Good evening, everybody, and welcome to the Bellevue City Council meeting for October 24th, the 21st, 2025.

Before we begin, we're going to have public comment tonight, and I'm going to ask that there be no signs raised up that blocks people's views.

I will warn you and I will call you out on it.

I also asked that people speak with nice language and be polite.

I know it's possible.

We're a very intelligent community, and so I encourage us all to speak civilly to each other while we express our own individual opinions about things.

Thank you.

Mayor Robinson?

Here.

Deputy Mayor Malikuti.

Councilmember Barkaba.

Here.

Councilmember Hamilton.

Here.

Councilmember Lee?

Yeah.

Councilmember Newman House.

Here.

Councilmember Sumadowaria.

Thank you.

Councilmember Suma DeWerria, could you please lead us in the flag salute?

And to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation undergo indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Sir motion to approve the agenda.

I move to approve the agenda.

Second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Who do we have signed up for oral communications, please?

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, this evening there are eight pre-registered speakers on our list.

So before I start calling names, I'll go over a few of the rules that council has in place.

So the total time for oral communications is not for a period to exceed 30 minutes, and all topics must relate to City of Bellevue government.

People speaking to items on tonight's agenda will be called first, and then if time remains, people speaking to items not on tonight's agenda will be called in both of those categories.

The presiding officer is authorized to give reference to those who have not spoken to council within the last 60 days, or to those who will be speaking on topics that will come in front of the council within the next 60 days.

Each speaker is allowed to speak up to three minutes, and only three speakers are allowed to speak to any one side of a particular topic.

And I want to remind everyone that also 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 support or oppose a candidate for election, and that includes one's own campaign.

Any speaker beginning to speak on those topics will be asked to stop.

And with that, I'll call our first speaker who is Jesse Clausen, who I believe I see oh, okay.

She is here.

Right now, we have 2,158 residential units either submitted for permit or very close to it in the Wilverton sub-area.

That's including pre-ops and applications.

That's an incredible amount of housing.

Of those, 368 are affordable units, and that's not even counting Bellweather's project on city property, which is separate.

For context, there are only 253 MFTE units total currently online in all of Bellevue today.

That means Wilburton alone under the supercharger is producing more affordable units than the rest of the city combined.

To me, this says two things.

First, the supercharger works.

If the city wants market rate developers to provide affordable housing, the best way to do that is through meaningful incentives like this.

As the city considers mandatory affordable housing through HOMA, you'll be looking at that in December.

It should also consider a citywide supercharger to balance those requirements with opportunity.

Second, we should ensure that MFTE program can reach its full potential.

The 12-year extension needs to be on the table.

It needs to be on the table now.

That would allow all of those 368 units to remain affordable for 24 instead of 12 years.

And it gives developers the certainty they need when financing or refinancing.

There is no downside to the city to including it now.

We actually I represent a developer who would actually really like this.

He's refinancing his property.

Telling his loan people that hey, I can extend this program is very, very helpful to him.

So in summary, congratulations.

You're doing it.

Let's extend it to any other zone that includes mandatory housing, including downtown, and let's add the 12-year extension so we can keep those homes affordable for decades to come.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Valentina Veniva.

Um, my name is Valentina, and I participated in the community facilitator program organized by the Office of Housing.

As a facilitator, I had a chance to talk to people forced to relocate to the US after Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and volunteers that help them settle here.

Finding housing alone with finding a job is the biggest and hardest problem immigrants have to solve when they arrive.

I will try to highlight just two things.

First of all, you kind of think of affordable housing as just units at a certain price.

Affordable housing is really not affordable unless there is great access to other services and transit, because even if the family can buy a car, which initially they often cannot, usually there is just one person who can drive it, and that person needs the car to get to work.

Obviously, there should be grocery stores, there should be parks and libraries close by for children, but also medical services.

Many people eventually bring their agent parents, and an affordable clinic, even a small one in working distance, makes a huge difference.

And for immigrants, especially, affordable community spaces nearby are very important.

Older people are unlikely to master English enough to participate in activities the city organizes for seniors.

And there should be spaces where they can meet other people speaking their language and where volunteers can provide help to anyone.

And it is very important that those community hubs are in walking distance from housing or right next to good public transit.

The second thing I'd like to highlight is how poorly the system works for those it's supposed to help.

Initially I thought that volunteers just help with translation, but they have to do so much more.

They have a valuable local knowledge about different locations, like where public transit is good, where the landlords are good.

They help gather up-to-date information from all the different sources, say what kind of assistance is available right now, which wait lists are open, where are units are available for rent, and so on.

They also have to explain a lot to the people they help because information brochures are usually straight translations from English and assume background knowledge that you cannot have unless you have already lived in the US for some time.

Volunteers also provide transportation for appointments and help with moving in and out.

Some of those things Bellevue cannot fix, but it still can help.

For example, Bellevue can provide grants to grassroots organizations that help immigrants find housing and stay in that housing, especially now that many people are afraid to ask for help because they do not want to attract the attention of the current federal administration.

And things I've talked before access to grocery stores, transit medical services, community spaces, those things are kind of obvious, but it is easy to forget about them when you just focus on the number.

So please do not forget them.

Thank you.

Our next speaker on the list is Jodi Alberts, who's joining us virtually.

Miss Alberts, can you hear me?

I can't.

Can you hear me?

We can.

Your time begins now.

Okay, great.

Um, good evening, Mayor Robinson and Council members.

Again, my name is Jody Alberts with the Bellevue Chamber here on behalf of the Plush Committee and speaking on the MFTE program.

Thank you first for your continued leadership on housing policy and for your thoughtful work around this program.

We really appreciate the time and care that you're giving on this topic.

We see MFTE as one of the most important tools the city has, not only to support affordability, but to make sure new housing continues to get built.

As you look at potential updates to the program, we do have a few recommendations that we like to flag.

First, we strongly support including a 12-year extension option for MFTE projects.

Seattle actually just adopted this model recently, allowing projects to extend their exemption by another 12 years if they commit to slightly deeper affordability levels.

We think that that's a smart approach.

Bellevue should mirror and it keeps affordable units in place longer, supports refinancing for existing projects, and it doesn't cost the city anything to offer it.

Second, we'd recommend removing the requirement for parking subsidies and MFTE projects near high frequency transit.

We believe that this is an outdated policy that adds cost and reds counter to our climate and mobility goals.

If we're encouraging people to live near transit, we ask that the city not make this a requirement.

And then third, as you move forward with the housing and office mixed use strategy areas and look at expanding mandatory affordability requirements.

We urge you to keep the MFTE supercharger tool aligned with those policies without an incentive to offset the cost of new mandates, production could slow, including affordable units.

A citywide supercharger ensures we're pairing new requirements with workable incentives.

And just finally, I'd like to thank the council for including that supercharger concept in Wilburton.

That was a great example of balancing affordability with feasibility, and we fully support staff's additional eight-year options so long as it's paired with the 12-year program council has already directed.

So thank you again for your leadership and for your willingness to dig into the details of these housing tools.

We're eager to continue collaborating with the city to make sure Bellevue remains a vibrant, inclusive, and attainable place to live.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Sahara Amini.

Good evening, Mayor Robinson, Council members.

I'm Sahar Amini with Habitat for Humanity.

I want to begin by thanking the Office of Housing and the City staff for their uh for their strong outreach and collaboration throughout this process.

The level of engagement and openness to feedback from both community partners and a development community has made this work thoughtful, data-driven, and forward-looking.

Habitat supports the city's continued efforts to strengthen the multifamily tax exemption program, one of the most effective tools for expanding housing opportunities in Bellevue.

We support staff recommendation for a two to four-year look back, ensuring the program remains accountable and continues to deliver results in both housing production and long-term affordability.

We also support adopting a 20-year exemption for homeownership projects and extending the MFTE to allow non-residential to residential conversions citywide.

These changes will help activate underused spaces, expand housing supply, and open new pathways to home ownership for working families.

Important steps toward a more balanced housing ecosystem.

Habitat also supports the MFT supercharger in Vilburton as it goes hand in hand with an affordable housing requirement consistent with the East Side Affordable Housing Roundtable recommendation that was adopted by the city.

We believe DeVilburton Flamwork framework can serve as a strong model for future housing policies, but only when considered as a comprehensive system where incentives, affordability requirements, and design standards work together as they were intended.

At Habitat, we're continuing active conversations with both nonprofit and private market partners, and we look forward to collaborating with city staff and council as upcoming housing policies like HOMA and Bell Red are taking shape, ensuring that the tools that are provided fit the code and infrastructure of different parts of the city.

This continued partnership is how Bellevue can ensure growth that's both inclusive and equitable where homes are attainable for the people who make the city thrive.

Thank you to council for your leadership and for the city staff.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That was our third and final speaker in support of the MFTE item.

The next speaker on our list is Annika Zimbrunin.

Good evening, Mayor Robinson and City Council members.

Thank you for allowing me to speak.

My name is Annika Zumbrennan, and I am writing, I'm sure I wanted to share my concern for the Bellevue College Parent Education Program.

There's a budget proposal that to eliminate the program.

And this is deeply concerning any potential changes that might impact its future.

I've been part of this program since 2017 with both of my children growing up and its many offerings, toddler classes, infant, cooperative preschool, summer camps, and positive discipline courses.

For the past three years, I have also had the privilege of serving as chair of the Parents Advisory Committee, which supports the parent education program.

This program has shaped my parenting, enriched my children's early years, and built a supportive community that has carried my family through every stage of growth.

What makes this program so unique is the way it supports both parents and children in tandem for parents?

The in-person lab classes are transformative.

We gain hands on experience, work side by side with our children in the classroom and receive guidance from expert instructors.

The parent education sessions offer a safe, supportive space to connect, learn, and grow together, helping us become more confident, compassionate, and resilient in our parenting.

The curriculum is grounded in research and covers a wide range of essential topics, including sleep, toilet learning learning, and positive discipline among many other topics.

I can say without exaggeration that I would not have made it through the early parenting years without this program.

The benefits for children are just as profound in these play-based classrooms.

They thrive.

Through a well-rounded curriculum, including math, science, art, reading, music, and outdoor learning.

Children develop curiosity, creativity, and emotional intelligence.

They build friendships, gain confidence, and receive a strong foundation for lifelong learning.

The ripple effects of this program extend far beyond individual families.

Parents take the skills they gain into their workplaces, schools, and communities, becoming stronger leaders and more engaged citizens.

Personally, my own leadership journey from co-op preschool class chair to board chair to PAC chair was nurtured and supported every step of the way by this program.

Again and again, I've been inspired by the dedication and professionalism of the educators who make this possible.

As chair of the Parents Advisory Committee, I am asking for help and assistance to preserve and strengthen this invaluable program.

Our committed leaders on the PAC board are dedicated to continuing our work, helping ensure access for families who might not otherwise be able to participate.

We also remain focused on supporting and advocating for the program and for future families who will walk through its doors and be welcomed with open arms.

The Bellevue College Parent Education Program is not just a resource, it is a cornerstone of our community with a long and meaningful 60-year legacy.

Please help us preserve it and asking for any assistance and guidance of where to where we can go from here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker on the clerk that you asked Mrs.

Zumbrennan to uh send us all an email of your speaking points.

Yes, absolutely.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker on the list is Pamela Johnston.

And Ms.

Johnson is joining us virtually.

Ms.

Johnson, can you hear me?

I can hear you.

Perfect.

Your time begins now.

Hello.

I'm speaking today in regards to the public benefits writing system.

I request that council takes the learning that we've done and send it back to King County as to make this program better.

Um staff did a wonderful job in putting out the main points of this problem last week.

Um the the um memo says basically that this is one of those programs that doesn't really fit anywhere else.

Um but it's it's one of those things where it's a lot of a lot of different check marks on it and technically hard to see.

Um basically think that there's things in there that are I think King County needs to hear from Bellevue that we don't want to hear the same issue coming up over and over and over again for every single project.

Um, because we should have our our there's a conflict there in the um uses of if we're supposed to be saving space, or if we're supposed to be using space for development.

And this is a saving space problem, but not every place needs to be saved.

So I I just wanted to say thank you to the staff for doing such a good job and ask the council to please send back a letter to King County and ask them to fix up their system to make it really for what we want to save the space for.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The next speaker on our list is Joe Kunsler.

Mr.

Kunsler is also joining us virtually.

Can you hear me?

Yes, I can.

Okay, your time begins now.

Thank you.

Um good evening, Bible City Council.

Recent weeks we've seen on Team Kelly TV, Kirkland TV, and Billview TV, a Bill View politician who's been heavily sanctioned by the public disclosure commission and keep county elections decided to engage in a new campaign to meet Muslim Americans.

We happen to be an elected office and sworn both to the union in the best state and union, which would be Washington.

Some communities have issued resolutions in response to some more actions.

I think it's time Bill V joined that against Alan Zerman.

I want to be very clear here.

