This trespass from council.

This trespass goes from commission.

I never seen like this before.

So you open a new page in Nazi Gestapa, fascist room.

You know what is mean?

What is we right now absolutely identical to Nazi, German Nazi, you know what is meant?

Input commission in this place.

So right now I will use play history.

Why this whole rules?

What does you have?

Only for one man, Alex Zimmerman, and I'm sorry, I'm a Jew.

Yeah, it's happened.

Yeah.

So in 2012, you make rules, what is exactly for Alex Zimmerman.

This all in in your uh video.

Yeah, you move to three minutes to 30 minute.

Yeah, speak only for 10 people.

I bring all seven councils in court, one by one.

All judges dismiss this.

Yeah.

Three branches of government like Nazi have nothing unusual.

Two years ago, you bring another rules for commission, you know what is meant.

So only touch Alex Zimmerman too.

It's nothing unique, you know what is mean.

I'm a Jew.

Yeah, people kill us for 3,000 years.

For a one one kill us, nothing.

Um forgot, yeah.

Inquisitive kill us, nothing happened.

Gitler kill us, nothing happened.

Muslim one kill us, nothing happened.

Ah, Jewish Jew, you know what is meaning, will be forever.

So right now, policy, what is we have right now, you will approve this policy so unique.

And I bring you again in court, one by one after election.

Yeah, absolutely.

So situation very simple.

When you stop and acting like a Nazi, just stop a pig.

It's a shame for you doing this.

You know what is mean?

You're a mafia, democratic mafia who exists for 30 years.

No one European fascism, no one South American fascism exists for more than 30 years.

You keep this chair, you keep this chair, and one keeps this chair for another 30 year.

So right now I speak to everybody who not freaking slave or happy cow.

You know what is mean.

We need stopping fascism and say fascism come from here.

So right now, my opinion straight.

Viva Trump, viva new American revolution, and stand up.

Stand up, everybody who have right, be American in fighting for America.

Stand up, America, for freedom.

Thank you very much.

That is the end of our pre-registered speaker list.

So I would ask at this point if there's anyone else joining us this evening in council chambers who would like to make a comment to the council or anyone online.

Please raise your hand.

I do see a hand online, and that's Joe Kunstler.

Mr.

Kunzler, can you hear me?

Yes, can you hear me?

We can.

Your time begins now.

Thank you, Manuel Cork.

I want to thank you and the council for your public service.

I want to begin as a friend of a Jewish American politician in the strongest possible terms, condemn the the references to Nazis.

Um none of you are um that thing.

None of you are.

Um, I read up on World War II, and I am very supportive of Israel's actions to avenge October 7.

And I believe Mr.

Zimmerman does not speak for any Jew, certainly not the Jewish president of Redmond, who is my friend for life.

Uh moving, I do not in any way speak from her for or for her.

She can certainly grab a microphone.

Moving along, I I'm so happy and so relieved that the Bellevue City Council is working to be update its defense systems to include excluding Zimmerman from commissions as well as meetings.

Um, if I'm speaking, uh you know, it is important that uh the commissions are defended because I've seen Zimmerman ever since at least April or May, probably much longer before that, attack you through those venues, abuse those venues, campaign during those venues, and that there have been reports filed of the public disclosure commission.

Attack you through those venues, abuse those venues, campaign during those venues, and that there have been reports filed of the public disclosure commission.

Um just as so I hope you will update your policies.

I would hope that someone who continues to abuse your rules and abuse you would be excluded for a year at a time.

Um and again, finally, in conclusion, I want to start by saying I do not speak for or from anyone but for anyone but me.

I'm speaking extra poinously, but I only speak for me.

Number two, the president of Redmond is Jewish and fruit Zimmerman out for six months for campaigning and anti-Semitism.

Number three, I absolutely personally support your update.

I just hope it goes for a year.

Thank you for a public service.

I will try to watch the meeting on YouTube, but the feed keeps getting glitchy.

So thank you for all you do.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

I do not see any additional hands, so Mayor, I'll turn it back to you.

All right, thank you very much.

So next up, we have a council liaison recommendation for appointment to the Transportation Commission, and Councilmember Newenhouse, I'll hand it to you.

Thank you, Mayor.

It's my pleasure to nominate uh Anthony Welcher to Bellevue's uh Transportation Commission.

Anthony brings a rare blend of global perspectives and local commitment shaped by decades of public service from the U.S.

State Department to the Millennium Millennium Challenge Corporation, his experience in intergovernmental affairs, infrastructure development, and community engagement has consistently centered on transparency, equity, collaboration, and results.

He's a proud Bellevue native.

Anthony has long championed inclusive growth and innovative transportation strategies.

His experience managing complex transportation and economic development initiatives across federal agencies make him uniquely qualified to contribute to Bellevue's future via the Transportation Commission.

So with that, I move to appoint Anthony Welcher to a full term on the Transportation Commission expiring on May 31st, 2029.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, great.

Congratulations to us and to Mr.

Welcher.

Okay, uh, do I have a motion to approve the consent calendar?

You will approve the consent calendar.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, we have some uh resolutions, three, in fact.

Um, they're more straightforward than they seem.

And I think most of us have had briefings on this, so I'm looking forward to the presentation.

But I'm sorry, city manager, please introduce us.

Thank you.

Um Mayor Robinson and Council members.

So um, as you heard in oral communications, this is a package of three um resolutions to make some um small adjustments to the boundary lines between Kirkland and the City of Bellevue near the South Kirkland Park and Ride and also the cross um Kirkland Trail Corridor.

Um we have had staff engagement and involvement in this for many years, and I want to thank the staff for both Kirkland and uh Bellevue staff for working through this.

Um, but we bring it to you today.

We bring these to you today um with recommendations to support and move these forward, and we are seeking um approval of the boundary line adjustments tonight.

And so we have with us from the city manager's office um Lacey Jane Wolf, who's our policy advisor to give you a great overview of the three resolutions, and then also Assistant City Attorney Brian Went, who's worked um on this on these proposals.

With that, I'll turn it over to Lacey Jane.

Thank you, and good evening.

Um, as City Manager Carlson said, tonight council will consider a package of three boundary line adjustments per state law.

Council must consider this package in three separate resolutions.

So I'll give one presentation that covers the entire package, and then I understand that council will vote on these three resolutions in order.

Tonight I'll start with a brief overview of the purpose and impact of the entire package, followed by a detailed review of each boundary line adjustment in turn.

Tonight council will consider approving three boundary line adjustments at the border with Kirkland at and near the South Kirkland Park and Ride.

The large circle in this map shows the first two impacted parcels and the small circle shows the third.

These adjustments will benefit the region because light rail transit-oriented development planning and regional trail planning can be developed in a more streamlined manner and make maintenance more efficient.

If all three adjustments are approved, both cities will also benefit from having clear linear city boundaries.

None of the adjustments would result in loss of population or tax revenue.

For this type of boundary line adjustment, any decision by the Bellevue City Council is exempt under the State Environmental Protection Act and does not require subsequent approval by the King County Boundary Review Board.

Kirkland, as you heard earlier tonight, previously approved the boundary line adjustments on July 15th.

However, said adjustments will not take effect unless and until this council approves the same and staff from both cities file required documentation with the state.

So for each of these three parcels, I'll describe the parcel and then explain why the boundary line adjustment is important.

Let's start with the first adjustment recommended by staff, the King County parcel where the South Kirkland Park and Ride is located.

This parcel is owned by King County, and the portion of the parcel shown here in red is currently in Bellevue.

The remaining portion of the parcel is in Kirkland.

If approved by Bellevue City Council, resolution 10534 would adjust the boundary so that the red portion is in the city of Kirkland.

The adjustment is expressly authorized by RCW 3513340 upon receipt of a petition signed by the property owner and approved by the legislative body.

King County, the owner of the parcel, submitted a signed petition on June 27, 2025, and that's included in your packet.

This boundary line adjustment is requested by both King County as a property owner and the City of Kirkland as the receiving jurisdiction.

Right now, if Metro came in for a permit for the South Kirkland Park and Ride, they'd have to go through both Bellevue and Kirkland's permitting processes.

It's not very streamlined because we have different review approaches and different codes that apply.

Streamlining this process is particularly important to the region because Sound Transit presently plans to use this King County parcel for a light rail station that will be built as part of the South Kirkland to Issaqua Light Rail Project, which is currently in the planning phase.

Bellevue will continue to have an interest in the facilities, amenities, and connections that may be developed at or near the South Kirkland Park and Ride.

So Bellevue and Kirkland staff have negotiated an agreement that will allow Bellevue to have a meaningful and substantial role in all permitting decisions related to the property.

As you can see here, Sound Transit plans to construct two new stations in Bellevue as part of this project at Richards Road and at Eastgate.

This action is focused on the station planning to be built in South Kirkland on at the parcel issue.

At this time, Sound Transit's project has a delivery target of 2041 to 2044.

Let's move on to the second boundary line adjustment recommended by staff, the Cross Kirkland Corridor parcel.

The Cross Kirkland Port Corridor is a 5.75 mile segment of the East Rail, and as you know, Bellevue City Council has long been a proponent of developing the East Rail.

A small portion of the Cross Kirkland Corridor is currently located in Bellevue, shown shown here in red.

The property is owned by the City of Kirkland.

If approved by Bellevue City Council, resolution 10535 would adjust the city's boundary so that the entire Cross Kirkland Corridor is in Kirkland.

The boundary line adjustment is expressly authorized by RCW 3513340 upon receipt of a petition signed by the property owner and approved by the legislative body.

Kirkland, the owner of the parcel, submitted a signed petition on July 7th, 2025, and that is in your packet.

This boundary line adjustment is requested by the City of Kirkland as property owner and receiving jurisdiction.

Kirkland plans future improvements, such as paving and other amenities that will make the trail more enjoyable for pedestrians and cyclists as funding becomes available.

As a reminder, the interagency agreement that I previously described allows Bellevue to have a meaningful and substantial role in all permitting decisions related to this property that are connected to development of the South Kirkland Park and Ride.

However, the the agreement is not intended to involve Bellevue in the decisions concerning more day-to-day use or operation of the Cross Kirkland Corridor that are separate from any South Kirkland Park and Ride development, such as paving the trail.

Let's move on to the third and final boundary line adjustment recommended by staff, the intersection parcel.

A portion of the intersection of Northeast 38th Place and 108th Avenue North Northeast, shown here in red, is currently located in the City of Kirkland.

If approved by Bellevue City Council, resolution 10536 would adjust the city's boundary line so that it runs edge to edge of Northeast 38th place just before the crosswalk.

This boundary line adjustment is expressly authorized by RCW 3513310 upon execution of an agreement between the cities approving the boundary line adjustment.

Bellevue is requesting this final adjustment as the receiving jurisdiction.

Bellevue currently owns and maintains transportation infrastructure at this intersection, which is presently located in Kirkland.

As a result, Bellevue must coordinate with the city of Kirkland before performing any work in Kirkland's right-of-way.