I'm getting really sick and tired of the Russian-style election interference trying to rip a support.

I wish it would just stop.

Um and I hope that Bellview leaders will stand up against it telling you of a lot of friends.

I think it's unfair to use public comment as a weapon even after you've lost your election contest.

And I hope that it stops.

Never is down.

I hope that Mr.

Zimmerman will be excluded for 180 days for both council and committees for this behavior continuing.

I go on, but I won't.

I think I've made my point.

Thank you for your public services always.

The next speaker on our list is Alex Zimmerman.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

I need to sit first.

Yeah, it's a problem.

Yeah.

One second.

Oh my gosh.

I smoke so slow.

I'm so sorry.

Mr.

Zimmerman, please put your sign down on the floor.

Thank you very much.

Please put your sign down on the floor.

Yeah, yeah.

That's not the floor, that's the chair.

Mr.

Zimmerman, please put your sign down on the floor so you don't block anybody.

Okay.

No, no, no, I don't block nobody.

Thank you.

Yeah, no problem.

No, no, no, it's okay.

Nobody.

Yeah, my name is Alex Zimmerman.

I leave this for 40 years.

And I sink local government in exactly for the last six years.

And I talk about this before.

It's look to me like Nazi fascist junta.

So I want to explain to you situation what is we have right now.

First, what is I want to explain to you?

Too many people in Bellview have two citizenship and they work for government.

By definition, by federal rules, by constitution and another rules to know what this means.

People with two citizenship cannot work in for government.

In Bellevue, how many people in community in a council chamber who have two citizenships?

Mr.

Zimmerman.

This has nothing to do with the Bellview City Council.

Okay.

Let's talk about things that have to do with the Bellevue City Council and preferably something that's on the agenda.

Oh, so you have two people who have two citizenship here in your chamber.

So this is exactly about council.

I've asked you once, and this is a second time.

No problem.

Yeah.

So my opinion about council, very simple right now.

You're not only fascist, you are killer.

Okay.

You are very heavy.

You cannot tell lies just to malign people's character.

All right.

If you do this again, I'm gonna ask you to leave.

If you no, I want to explain to you.

So we have fatality in transportation, 200%.

So when a year ago, 10 people die, right now 30, 40 people die.

And you guilty about this.

I never see in my life.

What is fatality in transportation and traffic, you know what this means.

For one year, jump by 200%.

You are killer.

You don't understand this?

Who make decision about this?

I no.

15 years ago, I told you red cameras, nothing.

15 years ago, I talk about this.

Nothing happened.

Five million dollars, 50 go to Arizona.

Right now we want to installate 40 speed camera, nothing will be changed.

Bellaview cannot accept so many people in the EU.

You bring this 120,000 people from Jungle Waters cannot drive.

It's not my opinion.

I drive car for 16 years in different city.

You are a killer.

You are a bandita.

It's exactly what's happened.

Whereas you see so traffic fatality jump by 200%.

I never see this in my entire life, and I stand in politica for all my life.

You are a killer.

You are a bandita.

Viva Trump, we have a new American revolution.

You need to stop on this.

This will be more fatality.

This never will be stopped when you criminal bandita in chamber.

Huh?

You see, I talk about that is the end of our registered list of speakers this evening.

So at this point, there are a couple of slots left for oral communications.

And I would ask if those of you joining us in council chambers, if there's anyone who would like to make a comment to the council, please raise your hand.

And then those of us online.

Mr.

Zimmerman, stop interrupting our meeting, please.

I'm sorry, city clerk.

You're fine.

Thank you.

Uh just a quick reminder that we have reached the three people uh maximum in support of the MFTE Adam.

But again, if there's anyone wishing to speak, please raise your hand.

Okay.

No speakers, Mayor.

I'll turn it back to you.

Okay.

It's always fun.

Okay.

Next up, uh, we have a written report on from the parks and community services board.

Uh and it's it's actually very interesting.

So I hope you all take a chance to read it.

Uh now we have a report from our city manager.

Go ahead and thank you, Mayor, Deputy Mayor and Council members.

This summer we uh reported to you on our five departments that have been accredited operating departments, and that included a report of our parks and community services department.

And their accreditation was in process at the time.

Um they have now since been uh re-accredited with a perfect score, which is quite amazing uh by the commission for accreditation of park and recreation agencies and the National Recreation and Parks Association.

It is a significant effort and a significant accomplishment.

I want to thank Director Shiosaki for his work and for all of the staff who are involved in that.

And tonight we're taking a moment here for Director Shiyasaki to highlight why we do it and the value of the accreditation process to the public.

So with that, I will turn it over to Director Shiyosaki.

Thank you, City Manager Carlson, and good evening, Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and members of City Council.

So tonight I bring you tidings of great joy, um, especially for parks and community services.

Um, you know, I'm so happy to share the news uh that your parks and community services department was formally notified that we have been re-accredited.

And uh, you know, uh we have the distinct distinction of being re-accredited four times.

We were first accredited 20 years ago in 2005.

And uh I know this starts to sound like a little bit of bragging, but so we are one of only three agencies in the entire state of Washington that is accredited, and one of uh 231 uh agencies nationwide.

So, as you heard, this uh presentation is a follow-up to the June 3rd more comprehensive presentation that deputy city manager McComan made uh about all the agencies across the city who are accredited.

So um why do we go through this effort?

You know, I I would say our department truly values the uh third party peer review, and uh, you know, through this process, it evaluates the effectiveness and efficiencies of our operations by comparing our plans, policies, and procedures uh to national uh standards.

You know, we believe it uh demonstrates that Bellevue is truly a leader in parks, recreation, and community services across uh the nation.

And uh I think it also shows our commitment to continuous improvement.

It also ensures the safety and well-being of all the participants in our parks uh and recreation programs, and um through these standardized practices and policies, and lastly, it demonstrates our commitment to excellence and to uh exceptional public service.

So um parks and community services is one of five departments across the city uh who are accredited.

You see the list in front of you.

But I would add that all departments and offices of the city really pay uh uh important roles in supporting these five departments.

So I I would say it's definitely a uh one city effort in achieving accreditation.

So our accrediting agency is CAPRA.

It is the commission for the accreditation of park and recreation agencies, and we are on a five-year review cycle, and there are 154 standards under which we are evaluated.

So those 154 standards, they you know explore um every aspect of the department's operations uh policies and procedures.

And um uh as I mentioned, maintaining this compliance is truly a one-city effort.

And I do need to uh call out several other departments in the city that are really so important in helping us achieve this, and that would be police and human resources, IT and finance, and the city attorney's office, they all play important roles in us uh accomplishing this.

So um, how does all this uh work get done?

And I'll say part of it is you know, we have a great leader in our department who leads the charge, and she's been doing it for the past five years, and that would be assistant director Tony Esparza.

She has truly been our ringleader in this.

Um, in addition to that, there are 20, there are more than 20 uh department standard leads who their responsibility would be to one, make sure the plans and policies within their area of the department are up to date, and they also need to track our progress throughout the five years.

And there is a great deal of coordination with other other departments, as I mentioned.

So, first, and the biggest part of this is completing our self-assessment report.

And um, I'll say that this report with all its attachments, it's more than a thousand pages, so it's something we don't print out readily.

Um then there's also a formal application that has to uh be done.

The the CAPRA review team or the CRT conducts an advanced review, and then there's a site visit, either uh in person or virtual.

We chose the virtual option, and um all the documentation we put together is reviewed by this uh review team, and then uh there's a lot of question and answer that happens during the site visit, and that happened at the end of April and or excuse me, the end of March and early April.

Then the review team submits their findings to the Capra board, and then hopefully the board gives the thumbs up.

And then finally, um just in September, it was the announcement of reccreditation at the National Recreation and Parks Association National Uh Conference.

And shown in the photo is one of our park rangers, Laura Harper, who was there to accept this very award.

So and I'll just say so.

Uh and uh this year, and it was true also in 2020, we received a perfect score.

We passed all 154 standards.

Um you aren't required to pass all 154.

So we do feel the pressure to always be perfect now.

Um we received some uh high compliments, and so I'll just list a few of them that you know our report was thorough and had well organized responses that made the reviewers' job easy.

We have beautiful and well-written plans that were enjoyable to read.

You know, you don't you don't hear that about plans all the time.

And um, our processes are integrated throughout the department in the city.

We demonstrate in-depth expertise, and our staff are very proud of the work they do.

And there is a clear commitment to thorough and thoughtful community outreach, and a high value is placed on the voice of our community.

And uh I'll end this uh part with a quote, and I think it sums it up pretty well.

Um the quote was right from the start, it was clear the entire Bellevue Parks and Community Services team is highly collaborative, well organized and efficient.

These themes remain evident and true throughout the week of the actual uh site visit, evaluation, process, processes, and systems evolution, inclusivity, collaboration, innovation, community engagement, and standardization were major values demonstrated throughout the review and the visit.

So what's next?

So we wish we got to like put this on the back burner for the next five years, but we don't get to do that.

Uh there is an annual reporting requirement, so uh we have to demonstrate every year how we're implementing what we said we would do.

Um, and then on the CAPRA side, because uh they want to ensure that accreditation represents the current best standards, they are rewriting all the standards.

So this next go round, there won't be any cutting and pasting and minor updates, so it will be kind of starting all over again.

So with that, I just want to uh thank you very much for your ongoing support and for your time and attention this evening.

Well, congratulations, we'd love to do a picture.

Are there some people here tonight who would like to be in that picture?

I'm sure there's many people that would like to join in the future.

If we have a lot, then the council can be one of our park uh board members is here.

I think Eric, would you like to join in the country?

Okay, is there a motion to approve the consent calendar?

I move to approve the consent calendar.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Excuse me.

Okay, we have two study session items tonight.

We'll do the first one, then we'll take a break.

And so I'd like to ask Ms.

Carlson for you to go ahead and introduce that first one for us.

Tonight we have the 2025 affordable housing strategy update.

And Bellevue adopted our affordable housing strategy in 2017.

That was the first one.

And in it, the city identified a 10-year target for affordable housing, and that was met in 2023.

So tonight you'll hear about the current update underway.

This update serves as a roadmap.

It includes goals, objectives, and strategies that will help drive the actions that the city will look at taking to achieve the housing affordable housing target for the next 10 years.

And that target was set in 2024.

Tonight's presentation is informational.

It's an opportunity to see how the update is being framed and formatted and shaped, and for the council to give some feedback as staff works to continue the process to complete it.

And with that, I will introduce Bianca Siegel, Director of Office of Housing, and Hannah Bondmiller, our senior affordable housing planner, to give you the overview and the update tonight.

With that, I'll hand it over to Bianca.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and Council members.

I'll turn it over to Hannah.

Thank you, Council members.

As mentioned, tonight's presentation is for information only, but we are very excited to be here tonight to be able to share a progress port update with you on the work that has been happening since council officially launched this update project last November.

And we'll be starting this briefing with just a brief overview of the affordable housing strategy itself and the update process.

We'll talk a little bit about the project goals and what we have proposed as draft strategies.

And as mentioned, that work began last November when you all officially launched the update process to have staff develop a plan to address housing affordability over the next seven years.

And during that project launch, the council did establish a new 10-year affordable housing target to help guide the development and implementation of this work.

And while the affordable housing strategy is heavily focused on income restricted affordable housing, it does also look to move the needle on other housing goals and priorities at the city that are documented in our comprehensive plan.

So to dig a little bit more into the affordable housing target that council set out last year.

This is a 10-year target that is broken down for under 80% AMI income bans.

And how we developed this target was using our 25-year housing growth target and using an analysis to distribute need by different income levels.

The result is this estimated need of 5,700 affordable units under 80% AMI in the next 10 years.

And as you can see, that is significantly weighted towards the under 50% AMI levels.

This is ambitious target.

It is not based on what we think we can accomplish.

It is based on estimated need in the community.

And we'll dig into that a little bit more momentarily.

For now, we want to talk briefly about the goals and draft strategies of the update.

We benefit that this update is being informed by overall city goals, objectives, and guidance.

We have significant direction from our city leadership from past decisions that you all have made that we are using as a foundation for this work, and these are things that we consistently point back to in the development of the update to showcase alignment with our with the overall city goals.

And so this includes looking at our strategic target areas, especially the high quality built and natural environment and thriving people and communities, as well as our comprehensive plans housing element and that overall affordable housing target.

The comprehensive plan in particular is a significant source of direction for the update, and this is where our five overall project goals are sourced from, and we'll overview these very briefly.

But the goal of affordable housing, this is really focused on increasing those income-restricted affordable housing units in the community.

Housing equity is aiming to eliminate disparities by different identities such as race, age, sexual orientation, or ability.

Housing for unique needs, that is a goal that's focused on creating more housing units that are available and affordable to those who might have unique circumstances, folks like seniors, families with children, or those with disabilities who might need unique housing types.

Housing stability is really focused on keeping low and moderate income households within their homes in the community.

And finally, housing supply and diversity is focused on creating more housing in general and more housing types for folks at all stages of life.

And so of these policy goals, as you can see, the affordable housing goal is really aligned with that new affordable housing target and is therefore a major focus of our plan.

And we know that these other housing priorities are important, but they do support other housing outcomes and priorities beyond production and preservation of income restricted units.

They're more focused on things like making sure people can access housing and other community needs to stay in their housing and make sure that their housing meets all of their different unique circumstances.

And so those five goals really form the basis of the update.

Each goal area has strategies associated with it that are nested under those various goals.

These strategies are buckets of work that we think can move the needle on that specific goal outcome.

And underneath each of the strategies, we have actions, which are really the specific implementation tasks.

So as you'll see, we do have a significant amount of work proposed.

A full list of the 27 proposed strategies was shared as an attachment to the council materials, and for this briefing, we're going to be zooming in on two of those strategies that are focused on preservation.

One aims to acquire and rehabilitate naturally occurring affordable housing.

The other is aiming at assessing and shoring up our existing affordable housing portfolio.

And so these two strategies are a new focus of the 2025 update.

We know that much of our unit progress from 27 2017 strategy implementation was due to preservation either by the King County Housing Authority or other housing developers in the city.

And so we want to leverage that success.

The photo on the screen is actually an example of the success.

It's of Aventine, which is a successful acquisition rehab project, you may recall.

This is a building that the low income housing institute acquired in downtown Bellevue using the city's housing stability program.

And Lehigh was able to preserve the existing affordable units from converting to market rate and also expand affordability to new units within that building.

So these efforts to acquire and preserve properties, either our NOAA properties or our existing income restricted housing, this has lower costs than new construction, and that often makes them easier to finance if there's capital that can be deployed quickly.

We also know that these preservation tools allow units to come online faster.

We're maybe talking about months for some rehab versus the year-long timeline that new construction can take.

So as part of the strategy, we are looking at ways that we can accelerate this work at the city by proposing actions that increase our ability to identify NOAA properties for potential acquisition to assess the needs within our existing affordable housing portfolio and to create processes so that we can deploy funds quickly to meet market timelines.

And so the work to develop these proposed strategies is not just based on the city's existing guidance.

We've also done some city specific or excuse me, project specific analysis and engagement that's informed that that we want to overview briefly with you all.

In particular, we want to highlight the work of the city and ARCH staff to conduct a gap analysis that the excuse me to conduct an analysis to assess the gap between the that the affordable housing strategy needs to fill.

So to do that, we used a gap analysis that looked at what we think that we can accomplish right now, pre-affordable housing strategy based on our existing tools and market environment, and where we need to be to accomplish the affordable housing target.

And as we can see, there is a gap, and this is why the affordable housing strategy is important and we're doing this work.

Right now we are on a course to build or preserve about 3,700 affordable units in the next 10 years, which is about 65% of that overall goal.

And as you can see, there is some significant misalignment between the distribution of those units by different incomes.

The majority of what we expect to produce will be at the above 50% AMI level, leaving some deficits at those lower income levels.

So before I dive into why this is important, this is where we offer the caveat.

We want to acknowledge that there are a lot of factors that influence whether the city is going to be able to meet this affordable housing target.

Things like federal policy, interest rates, the costs of construction and labor.

These are not things that the city can control, but will most definitely impact our progress towards our goals.

So we want to acknowledge that and make sure that the work we're doing is focused on what is within our control.

And so why we share this gap analysis is because we do think it's very important to acknowledge and be honest that this is a lofty goal that's going to take additional work to reach.

The fact that we can see 3,700 affordable units come on in 10 years or expect to is really significant.

And we also see we have a lot of tools that support production at that 50% above 50% AMI level, and we see strong outcomes from that.

But this analysis does make it clear that we need more work to meet that overall target and to produce at those lower AMI levels.

So this gap analysis has informed our development of the proposed strategies and made us focus on putting additional tools in place to support an under 50% AMI environment.

This includes work like reducing costs for 100% affordable housing development and identifying new revenue and financing tools that the city can implement.

So this is an ambitious goal, but we think that with the strategy, our new actions are going to move the needle even more, and that we can be closer to meeting the city's housing needs.

So additionally, we had a robust community engagement that is informing the development of the strategy.

We've so far completed two phases of engagement, and a summary report of the first phase of engagement was included as an attachment to your council materials.

And that first phase was really focused on education and informational events and getting the word out and building our audience.

So to do this, we focused on some fun non-traditional events to get folks out and talking about affordable housing in new ways.

Some highlights were hosting a housing focused short film festival at City Hall.

It was a really cool night.

We had popcorn.

And these non-traditional events actually got new folks out to talk about affordable housing, and through them, we were able to reach around 300 community members and about 25 different organizations.

And all of our public events in phase one and subsequent have really emphasized language access.

We know that this is housing as an issue that affects all sorts of people, and we want to make sure that they're involved in the conversation.

And so we utilize the city's cultural outreach assistance to make sure that we were spreading the word far and wide and that we had materials that were available and understandable in other languages.

Our phase two engagement was really more targeted.

It focused on reaching those who are most close who are closest to the housing issues, including our technical experts and those with lived experience.

And tonight we really want to highlight the work to develop and implement our community facilitator program.

Thank you to Valentina for coming out and sharing her experience.

This is a program that the city piloted as part of the strategy to hire community representatives to host listening sessions with folks who would likely not otherwise come out to city events.

And this program is really based on the understanding that city staff aren't always the best person to have the conversation.

We know that community members may be more likely to give insights, especially around sensitive and personal issues like housing with folks that they have existing relationships with and may share community identities with.

So we were able to recruit and compensate nine community facilitators to host conversations and listening sessions in August and September.

And these conversations were folks with lived experience who deal with housing issues, even if they may not live in income-restricted affordable housing, and honestly, we would likely not otherwise participate in this process.

And so altogether, our facilitators were able to conduct 35 listening sessions over the course of about six weeks.

It's a lot of work.

And so finally that brings us to our next steps.

Um while this project is nearing its conclusion, we are still hoping and um asking for community input before we begin drafting the full strategy.

Uh we have some touch points with our organizational partners planned in October and in November.

We're planning on hosting a uh public information session here at City Hall on uh November 6th.

Um and we're also be opening an online public survey for folks to participate in as well.

Um so encourage uh folks to uh come out to that event and uh stay tuned for that survey.

Um and this is all going to come together in that full draft strategy and action plan with those prioritized actions.

We'll be bringing that back to you all um in January for review and adoption, and we're really looking forward to uh final action.

Um and with that that concludes my remarks, and uh Mayor, I'd be happy to turn it back to you.

Okay, thank you, Bianca Hannah.

That was really a great presentation.

I appreciate it.

Um this is information only, and I will go ahead and start um calling on Council Burma Lee.

Uh thank you.

We've been working on this for quite a while, so uh it's a lot of things that have gone uh through conversation, discussion.

Uh you know, it began, I remember in comp plan, we were talking about housing.

That's why it's very challenging topic because so many people are affected at different levels and different ways.

You know, it's very difficult to define.

And uh so I think your outreach is really one of the key things, which obviously you've shown what you have done.

Um I'm still have some question regarding outreach.

Uh I noticed that you're talking about language, you talk about mostly the picture I saw is organizations that represent uh some connections, you know, with already previous uh involvement.

Um it's hard to say, you know, from my own personal experience.

Uh you're talking to mostly senior citizens, uh and the parents of people who work here.

Uh the people I know, you know, from different cultures, they come here to work as high-tech employees.

Uh they're busy, they're working, they're making money, they raise their kids, and uh financially to do pretty well, you know, they all make six figures.

Um the parents are the problem, uh challenge.

The parents usually don't know the language.

Um they depend on the kids.

They depend on organizations, you know, which can help them uh from day-to-day social activities, basically social, just keep busy.

Um I think when you talk to them about what they need and tell them what are the things that they can assess, access, rather.

To me, I think it's a challenge for them to communicate back to the kids.

In those cultures, the kids make the decisions.

The kids make decisions based on their own experience, based on own perception of what they need in the traditional family system, you system.

In those cultures, usually the family, the parents, they live with the kids.

You know, but in this country, the parents don't live with the kids because the kids say, well, you know, they they cannot take care of them.

So tend to find outside help, even if they live there, but their social activities is outside.

So I don't know whether there's a connection when you talk to the parents, whether the kids themselves which ultimately the decision makers.

Uh whether they actually know what's going on, what's communicated, whether we planning to do, and if they have any opinions, how is they gonna pass on back to us?

City council city staff that are making decisions ultimately.

I think that's a challenge.

So I think that uh there has to be a link somehow we can get to the decision makers, which are the kids of the people we're talking to, which have housing challenges.

So I'm not seeing that.

I think this uh all coaches are similar, immigrant coaches.

Um they're family-oriented, that's how they can get here.

Uh and it depends on the kids, and the kids are busy making money.

Uh when I, you know, when we council went through the uh plan, uh we went talk about housing.

Uh difficult.

Most people don't understand what we're talking about.

You know, I was uh interview uh as a outreach.

Yeah, very seldom that I get a call.

We would like to get a few mentioned, ask questions what do you think?

I was totally confused.

Very challenging.

You and you know, I know what's going on.

But the question has the way they ask it.

Uh you know, and it's also I was the probably first ones that would do a questioning.

So the the surveyor taker, the survey take it.

Also, probably is just learning how to you know address, yes.

You know, I asked questions when I got surveyed as I just answer them.

I said, Why are you asking this?

How about how does it take?

And they say, well, it takes 10 minutes.

As it turned out took me 50 minutes, and I studied figure out that you know I asked or answered the questions they really need.

So it's challenging.

So I think what we do is very important based on the survey we make, based on the input we make.

If we don't get the right answer, I think we're not going to be able to make good decisions.

That's the first one.

Second, we have to make decisions by uh January.

That's very short time.

You know, I think that before I can make my decision, I need to know by answer, your answer to the to the survey.

That's going to take some time to figure out.

I don't know whether you can actually you're assuming that the survey is all good.

The survey is accurate.

We got all the information we need.

I I believe that we did a good job making the initial strategy.

We set the target 37,000 units or five and uh 100, 100, 3700 units.

But now we want to change it.

Because maybe there's some new input or whatever.

Maybe we we fear that the twos, or not the two is necessary.

That's what I want to hear from you also.

What strategy we may have to come with, what's the change that requires to and understand more input, more information, so that we can change our strategy.

We can create more tools to get to where we're going to go, right?

House Mansay would talk about MFTE and all that stuff.

And we heard some people speak, maybe that's good enough, maybe that isn't.

But you want to do that when you know have the real numbers.

What is it going to be?

Because it's going to affect the next step, you know, HOMA.

It's all going to be related.

So I want to be sure we have a short footing, sure information, sure base to make the decision on.

Okay.

Thank you.

Good input.

Thank you.

Councilmember Hamilton.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, thanks for the presentation, uh, Bianca and Hannah.

Thanks for all your efforts in support of addressing the needs of affordable housing in our city.

Uh the council staff and stakeholders, we're housing suppliers, nonprofits serving the city, and community members are responsible for ultimately implementing the strategy and accomplishing our affordable housing goals.

We all succeed or fail as one, and considering the short supply of affordable housing, we can't afford to not meet our goals.

One of the strategies mentioned to increase the supply of income restricted affordable housing is to leverage city resources for affordable housing.

I'm just wondering if you could give me an example or two of the most impactful ways we can leverage city resources to add more affordable housing.

Um thank you, Councilmember Hamilton.

Um I appreciate the question.

Um, in terms of city resources for affordable housing, I think a great example is um um something that we are doing right now, and we're hoping to seek to expand, which is to utilize city-owned land um to dispose that for use and development of affordable housing.

Um, so we know that land is very expensive in Bellevue and in short supply.

And so um, this is one of the resources that the city has that we can leverage for affordable housing development um when appropriate in specific cases.

Um so that is something that we're doing now, and the strategy seeks to expand.

And then um a similar but um different concept is thinking about how um not necessarily um using land solely for affordable housing, but is there possibilities for future of co-location of housing with city facilities where appropriate?

Um so this is um something that other jurisdictions have explored and successfully implemented in some cases, um, and so that is one of um the items that is also within that overall strategy.

Okay, well that was an excellent answer, thank you.

That's very exciting.

Um so yeah, anyhow.

I mean, this is great work, you've done a lot of good work here already, and of course, uh a lot more to do.

Ultimately, uh, we're gonna have an extensive detailed plan to review.

So I want to be sure that we have plenty of time to understand it and work together to fine-tune it so that when we begin to focus on the budget, we are ready to support the implementation of the affordable housing strategy.

So thanks again.

Thank you, Mayor.

Great.

Um, Councilmember Bargada.

Well, thank you very much.

Uh uh enjoyed the presentation, Bianca Hannah.