The proposed boundary line adjustment will enable Bellevue to perform this work more efficiently, and it will eliminate a situation where the municipal boundary proceeds into the middle of 108th Avenue Northeast.

So if all three resolutions are approved tonight, the portion shown here in Teal will become part of the city of Kirkland, and the portion shown in yellow will become part of the city of Bellevue.

Kirkland has approved these uh boundary line adjustments already.

And as you can see here, a clear and logical boundary between the two cities is retained, running along 108th Avenue Northeast and the cross Kirkland corridor.

Moreover, the proposed annexations are consistent with local and regional planning goals.

So to in summary, we'll bring you back to the recommended actions tonight, which are to move to adopt each of these resolutions in turn.

Thank you so much.

Great.

Thank you so much.

So I'll open it up for questions or comments.

I'm going to start with Deputy Mayor Mal Kutian.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Staff.

I do not have any questions, and I'm aligned with the suggestions.

Okay, Councilmember Bagara.

Just a very quick clarification.

Can you explain what you mean by meaningful and substantial review by the City of Bellevue?

Absolutely.

Um Brian, would you like to answer that question?

Or I have some notes on that.

I'll take a signature uh council member.

So what we mean by a meaningful and substantial participation is pursuant to the interagency agreement that's uh included in your materials.

Bellevue would have a voting member on any committee or planning group that Kirkland may create in the future.

Now that's with the exception that it would not be a member voting member on their planning commissions or their more council established boards.

But any future committee that's assigned to study this matter, Bellevue would be invited to participate and would be able to vote on guidelines, recommendations, and you know, plans for futures uses on the site.

What's more, Kirkland would be providing um periodic updates to provide status reports as to where ST3 is for by way of example only partnerships, private and public that they might have to support the development of the parcel.

Last, um Kirkland is committed to providing a minimum of 90-day notice before any type of permitting decisions are made, which would give Bellevue staff the opportunity to look at its development regs and propose recommendations consistent therewith.

Now that recognizes that Kirkland will remain the permitting uh agency and have the ultimate you know decision.

They will not be approving recommendations that are inconsistent with Kirkland's um applicable development regs, and that would otherwise defeat the project.

But it is an opportunity for Bellevue to weigh in on matters such as transportation impacts, um, landscaping and design needs so that um Bellevue uh's voice is still heard, recognizing that this is a development proposed at the boundary.

Okay, thank you.

And short follow-up.

Um does the reverse and put a little triangular piece for our intersection for our transportation improvements.

Is that additional process for that as well if we make improvements to that intersection?

That's a good question.

Um the answer is no, council member.

That is separate from the agreement and it falls outside of the interagency um agreement that is to be executed as part of this recommendation.

Um the entire intersection would be located in the city of Bellevue that would allow us to have access to our transportation infrastructure, and we would be able to proceed and maintain such um consistent with our own policies and procedures.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Hamilton.

Nothing for me, Mayor.

Thank you.

Councilmember Sumadwea.

Nothing for me either.

Okay, Councilmember Newenhouse.

Ready to move forward.

All right, Councilmember Lee.

Uh my question is the boundary, the new boundary when it's now shifted to entirely Kirkland.

Is any residential located there?

Any people living that area that within the boundary that's shifted to Redman.

And if it is, how does it affect those people living there regarding all other matters?

Such as are they considered as a Bellevue resident or Kirkland resident.

So uh council member, there is no uh exchange of population.

These are sites where there are no residents and no one living.

The parking the parking ride is a commercial parking lot, the cross Kirkland corridor trail is in uh interim trail, and then the the last portion, the intersection parcel that is right of way.

So no uh change in terms of population, no change in tax revenue basis to either jurisdiction.

Good.

That means the uh area involves strictly metro operations.

So regardless of where it is.

That's Metro's responsibility.

Yes, okay, thank you.

Okay, um nothing from me.

Uh is there a motion?

Yes, Mayor, I would adopt resolution 10534, adjusting the boundary line between the city of Bellevue and the city of Kirkland, pursuant to RCW 35.13.340, and a petition filed by King County so the entirety of the South Kirkland Park and Ride may be located within the municipal boundaries of the city of Kirkland.

Okay.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, great.

Let's move on to the second one.

Okay.

I move to adopt resolution.

Well, hold on.

Um, can we just do a boom boom boom like that?

Yes.

Or if you're sorry, go ahead.

No worries.

I would adopt resolution one zero five three five, adjusting the boundary line between the city of Bellevue and the city of Kirkland, pursuant pursuant to RCW 35.13.340 and a petition filed by the city of Kirkland.

So the entirety of the Cross Kirkland corridor may be located within the municipal boundaries of the city of Kirkland.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, and then the last one.

Thank you.

I move to adopt resolution 10536 authorizing the city manager or her designee to execute a boundary line agreement between the city of Bellevue and the City of Kirkland pursuant to RCW 35.13.310 to adjust the common boundary line between Bellevue and Kirkland within the public right of way and the intersection of Northeast 38th place and 108th Avenue Northeast.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

We're gonna take a quick break, come back at 10 after resume.

So uh we have our two study session items tonight.

City manager, would you like to introduce them, please?

Thank you, Mayor, and council members.

I would like to invite some of our community development staff to the table.

Uh welcome Chief Economic Development Director Jesse Canado, Corbin Hart, our business development manager in Ellie Ha, our economic development specialist.

They're here tonight to give council and the community a progress report on the Bellevue's uh 2025 economic development plan.

This uh tonight they will include some findings from the data analysis uh work that they have been undertaking this year, and that it will be informative for helping to craft ultimately some actions.

And they also will report on the community engagement activities.

This is an information item, and uh we'll hand it over to Jesse to provide the introduction.

Thank you, City Manager Carlson.

Good evening.

Uh Mayor and Council members, staff stakeholders and our consultants have been hard at work over the last several months to analyze all of the possibilities for the future of economic development in Bellevue.

As the city manager mentioned tonight is information only.

We there is a lot of information to digest as we think about the future strategy.

So we really want to be intentional with introducing the results of the data, the feedback from our stakeholders, and we welcome your feedback at the end of the presentation so we can help take that in and craft some draft strategies to bring back to the council on October 7.

Uh tonight we'll do a little bit of a background of where we've been.

The staff will introduce the initial data report and feedback from the consultants.

We'll introduce the draft framework around which we plan to build the updated plan, and then we will uh speak to the touch points that we have with the council coming up.

Council gave us direction to initiate the update to the plan in December.

Uh and since then we've worked to integrate nearly 2,000 data points uh with our consultants into the opportunities uh that we're gonna be start talking about tonight.

We have three more touch points planned with the council by December, and we each meeting we will narrow down a little bit to help us bring uh some bold and doable strategies to the council uh for adoption.

In December, the council approved the guiding principles that are on the screen.

They have helped frame the staff's work and the consultants' reviews over the last several months.

For example, shaping the focus groups that were convened, helping us identify the specific data that we wanted to really deep dive into.

Tonight is intentionally broad if we think about the guiding principles as kind of the orbit level of economic development plan.

Tonight we want to bring you into the atmosphere so we can start talking about the data and how that will affect our landing approach for the plan.

Again, the council's feedback tonight will shape our draft strategies that will come back in October.

And with that, I will hand it over to staff to start talking about the data.

All right.

Thank you, Jesse.

Our data analysis, we began by refreshing the list of peer cities we use as benchmarks.

By identifying our strengths as well as gaps between us and peer cities, we want to gain clearer insights so that we can develop more effective strategies.

As you can see on the map here, we have five peer cities across the nation.

And similar to Bellevue, they are largely major employment centers within larger metro areas.

And we did update two cities from the 2020 economic development plan.

Our data analysis, as Jesse mentioned, we touched many data points.

Tonight, we will just present some key metrics that we will continue to use in the updated economic development plan.

Starting with economic uh employment growth.

So in the graph on the left, uh it shows the historical employment growth trend.

As you can see, Bellevue has added many jobs over the past two decades.

I do want to point out though over the past two decades, the number of people who work and live in Bellevue remain largely flat, about 15,000 people.

So that indicates the increased interdependence between the city of Bellevue and the region, especially in regards to workforce and transportation.

Bellevue's comprehensive plan has a target of adding 70,000 jobs by 2044.

And the graph on the right shows the actual annual uh job growth rate as well as what is required in order to reach that target.

As we can see, we need to grow our employment faster than what we have in the past five years.

And uh in this case, uh index number of one indicating full independent full dependence on one or just a few industries.

So the lower the number, the better.

Um, Bellevue is more diversified than three of our peer cities, so our economy is more resilient.

For example, uh Cambridge has large education and life sciences sectors and making them more vulnerable during a time of federal spending cuts.

Small businesses are instrumental in economic growth, and they are important part of our economic development development plan.

And the COVID had a large impact on the number of active small businesses in Bellevue, but we recovered and we surpassed the pre-pandemic highs.

I also want to point out that despite the fluctuation you see here on the number, um small businesses in Bellevue consistently make up about 21% of total employment in Bellevue.

And this data, as well as the community engagement insights that Cobin will talk about later, will inform us about the strategy and actions we need to take to support small businesses in Bellevue.

Creative sector is another core focus, and that includes both the traditional arts communities like Dance Studios and Art Galleries, uh, as well as technology-driven creatives, uh, for example, video game developers and uh advertising firms.

Uh we Bellevue has a very large creative sector.

Uh however, we do recognize that some of our peers have a more even split uh between traditional versus uh digital creative sector.

So this data inform us we need to uh provide more support to our traditional arts community.

At the same time, we do recognize that digital sector, digital creative sector, they play an important role in terms of helping us reach, helping us reach that the job growth goal I mentioned earlier.

Office vacancy is a standard data point we reference.

And here we are looking at historical vacancy level paired with prediction into 2029.

Downtown Belleview, the blue line is predicted to return to about 10% vacancy level, which is considered healthy, leaving some room for new businesses to move in and existing businesses to expand.

However, on the other hand, Eastgate and Factoria, the green line, is projected to remain at a very high vacancy level of about 42%.

And we do recognize this unique situation early on in the plan update process and incorporated it into our approach, including a real state analysis as well as focused groups in these two uh kind neighborhoods.

So and our findings provided a valuable reference for the neighborhood area planning project uh that was just launched last week in these two neighborhoods.

Uh with that that is that these are the quantitative data we want to highlight tonight, and I will turn it over to Cobin to discuss about the community engagement.

Thanks, Ellie.

So we took a really two-pronged approach to community engagement for the plan update.

Uh we wanted to be uh conscious of the fact that we have four to five years under the existing plan where we've been getting a lot of information.

This includes through our small business walks, our business interviews and our business retention and expansion program, our business surveys that we now have three of under our uh the existing plan, and also other uh engagement like permitting assistance and all the work our arts program does to engage with our creative sector.

So we integrated uh all of that as sort of the foundation to our community engagement program, and we wanted to really focus on areas identified by council in those guiding principles we referenced earlier, and any gaps or major uh issues we saw coming down the pipe.

Uh we did that via a combination of focus groups and interviews.