Um I also uh, you know, uh really appreciate all the rigor that's gone into a very aggressive target for 5700 units across different AMIs uh over a you know condense period, it's not something that's going to be easy to achieve, and I really appreciate sort of a needs-based approach versus a uh you know things that we have more confidence in.

So it allows us to have innovation and really push the boundaries in this process to achieve these lofty goals.

That's great.

Uh, I really have two comments more than uh questions and just suggestions as you think about this.

Um the first one is uh as I read through the strategies, I also really appreciate the the uh before I get there, the sort of double click on trying to get to a more actionable plan and strategies that you think that can help us get to those outcomes.

I also really appreciate the community facilitated process to leverage the trust in the community to get the input.

That's a great step as well.

Uh to all nine and others you will continue to recruit.

However, when I look across the strategies, um, one of the things that I was thinking about the trade-offs across different strategies, how do we come to uh sort of a guiding principle across those was not clear to me and might be worth considering as you evolve this further.

An example of that is you know, we want more affordable housing, but we also want to achieve housing at deeper AMIs, and so just getting more affordable housing at 80% versus achieving the 30 to 50 percent or sub-50% AMI could be potentially uh at odds based on different actions that we evolve.

So those trade-offs and how we think about those become really important.

A similar one could be, you know, you have housing diversity uh and smaller houses for different, you know, family needs or different kinds of resident needs, that also can also come in and be a trade-off against the number of units versus the diversity of housing types that we're able to get.

And so when you get to those positions, when especially for investments and you know, the limited resources we may have to try and achieve our outcomes, how do we establish that balance is something to think about?

Um that's one comment.

And the second thing is um, you know, for me, getting clearer on the tactical steps that we have for the action.

Some of them I think we can make more robust.

Uh, like for example, the acquisition of uh uh and preservation of affordable housing units in the city.

I don't know if we have an entitlement clarity that says if you want to achieve this much.

The city only offers a limited supply of housing we can preserve that is already affordable.

And so, what is that entitlement?

How much can we stretch ourselves to achieve that?

There's a limit to that, and then what happens after that is one suggestion of where we get more tactical uh potentially that would help give um more credence to where we're going and how we're doing this.

Um local revenue sources is another one uh where you know more detail around what those could look like will quickly become the question.

Uh and so those are two uh comments and suggestions on how to improve this further.

So but I really appreciate the work that's gone in.

Thank you.

Okay, I'm just trying to something they have to say.

Uh okay, council member New Enhouse.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Uh, great presentation.

Um great to get up as Council Member Lee said this is obviously a very important topic and something that we need to continue to obviously uh address with these uh new new strategies.

Uh first of all, love the fact that you zeroed in on an example, I'm not sure it was on purpose or not, but the preservation um and um acquisition strategies so important.

We always you know look to the shiny uh of developing, but there's always a lot of great um opportunities when it comes to preserving and acquiring access, and and you put it here requires new processes, and I was wondering if you could touch on that a little bit and provide a little bit of color in terms of what those processes would need to be in order to um really expedite um uh a very cost-effective strategy.

Um can you touch on that a little bit?

Um yes, thank thank you, Councilmember Newman House.

Um in that comment, what I was referencing was um some coordination that we're hoping to undertake with um our uh uh FAM department around how we can potentially allocate resources uh quickly to be able to respond to new acquisition opportunities.

Um we have um uh found that the government bureaucracy doesn't always move at the pace of the market.

And so by having an established process that we're able to work out with our fam staff beforehand, we think that we may be able to leverage some new opportunities in different ways that right now we can't take advantage of.

So these would be internal city processes to help us expedite that work um and those resources, um, how that may uh what that process may look like would need to um be fully developed in in conjunction with those other staff.

Okay, so we get some specific examples of that uh during the next update.

Yeah, um just to add on to that a little bit.

So we we already have some opportunities in place with the housing stability program that has been used to um to support acquisition and preservation in some cases in addition to the um uh sort of flexible financial tools that would allow us to move quickly when uh opportunities arise.

We're also looking at items in the plan that would um uh better assess the state of the um city's existing housing, identify future um uh preservation opportunities so that we're aware of those in advance and work towards them more specifically.

Yeah, I remember from past conversation or just awareness that you know properties may um be coming on the market that we could acquire before it even hits the market is you know, really really important.

Uh another question is um in in any of the and I may have missed it um regarding any of the strategies regarding specific goals for uh homeownership uh to help communities um build generational uh wealth that perhaps previously they were unable to attain.

Um you speak to that.

Um yes, uh so we uh do have goals for um home uh affordable homeownership within the strategy.

They're largely nested within our housing equity goal item.

Okay.

Um we are still continuing to refine the final metrics for the plan, but um right now we are proposing a metric around um new or preserved affordable homeownership units so that we can be attentive to the progress that we're making around that goal area um since um you know uh historically our our uh new and preserved units have traditionally been um the majority rental housing.

Okay.

All right.

Well I look forward to some more specifics on that one as well.

And then last question I had is um uh because I did not see it in the packet, but I couldn't miss that the 24 25 organizations that you had uh mentioned.

I mean, that's that's great, great outreach.

Um uh and and the number of residents as well, great outreach.

But who are the 25 organizations?

Um can those be listed out, please.

I just think from a matter of transparency to the public as well, they should know who these organizations are that are seeking to um um you know influence our affordable housing strategy.

So if you could provide that in the future as well, unless again, unless I missed it, but I don't think I did.

Um if we could list those out, I think that would be great.

Happy to, Councilmember, thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, Councilmember Sumadouria.

Thank you.

Um I am so I think right reading this is really exciting because I love that these non-traditional events and language because I think that when you create a really safe space, people tend to have sheer really authentic feedback, and as you know, any kind of policies made for humans.

So it has to make for the betterment of the community.

I have just a few um clarified cash questions to ask.

One of the things I um uh how are we ensuring the renters and also youth and underserved groups that meaningfully involve shaping the strategy?

The reason I asked is actually I can connect with how um Councilmember Lee said as immigrants, you know, I was a decision maker for my household at very young age.

So I think that's important to know that that is probably a very unique demographic that we need to reach, and also they might not be able to be connecting with the community because they are either going to school or working hard.

Um I'm just I would love to see how can we engage that part more intention with more intentionality.

Um another question is I think that it's it's really important that we can we I think that it be great we can focus on the workforce development.

So have we done any um engaged in the college, other maybe in the training center to ask the needs of the teachers and students doing engagement.

Um yes, happy to speak to some of the work that we've been able to do in those areas.

Um we were able to go to the Youth Link Council earlier this year, present to that group, as well as um participate as one of the workshops and the youth involvement conference.

Um that was a great way to get out, and there's actually a new action team at Youth Link who's really excited, and they're gonna come out and help uh volunteer at our public info session.

Um so that's some of the ways that we've been able to engage young people.

Um also um uh our community facilitator program has been really um essential in filling some of these gaps.

Um we did have a uh student at Bellevue College who participated as one of our community facilitators and was able to reach folks in her network.

We also had a small business entrepreneur who participated as one of our community facilitators.

Um they also serve on our B Dan.

Um, and so from those conversations, we have been able to connect with some folks.

Um obviously, we are in close connection with our economic development team and the work that they're doing around their strategy update and trying to align what they're hearing from their engagement around housing affordability in the business community with our work as well.

Um, and then just finally um as to your question about reaching renters, um, one of the lessons learned that we've um implemented in our public events is that um if you want to reach folks who are most impacted by housing issues, you need to have uh resources available to help them meet their needs.

Um so that's something that we incorporated into our housing 101 and resource fare, and based on our optional demographics that we collect at our housing events, it really did seem that we had um uh the turnout reflected those resources being available.

Thank you.

And one other um it's more common.

So I would uh because when we are building other housing in the future, right?

I think it's crucial to kind of keep in mind of the team of us constructing maintained housing as well because it I mean it's a safety matter, right?

When you drive two or three hours to come build a building for people who are in need, it's it's tiring, and then also it could be really dangerous when your lack of sleep because driving.

So I think that one um comment I want to make is maybe if we could maybe thinking about like training or having like a program that's kind of tied up to the affordability affordable housing where we focus on the workforce on the construction side as well.

Um, last thing my statement just I think this strategy is really thoughtfully connecting the housing with a broader community goal.

Um I just love to see even more connection with you know the small business support, workforce development, and of course the um educational access where maybe we can have some collaboration with the school district, see how we can help the kids have closer housing near school so the family who's in need, they can the kids would never have spent any night in the car.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember.

I wonder if we can give council member Sumeruaria some information on the partnerships we have with the school district and the human service providers that do that very thing.

Okay, good.

Um let's see, Deputy Mayor.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Bianca and Hannah.

That was a great, great presentation.

Uh appreciate all of the hard work that you put in this comprehensive update.

Plus one to all of the council members here, especially.

I would also love to know more about the homeownership that has been mentioned.

Uh I started with the first thing that I was not even planning to talk, but when you were uh presenting caught my eyes, is I remember when the King County communicated some very large number that recommended to each city uh at what percent AMI.

We use the language that that's going to be our target, but it is very, very hard to achieve.

But in about our number, about the city number, about the 5,700 number.

The language was we are going to build and preserve this number.

In today's meeting, when you were talking.

I've heard several times that this is a very hard number to achieve.

It's a need, but we are hoping to get there.

Am I seeing a change in the tone, or am I just overfixated in some wording that I just uh covered off guard in today's meetings?

And again, I know all of them are hard.

Zero to 30% is really hard.

But I but the way we're talking about that, the King County number was target.

This is what we are going to build and preserve in the next 10 years.

Yeah.

Um so uh yes, um, Deputy Mayor, just to be clear, our 5700 affordable housing units in the next 10 years.

This is a city of Bellevue need methodology that we've utilized that is separate from the King County affordable housing need allocations as part of our comprehensive plan planning process.

Those King County uh need allocations are very important.

Those are something that is wrapped into our comprehensive planning process that we are planning for and accommodating those need levels.

Uh what we have done is um we have used a city of Bellevue methodology to establish a short-term target for the city.

Um in terms of the tone, I believe that this is something that we still aim to have the strategy um uh accomplish, and we want to be transparent uh with the council member in the community about the level of effort that it will take to get us there.

So our tone has changed or it has not changed?

I think it has not changed.

We're we're sort of talking about two sets of numbers.

There's the overall number that was considered for capacity planning purposes and the comprehensive plan.

And what we're looking at here is a subset of that that's really focused on affordable housing needs and the ability of the affordable housing strategy to put us on a path to achieve to meet those needs.

Which we're acknowledging is still very hard.

So not a different tone, just a uh more focused conversation, maybe.

I guess I can take this uh off the dais for maybe more detailed conversation.

Uh I love the engagement effort and especially your new engagement effort.

Uh great job.

I think you bring, and thank you to Valentina for uh leading that, uh, bring 150 plus people that we could never even probably heard.

Uh my one question about that effort is are there any new programs came to fruition just so just exactly because that community feedback and you guys not were not thinking about that.

We just went to this all of these engagement and we learned something that we could not have achieved on our own, and it's all due to this engagement.

Um yes, Deputy Mayor, I uh we actually did um add new things um into our strategies and actions based on what we heard um in that round of engagement.

Um, in particular, in particular, as Valentina highlighted, the challenges around navigation and being able to access information um by members of the community.

Um we did have some um elements of that within uh the strategy itself, but hearing um the really significant challenges within the community and the need expressed, um, that is something that we did elevate more.

Um so looking at new ways that we can improve city of Bellevue information, ways that we can work with Arch to make their resources more accessible, and then potentially considering ways that we can support additional navigation services either at the city or in the community.

Thank you.

That's great.

Can you please go back to slide 14?

I have one comment and then maybe I have uh maybe two comments.

Uh, one, I think we should not say that we think we are going to achieve, I think you said you said 65% of the goal.

And combining all of these AMI as a together, I think that's not the if this happens.

If exactly this estimated production happen in 10 years from now, I don't think we can just say we achieve 65% of the goal because we are completely mismatching our AMI percentage.

So I highly recommend we don't use uh the goal of affordability under one umbrella because from zero to 30 percent, as you know better than me, 30 to 50 percent and 50 to 80 percent are completely different games, and I would just use each of those segment a success percentage separately.

That's one recommendation.

The other question or comment is there are 2,000 shortage in what you are we we are seeing here, and you are saying that your strategy is going to address that.

So in the next session that you come back, you kind of do this mapping for us that these strategy that you are all going to uh with action plans eventually fill this gap at the best that we can.

Is that correct assumption that when you come back, this is going to be something that we will see?

Um we'll definitely bring back information on the order of magnitude that we think different at um actions and strategies will have in terms of impact.

Um at this time um we are not you know going to have a specific number of units.

Um, as we said, there are lots of factors that do play into what we think we might be able to accomplish with our new tools and strategies, including level of resources, and so we will um try to provide a level of detail that um is sufficient to help you with your decision making, and uh we'll you know look to make sure that that's appropriate.