So, for reference, our focus groups included, for instance, a specific one on eScape that Ellie referenced earlier to uh get some feedback from, for example, property owners, brokers, business owners about that area.

But then that also included other sectors like our tourism sector, our creative economy, our small businesses, and a number of others uh that we helped focus groups on.

We also held a number of one-on-one interviews.

This is where a lot of our major employers got an opportunity to provide feedback, but also uh our small businesses, community-based organizations, and council were also included in that interview process as well.

Um that's how who we heard from, and this is what we heard.

Um a lot of these strengths or stakeholder insights won't come out of left field, uh, but they will be um good as we continue to update our plan.

So on the strengths side, high quality of life.

Uh, this encompasses everything from our parks to our school district to our transportation infrastructure, um, a lot of those core elements.

Uh I will say personally, having seen a lot of economic development plans everywhere everywhere will claim they have a high quality of life.

Bellevue blows them all out of the water, so it's a really good strength to hang our hat on.

Um growth potential is another one that was really highlighted a lot in our location and accessibility, being in the center of a major metro region was also a very good strength.

On the flip side, the challenges, uh high cost living and doing business.

This is everything from uh our housing costs for employees, our commercial uh rental costs, and then also things like child care for attracting employees as well.

The legislative and regulatory environment came up a decent amount in community engagement as well.

And this is more in reference to the state and federal levels versus the local level.

Navigating permitting, this is something we hear frequently, but one specific insight that came up a decent amount more was the financial cost of time delays.

For instance, if it takes two weeks longer for small business to get a permit from us, that's two weeks are not generating revenue, for example.

On the opportunities front, uh we got a lot of good information uh and excitement about how we're positioned well for new sectors.

These include life sciences, artificial intelligence, and clean tech.

Uh, artificial intelligence is one.

Uh, artificial intelligence is one uh Ellie and I actually spoke with an AI company today who's looking for more space in downtown.

So that's a really uh good growth sector potentially for us.

Investment in arts and culture, arts and cultural initiatives, and this is really not just the direct impact that has on our creative economy, but the ancillary impacts as well, uh, whether that's overall community vibrancy, the tourism industry, so on and so forth.

And then the ability to leverage existing public space, new transit connectivity, and the potential of creating new spaces.

Uh the picture on the right is a great example of those last two points.

The Bell Red Arts District uh night market that was recently held.

Um great example of some of those opportunities.

Now we'll shift gears a little bit and talk about the framework for the plan update.

So for reference, the this graphic shows sort of the plans we're working with here.

The blue boxes at the top represent uh prior adopted council policy and the strategic target areas and the comprehensive plan.

And so we're pulling elements, relevant elements uh down into the economic development plan.

So the vision and goal from the economic development element of the comprehensive plan, we're proposing pulling in and you utilizing as a vision and goal for the economic development functional plan as well that we're updating currently, and then also pulling out the vibrant economy section from the SCA objectives to nest our direct strategies that we'll be bringing to you in the future that are specific to how we're uh implementing those different objectives.

And then we will also have an implementation plan uh to get to the how of how we're implementing those direct strategies as well.

As a refresher for the economic development element of the comprehensive plan, this is our vision and goal.

Uh, not only is this a recently adopted vision and goal, but it also covers a lot of the elements we heard from uh not only council but also uh the community, residents, business center, and so on and so forth, uh, in terms of the elements of being a global business hub, uh, the focus on innovation, supporting a strong local economy with our small businesses, and an overall high quality of life.

And as a refresher on the strategic target area objectives that we will be nesting those direct strategies under, we have those six listed up here.

Uh, these aren't the full objectives.

We have some handouts in front of you that give you the full text of all of those.

But broadly, those are summarized by growing and diversifying our economy, supporting our large and small businesses, spurring investment, supporting our workforce, and providing inclusive access to opportunity as well as overall cultural vibrancy.

So, in terms of looking ahead, like Jesse mentioned, we'll be uh coming back with some of those direct strategies on October 7th, and then we'll be back again with that implementation plan that I mentioned earlier.

And that's in addition to any uh feedback integrating any feedback we receive on the direct strategies from council as well, um, with a targeted adoption in early December of the plan.

And with that, we'll open it up to questions.

Great, great presentation.

Thank you.

Council Member Lee, would you like to kick us off?

Thank you.

Uh well, thanks for the report.

Uh, really uh appreciate you bringing this time.

Uh, as you all know, uh economic development to me is number one.

But without a healthy economy, uh, if we don't have revenue coming in, uh thing works.

So, as you notice, I always have since the first day I came to uh council member.

The priority we list a console objective.

Number one is always economic development.

So I keep that in mind.

Uh in order to keep it number one, we have to come up with support, making sure we pay attention, making sure we provide resources, making sure that we uh do things we we can uh to keep economic development ahead of other things.

The second point is economic development actually drives everything else.

And everything else drives economic development.

So it's very, very closely connected.

So sometimes very challenging.

But that means economic development needs to have a very focused uh action plan, and so that we can do things to support all the other things because the other infrastructures are necessary to have a successful economy.

Same time, economic development has to have a very clear vision and clear action in order to satisfy the other needs and objectives like the housing, transportation, and all that stuff.

So I really appreciate this is a good thing to do.

So I don't want to talk too much.

So I'm going to get to some questions.

We heard that 21% of value of small business.

Small business, obviously, it's very important at all levels, national level as well.

You know, when I was the SBA region administrator, we talk about 90% of the business in this country is driven by small businesses.

So I want to make sure that uh what specific things are we doing with what small business sector and how are we helping them and how are we communicating with them?

Because we know small businesses spread it out with the new economy.

We have now uh recovery from COVID, which you guys have done a great job.

Uh how are we making sure that they're growing and they're gonna grow even more?

And so that's one question.

Uh you want to answer now?

Okay, maybe just quickly.

I can answer that second.

So uh thank you for pointing out the importance of of small businesses.

So we do have a variety of current programs, and as Corbin mentioned, our small business walks, our business engagement and retention meetings.

And in October, we will bring back some of those draft strategies that are more specific to how we uh can engage more with our small businesses, perhaps some of the additional tools or incentives that might be included, uh the Wilburton land use incentive or the affordable commercial space incentive is a great example of some things that we might be able to do at a citywide scale in the future.

So we will be back with those in October.

Do you can you describe or see something that's uh of small businesses?

What what uh uh demographic consists of small businesses a lot, you know.

So what is there any particular one that you can focus and concentrate on?

And because we see a lot of uh uh immigrants coming to this country, and they all very want to be uh you know, uh set a uh life well, you know.

So they got into small businesses.

So do you can you say a few things about small business?

Corbin, could you immigrant businesses?

Could you share with the council how we define kind of the traditional small business and then the tech business kind of at least in the accelerator model?

Yeah, so we as you said as you alluded to, council member small business is a very broad term.

It's everything from your one-person consultancy who might be supporting some of our tech companies to uh restaurant down the street, and so we take very different approaches to support those different small businesses.

So, for instance, um on the immigrant-owned uh restaurant and crossroads, for example, that's a great example of uh group we might do some small business walks to provide technical assistance through the SBDC, um, provide SBA financing, that sort of thing too.

Whereas on maybe the more consultancy or venture scale side that we have a lot of here in Bellevue, um, we have programs like Startup 425 that provide uh the entrepreneurial education and connections more in the venture scale side as well.

Do you have any numbers?

Maybe not now, if you don't have it, but I would like to see as a council, what are the numbers we're talking about, and what are the things that we have work with them, and what are maybe some of the uh results we're seeing, we're getting so that we know what to move forward.

That'd be good.

Okay, thanks.

Um another question.

Uh you mentioned office vacancy.

Are we doing anything about office vacancy?

That's very concerning, right?

Yeah, we know that people are being laid off, uh, people are not going back to office to work.

Many office are not empty, higher than normal.

I don't know what's the vacancy now, 30%, 24%.

The citywide vacancy, Corbin's about 20, 25?

25, yeah.

Is there anything we can do to help?

Yes.

So we are doing several things to help with uh the office market recovery, uh, including Corbin can go into a little bit more detail on some of the work we're doing with Greater Seattle partners uh and some of the brokers in that space and some of the work that we've done in terms of uh additional lead generation consultants.

So those efforts over the last couple of years have helped bring in and continue to maintain a steady smaller uh pipeline of companies.

So we're seeing continuing demand for office space in Bellevue, just smaller footprints that they're taking.

Uh for example, across the street at City Center Plaza, where uh where Microsoft used to have that entire building, they will now be six or seven tenants across the whole building.

Uh so that pipeline is steady, and we have about probably about four to five years of availability at the current rate.

Corbin, could you speak to the work with GSP and our lead generation consultants?

Yeah, so like Jetsy alluded to, we we work regionally with uh a lot of other uh groups, such as as greater Seattle Partners to get that sense of scale to attract tenants both internationally and domestically within to the within the market.

And so we we've seen again, like Jesse said, still a lot of interest um in especially downtown, um, which is um downtown's a lot more uh of a relevant market for where a lot of those companies want to be.

Um when we talk about Eastgate, it's a little bit of a different conversation in terms of the stock being very different.

A lot of that's 1980s older buildings that are less appealing to the type of firms that are in the market right now.

So that's more of a structural issue versus an attraction issue that we're looking to update in the planned strategies and reflect that difference.

Yeah, good.

Lastly, we're working with other partners helping us, right?

In filling up vacancies and what do we have any numbers to show how far how I mean how much have we made progress?

Well, are we moving to the right direction?

Any numbers showing that maybe in the last year, two or six months, I'll be seeing some you know progress.

Corbin, what can you say about the trend in office uh absorption?

Yeah, so in terms of overall ops office absorption, we've seen um positive absorption, which means uh drawdown in the amount of vacant space in the downtown area.

Uh it's obviously been the other side, the flip side of that uh outside of downtown, except for the spring district, I'll say.

And then in terms of the work we do specifically in the office, we do track uh square footage of businesses we're working with who eventually end up leasing.

Great example of that is uh, and this is actually another example.

Um, a lot of our expansion actually doesn't come from new businesses being attracted first time into the market, comes from employers who are already here.

Great example is Snowflake, who went from downtown two floors in downtown to about 300,000 square feet in the spring district.

Uh so I don't have that exact number for all those firms we've worked with in front of me right now, but we can get that to you as well.

Okay.

I'll stop with for the for now.

Thank you.

You've got a chance, we'll hopefully um have some additional time for additional questions.

All right, and somebody else may ask the same question to spell.

Okay, council member New Enhause.

Oh, thank you so much for the update.

And just to understand uh again on October, what's gonna come back in October, and then we're going to do a final um uh vote on this in December, right?

Is that correct?

That's correct.

Okay, but what's gonna come before us in October?

So in October, it will be the draft strategies.

So these will still be fairly high level and give general direction.

Okay.

Uh and then in November, we'll come back with a draft implementation plan that would be.

Okay, so the tactics and strategies that we plan to implement in order to shore up some areas of the plan that we are concerned about or of the economic department.

Okay.

Okay.

Um, you know, Brad Smith said about three months ago, uh, we better wake up.

And I still feel we're in that position right now.

Um but um, and while your presentation has a lot of great detail, um, I don't think it sends out the red flags that I think we should be talking about right now.

Um very seriously.

Um there are I have grave concerns about, I mean, listen, some things are out of our um out of our control uh in terms of what happens at the legislature.

And and when I see that graph there about our tax competitiveness, we're almost last in the country.

And I know we don't have much control over that, although one of the most proudest moments as a council member standing with this council pushing back against other taxes that would have made it even worse.

Thankfully, um, because of our efforts and other uh efforts of other cities, it did not get that bad, but it is still bad.

And there are companies leaving right now because of the increase of BO taxes, uh, the additional uh retail uh uh uh taxes, et cetera.

Um this is not a good time.

And when you look at the number of folks that are um, this is just another data point I looked at today, that are leaving Washington State.

Um folks um that are you know 200 grand or more that are a lot of times creating jobs, starting companies, entrepreneurs.

We're in the last bottom 10 outflow.

This is not good.

So this is something I'm um uh again very concerned about, and I know that um there's a lot of positive stuff in here too.

Uh and and don't get me wrong.

Um, but I think when we're talking about, and Council Merley mentioned it, especially about small businesses.

I feel like we have a little bit more uh potentially uh the things that we can do.

Um, like for example, in and in the presentation, I um because when I was reading the report, the data analysis, it made it really clear that there are some um some real real weaknesses that I think we need to address right away.

And one of them is permitting.

And we have talked about permitting time and time again, so in in different perspectives, be it housing or or what have you, but we are making it way too difficult for small businesses in our city.

I I hear it all the time.

I know that we are constantly uh providing different types of resources, um language, uh uh culturally, uh culturally uh significant or uh important uh barriers that might exist at times that we try and walk them through.

But when I look at the report and said the perception of per it, it's no longer a perception of permitting issues, it is permitting issues, and we really need to address this quickly, especially again as council member Lee said a lot of uh immigrants coming to this country or coming to Bellevue that want to start up that business, that want to start up that restaurant or what have you, and it's taking too long and it's too expensive, and then they go somewhere else, or the business fails, and there are plenty of of examples of that.

So I I want to raise that red flag uh right now about permitting, about small businesses.

I think it's it's critically important that we get really uh hyper focused on that issue really quickly, given it's 21%, um, and given also you know the importance to our overall economy, you know, that sales tax coming back to us, which is a a big uh uh a big number.

And it also helps with our diversity of our economy, right?

Um uh yes, uh we are blessed to have such a strong tech sector in this city, and thank goodness we did during COVID.

Uh we were truly blessed.

But we want that that diversity, that uh that great balance of different of different industries.

Um so that's that's that's really uh important to me.

Um stakeholders, question for you.

Um, who are the stakeholders uh that we did it looks like over 400 that you sp that were part of this engagement process?

Can you give me a sense of who these stakeholders?

I didn't see a list anywhere of who the stakeholders were, so I'm not sure if that's going to be revealed at some point, but I'm just curious what sector they were from.

I think the context is important here.

What sector from where the what part of the city?

Um that that's important information.

Can you speak to that for a second?

Absolutely, council member.

And so the the consultants were given some very specific direction to engage a broad swath of of stakeholders that reflected the guiding principles.

So, Corbin, could you share a little bit about some of the examples of who we're engaged and remind us of the uh focus groups?

Yeah, so we um we two things on the focus groups were slightly different than the interviews.

We have the full list for the for the interviews though, there, and we were very intentional to be broad in that.

So we had groups like property owners, uh, Scanska, uh, Alexandria real estate were some good examples of uh groups in there, some of our major employers were in there as well.

But then also um we had a very big focus on trying to touch as many small businesses as we could.

And so we did that also through a lot of the focus groups.

We have the the list of invitees, one of the things that we intentionally structured with the focus groups around was uh not having city staff in the room so they could give raw unvarnished feedback, and we we got that across a lot of different areas, so we can get you the full list for all of those as well.

Um it was everything from we were intentional with um geographic diversity too.

Um a lot of times we hear from people downtown very frequently, so we were intentional about getting people from our neighborhood shopping centers from Bell Red, Crossroads, Factoria, Eastgate, some of our major areas as well.

Um then also uh in terms of dem demographics as well with community-based organizations who might be uh providing business services themselves to their respective communities.

So we had a intentionally broad strategy there.

That sounds great, and it was intentional, but what was the actual result?

Like how like a percentage-wise, how many small businesses did we talk to actually talk to?

How many restaurants did we actually talk to?

How many small cafes did we actually talk to?

And it sounds like we were asking them to either get online or go to a destination of some sort.

And I tell you, a lot of these small business owners and restaurant owners, they can't afford to do that.

That will take someone from this consulting group or someone from staff going to the location, sitting with them and asking those questions.

That's the only way we're going to get that important and realistic data that I think we need.

Sorry.

Yeah.

And on that, Councilmember, we do a regular set of small business walks across the city.

So North Town, Lake Hills, we have staff that go out on a regular basis.

So when we gave that 1,900 number of community in input elements, that is inclusive of our small business walks, the business survey that we completed this year.

So a lot of touch points with opportunities for the small businesses to give feedback for us to go to the small businesses.

We include our work with the BDA, with the chamber where we are touching the small businesses on a regular basis.

But Corbin, can you speak a little bit more?

All right, last question before I yield my time.

What other factors are there beyond the fact that those business or that office space was built in 1980?

What other factors are contributing to that area's very um uh high uh occupancy or sorry, vacancy rate right now.

Um, and what else did you hear specifically about Factoria?

So a lot of the, and this is as Corbin mentioned, this has been a consistent trend over the years, uh, over the many years.

Eastgate, in addition to the the older office stock, it's a low amenitization.

So there's not great um small businesses that are within walking distance of the office space, low public space opportunities, congestion in the area.

It's a variety of things that make that particular corridor along I-90 with a real focus on Eastgate.

So I do think there is a difference between Eastgate and the Factoria Boulevard neighborhood that make that area less attractive for the types of companies and the types of employees that come to Bellevue when we engage with uh our companies that are coming into the city, they ask about access to the two-line, they ask about access to opportunities for their employees to do uh engagement with community events, with community organizations, uh, to be able to host a happy hour for their employees at a local small business.

It's a variety of things that Eastgate was not configured for based on the period in which it was developed.

Corbin, what would you say about Factoria?

Yeah, Factoria is um again a little bit of a different uh group from from Eastgate.

A lot of it is always the transportation infrastructure uh down there is one frequent element.

Uh walkability is something we hear about a lot.

Um community safety does come up as well as an element we hear about that we got out of some of those focus groups.

Thank you.

Okay, council member Hamilton.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh thanks for sharing your progress report with us.

Appreciate it.

I think this is exciting and critical work for the city.

Uh we started off the process with the right guiding principles, and you've done a great job adhering to them to move the process forward.

Um, also the strategic framework, I think is excellent.

Um, well done on that, and really making sure it's aligned with the comp planning council's uh strategic target areas, I think is really great.

So thank you.

Um glad to see too that we're looking carefully at our creative economy and appreciate the focus on artists that will be moving into Bell Red and the others that are already here in Bellevue, and look forward to seeing you back here in October for another progress report.

Got a few questions for you.

Um, first of all, two as far as small business support, I'm especially interested in displacement of small businesses and in areas uh like Bell Red and Newport and some of the other HOMA areas.

And I wonder is uh the updated plan going to include strategies on supporting businesses that are likely to be displaced during the that process of redevelopment.

Absolutely, council member.

The strategies, the draft strategies that you'll see in October will include some additional anti-displacement or uh kind of business relocation type of strategies that we can we can work on with the small businesses.

There are some additional things that we already do uh to track potential displacement of businesses.

So, Corbin, could you speak a little bit about how your team tracks the development pipeline and flags any businesses that might get impacted?

Yeah, so displacement is something we we hear consistently and hear loud and clear.

So we're not waiting for the plan update to be in place to start doing things.

So one thing we do on our team is we track the development pipeline for when we see a development's about to a redevelopment's about to occur that might impact commercial businesses.

Um and we proactively do small business walks to the those areas and proactively say, hey, we're here to help you potentially find a new location within the city.

Um and we've seen within some developments some success out of that model, although it has limited impacts, there still has to be a space that's relevant for the business to move into within the city, both from a typology and affordability perspective.

Um so there's more we can do, although there are programmatic elements we do already on that front.

Okay.

Um also, too, in the agenda memo, and I want to be sure I've got this right, but um you you talk about uh Bellevue's growth industries are ones that are projected to grow in employment nationwide in the coming years.

And as I read it, that's considered a challenge.

And did I read that right?

And if so, why is it a challenge?

I don't think we meant it to be framed as a challenge, Councilmember.

Uh the we have benefited tremendously from having some of those growth areas in the city.

Uh and while uh we do have some additional uh challenges at the kind of the state regulatory level, those areas are still protected to grow more in Bellevue.

So I think they are there is a challenge there in them coming to Bellevue perhaps, but they are themselves not a challenge.

We want those growth areas.

Great.

Okay, thank you for clarifying that.

Um also, too.

I know you touched on the peer cities, and and I think that's really important.

But I wonder if we're missing an opportunity if we don't benchmark Bellevue with our neighbors, so within the Seattle MSA, so that our strategy is aligned with what our neighbors are doing and that we can tap into that uh most effectively for Bellevue.

So when you think about benchmarking and you're looking around the MSA, um, are you taking that into account and how we kind of create our own strategy?

Absolutely.

And and Corbin can speak a little bit to the MSA and regional level data in a second.

Uh, what you're seeing in this particular data set is we did intentionally ask the consultants to help us benchmark against the national peers, because those are more difficult data sets for us to get.

And so we really do rely on the consultants to help us gather that data from cities outside of Washington.

So, Corbin, could you speak a little bit about the regional context?

Yeah, so for the the regional context on that, uh, that's something like Jesse said, we we track pretty closely on the staff level.

Good example of that is unemployment rate, national metric that we have limited direct impact on.

But what we can track is our unemployment rate relative to the metro area.

So how we're doing relative to the overall area.

Obviously, we want our rate to be lower than the overall metro area.

So that's a good example of how we benchmark regionally uh on an ongoing basis.

You'll see in the data analysis some other metrics that we do include the metro area, although it is not universal across the data analysis.

Okay, good.

I'm glad you you're looking at that.

I think it's really important for us to look closely at what our uh neighbors are doing and and that we complement that when we can to our advantage and and uh work to improve on what they're doing in other ways.

Um, too, just kind of curious about revenue sources and if we rank our revenue sources and incorporate that information into our plan.

And uh for example, I I noted in the memo that um obviously sales tax is one of our main revenue sources, and in the memo it talks about the retail trade and how it uh employment in that sector is weak and declining.

And I just wonder if the updated plan is going to address that trend and and include strategies to strengthen employment in that sector and other sectors that are in a similar situation.