Um, and um at the same time, we may not have you know specific numbers associated with every action.

Thank you.

That's a great answer.

Uh just two more questions maybe very short.

Uh about the housing equity.

So this is the place that you are going to address the unique needs of different demographic, marginalized group.

Uh am I right in that section you are going to see this stuff?

I checked there was a there was a metric that I didn't understand how much the housing equity concept.

The metric was increase the number of new or preserved affordable homeownership unit, homeownership units.

How that tie to addressing the housing equity.

Uh thank you, Deputy Mayor.

Um, so we have two relevant uh goals to that issue.

We have a goal around housing equity, and then we actually have a specific goal around housing for unique needs.

Um, and that housing for unique needs goal is where we um have strategies and actions that um address things like uh uh housing for folks with disabilities, seniors, families with children.

Um housing equity is more focused on um disparities between different identity groups.

Uh one of the major disparities that we see is in rates of homeownership in the community, um, especially amongst black and uh Hispanic Latino um households, and so um the metric around affordable homeownership is really um an effort to um really create more uh opportunities for affordable homeownership in Bellevue with the intent that that would open up more opportunities for um uh folks to uh transition from rentership to homeownership.

I think that's a great explanation, but in the metric is just tracking the number of units.

So are you saying that you are doing that by different categories, and then that's how we are tracking RV on track or not?

I think maybe you need to expand on that metrics because the metrics by itself doesn't uh at least to my eyes, doesn't address the need.

I think my last comment is uh this is uh I think we we need to be uh somehow find the impact of all of these strategies and be able to be evaluated over over the time.

So hopefully you are thinking about that that how can we ensure a feedback loop that can provide continuous improvement based on all of these strategies, and if there is a way that we can uh see all of those impact would be great, and hopefully you are thinking about that.

Thank you so much.

Great presentation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

Um, I have some questions.

Um read my writing.

Oh, you know, at public comment, we we heard somebody speaking about Valentina, I believe, the value of a community around transit, and I've always wanted to call it TOC instead of TOD.

And I actually encourage us to use transit-oriented community because that a community involved includes all those support systems with the grocery store and the multimodal transportation and and everything else that makes a community, so it's not just about putting housing in or office building or whatever it is, it's about the the whole community.

So I would encourage us to kind of define what community is and really aim for that around transit.

Um then this is uh somewhat philosophical, but the whole goal of this housing is to get enough housing so that rents naturally decrease so that people can afford to live here.

We're all you know, the whole country is like 10 years behind in housing production, and so everybody who is working on this is in addition to wanting to create more affordable housing, just more housing, period.

So, as we succeed in doing that, and in our long-term plans, we're certainly planning to create was it 35,000 new housing units in the next 20 years or something.

Um as rents go down.

I feel like people the developers are going to feel like they failed because they're not their profits are going to be different, and they will not be as inclined to want to build housing.

So I hope that in part of this program, we're also looking at ways to make housing development more affordable for the developer, too.

So I think that has to go hand in hand.

Um you can't underestimate underestimate the value of housing preservation.

I just want to kind of talk about that a little bit.

You're preserving communities.

Oftentimes you preserve the very community that's still in the housing, which is great.

You save uh all that building from going into a landfill.

You retain the character of the neighborhood because you retain the building, but the building gets rehabilitated.

So it looks brand new on the outside and on the inside.

And I know when we did Highland Village, they ended up changing the entire drainage system that had been done incorrectly in the first place.

And I mean it was such a superior product by the time they were done preserving that, and then that's in perpetuity affordable.

So I'm really all about housing preservation.

I'm glad we're focusing on that.

Um councilmember Suma Dewey kind of mentioned this too.

I'd love to do out uh targeted outreach to the people who work in our city who are trying to get closer to home.

And I wonder if Mini City Hall plays a role in this.

Seems like a good pivot point.

Um I was going to touch on the question that Deputy Mayor asked because I'm I'm on the afford King County Affordable Housing Committee that came up with the county goals.

It's a little bit of a touchy subject because the methodology was controversial.

We had a choice of either every city uh divvy up in their city how many units of each affordability they were going to do.

Or they were going, oh I sorry.

Um, or they were going to um say, well, there's one city in the south end that is mostly AMI to this level, but they don't have very many 80 to 100 percent.

And there's a city in the north end that's mostly 80 to 100 percent, but not a whole lot below that.

So we're gonna make this city take all the lower affordability burden, and we'll let the South City take all the higher AMI, and that's what it ended up being because of a vote.

So just to give you a little history.

It's so it the it's a recommendation.

We definitely need housing of all affordabilities throughout the region, and we do need far more zero to 30.

And I think that the efforts that we are doing in the city are really great, and as we see what works and what doesn't work, we can shift, and we'll be it sounds like we will be reassessing as we go on.

So thank you.

Anything else you want to say?

Uh thank you, Mayor, Deputy Mayor, members of the council.

We look forward to coming back to you in January.

Okay, so we're gonna take a quick break here.

We'll come back at um how much time would you like?

10 minutes.

All right, we'll come back at quarter till okay.

We're back in session, and city manager, would you like to introduce this last study session item?

Thank you, Mayor, Deputy Mayor and Council.

Um, this is also an information session.

The multifamily tax exemption or MFTE is as you heard in the last presentation, and you're aware, it's a tool for cities to incentivize affordable housing units.

And Bellevue's last substantive change to our MFTE program was in 2021.

Since that time, the state has allowed some new components for jurisdictions to consider using.

Um, and additionally, the council this last summer, when you approved the land use code for Wilburton, um, asked for an analysis of some specific changes requested by stakeholders during that process.

So over the past few months, our staff have evaluated uh potential options uh to update the city's MFTE program, and um that includes some expanded program options.

So tonight Bianca Siegel is back, and she is joined by Robin Zhao, our affordable housing development program manager.

They will share some information about the stakeholder input and also preliminary staff recommendations for council in the future to consider.

So with that, I will turn it over to Bianca.

Good evening again.

Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and Council members.

Thank you for allowing us an evening of housing tonight.

So we just talked about the affordable housing strategy, which really sets the stage for how we address a whole range of affordable housing needs.

The MFTE program, multifamily tax exemption program, is an existing tool in our affording affordable housing toolbox.

And we are proposing some changes to it tonight to help it to be increasingly effective and expand some of the opportunities that that framework allows.

And just a note for folks who may be listening who are not familiar with what multifamily tax exemptions are.

So it's basically a tool that incentivizes affordable housing units to be included in what would otherwise be a market rate housing development.

And it does that by exempting the value of residential improvements from property taxes for a period of time in exchange for providing a certain number of affordable housing units in the project.

So Robin's going to talk in uh in more detail about how our program works currently and some analysis that we've done to look at changes that we could bring back to you a little bit later this year.

Thanks.

Good evening, Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and Council members.

As mentioned by City Manager Carlson, the purpose of tonight's study session is to provide uh information on some recommended updates the city's MFTE program.

So I'll begin with an overview of the city's current MFTE program and its impact to date, and then we'll uh dive into the specific uh updates that we're recommending this year.

Uh we'll discuss the stakeholder input and technical analysis that's kind of informed those updates and then end with our recommendations.

Uh so starting with an overview of the MFTE program, uh, really wanted to uh start here uh with just some of the key policy considerations that we have in mind when looking at changes to MFTE.

Uh so there's really uh three main areas that we look at.

Um MFTE is of course an affordable housing tool.

Uh so we think about you know whether these changes are going to advance the city's affordable housing production goals, which you uh just saw uh earlier.

Uh we know that MFTE is a very strong uh development incentive in general.

Uh so we look at you know whether these changes are going to be stimulating new uh housing production that otherwise might not happen.

Um, you know, it is a voluntary program, so it's important that there is a benefit to the property owner.

Okay.

Uh and then lastly, uh the cost aspect.

Uh, there is a fiscal cost to MFTE when taxes are exempted uh under the program.

Uh of course that results in foregone revenue uh for uh the city, uh, but it also uh results in what we call a tax shift.

Uh, in other words, some of the tax burden is passed along to other property taxpayers to pay.

Uh so as part of this analysis, we also looked into that fiscal cost and how it compares to the benefit provided by MFTE.

Uh so this is kind of our overall framework when evaluating changes.

Uh so I'm going to turn to uh what the program currently looks like in Bellevue.

Uh we currently have the 12-year MFTE program that offers uh again a 12-year property tax exemption on the value of uh residential improvements for new multi-family properties.

Uh so it doesn't exclude taxes on land, just the improvements.

Uh generally, the city of Bellevue requires that uh 20% of units uh must be reserved for households earning up to 80% of area median income for 12 years.

Uh so right now that's about uh 88,000 for one person and 100,000 for a household of two.

Uh we do require uh deeper affordability for certain types of projects and units.

Uh, for example, very small dwelling units under 320 square feet.

We require uh at 50% AMI and uh projects with fewer than 15% uh of family sized units also have deeper affordability requirements.

Um in terms of where the program can be used, uh it's it can be used citywide in all areas zoned for multifamily use.

Uh so the 12-year program is just one option that cities have to implement MFTE under state law as part of this update.

As part of this update, we've looked into a few other options that are available.

So that includes the eight-year MFTE program that provides an eight-year tax exemption.

And that program provides cities a lot of flexibility and kind of setting the affordability rules that go along with it.

So cities can provide up to 24 years of the tax exemption.

And then there's a 20-year homeownership program as well that's really geared towards nonprofit home builders to incentivize the production of permanently affordable homes.

Specifically, that requires 25% of homes in a new development to be owned or sold to a nonprofit who will preserve those units permanently at 80% AMI or lower.

So looking at the impact of MFT to date in Bellevue, since its original adoption in 2015, we've received 11 MFT applications totaling 472 units.

Across all those MFTE units, the average AMI restriction is 77%.

And you can see in that pie chart on the bottom right, kind of the breakdown with some of those deeper affordability levels coming from previous program iterations.

And based on the city's permitting data, we know that the program has had a 78% utilization rate since July 2021, which was that last major program update.

So the city has seen enrollment increase over the years as the program has been updated.

As I mentioned, 80% of area median income is kind of the current baseline for new MFTE projects.

So as part of our analysis, we looked into how these 80% rents compare to market rents.

So this chart on the left is showing for each unit type.

So what we find is that on average an MFT renter at 80% AMI pays about $800 less per month than a comparable market rate renter in the same building.

So nearly $9,500 a year.

So they do we know that a lot of MFT renters do remain cost burden.

Speaking to a few specific points in Bellevue, rent growth for MFTE units is limited to 3% annually, and we hear that is a really important part of our program so that renters know year over year kind of what to expect in terms of their housing cost increases.

We know that our MFTE projects are located in neighborhoods like Bellred and downtown.

So these really vibrant areas, you know, near near transit and storefronts, so it provides access to these neighborhoods that households may otherwise otherwise be priced out of.

So now looking forward to this year's update, there's a few specific goals that we've had in mind this year.

One is again addressing those city policy and planning goals that we just mentioned.

So expanding the number of projects that can use MFTE and also looking at ways to incentivize deeper affordability through MFTE.

Of course, the city adopted the Wilburton Luca earlier this year.

So part of this update is also addressing stakeholder comments regarding some changes to how MFTE interacts with mandatory affordability.

So we'll talk a bit tonight about the supercharger program and what that means.

Take a step back and kind of look at what it's done today and then kind of dive into a thorough technical analysis of some of some of the changes that are being considered.

So with those goals in mind, we really narrowed in on two key focus areas.

So I mentioned that 20-year home ownership option.

Currently, the city also does not offer MFTE for conversion projects if someone converts an office to a residential building.

And that's really getting at our second focus area here on the right, which is looking at how MFTE aligns with mandatory affordability in Wilburton.

So looking specifically at our rules for stacking or unit overlapping.

Currently, we do allow MFTE units to stack or double count with other affordability requirements such as land use incentives so that one unit can count for both, as long as the overlapping unit is 15% deeper in affordability.

So we examined what's been called the supercharger program, which just allows for double counting without that deeper affordability level.

Again, we were also looking at the opportunity for an eight-year program to incentivize deeper affordability, and then also again looked at aligning our code with the land use code regarding some of those affordable housing standards.

Particularly in that second focus area we were looking at, this table up here is uh kind of comparing the mandatory requirements in Wilburton uh to the uh existing MFTE program as well as uh the uh supercharger proposal.

Uh so standing starting with the uh Wilburton Luca requirements uh in this orange color, uh, this is uh a requirement for permanent affordability, uh, and developers have a few uh choices to to comply with this.

They can choose to uh set aside 10% of their units at 80% AMI, uh, or they can you know choose fewer units in exchange for deeper affordability.

Can I interrupt you for a minute?

Can somebody move mute their phone?

I don't know whose phone is chiming in here, but it's very distracting.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Um that was the uh Wilburton Luca requirement in the orange.

Uh moving on to uh the middle.