Yes, council member, we do uh we do track the the city's revenue sources uh to understand which are growing, which are declining, uh, where some of those revenues originate.

Uh our the city's chief financial officer John Risha and the city's budget director, Evan Phillips are part of the internal core team that are helping with drafting of the and review of the strategies.

So they are keeping that lens on what kinds of revenues are growing and which uh might need to be reinforced.

And that will be reflected in the draft strategies that come forward next month.

Okay, good.

Uh, I think we certainly want to strengthen those uh revenue sources and support them as much as we can.

Um and we've talked a little bit already about Eastgate and Factoria, and certainly look forward to uh hearing more about that and incorporating uh that into our sub-area planning that uh we just kicked off.

Um just thinking about kind of the coordination with um property owners, especially uh in that area, and this was mentioned earlier, but um, and you mentioned you've had some interaction with them, but I'm just with the property owners.

Um just curious what's planned for in the future and you know, more communication so that we can really kind of drive this plan.

But what's what's coming with those folks and engaging with them?

Corbin, we speak to the future engagement plans.

Yeah, so um we obviously had that engagement work as a part of a plan update.

Oh, I will say that's that is specific.

We do engage in an ongoing manner with those property owners.

Um there are some that are you know we're very engaged with in terms of future planning for their sites.

Um so you'll see um you know a bunch of different property owners going in different directions on that front, although as we develop the strategies as well and get more specific with that, we'll be having an ongoing conversation.

Then once the plan's implemented, we'll be talking with them about the actual implementation, obviously, because uh for Eastgate, they're obviously very important stakeholders and being partner thought partners in reinvisioning that area.

That's great.

I think that's very important.

Um, and at the conclusion of the process, I would like to get a list of recommended specific actions that council can consider taking in support of the plan.

And I think it would be helpful for us to have this information we could take to our uh January retreat and we could discuss and and make some decisions.

So I would I'd love to know you know how do we activate the council in support of the plan in specific ways.

The the draft strategies will come to the council in October, and then that drop-down level of more specific tactical actions and the menu of options that may exist for implementation will come to the council uh in November for to provide some visibility.

And then how those are our workshops, I would look to the city manager for for guidance on that.

Great.

Thank you.

Um and Councilmember uh Newenhouse touched on this, but I would also like to get some recognitions on how to incorporate support for our economic development plan uh into our legislative priorities for the next season.

And I think uh Councilmember Neuenhouse really hit on it be it because included in the data analysis and community engagement report, there's an indication that the state essentially stepped off a tax competitiveness cliff in 2023, and we moved out of the top 10 and into the bottom five.

And as again, as Councilmember Neuenhouse uh mentioned, I mean, I just think this is a shocking uh development, and I think that um as we did with recent tax proposals and providing feedback, I'd really like to be able to incorporate uh some of what comes out of the update here into our legislative priority so that we can uh continue to advocate uh for some positive change in Olympia.

So I'll look forward to getting that too, if possible.

So thank you for voting that council member.

I will uh I can offer that we have asked the consultants very specifically, and that's part of the work they're doing right now uh in the next month, is to compare some of the regulatory and other uh tax barriers of Washington State compared to some of our competitor states in particular, uh, so that we can understand what opportunities might exist to partner with uh our external partners and other agencies in the state to help advocate for uh for some some policy issues uh so those would again come to the council and the city manager to workshop on how those might manifest in the council's legislative agenda.

Great, thank you.

Good work.

Look forward to seeing you back in October.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay, thank you.

Council Sum Councilmember Sumadoweria.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um I think my colleagues said all the good stuff.

But um, I do have um uh a few observations from you know the review and this material.

First, I think you know there's a really strong paradox of our success.

I mean, as we see that there is a strong economic growth and also income growth, but because of that, our big success also create a big problem with affordability change.

Um, and also that really threaten our workforce development pipeline, especially how they can live where they work.

Um, not on the tech work side, more on the hospitality and retail space.

Um, I think that's uh very interesting.

I will I think looking forward to learn how we can navigate that, make sure that we are creating equitable and also accessible economy for everyone.

And then the second one and second and third one, my observation is actually very close, is that the commute um commuter data and also the timing, I think is very critical because as you see a few days ago, the I9D had just the first round of the LIRAL went through the I-90.

The brave soul, one person on that with life jacket on that one there.

And I think the good news is probably close, but I think because it's right close to the I90 corridor.

But I think because it's right close to the I-90 corridor, I was wondering, I think that creates a really unique opportunity for us to explore the east side, the Eastgate factoria area for the vacancy because the added transportation side.

And then because of that, I think that we are looking not only on the Bellevue transportation.

We are going to be a collaborative leader for the region.

We can showcase and how we can collaborate with them together.

You reach out.

What about what numbers were there?

Out of the 400 stakeholder, how many would be small business?

Corbin, do you have that data off the top of your head?

I don't have the number in front of me.

I will say the vast majority of them were small businesses, and that that includes, so we had some specific small business focused groups and interviews.

For instance, the creative economy focused group had a lot of small creative artists, that sort of thing.

So I don't have the number in front of me, although it is the vast majority.

I would love to learn about those numbers.

Like, you know, because council member house and council member lead, too.

You know, a lot of restaurant owners, small business owners, they are immigrants.

So I think knowing the percentage of the people we can talk to and kind of pinpoint exactly where it's how we can support them will be more relevant.

And then, you know, I think that I we we all can be advocating to support, right?

And I think there's so many businesses owners, they probably feel more comfortable talking to different types of people with connection person relationship as well.

Um so that goes to my next question because the small business permitting process, um, what is there a matrix we are trying to follow how fast the permitting is turnaround?

Um one example I want to give you um one of actually one of a small business trying to start a business on Main Street right now, they reach out to me.

Um they are getting their permit passed, but they're having a hard time getting the signage.

It would not be ready until their grand opening day.

So that's gonna be an issue.

Um so things like that, how can we in the October to learn how can we exactly pinpoint where we are, and then how can we expedite it?

Because as I understand from the permitting process, there's different p different need to submit the work.

So the contractors, you know, electricians and different things onto the portal, right?

So I wonder if there is any schedule we can see exactly where the the holdup is because sometimes it could not be maybe just not the city staff that's having issues.

Maybe it's the plumbers not inputting all the information, but we're not seeing it.

So we don't know how to like disrupt that um bottleneck per se.

So is there any opportunity for us to able to explore the portal the portal for um permitting that we can see exactly how can we um expedite it in the future?

That's a really good question, council member.

I would uh I would redirect that question to development services as they are the ones who manage uh my building permit.com, which is where the majority of those applications uh are taken in.

They are our development services director and uh one of the assistant directors are part of again our internal core team, so they're also getting all of this information and understanding how they can implement it as part of their work plan.

Um, and I do believe there are some updates planned for my building permit.

So I would definitely encourage uh y'all to reach out to Rebecca Horner.

Well, I I would say what I'm hearing consistently from all our council members is that we've identified some of our shortcomings, and we're hoping the next step is to determine what the solutions are and bring those back to us so we can see what they're going to be.

And it's I think you know, um, we're not gonna tell you how to speed up permitting, but obviously that's an issue, and that's something that's been identified, and we're asking, you know, can you show us what the plan is to fix that?

Thank you, Mayor and Council members.

These are uh really good points to be making, and I think it's information that um you've gathered through the process too that will help um develop the actions.

I just wanted to point out on the small business permitting that our small business permit program manager um just started about a month ago.

And so I know Stephanie Collier is her name, and she has been starting to work with small businesses to um provide assistance through the process directly.

So that is just one avenue for um assistance, but we'll continue to build on that as the actions are developed.

Yeah, so that'll be something that we get to look at later.

Thank you.

Yeah, thank you, by the way.

Yeah, thank you.

That yeah, that's sums up my um ask.

I think for the detail about you know how to create a solve the bottleneck, we can talk more about it.

Because I think sometimes, as a small business owner myself, it's really easy to just blame it to the city saying, like, okay, the permit is taking forever.

But if we can look deeper into it, how is everybody have to be collaborative together to figure out what the problem is?

Um sometimes could be the contractor, we can do it together.

I think it'll be more helpful to that.

Um another question was um as you see, like when you know my colleague talk about the tax.

We actually below California's desiring a self-business environment right now, according to the report.

Um, it's not a good place to be because when we drive out big corporations, who suffer is actually small business.

It's gonna affect the livelihood of downtown and the corridors.

Um can we explore in the future and then the next time maybe having some suggestion?

How can we locally um like how can we have like tax incentive or check structures to just kind of maintain our competitiveness?

Because we don't want our small mom and pop jobs to be um penalized and then losing business and closing doors because they don't have steady income from the corporate because I think there's a big drop-off corporation um catering from a lot of uh local restaurants right now because there's a changing of the in business environment.

So I think that's area that I would love to explore with you more as well.

Um was um, because you said that Eastgate has a lot of vacancy.

Do you think that is there any um opportunity for us to come together to think about as converting those spaces to adapting to um cheaper rent for small business as is either the first time um building it, or if it's like a gent um, I think generation one, you know, a bare bone structure, if we can give them kind of subsidies um to support them with electrician plumbing, like you know, some kind of subsidy to help them to get there.

I'll I'll I'll look to Corbin in a second to speak a little bit about the the quality of the office space in in Eastgate and its suitability for some of our uh particularly our non-small business, our non-retail small businesses.

Uh, in regards to the city's ability to provide additional support for 10 improvements or other uh related issues, there is a there is a provision in the state constitution that does limit the city's ability to provide direct grants and other types of support to businesses in in the state.

That is again one of the things that our consultants are looking at comparing us to other states.

Um Corbin, can you speak a little bit to the office stock?

Yeah.

So the office space, uh, you you do have a a little bit of a range of different options within Eastgate.

I will say we have a number of uh co-working facilities that are actually in some of those older buildings in Eastgate that are uh good sources for first-time small office users and much more affordable relative to something you might have in downtown.

So that is actually already happening a little bit um in Eastgate.

I will say there is a second group of office stock that is uh in very poor condition.

So we we hear frequently and we speak with the businesses who are exiting those specific properties, and it oftentimes the amount of investment needed to bring it up to standards even for a small scrappy business who might be more willing for that type of thing, um, would still be prohibitive.

So they're kind of two two separate um situations there.

And we want to definitely promote the um the uh already affordable space that is there and more applicable for those small and scaling businesses.

Okay, how are we marketing it to the people who need this space?

Corbin.

Yeah, so um through a combination of different methods, uh, oftentimes when we have uh international company maybe who might be more price sensitive to what's what might be in downtown, we will present the other options like some of the the um occupied facilities in Eastgate as options, and we've seen uh an uptake on those, although those are typically small users, so the overall impact on the square footage vacancy rate is low.

Um so we integrate that into our ongoing business traction program um that that we were referencing earlier with GSP and that sort of thing.

Uh also when we're talking in our business retention and expansion program with people who are already here, um, somebody moving from maybe their house into their first office.

We we do that transfer as well.

And I will say it's a different case when we're talking about office versus retail, so a small retailer.