So this here is our existing MFTE program and the rules there.

Uh so under our existing program, if if a developer used MFTE, uh, we would require 10% of the units to be at 80% AMI, and then another 10% at 65% AMI.

Uh so those 65% units would be the ones that overlap between MFTE and the mandatory requirements.

Uh, and then again, looking at the supercharger on the right, what that does is is remove the requirements uh uh for the deeper affordability.

So uh all 20% can be at 80% AMI.

Uh moving into our engagement and analysis process uh in terms of our engagement scope, uh, we held uh several presentations with our uh organizational stakeholders, which you can see on the left uh left side over here.

We also held a lot of individual interviews with developers as well as speaking to some of our peer cities and Arch staff.

And then we also held a series of technical workshops with a consultant who's been helping with some of our analysis and really use those as a way to refine and inform our analysis.

So to highlight some of the key themes that came out during this engagement process, we've heard general support for the expanded program options, such as that 20-year home ownership program.

There's also been broad support for aligning affordable housing standards citywide.

We've received mixed feedback on this supercharger proposal.

But some other stakeholders are kind of concerned about the concentration of 80% AMI units that this program would create and are concerned about this program potentially being expanded beyond Wilburton.

We also asked folks about their experiences with the current program and thoughts on that.

And for the most part, we've heard positive feedback around how the program's working and Arch's administration of the program.

We hear that the AMI levels work well, that the enrollment process for MFTE and the annual compliance is not very onerous, especially compared to other jurisdictions.

We're also not seeing major vacancy issues across our projects.

However, again, there have been comments about the MFTE program not getting at those deeper affordability levels.

So we first wanted to see how the Wilburton supercharger impacts development feasibility compared to the existing program rules.

Here we found that the supercharger does provide a moderate benefit over the existing stacking or overlapping rules.

However, even under the existing rules, MFTE remains a strong incentive compared to the mandatory performance baseline.

For example, when looking at one metric annual property income, we saw that the supercharger resulted in a 6.6% increase in income while the existing program resulted in a 4% increase.

So we found that yes, we could design an eight-year program in this way, and we'll talk about it a bit more in the next few slides.

And lastly, we looked into whether the city should adopt a 12-year extension and whether that should require a deeper AMI level.

What we in the consultant found here when we started digging into kind of the data sets is that there's ultimately not a ton of information on the east side to inform that analysis.

So going back to the public cost of MFTE.

So in 2025, we had six properties that received a tax exemption through MFTE, and that totaled $3.5 million of exempted taxes.

Shifted taxes are paid by other property taxpayers across Washington state, including other Bellevue residents, and foregone taxes are collections that taxing districts miss out on.

So that includes the city of Bellevue, but also the county, Sound Transit, the port, and all those other taxing authorities.

So of the 3.5 million of exempted taxes, we know that 2.6 million were shifted and $900,000 were foregone.

We know that 1.1 million dollars were shifted within Bellevue specifically to other Bellevue property taxpayers, and 122,000 was forgone by the city of Bellevue.

Meanwhile, the program bought down over 2.5 million dollars in rents for our MFTE renters.

So that represents a rent savings of about 75 cents per dollar exempted.

So under the existing program, we do see a very strong benefit being provided for each dollar of tax exempted.

Now kind of digging in a bit deeper and turning to the costs and benefits of MFTE in the in the context of some of these new program options.

So this first graphic here regarding the annual MFTE cost of the program, it is essentially showing the same information that was on that previous slide.

So how much of the tax exemption is forgone and shifted per dollar of tax exemption.

So looking at it this way, we see that roughly 32 cents are shifted to other Bellevue property taxpayers and three cents are forgone from City of Bellevue tax collections for a total cost to Bellevue of 35 cents for each dollar exempted.

So that's the cost of MFTE.

These bottom two graphics are showing the benefit of the exemption and specifically how it gets split between renters and property owners.

So for each dollar of tax exemption, the dark green shows how much renters save, and the light green is showing how much developers essentially gain in property income.

So under the existing 12-year MFTE program, we see that the renter receives the majority of the benefit from MFTE.

So for each dollar of tax that's exempted, MFTE renters are saving 53 cents, and the developer gains 35 cents in income.

Now when we looked at the new supercharger proposed in Wilburton, we see that the developer now gains the majority of the benefit at 56 cents for each dollar exempted, while MFTE renters save 33 cents in rent.

And notably what we see here is that the rent savings at that 33 cents is slightly below the cost to Bellevue of 35 cents.

So now turn over to our staff recommendations.

Starting with that first area of focus regarding the new MFTE options, we do recommend adopting the 20-year program as well as extending MFTE for conversion projects.

Both options receive really strong stakeholder support.

At this time, we do not recommend adopting the 12-year extension.

So again, we looked across a few properties and data sets to see how the public benefit of MFTE would change over time as buildings age, but didn't really have enough information to assess its benefit on a broad basis.

So our recommendation is to reevaluate this option as part of a future look back once we have some more concrete data from Bellevue's existing MFTE properties.

So regarding how MFTE aligns with mandatory affordability, we do recommend allowing for the supercharger in Wilburton only with a look back within four years to study its impact.

So at that time projects could should be far enough along where we can look at, you know, is it producing more on-site affordable units?

We can look at the tax shift and see what the benefit is to renters.

At the same time, we recommend adopting this new eight-year MFTE program option.

So while the 12-year program kind of incentivizes the production of those 80% AMI units, this would get at those deeper affordability options.

So what this flow chart on the right is showing is basically for each mandatory performance option in the blue.

So potentially producing more affordable units in the long run.

And we chose these specific set asides, the 8% and the 6.5% based on some that technical analysis we did where we were really trying to make sure that these options were balanced alongside the supercharger to make sure they have the same kind of impact for the developer.

At this time, we're only really looking at these options within Wilburton.

We found you know the supercharger is a great general development incentive, but again, uh do have concerns with the fiscal impact and the benefit that it's ultimately providing for renters.

We're also still waiting for waiting to see how mandatory affordability is kind of adopted in these other neighborhoods and don't want to preempt those processes either.

And lastly, again, uh we we do plan to align our code language with the Wilburton director's role.

Um so just to kind of help visualize uh these recommendations, particularly uh uh regarding the the supercharger and the new eight-year options.

Uh, this graph is kind of showing uh uh the different options available.

Uh so say you're uh a developer in Wilburton and looking to uh build a new 200 unit uh project.

Um shaded in the light blue here are your new eight-year options.

Um looking at the uh 50% AMI level, for example, uh, in order to meet your uh mandatory uh requirement under the land use code, you would need to restrict 10 of your units.

Uh now if you restrict an additional three in that orange color, then you're able to get the eight-year MFTE exemption.

Uh and it's a similar kind of case for the 60% AMI level.

Uh now looking at the 80% AMI, that's where you have uh your your supercharger option, uh, where the mandatory requirement is for 20 units, and then uh if you restrict another 20 units for 12 years, uh then you can get your uh MFTE.

Um so lastly, uh I wanted to summarize our recommendations by uh kind of tying them back to the policy considerations uh we looked at in the beginning.

Uh so in terms of our affordable housing goals, uh the new eight-year options in Wilburton are helping us get to those deeper affordability levels, uh, and then the 20-year MFTE program is getting us uh home ownership opportunities.

Uh so those programs are kind of getting at our deepest needs in terms of affordability.

Uh in terms of broader housing production, of course, these options are still creating affordable units, uh, but perhaps focusing more on overall production rather than hitting the uh deepest affordability levels.

So that includes the Wilburton Supercharger as well as uh expanding MFTE for conversion projects.

Uh and then lastly, uh regarding program costs, uh our goal here was to take uh a balanced approach.

So uh we've heard a lot of support for the supercharger in Wilburton and want it to be available there, but at the same time we we want to be able to evaluate its impact, uh including its its costs and benefits, and then uh come back uh with any adjustments as needed.

Uh and we also don't want to expand the program before we know it's a good fit everywhere.

Uh and then regarding uh the extension, similarly, uh we'd like to reassess this as part of the look back.

So at that time we can better weigh the uh costs versus benefits and see again what that right AMI level is.

Uh so for our next steps, uh we do have our second uh study session uh scheduled for December 2nd, uh, where we can answer any questions and and if appropriate return with the uh draft code language.

And those are our prepared remarks.

Thanks.

Okay, very good presentation.

So you're open for comments and questions.

Okay, I'm gonna start us off, and um it's really interesting to me to think that we I think we passed the first MFTE in 2015, is that right?

And we were one of the last cities in King County to do it, but I think ours is really thoughtful, and um I think um we're a good example of of really thinking about how to utilize this tool since every city can kind of come up with their own recipe.

Um I appreciate the key policy considerations.

I think that's wonderful start.

Um, and I appreciate the flexible margin for who can apply for MFTE units at 80% AMI.

That's excellent.

Um I've heard that if tenants use a third party to apply for an MFTE unit, it's harder for everyone involved, especially uh the landlord.

So I wonder if it's worth um looking into who are these third parties, what is the value of somebody using a third party?

You know, can we uh help them without them having to go through that, or we can we partner with a third party?

Because um I'm not sure who those third parties are.

Um just as a question how many MFT units in Wilburton after a four-year supercharger is in place, do you think you're going to get just an estimate?

That would depend on a lot of things.

Yes, I know.

But you you arbitrarily said let's review in four years, so I assume you have uh an idea of like how many units you would think you would see in four years.

Yeah, so we um uh we know that you know the catalyst program has kind of already uh been fully uh used, um, and we know that we're getting some units from that based on kind of what we've seen over over the past few years.

We know we've been getting around averages out to around 70, 80 MFT units a year, so would expect um you know, with the inclusion of of the supercharger, hopefully, you know, definitely beyond that, maybe closer to 100 units a year.

Okay.

Just to add on to that for clarification, uh great on the spot map.

Um another consideration for the uh four-year look back recommendation is that we're anticipating a need to do uh that our development services team would need to do a code amendment to implement some other recent state law that also has implications for MFTE.

And so in addition to having a four-year period where we can see how the program uh with the proposed changes is performing, we also anticipate at that point needing to make some other adjustments potentially for other areas of the city as well.

So I'm looking to combine those efforts, um, and it turns out to be good timing for for both purposes.

Okay.

So here's my thoughts.

Um it comes to the supercharger, I'm all in support of having it in Wilburton only to start with, but rather than just cross the board four years, I'd love you to look at what would it look like if we did a catalyst again.

Like maybe after 400 units, the first 400 units in or the first how many developers in.

I don't know how you count up uh what would occupy a catalyst period.

But if the goal is to get on-site development of affordable housing, I feel like a catalyst is a good idea rather than just leaving it open for four years.

Uh, then the people who are genuinely interested in on-site performance are I feel would be eager to apply if there's a time limit.

So just I'm curious at looking at that.

Um terms of the 20-year MFT home ownership, yes, hard yes, and also MFTE for conversion projects.

Um I'm supportive of an eight-year MFTE with decreased AMI in Wilburton only, and then I'm wondering why Wilburton only that's your recommendation.

So yeah, so specifically uh on the eight years, uh, because we kind of tied the value of that exemption to the supercharger and and the fact that there's uh permanent mandatory affordability.

Uh so if we were to expand the eight-year option, it would have to look a bit different.

Okay, well, that's important information.

I didn't see the tie-in between the supercharger and the eight year.

Um, and then I do not support the 12-year extension.

Because after 12 years, rental units are less expensive anyway, and it's onerous for a tenant to be in an MFTE unit, they have to qualify every year.

And it could be that as the actual value changes, um, they would have to move to because they you know, like they may in 12 years time get a raise and everything and no longer qualify for the MFTE, but they could still afford that unit if it was just naturally affordable from the age of it.

So I think it makes more sense not to have those extensions.

So that's uh my thought on that.

Um yeah, I I think that's all I was gonna say.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Deputy Mayor.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Uh, great job, uh Bianca Linda, and amazing job, Robin.

Such a great presentation and detailed topic.

Uh, and you're doing a great job updating our MFTE program that is going to help us with housing production and of course affordable housing production, as we heard whatever we did on Wilburton, it seems has been working.

The huge shout out to Eastside Affordable Housing Roundtable for all of their partnership and also all of the other stakeholders involvement in Bill Burton.

I have two quick questions, and if you go to a slide 21, I kind of start with that.

And then also when you're done answering his questions, can you go back to slide seven so that people can give you feedback on those specific staff recommendations?

Okay.

Do you want to start with that?

Oh, whatever, no, it doesn't matter.

Can you explain to me the bottom two picture?

The first one dollar, we found that 35 cents, 35 cent is the cost for City of Belleview and every property owner in Belleview.

Then this middle one is our ordinary MFC program that shows that 53 cent is the benefit for renter and 35 cents what developer gain.

But if we add the supercharger, then that switch uh 30 33 cent is the renter saving and 56 cents is property net income.

Can you explain how this happens very high level?

And then why are you recommending the second one?