Um the issue in Eastgate is actually the flip side.

There isn't much space for any retailers in Eastgate, and the the space that is there is already occupied by small businesses usually.

Thank you.

Okay, um, Deputy Mayor.

Thank you, Mayor.

I just need to start saying I really missed this.

Uh, you all sitting there and providing all of these great feedback.

Uh is a blessing to learn from you all.

So great comments so far, and I really missed this for the past month.

Uh, thank you, Jesse Corbin and Ellie.

That was a great presentation and a comprehensive report.

Uh, and a great job on getting the community input, I think uh when I read the report was very, very detailed and all of the comments was great.

Uh, I am just going to go and sometimes probably repeat other council members, but go through my concerns when I was reading this report.

I think the first one was mentioned by council members Madavaria.

Uh, the report said that 90% of our jobs in Bellevue are filled by commuters, uh, which directly impacts our uh traffic and environmental goals.

So I think we should all do our best that you are doing, but even maybe more to address housing affordability that we have to naturally maybe address some of the traffic that we are going to see because of that 90% of our jobs are filled by commuters.

Uh I really worried about and concerned about AI and how might impact our workforce.

I would love to see in October and November, how we are strengthening our partnership with Bellevue College to prepare our resident and all of our people for uh AI to revenue.

Um, I don't know if we can even maybe create the AI task force with all of these local tech companies that we have here that they are all investing in in AI, they can even tell us what that workforce looks like.

Uh and then we can maybe educate them by partnering with Bellevue College.

I think a small businesses has been mentioned many, many times, especially for marginalized communities.

Uh we should provide them with anything that they need.

Uh, I think the ROI would be better for us in long run, permitting help with regular regulation, any resources that they need, marketing, money, managerial training, targeted incentives.

I think we should provide them again.

If they are successful, our city is successful.

I think economic-wise is in our benefit.

Something that has not mentioned, I think we should make Bellevue hip.

Uh, this is going to make some effort on our night uh late-night activity, maybe better late-night transportation options.

There are people who live and work in Bellevue and Eastside, but when they wanted to have some fun, they go to Fremont and Ballard for entertainment.

Uh, we need to again incentivize restaurant, live music, venues, art spaces, night, maybe a nighttime economy strategy that make Bellevue a place that people out after work wanted to hang out and enjoy.

Uh you uh it was mentioned that uh we are growing 0.83%.

We should grow at 1.7% annual growth is ambitious, but I think creating all of those incentives and expedites permitting and focusing on AI, take a start out.

I think maybe and support small businesses maybe get us there.

The last comment that it was brought by maybe all of the council members is our state tax environment is challenging.

Uh not only we should try to improve that, but also we should focus on what is in our control.

Again, permitting process and local incentives is our in control, and we should create solutions that address all of these challenges.

Overall, great job, and thank you so much.

Mayor, I am done.

Okay, great.

So I wish I didn't have anything to say, but I do.

Um, you didn't speak yet.

Oh, Councilmember Bargabas.

I'm so sorry.

Your turn.

It's okay.

A lot of my points were already stated very eloquently, uh, more eloquently than I could have made them anyway.

So all good.

Uh I want to start by just to thank you.

Uh it was very informative, a very helpful report, great progress, lots of great work.

So thank you for doing what you're doing.

I also want to personal note to say thank you for including Irvine.

Uh spent nine years living there and uh really appreciate the quality of life.

It's one of the better master plan communities in this United States.

But I do think Bellevue gives it a run for its money for quality of life.

So we're doing really good here.

Um quick things.

Some of the things that are being stated, I will not go deep into, but uh, one of my concerns is around diversification of our economy.

And um instead of going deep, I just want to say that I would love to see more tactical strategies on diversification.

I know you've got certain segments in mind that are part of the strategic guidance and the guiding principles you're using, but I think there is more to do.

And if you picked out certain areas that you think we have the competitive advantage for, whether it's through uh current sort of uh what I would be critical mass that we can build around or uh proximity to other uses like medical office and so on and so forth, we should try to get really tactical on what we want to see so we can accelerate that and keep up with the the metrics that we think are you know signifying success for us.

So uh definitely want to go deep on how we would think about diversification more.

I also want to think about cost uh of doing business here.

A lot has been said on permitting and other things, but what could be other strategies?

And I've got a few suggestions when I talk about small businesses in a second here, just to consider and uh put it in your uh sort of consideration set for tactical strategies to come back and for the next round.

I do think 42% for office vacancy rates are alarming.

Like obviously there is something to do there, which we haven't done successfully for a number of years now.

And so there has to be a pivot in our strategy in what we're doing in those areas, EastKate and Factoria that allows us to turn it around.

Now I understand the structural constraints you talked about.

I also understand that there's guidance on can we make it available for scrappier businesses that have a lower cost need?

Can we make it available for international businesses that may not know any different yet where small business needs?

I don't know if those are the right approaches.

I think we need to think about nexus of land use infrastructure and what we're doing there to promote redevelopment possibilities to create opportunities that would be more uh which have a higher propensity for adoption and utilization than it currently exists.

I just don't think more of the same or go cheaper and provide it to people who need it at a lower cost is it's like a you know, in the economics terms, you call it a spiral of death, it's just gonna go down that path, and it's at some point it's not gonna work.

And so I'm really worried that that area needs maybe in between now and when we come back, maybe we have a focused attention on areas that's where we need specific concern to be addressed, and we come up with a more uh tactical plan for those areas that look different from the rest of the city, and that might be very supportive of that.

Small businesses.

Uh I don't know if 21% is good or bad, it's sort of middle of the road, but what is the gold standard look like?

What should be that number?

I'm not I'm curious if you know because I've got a couple of suggestions after that.

Cormin, do we have that you information from UI?

Yeah, so in terms of the benchmarking with our peer cities, that number is pretty in line with a lot of the pure cities.

Uh that's not to say, you know, when we're looking at our peer cities, a lot of them have the same problems relative to small business we do.

That so, you know, in terms of overall benchmarking, we're in line.

That doesn't mean we don't have issues in that space.

Yeah, benchmarking is really not the question I'm asking.

I'm asking of the gold standard being what would be the aspirational number where diversification and small business opportunity for employment within the city would start to feel right.

We can look into that, council member, and and see if there's any data or or best practices that we can we can bring back in October.

The challenge is that it's hard to set a gold standard because each community is very unique in you know its cost structures and its state regulatory environment.

So we did ask UI to kind of give us some gold standards around some of these items, and this one was one that is very hard.

Yeah, but we'll look at what we can bring back for October.

I would appreciate that because I would look for the same kind of data points on the 15% number in terms of the number of people who live and work here.

I would look for the same data point on uh, you know, uh not downtown, but other areas where we want to have uh vacancy rates come down.

What would things be aspirational so that we can set targets that are truly not middle of the road but achieving higher uh outcomes for the city?

So we are more aspirational in our pursuits.

Um going into the uh pieces permitting has been talked about, but I would make three other quick suggestions.

Incubation space, like cost for small businesses are really important thing.

So maybe we try to see if there's possibility for incubation space in partnership with the private sector to see if we can bring in incentives of small business sort of establishment and so on and so forth, because I think that will be as a small business owner or an aspirant, maybe very useful.

I think also thinking about strategies for access to capital.

I know not directly from the city, but again through partnerships, that might be something.

And then there's something in the city.

I think uh Deputy Mayor touched on this uh through his push on AI, but I think technical assistance in terms of small business establishment and support um could go a long way as well.

So those would be three things that I would say to put in your consideration set for the tactical strategies for for growth to accelerate growth and so on.

And then uh two other quick points.

Um in terms of revenue sources, I think council member uh Hamilton asked this question, but what are you most optimistic about?

What would be the places where you think V can get quick wins?

You may or may not have an answer.

We don't have an answer right now.

The as we've talked about with our with uh our internal uh core teams, it's a it's a diversified mix.

We want to have a variety of revenue streams so that when one is down, another one is kind of balancing it out.

So it is more about balancing the portfolio than uh in our perspective.

Yeah.

And the last point I just make is when you think about your tactical strategies.

Um I know that the uh council has asked and talked about a brand for our city, and it is part of sort of the largest strategic work that the city is trying to do, but tying economic development to the brand we're trying to build, or an economic development brand that we're trying to build for the city can be an attractive way to sort of build uh you know, catalyze the process of getting new businesses to come in, uh, to build infrastructure that focuses on those particular areas that creates uh a little bit more buzz might be something to consider as well.

There's already lots of great suggestions on the table, but just some of the things to consider.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, anybody else?

Okay, um, so I had like six validations.

First of all, I want to commend the report and all the work that you have all done uh working with the consultant.

I was very impressed with that report.

I some of the data's old, some of it's from 2022, and I really hope that things are looking better today than they were in 22, and that maybe some of this uh the data that we're seeing is not actually as bad.

It's not as we're not as bad as the data kind of looks right now because it was from 2022 and a lot has changed since then.

So um what I can I can respond to that a little bit.

Some of the the job growth data may have changed a little bit.

Uh some of the other data, like the office vacancy is is very recent.

I saw that.

Okay.

So I wanted to name there were like six things that I felt really were validated by this report.

Um let's see the value of preserving character of our neighborhoods.

So I'm really curious how we're going to apply that to old Bellevue.

And I would really like to see staff come back with a recommendation and a plan of what we're going to do for that part of town and any other part of town where we want to preserve the character.

And um, so the the uh you don't have to answer right now.

Um let's see, number two, the need to increase opportunity for people to live where they work.

Uh this these are things that I think are important that the report brought out.

The support of the grand connection, um, increasing investment in the arts, the need to speed up permitting, and the value of high quality of life.

And I just I really appreciated how they um brought that out and really um emphasize that.

So I do have two questions.

One is uh they talk about I remember when we had a consultant five years ago, and they told us that our economic diversity was terrible in Bellevue.

And this shows us as being quite diverse, actually.

So I'm wondering what did we do something to make it better?

Did it happen naturally?

What what did you do to make that better?

And there's my second question.

How do we prioritize job growth in Bellevue?

And maybe you don't you can't answer that tonight, but those are both good questions, Mayor.

Uh, with economic diversity, as the council may remember, the 2020 plan was intentional in trying to provide broader base foundations for for a variety of businesses in Bellevue.

So over the last five years, we have put in place several new programs that help support our tourism economy, have improved we we provide more service than we ever have to small businesses in Bellevue.

We can certainly do more, but we've increased that.

Uh, and we have seen an influx of new companies because of the continuing good regulation that the city of Bell V puts in place.

Corbin, is there anything you would add to you've also been here during this five-year period?

Yeah, I'll I'll say in terms of how that that diversity index has changed and gotten better.

Is you know, we broadly talk about tech a lot of the time.

Uh tech means a lot of different things, uh, as you all are aware.

Um so for instance, within comparing 2019 Bellevue to 2025 Bellevue, um, we have a lot more, I'll say diversity within that industry.

Um, a lot more e-commerce is a big one.