Yeah.

Yeah, so um it might be easier to like use actual numbers for this.

So you know, say looking at this middle option uh specifically, um, you know, if if a property uh would have paid 100,000 in taxes and and now they're exempted under MFTE, uh, what this is showing that is that uh of that 100,000 dollars, 53,000 is going towards renter renter savings, basically, uh, and then 35,000 is the additional annual income that they're getting from from the tax exemption.

Um essentially uh the reason uh this balance kind of shifts uh with the supercharger is is because there's basically the the developer is basically giving away less uh in rental income since they no longer have to provide uh the more deeply affordable uh units.

Uh so in that case, uh the benefit to the renters uh shrinks uh while the benefit to the developer uh increases.

Um then uh regarding your second question on why we would recommend this if if we're showing that you know it's it's it's a net cost to the city, um, really again pointing back to those policy considerations on one hand, uh MFTE is an affordable housing tool, and and on the other hand, uh it's a general housing development tool.

And we know that uh some cities do have eight-year uh MFTE programs where they don't require any affordability at all because they're focused on the housing production.

Uh so what we've heard is that in Wilburton uh people uh do tend to agree that we can use MFTE more as a housing development tool there.

Great.

And I think we need that.

We need more housing and we need more affordable housing.

Great.

Can you go to a slide 24?

So in when you add the optional new aid program, you made in regardless of 60% or 50% AMI.

I'm talking about the right two columns.

You went with all permanently.

Why didn't you go with all permanently in the 10% at 80% AMI supercharger?

Yeah, so the um the thing with the 12-year program is by statute you have to set aside 20% of your units uh as affordable.

Um so um if you know we were to require that permanently, it would no longer be a desirable option uh for developers because it's just such a such a significant increase in in the uh set aside compared to the mandatory baseline.

Um but again with the eight-year option, there's a lot more flexibility in in choosing uh the rules for affordability.

Uh so what we can do looking at you know the 60% AMI level is if you add just a tiny bit of of units permanently, um, it's not as as massive of an impact as adding an additional 10%, so it can be uh a bit more in line with uh uh more a little more palatable, um, especially as uh besides the supercharger, uh, which only requires that temporary increase.

Let me ask my question uh one more time for just for my understanding.

Are we saying that 10% at 80% AMI permanently plus 10% at 80% AMI temporally?

The cost or maybe the benefit for developer and for renter would be equal to 8% at 60% AMI permanently and equate to 6.5% at 50% 50% AMI permanently.

Yeah, so so we did do kind of the math on this, and our goal was to get those eight-year options close in line to the impact of the supercharger.

Uh so that's kind of what I was saying about the eight-year being tied to to the supercharger option.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

Um council member Sumaterial.

Thank you for the presentation.

It's really thorough.

I like it.

Um I do have a few um questions.

So for there's I see in the um study, there's uh multiple times that we were gonna review and assess the performance.

So what type of metrics are we looking at to see the performance of this program?

Yeah, um definitely uh one thing that's been mentioned is just whether or not we're getting the on-site units.

So uh, you know, generally are people using this new MFTE option, uh, and now that we have these new eight-year programs under consideration, you know, how many are using those options compared to the supercharger.

Um we also want to look at a lot of the uh same fiscal considerations that you saw in this presentation.

So looking at uh, you know, the amount of taxes shifted uh and forgone, uh, and then also looking at again that kind of balance of benefits between the renter and and the developer.

Would we take consideration what's the percentage of developers participation rate as well?

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

And then something else I want to ask was um, so for example, something like the 12-year extension, right?

So when we bring it back, is there um like a public dashboard or some sort of or for any of these programs where we can assess different metrics we use across the board so we can um not only we know the data, but also you know the public can track what we add?

Because I find that very encouraging when people can easily access to that data.

Yeah, we don't have that currently, but that actually is one of the items that we're looking at in the affordable housing strategy and for the housing programs generally is to develop a dashboard that would show a number of those indicators.

So it is something we anticipate moving forward.

Okay, perfect.

I think one last question is I was wondering um, so if you know, it's I mean, we are still in the developer stage, but they if they're not really deliverable equitable um results, because you know sometimes the number of the rate of the housing is a not a full picture of how it's being used, right?

The level affordability and also um the equity inclusion of how it's being established to different communities should be taking consideration because of facts to house of the whole community.

Um if it doesn't work, like or maybe something happens, the market condition completely changes, and developer might have what have you.

It could be anything, we never know.

It's on our control.

Um how um how can we adjust to that?

You don't have to answer me.

I'm just I'm just wondering because I think because right now markets are really volatile, and then there's so many different elements affects how we feel every day.

So, you know, I was just wondering if how can we address that?

I I think the the look back is kind of how we address this.

Like I think MFTE, you know, it's create these rules and and then the market changes in a few years.

So it is something that kind of needs to be constantly reassessed and uh you know try to find what the right balance of benefits is.

So you can change it.

We can with a vote.

Okay.

Make a change.

So if you decide on this today, and at the look back, it's not appropriate for the current market.

We can we can make a change at that time.

Well, thank you.

I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Okay, good questions.

Um Councilmember New Enhouse.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh I too just want to thank you so much for the great presentation.

Um really laid out uh the argument um and the staff recommendations well.

So thank you so much for that.

Um so a couple of different things, and I want to make sure that the mayor's uh request was addressed as well before my time is over in terms of the four recommendations, which slide was that on.

Can you go back to that?

Oh, thank you.

Um, I thought it was a different uh what a I thought it was um slide 23.

Yeah, thank you.

Um question uh so uh just uh uh Jessica Clausen provided some numbers on Wilburton um during oral communications.

Did you hear that?

Are are those accurate as far as you know?

I'd have I'd have to confirm, but I but we we've heard that there's been really robust development interest.

Um I I wouldn't be surprised if those are accurate.

Okay.

I I would assume they are, but I was just wondering if you I mean, obviously I'm assuming she got them from the city.

So clarify something with that because um I had asked for clarification on that.

And I heard from development services that we don't know until permitting or something whether they're actually going to do on site uh uh if they're gonna do the affordable housing or not.

I don't remember actually what the answer was, but I did ask for clarification on that.

I mean they might change their pre-application.

I I think I don't know.

Uh we just don't know for sure right now until MFTE program participation.

Right.

Might be what they were referring to.

Yeah.

I mean sometimes projects change between initial submittal and and final permitting, um, but the enrollment in the MFTE program also happens later in that process.

So yeah, there's some potential for sure.

Well, if you could follow up with us uh confirming those numbers and then any other context you want to put it in, that would that would be great.

Um however, there does exist some data if we look to our friends of the West, right, in terms of how impactful the supercharger has been in Seattle.

Um so I'm I'm having a tough time um with um only focusing on Wilburton for the for the supercharger.

Why we wouldn't.

I understand the argument about the public benefit.

Um, but I also understand that we're in how housing crisis right now.

And this is a vital production tool of housing.

I would rather be as our old colleague, Councilmember Soaks used to say, go bigger, go home on this.

I would rather push hard first than shorten that look back at two years if the numbers are not working, or um if we feel that um the public benefits not correct, etc.

change at that time, but to wait four years when we are really trying to drastically increase our housing stock, of especially affordable housing, workforce housing, why would we wouldn't be more aggressive in this case is a bit um perplex perplexing for me.

Um I don't know if you want to speak to that, I'll give you an opportunity to do that before make make my next point, but um that's just a personal preference, and I I think my colleagues might might feel differently, but we'd love to get your answer to that.

Yeah, I I can appreciate that.

Um I the only thing I would uh maybe uh add to or emphasize from what we shared earlier is the of course the existing MFTE program um is available citywide, right?

And and is still um a useful uh development incentive for um for producing affordable um units.

It just does require that lower AMI level.

Um so I suppose yes, what could make the argument that's not quite as enticing um for new developers as um as a program that does not require that deeper affordability.

There's a balance of the um uh of the how counter and policy intent.

Yep, it's a balance and and and um the the the other part of your argument that um uh about the four-year look back, which I would push back against um is the um the the mandates from the state that we would have to incorporate into this as well.

I think we're nibble enough that you know we can address that as it becomes um necessary to incorporate.

Again, I I don't see the the need why we would pause or wait um for that.

Um I would be more in favor of moving forward as aggressive as we feel comfortable um and then incorporate that as needed as as we go along.

Um I understand that might be a little bit more work perhaps for development services, but again, given the um the urgent need uh for more housing, um I would uh definitely support that.

Um another item about uh public benefit, and we've got some great public benefit metrics already in terms of the reduced cost of rent, number of units, etc.

Um, but also I was thinking about back in 2023 when we passed an apprenticeship program, um, which I was very proud to support, um, where um if I remember the numbers correctly, um, for projects over a million dollars, I believe that 15% of the of the labor will go towards apprenticeship programs for um those looking to get into the trades.

Do would we look at that as being part of this since there is a public benefit here or uh subsidy of some sort if you if if you think of it in that way?

Would there would there be an opportunity to apply that apprenticeship program in this case or would it not apply?

I will give a partial answer.

I think we need to look more into it.

Um the apprenticeship program applies to public works projects with publicly funded uh resources.

Okay.

MFTE is different.

Um that's not a public dollar, that's a private project.

So I think there's some conversations that we would want to have potentially around that, but I think there is a definite um difference.

Okay.

So the entire project would have to be public, is that what you're saying in terms of public dollars would need to be part of that at least.

Um and these are privately funded projects.

These are private projects.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Thank you for clarifying that.

If there is a way to still incorporate that, I would love to if you can come back with that and let us know if there's an opportunity to uh still include that.

Yeah, even if it might not be an exact match, but maybe there's some creative way.

So thank you.

I think that ties in uh council member Suma Dewaria's request um when we're reaching doing outreach that we're reaching out to students and apprentices and um as well as people who work in the city.

So thank you for bringing that up.

Okay.

Um I have my time back, please.

I was I wasn't done.

I thought you were done.

No, it wasn't.

Please continue.

Thank you.

Um so just to go through the uh recommendations.

Yes, on adopt the uh 20-year homeownership, yes on the MFTP uh conversion project citywide, although I don't think we're gonna get a lot of use from that, but yes, let's make it available if someone wants to.

Um but I do believe we should adopt the 12-year extension as well.

This other point I want to make.

Um again, given the success of other municipalities, let's adopt that 12-year extension um now.

And then I would also say let's do the um uh supercharger citywide, not just Wilburton only.

And that's it, Mayor.

Thank you.

Councilmember Bargada.

Okay, thank you.

Uh so I want to begin by just thanking you for the thoughtful and collaborative approach that you've taken and taking.

I think what is a very complex set of topics and synthesizing them for our uh understanding as well as your partner's understanding in a very thoughtful way.

Really really well done.

It was strong kudos.

Um I also think you know what you've taken as a sort of a very proactive approach to working with your partners and uh both um the development community as well as community partners that you had have resulted in a very thoughtful sort of uh policy discussion.

So get us to this point.

So I appreciative of that as well.

I do think uh MFTE overall is a win-win uh outcome.

It allows us to get a much faster place of development and also further affordability outcomes.

So those are really important win-wins uh from MFTA overall, sort of as a foundation of what you're doing here.

And uh I also think MFTs, for example, and some of the work that you're doing in the recommendations will actually create feasibility for projects in some instances that don't happen right now without this.

So towards our goal of achieving more housing and more affordable outcomes, many of these things are steps in the right direction.

And I'm like pro housing would be a very uh great outcome to have for us in the city.

I am also supportive of the permanent supercharger in Wilburton as well as the eligibility for MFTA for conversion projects.

So I'm gonna state that up front.

Um and I also support the 20-year MIT program for permanent home ownership that you've laid out as a recommendation.

Um one comment and a couple of questions.

Um I know that whilst you're not supportive of the this is my comment of the supercharger citywide, and right now only suggested for Vilburton.

I do think there is a tie between mandatory affordable housing and the supercharger, and allowing us to sort of maintain that couplet of policies as we think about expanding into other parts of the city and using the same fiscal analysis as well as all the consensus building that you've we have done for Wilburton as a foundation would be a really great way to leverage this work.

And I would make a strong recommendation that we consider that couplet into other parts of the city as we do this because one, it creates the opportunity for mandatory affordable housing that does pencil for for-profit developers.

So it's a great win-win, and we should try to leverage that to its maximum.

There will be nuanced uh details in other parts of the city that will come into play, but this is just my general sentiment and support for that couplet of policies.

Um to the questions.

Um I really appreciate the uh supercharger impact that you can have, but it does create sort of a much larger production at 80% AMI.

One of the things that I'm I'm a little bit concerned, and I think you voiced it as well, is what happens and what levers do we have for production of housing at the lower or the deeper AMI uh opportunities.

A housing levy might be something uh, you know, that we might have as that gets us there.

But any other considerations on what might be opportunities for us to get deeper there would be uh I'd love your thoughts uh or even a follow-up.