Amazon's obvious one that springs to mind, but there are a lot of other companies in that area as well that are adding to that enterprise software base that Bellevue has traditionally been a leader in.

Uh, and that's an example of some of those other sectors.

Uh, interactive media, video game development's another one uh on that front.

So we've seen a lot of identification within that broad tech group.

Um, but then there is more potential beyond that as well because those are still subject to some of the same forces.

Yeah, well, good job.

See what you can do when you identify and focus on it.

So I'm feeling optimistic after this report.

And then the other one is you know, do we have a plan for how we're going to prioritize job growth next?

And that is a also really good question, Mayor.

We are this plan is building around our comprehensive plan target for an additional 70,000 jobs by 2044.

And so we are setting out uh that in this six-year period we get about 20,000 of those 22,000 of those jobs.

So the strategies that you see in October and then the action plan will reference how are we really catalyzing that knowing that as the deputy mayor referenced, the job growth rate has to be double of what it's been the last couple of years.

So we are looking for that balanced package that helps grow our professional and large employers, our retail businesses, our tourism sector.

It's gonna be a basket of things that help us achieve that.

Great.

Okay, well, look forward to hearing more.

I do want to underscore deputy mayor's request for an AI task force.

I think that's an excellent idea.

So I don't know what that would look like.

Um I'm sure there's more questions from the council, but can I ask that we email them in to staff and we move on to our next thing?

Can I ask that we any questions you have you email staff and we can move on to the next topic?

Is it possible for me to ask why we'll ask questions?

I'll give you one minute.

Uh one question I have is you mentioned Bailey is the hub for global business innovation.

That's our objective.

Okay, my question is what are we doing to achieve that?

And yeah, go ahead.

Well, Councilmember, that that's the intent of the plan.

So the plan is setting that goal as Bellevue is a global hub for innovation.

And so all of the strategies and then the implementation plan will be focused on reinforcing Bellevue as a global innovation hub.

So you'll see more detail on that in October and November.

The reason I ask you that is because one point that was made very clearly is the state's regulatory and taxing policies.

They have to be cheating the uh tech companies very well.

They represent uh 20% of the uh salary in one sector and 12% of the workforce.

So it's very important.

He noticed that we're going the wrong direction.

So I think that's an important consideration.

Uh it's just one thing we need to emphasize.

That's why I'm looking at what specific things we can do.

But one thing that is important to do, we can do a lot of other things too, but it's a lot more focus, more concentrated.

I think we can accomplish more.

Yeah, that's the first question.

Do you agree?

Broadly, we agree in the the again the strategies and the tactics that you see in October and November will reinforce uh and it'll include a broad set of things that we can do at the city level, and it'll include some opportunities for us to work with our partners at Greater Seattle Partners at the Bellevue Chamber and other groups to help uh where we can advocate at the state level.

Right, right.

Okay, so the other would fall out of this, but we need to focus on that.

The second associate with this question.

Good question.

I'm gonna allow I'm gonna allow you to um email staff any further recommendations or questions, and we'll we'll stop here and thank you very much.

Good presentation.

We're gonna take a break.

Uh we'll take a break at 20 till 22.

Thank you.

So we shall go back on to our last study session item city manager.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor.

Council members.

So tonight we have brought you a proposed resolution for potential changes to council rules, city code, and board and commission bylaws.

The council has the authority to enact your own rules around orderly conduct of your council meetings.

And tonight staff will present you with two proposed changes.

One to change the rules for the decorum for both council and city board and commissions.

And then second, a potential change to the term limits for council appointed board and commission members.

And this was something that council identified as a potential change earlier this year, and we're bringing it back to you tonight.

So we'll have presentation by our city attorney, Trisna Tanis, and our city clerk, Charmaine Ardondo.

And we would like to ask council to consider directing staff to bring back the necessary legislation to modify these rules.

And if council is supportive, we would also propose that you could do this on consent.

And with that, I'll hand it over to Trisna.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, Deputy Mayor, Council members.

As City Manager Carlson noted, we are here on a couple of pretty narrow amendments to council rules and board and commission rules related to decorum and then term limits for service in boards and commissions.

Next slide.

So the our agenda tonight fairly short.

We'll start with the exclusion period changes and then the term limit changes.

And then so starting with uh the exclusion period, wanted to provide a bit of background here.

Um as you all know, uh we have uh an ability to exclude uh individuals from participating andor attending council meetings as well as board and commission meetings.

These rules are in the rules of decorum.

Um the rules have now been in place for a little over two years.

So council and boards and commissions and the city uh have had the opportunity to um use these rules.

Um violations of these rules uh may result in exclusion, as I said, from either participating or attending future meetings.

Um the rules are um say that the current maximum for exclusion is 60 days, and um the any appeals of notices of exclusion would be heard at the next regularly scheduled council meeting.

So the proposed changes has the intent of increasing the um maximum exclusion period while at the same time keeping the ability to impose shorter duration as well as uh protection of legal rights.

Um the other thing that we've noted since we have been using these rules for uh a couple of years now and have had um experience processing appeals of exclusion orders.

We um wanted to be able to provide some additional time in terms of processing uh of appeals so that we can uh better prepare appeal materials for council consideration.

Um staff have also sorry, go back to that one.

Staff also um wanted to let you know that we have done a survey of other jurisdictions uh nearby um and in kind of Washington state.

Um we have found that the um the maximum exclusion period, um, although they vary.

A number of jurisdictions have moved to um longer duration.

So um the proposed changes here um right now are um we have a maximum exclusion period of 60 days.

The proposed change would be to increase that to 180 days, and then the timing of council consideration of appeals right now.

The it's that next regularly scheduled meeting.

We are um wanting to change that to have the um consideration happen at the next meeting that is at least three business days from receipt of the appeal again to allow for time for staff to prepare the materials for council's uh review.

Um next slide here.

So there are several actions.

Should you choose to um implement these changes?

Uh first one, we would need a resolution to amend council rules.

This would be a repeal and replace of resolution number 10 369.

We would need an ordinance to amend sections in Title III of the Value City Code pertaining to the seven boards and commissions, and then we would also need instructions to these advisory boards and commissions to modify their bylaws for conformance to these changes.

So next I'll turn it to Shermain to go through the term limits.

Thanks, Jessica.

So can we stop here for a second just see if we have any questions?

Sure.

Okay.

Does council have any questions on that?

No, Deputy Mayor, yes, he has his hand up.

Go ahead.

Like, is there a criteria that, for example, mayor can say, okay, this person 30 days, the other percent 60 days.

Um, thank you, Deputy Mayor.

The criteria is in the uh council rules right now, as well as in all the um bylaws um and code sections pertaining to boards and commissions, and it isn't as prescriptive as 30 days getting um, you know, uh should be uh based on uh kind of uh XYZ criteria or 60 days on another criteria.

It is very discretionary based on the presiding officer's view of what has uh been occurring and how uh the uh person has been conducting themselves in these meetings.

So um the presiding officer is to consider the seriousness and the number of disruptions or violations, the impacts of those disruptions or violations on the meetings, um, and then uh whether there are any kind of um uh threat to public safety, as well as the overall record of the person at these meetings.

So there are a number of criteria for consideration, but there isn't any specificity in terms of what um how do you uh I guess grade or evaluate those the conduct and what uh you know the specific conduct should result in.

Though those are discretionary to the presiding officer.

Great.

So there are general criteria that and I look at all of them, but it's going to be very vague if we just leave it at that.

Uh, I think it I recommend that we do a tiered system that is collegially defines what types of violation would trigger different length of exclusion.

I think that would be make it more clear uh for all for public, for us, for whoever is in charge to go through that tiered system to be able to say okay, 30 days or this is 100 180 days.

Thank you, Mayor.

Any comments, Trisna.

If council wishes to uh have us come back with criteria that could be um look if you want to consider those tiered system of some sort.

We can certainly do that if council wishes for us to otherwise is it 180 days cross the board?

It is 180 days as the maximum that you can impose.

You are free to impose anything below 180 days.

Okay, okay.

I I'm conflicted with that because we haven't had criteria in the past and we haven't needed it.

Um I guess uh that's something to think about.

Um I'm gonna let council member barva.

Yeah, I mean, my comment actually was not very different in flavor from Deputy Mayor's uh that in terms of transparency and equity.

Uh, because this is discretionary and because we're going to 180 days, it might be helpful to set up a framework not dissimilar.

I don't know if it has to be tiered.

I would be even comfortable with just set of guidelines that say that even guide the discretionary choices that say the level of disruption is high or safety is impacted, or simple guidelines that allow us to say here's the framework for decision making for how we think about the length of exclusion that's clearly stated to anybody who gets excluded and can be you know visible transparently, and then we can justify it with clarity as well.

So that is equity in how this is actually delivered.

That that would be my only suggestion.

I'm just gonna say, as the person who's had to make these decisions, I'm not for that because it's really hard to define what is a gross offensive, threatening behavior.

It may not be violent, it may not seem so bad, egregious, but to the person who's received on the receiving end and the people in the audience who are feeling threatened, that's what we're responding to a lot of times.

And so I don't know that there's criteria that can take that under consideration, to be honest with you.

Yes, Councilmember Sumadwearia.

Um I think having this system to like a matrix, how severe, like what kind of language do you?

Because I think I'm gonna use a personal experience, right?

With um, because I think as a woman being vulnerable, I think sometimes in the leadership role, if we don't set the rule really clear, it's hard for us to explicitly say this make me unsafe space.

And then also it's actually um diminished ability to able to work as in the space that if when I don't feel safe.

And then sometimes I think not sometimes, I think at all times when the leadership of the staff that can help us support to give the language that I can able legally use to protect not only me but every person in the room.

I think that I believe that's gonna be really beneficial to make the public service even more efficient.

I think that's that's how I feel personally.

I think that um can we say when certain individuals come to commission meetings and then make me feel scared and fear that I cannot give a hundred ten percent to service the City of Bellview residents.

I think that it makes me feel struggling to able to express my fear freely when I don't know there's something to protect me.

Right.

So if I'm walking down the street here, if I encounter the same individual who's calling my personal number, I feel I'm scared.

That's just how I feel, and that's in the tier a lot of upgrade talent to able to step up in this realm to able to service our residents.

So this is how I feel, and I think that it probably ran as sense with a lot of other people out there that are but then willing to put their name on the hat, able to serve our community too, right?

Um sorry, I got a little bit vulnerable there, but I I want to share my personal experience.

I appreciate it.

I guess my question is Deputy Mayor had recommended, and Councilmember Bargava supported kind of having criteria and tiers that we would use to identify is this a 30-day offense, a 60-day offense, a hundred and eighty-day offense, and I'm not sure where you lie on that.

I kind of told, and I'll listen to other council members in a minute, but I didn't I couldn't understand where you were on that.

I think the wording is I think any time anybody feel not safe in that room.

I think there should be a vessel or avenue that we can express at.

Um that's what I'm coming from because what I can see feel not safe, could be very different from everybody else in the room.

I think she's right saying exactly what I said would be very different.

It's hard to qualify what is uh a larger offense for some person versus um how somebody else might perceive it.

So I think it needs to be at the discretion of the person who makes that decision.

Yeah, also the language they used to write different words can trigger different things for everybody too.

That's true.

Yeah.

Okay, Councilmember New in House.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yeah, I think we could spend days trying to uh thread the needle um on some of these issues and in terms of what bucket that it might fall into.

Is that a 30-day versus 60 day versus 90 day?

Um I I think it's nuanced and it and then we're all gonna have different um depending on the on the content or the individual, um, what was said, not said, etc.

We're all gonna have a different potentially reaction to that.

So um, so I I wouldn't be in favor um uh of going down that path.

What I would be in favor of though, if we did want to put some additional guardrails, is I think maybe the deputy mayor is looking for is maybe um uh uh um you know if it's it's a first time offense it's 30 days second time offense then it escalates to 60 days and then if there's a third offense then it goes to the max or potential max or still um you know discretion there in terms of do you go all the way to 180 or 90 or 120 what what have you but um um but um this at least would be transparent to the public in terms of you know a first time offense versus someone who continually comes here every single meeting um uh the I I think that might something like that might work a little bit better than trying to define every type of um perceived or real um um threat insults um or disruption that there could be here in these chambers and I'm just gonna remind us of the caller last year who called in with the most offensive vitriolic comment ever made and I would I know but I would hate to have to go through that three times before we got the maximum so that's two point I think what I'm gonna suggest and like to hear your thoughts on is that up to a hundred and eighty days at the discretion of whatever and um clear uh identifying you know here's what we consider um qualifying for that type of response whether it's language or whether it's physicality or whatever so um deputy mayor I mean no you're our city manager go ahead thank you um I was just gonna offer that um when these occurrences um have happened uh in at least the last couple of years um the mayor presiding officer um has consultation with our city attorney um to go through what exists today in the rules and um offers that um opportunity to assess what the balance is so that's something that the the rules have served well um today in having that conversation to allow that flexibility um and um based on the situation that's in front of the um the council okay so I see deputy mayor hand up but I'm gonna go to council member Hamilton and Lee and then to Deputy Mayor Great thank you um just a question about the exclusion when it's presented to someone what rationale is provided what's the explanation at the time um thank you council member the notice of exclusion does have to contain the rationale for the exclusion it is pretty detailed in terms of what elements need to be play need to be in that notice so um and also have to have a warning warnings before you implement that right one of the criteria that I spoke of earlier is the person's record at the meetings so um we do look at all the kind of previous uh violations of the meeting uh of decorum and we cite all of those previous occurrences of violation in order to provide that supporting rationale for why the person is being excluded from future meetings um exclusion is a is a serious um uh kind of matter that we look um and it's something that we want to be able to have really good basis and rationale for and we do take the time to look at the history of all the of what had uh happen and document those in the notice of exclusion okay well I think with that you know provided that whoever's being excluded is given a full explanation and then of course they have the right to appeal and I while I've yet to see a coherent appeal um made in theory it's possible and then the council has the ability to override the exclusion and so I I as far as I'm concerned we have enough guardrails in place I think 60 days is just generally not enough time we need this extra tool it's gonna be used so rarely and and considering the guardrails again with the explanation and the appeal I think the way it's the we have it here is what I'm in support of thank you council member lee do you have any comments?

So in uh one the proposed changes would include changing all the boards and commission rules of decorum to the same uh maximum of 180 days.

Well, so just what I said.

So it applies to boards and commission.

Yes, but they're under different um they're in the code itself and they have their own bylaws.

I know, but they apply the same standards.

Correct.

Yeah, so whatever we council does, it applies to them.

Yes.

So you presiding officer in that case is the chair of the board and commission.

That's correct.

Okay, not the mayor.

Correct.

The mayor's presiding officer of the council.

So that's going to be different application.

Yes.

So that puts another different perspective.

The chair of the board's commission would have to consider the same set of considerations.

Okay, so just want to leave it out there.

They have a they have a dilemma as well, that's we are talking about spending council time.

I don't know how they're gonna decide on that.

So given that, I think it's important, you know, rather than rely on volunteer than chairing the board of commission, they have to make those decisions.

I I don't think it's a fair uh responsibility that they should take.

So I kind of side with the deputy mayor that needs to be some guideline.

Okay, take it kind of out of the hand of it.

Uh, that they need help.

They need the help will come from consulting with our legal advisor, our lawyer, city attorney, and you have to give the your reasoned explanation or recommendation.

Then I hope the presiding officer would use the discretion, probably easier for a volunteer, you know, and a chair of the commissions to follow that recommendation.

So that person feels that they are protected, they have legal counsel, and they are have a guideline that they can follow.

Okay, let's hear from the deputy mayor again.

Thank you, Mayor.

I just wanted to first acknowledge both mayor and council members mode very about that they don't feel safe.

And I think what I am saying can be incorporated in exactly what's uh that what that's uh what you guys are talking about, both of you.

To me, the way I understand this is a general rule, apply to everyone, and can be conducted by any mayor in future, because I don't have any doubt in our foreign mayor that going is going to be fair, but now we increase the 60 days to 180 days, and when I go and look at the section eight d1, speaking without permission during council session is a disruptive behaviors.

Uh not following the time limits or speaking off topic is a disruptive behaviors, then section eight d2 has more serious violations, uh true threats of violence, off-scene language, assault.

To me, these are all very, very general and can be can be more categorized in a way and I don't think is very neat, could be very nitty-gritty, but help that officer that is in charge that can be uh our current mayor, can be all of the future mayors, can be anyone who is chairing any of our board meetings, help them to have a better guideline to decide now in these 180 days what crime just or not what crime, what behaviors justify what duration.

Uh, I think just solo putting that in the hand of that officer to me is very arbitrary and is not going to be uh equitable to every person that is going to have those behavior of and we need to be consistent uh and follow that consistency as much as we can.

Again, I'm sure we cannot be the best.

But to me, just leaving as 180 up to 180 days doesn't make sense.

Uh unless we have more tiered system to be able to distinguish between the behavior and the days of exclusion.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yes, City Manager, sure.

Thank you, Dev Mayor, for those comments.

I um I just want to highlight again what our city attorney indicated, which is that this is a serious process that we look back at the record.

We take great care to document um what has happened and before providing any kind of uh recommendation or support for the presiding officer's decision in this case.

So I would be a little concerned about narrowing narrowly constraining, given the potential range of actions that we need to evaluate.

So I just offer that again that the the current rules have been applied extremely judiciously and with great care um to make sure that we are following the laws and ensuring that people have access, appropriate access.

So I offer that up.

We will, of course, take the council's direction on what you'd like us to provide to you.

Yeah.

I wonder since we have um different opinions on this.

I wonder if I could get a motion for an ordinance to amend the BCC to update the timing of processing appeals of exclusions and to limit service no shoot.

I just want to do it for the um I just want a motion that would just cover the uh exclusion and the can you put up the last slide, I think, where we have the two things.

There we go.

Um maximum exclusion period update the timing of processing appeals of exclusions.

Okay, I wonder if I could get a motion just for that first thing.

I'm a direct staff prepared resolution to update uh council rules in relation to legislation instructions to the board and commission to increase the maximum exclusion period and update the timing of the processing appeals of exclusions.

Is there a second?

So I have a I can you can somebody second it so we can talk about it?

Second.

All right, thank you.

Go ahead.

What's here?

Well, I'm just I I want to be sure that I'm clear what we're doing here because the way that uh we've laid it out is what I'm fully in support of.

If we want to break this into two motions, that doesn't matter to me, but I want to accomplish the same thing.

And is that what we're doing here?

So we're offering it up as it as written with just talk not talking about boards and commissions yet.

Okay.

Okay, so it's uh we have a motion, it's been seconded.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed.

Any opposed?

Okay, thank you.

All right, so um, did you vote?

Councilmember Bargava?

Okay, I didn't hear you vote.

All right, so let's go ahead and take the second half of this.

Thank you.

Um, so really quickly, given the hour here, we'll talk about the limitation of service as it relates to boards and commissions.

So council has expressed an interest in expanding opportunities for residents to serve on the advisory boards and commissions.

And in fact, at your council retreat earlier this year, the council discussed a minor modification to the terms of service related to the six council appointed boards and commissions.

And those are here on your screen.

They're arts, environmental services, transportation, parks, human services, and planning commission.

Next slide, please.

So uh currently members are limited to two consecutive terms on the same board, then they must take a two-year break in service before becoming eligible to serve again.

The proposed change applies that limit across any board or commission, um, so that after two consecutive terms, whether on the same body or across all of the six appointed uh boards and commissions, a two-year break in service is necessary before being considered eligible to serve again.

So there is no change to the proposed uh no proposed change regarding the two-year break in service and partial terms of less than two years still do not count towards this maximum two-term service.

And implementation of this would require an ordinance amending the city code for each of those boards and commissions.

Um next slide, please.

Uh with that, what we have left tonight is just direction on the second item here, which is to amend the Bellview City Code uh to implement the two consecutive term limitation.

And I'm gonna ask just to start with a motion.

I move to direct staff to prepare a resolution update council rules and orders to amend the BCC and instructions to boards and commissions, limit service to two consecutive terms on any council advisory board and commission for action at a future meeting.

Is there a second?

A second.

So I appreciate staff bringing this forward.

This is something that we discussed at our retreat.

And so are there any comments or questions before we vote on this?

Okay, I see Deput Mayor has his hand up.

Yes, I have just uh two quick comments and maybe one question and one comment.

Uh do you have anyone right now that is not following this rule?

No.

Uh if your question is, do we have someone who has crossed commissions and served more than two commissions?

No, we do not have anyone in that scenario.

Great.

And then my uh maybe comment is that the person who served two terms on a commission and now showing interest to do more.

I think it's a very valuable.

There is a lot of knowledge that that person has.

Have we ever considered creating a mentorship program that can like that this person apparently is very enthusiastic to serve more that can run that mentorship program and transfer that experience that they gain after eight years on a uh commission or board and can train a new people that they want to serve.

I think it's very important.

We have these group of people has two things.

The uh crazy amount of experience, eight years, and then also passion and interest to serve again.

I think we should utilize that in some way that is meaningful for them and is going to be meaningful for the city and our people.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor.

I hear you loud and clear there, and I agree that there is uh there is an effort around consistency and onboarding and continuity of board and commission members.

And if we can somehow leverage the um experience of these members who have given so much of their time to the city, that would be a fantastic addition and would be a benefit to new members coming on board.

So I I hear you and we'll take that feedback into account.

Thank you.

Great, great input.

Any other comments or questions?

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, that passes.

And then I crumpled up my notes here.

So I know there's something else that we read in our packet because I read it and it was really interesting.

It was our legislative agenda.

Um sorry, just sec.

Okay, you're right.

Intergovernmental affairs monthly update with our legislative agendas for the state and the Fed and talks about the county as well.

So if you have a chance to read it, I recommend you should.

It's worth reading.

Thank you, Genesee.

All right, and with that, we are adjourned.

Thank you.