And then uh did I don't know if I missed you.

Uh did you weigh in on the eight-year option?

Yeah, I'm gonna come to that one in the second.

Okay, okay.

So that really is a question, you don't have to answer that now, but that is something that I would be very interested in.

Um if I go straight to the eight year piece first, because I have one other comment.

Um actually go to the 12-year extension first, just in order.

Um for the 12-year extension, um, I think it does offer strong incentive to preserve housing affordability while reducing the risk of units becoming market rate, you know, after 12 years.

So that's a good outcome.

Uh I also think that there is uh you know some of the stakeholder input around refinancing of projects today that might actually create more housing production is a good outcome.

My suggestion, I would be supportive of including this recommendation, but I would in parallel suggest that we consider, and I'm not sure what the math behind getting that would be a deeper AMI for that extension if we were to do it.

I would be supportive of doing it, and if we were to do it at a deeper AMI than we have at 80%, because I think that will create that balance that we're looking for again, and it's really a numbers uh driven analysis that will get us there.

But everybody have to move all the people that qualified at 80% AMI all of a sudden have to qualify now at 60% AMI.

Okay.

Something for you to help us understand.

There is a buffer right now, so that if if you qualify, say at 80% AMI, you can earn up to 100% AMI every year if when you recertify your income every year.

So that is kind of a something we have in place right now.

Gotcha.

And then to the eight-year piece, um, I do appreciate the balance that uh the deputy mayor called out, and you reiterated between the 12-year supercharger and the eight-year.

My only question there is have we got input from a wide group of stakeholders, including the development community on the interest in possible uh possibly the eight year program, and if so, what does that sort of look like?

Yeah.

Um, I think generally um developers have been very supportive of just having options in in general, so being able to kind of you know choose between uh the supercharger on one hand, if they you know maybe don't want to restrict as many units in their project if if they're concerned about the annual compliance for like 20% of their units, then you know they have this other option that they can use as well.

Okay, so based on that flexibility and that response, you know, I would also be supportive of the ATR flexibility.

Okay.

Um are you there?

Yes.

Okay.

Council Member Hamilton.

Great.

Uh thank you, Mayor.

Uh, thank you for the presentation.

Um Robin, welcome to the city.

You've uh certainly jumped in on a really important topic and uh are doing an excellent job, so really appreciate that.

I think this is really solid work here.

Um, and it addresses the single most pressing concern for folks in Bellevue.

We've seen recent survey results make it clear that affordability has surged to the top of the priority list in our city.

Uh, thank you again for focusing on housing affordability, as it is the key driver of overall affordability here.

Uh, thanks to for all of the engagement work that has been done.

You're talking with folks who understand housing production, want to join with us in efforts to increase our stock of affordable housing and have the know-how to help us achieve our goals.

Appreciate the leadership and engagement from Habitat for Humanity, the Bellevue Chamber, HDC, and others in their support of this critical effort.

Um I read in the agenda memo that staff did not directly interview MFTE tenants as a part of the engagement effort.

And I'm just curious as to why not and if there's any plan to talk with tenants and get their uh perspectives.

Yeah, we we did originally um consider a kind of broader tenant engagement uh effort and particularly uh a tenant survey, which is something that the city of Seattle has done.

Um, but kind of given the scope of of this specific update and and particularly uh in particular trying to kind of move along some of the changes in Wilburton as as fast as possible, um, decided to um kind of kind of hold off so we can make that a key focus piece of a future update, or one that hopefully isn't uh this kind of in the weeds on some of the technical details.

Um so that is something we would like to bring back with with the look back if if not sooner.

Um you heard from Hannah earlier tonight.

She uh, as part of the housing strategy strategy, she has done some of that more uh broad tenant engagement, uh, but obviously uh not MFTE specific.

So that is something that that we would like to do.

Um then uh we we did speak to uh Arch kind of about the tenant experience more generally, so do have uh some some feedback from them and uh they've been uh on on the ground, so hearing um positive things generally about MFTE.

Okay, all right, good enough.

Uh I think it would be helpful.

So when we can, I think it would be a good thing to do.

Um, certainly aligned with the staff recommendation of implementing a permanent supercharger in Wilburton, and with the look back, as I noted in the agenda memo within four years.

So it's not that we're going to do it in four years, but between now and four years from now we will.

So I think that uh that makes sense.

Uh from the beginning, the Wilburton supercharger was considered a critical part of the final Wilburton Luca, and having it in place quickly was established as a priority.

I really appreciate being here already in October, uh, close to finalizing the supercharger.

Uh there is and has been a general agreement that the supercharger will catalyze development in the new Wilburton TOD area as we need it to do.

Much of the collaborative work that was done in Wilburton was done in the context of its applicability to Bell Red and elsewhere in the city.

And part of the motivation behind putting in so much care and effort in creating the Wilburton land use code was so that we can move even more quickly and updating our land use code in Bell Red and all sub-areas.

And I'm still supportive of that key outcome, Wilburton is a templum template for process and outcomes, and think we should duplicate the careful calibration of incentives and requirements that are in place in Wilburton throughout the city.

The template is affordability, incentives and design equals more housing options for the community, and that's a winning formula.

After we move the supercharger forward to catalyze development in Wilburton, I do think we should be ready to use it everywhere in the city to help us meet our affordability goals.

I think we should ask ourselves why it wouldn't make sense to use the supercharger program in Bell Red and elsewhere if, as it is in Wilburton, it is a part of a broader package of affordable housing updates specific to the neighborhood.

I, along with everyone who's expressed an opinion to me about it, like the direction of the eight-year MFTE program, and I look forward to learning more about that as we move forward.

A couple of quick questions regarding a possible 12-year extension of MFTE.

The agenda memo states while an extension may preserve affordable units, it no longer serves as a tool to create new housing.

And it just seems to me that the preserved units are one of the most, when we've talked about this, one of the most cost-effective ways to increase the supply of deeply affordable units, and as mentioned earlier tonight, support our uh affordable housing strategy.

Um I'm just kind of curious if you could talk about just how it helps uh the you know that preservation is really critical to meeting our uh deeply affordable unit goals.

Um and don't we count preserve don't we count those units actually in meeting those goals?

Yeah, so so we we absolutely do, and and uh preserving units is still very very important as as you've heard tonight.

Um with MFTE, the consideration as you know, the mayor mentioned is is really about you know what um benefit are you getting uh during that extension period from these uh MFTE units uh compared to the value of the tax exemption provided.

So uh, you know, we know that as as building age, uh their rents typically go down and maybe naturally closer to that 80% AMI uh level, uh and you know, in which case it makes sense to require the deeper affordability levels.

Um so uh the agenda memo is kind of noting uh the importance of of getting that affordability level right uh because we're uh preserving units and we want to make sure that uh that they remain uh beneficial and and impactful.

Okay.

Um I I definitely think, as I've heard a few of my colleagues express that uh this is the time for us to consider a 12-year MFTE extension like the one that Seattle just uh adopted earlier this month.

Um, and as also was suggested in Seattle, they set lower AMI levels uh for the extension, uh, which I think we should consider as well.

Um, and then considering that uh as was mentioned in the previous presentation that many um folks are at 50 per 56 percent of AMI and their earnings, I think it could really help that uh those folks out as well.

I think the more quickly too that I think the uh and a 12-year extension would would help us, the more quickly we can answer questions for housing suppliers, the more quickly they can move their projects forward, and obviously the more quickly we bring on the housing we need.

So considering a 12-year MFT extension now makes a lot of sense to me.

I would I also would like to see this uh for some further proof.

I would also see this as further proof that Bellevue takes its role in supporting housing growth in the region very seriously, and I think we need to keep pace with our regional partners in the 12-year extension would be a help in that regard.

Very much aligned with the recommendation of adopting a 20-year MFTE uh program for permanently affordable homeownership and of extending the MFTE program to conversion project citywide, also in favor of aligning MFTE code language regarding affordable housing standards with the land use code and the forthcoming director's ruling.

Um, and you know, this just as a follow-up, I'd like to get some recommendations on how we can incentivize the creation of three bedroom units.

So if that's something you could bring back at some point, I I would I think we'd really benefit from hearing that.

And then I would also like to understand the rationale for requiring MFTE designated parking stalls uh within half a mile of high frequency transit.

I know Seattle doesn't have this requirement, and if you could follow up on that, um, because I'm I'm really kind of struggling why we have that in as a requirement.

Um, but I'd like to hear more on that from you when you're able.

Um but otherwise, great work, um, you know, more collaboration uh that needs to be done.

Um looking forward to uh getting all this wrapped up.

So thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Councilmember Lee.

Okay.

Great job.

It's a very, very tough uh issue to deal with.

Uh, you know, great Bellview is a great place.

Everybody wants to come live here.

So it's a supply and demand situation.

You know, we don't have it when they come to live Bellview, they need to have a place to live.

So we don't have enough houses, right?

Lots of people.

And so uh I don't believe in mandatory program.

So I want to know who is providing the houses is the builders, developers.

Uh government is not business build.

Builders, the free market.

So I think this is uh M FTE is really a good idea.

Let me stop you right here.

Let me stop you right here.

Can we just have a level set here on this mandatory inclusionary housing that we pass quite a while ago?

And that's not on the table tonight.

Right.

The uh inclusionary requirements are already in place.

Yeah, what we're talking about is an incentive program to uh um that can help to offset the cost of some of those uh units and incentivize additional affordable on site.

What's this?

Who's talking about inclusionary housing?

I'm talking about mandatory MFT is uh, you know, for the builders.

It's okay attack.

We're talking about housing.

We're talking about multiple multi-family housing.

It's not mandatory.

What MFTE is a word mentioned mandatory program.

There's nothing mandatory about that.

So I'm saying to say it's not a mandatory program.

It's a incentive for builders to build homes, whatever home they are.

We're talking about multiple housing, that's fine.

If you want to nitpick, I don't know why you're doing that.

Okay.

Don't pick on me.

So I think that's a good thing.

We need to work with builders, which is just what a program is about, right?

And we don't know what their needs are, what would incentivize some of that stuff.

So you're doing the best you can.

That's what we're trying to do.

I think they what you have done, what you have done so far, they like it.

You know, they say it's a great program.

They like to see what's happening.

And they said, well, but it's working well.

So I think uh, you know, it could change, obviously, right?

I mean, depending on who are the builders.

Some builders are very, very collaborative.

Some builders here are long-term residents, long-term business people in Bellevue.

They want to be here for a long time.

Some builders may just want to get in, build something, and then get up, get take off.

They don't care about 20 years or whatever.

They just want to do it, take a puff and go.

So I think that changes.

So I think we're doing the best we can working with developers, builders.

That's good.

So we need to provide these programs to fit their needs to incentivize them to do it.

You know, incentives different for people to people.

But we're got we got them here.

They're working, and they're proving it's working.

So it's good.

So I approve I agree with the 20 year exemption for homelessness because homeowners is important.

Okay, but still they have to have a home to own.

So builders still have to build it.

So I like that program, okay, and should be city-wide.

The MTE program, conversion project, I agree, it should be city-wide.

And I also like the 12-year extension, because that's what they agree.

They like to have it, and there will be enough incentive to do it.

So, no problem.

You know, if that's the situation at this time.

So we evaluate, obviously, we do, because things change.

But two years from now, three years from now, whenever.

They may say, well, gee, we want to, you know, we cannot do it.

So for some reason, they're not enough builders or developers, or in this to supply the adequate units for us to have.

So we're gonna figure out what to do.

It's gotta be reevaluated, it's gotta be changed.

You know, it's that's what we're depending on.

They're all human beings, we're human beings.

We have a goal.

Our goal is to build more units, more units.

I don't care whether what it is.

In this case, money family, it's fine.

But most cases is homes, it's buildings.

Okay, so we need to figure out what does it take.

Right now, I think that's why it works.

And let's keep going doing that.

Okay, but if things change, then we need to come back and look at it and evaluate.

Okay.

And we can also look at our city.

Maybe, maybe we'll evaluate to something else else.

You mentioned this cost to us, right?

But it's what's this cost we're willing to pay to reach our goal?

We have to pay something to get something back.

There's no free meal.

There's no feeble, no freebie, no fee meal.

It costs something, right?

So I think what that's happening is happening well, happening to fit what you are proposing.

So I like that.

And we look back either four years or whenever.

If things change two years later, well we have to change right if it works well we keep going.

And this eight year option you know it's again something it's gonna it's working it's accepted.

The builders are waiting to do it and we can foresee the supply is going to be adequate to meet whatever our goal is.

So I'm comfortable with this whole thing.

Okay but based on what is said so keep up the good work keep going and we want to make sure that we understand supply and demand and who's providing supply okay I just want to be sure the city's not going to pay everything the city's going to do all the supply we need to have partners we need builders developers to help provide the supply that's it.

Okay.

So you got a lot of feedback actually council member Bargava kind of suggest a a caveat on uh the 12 year extension that is just you know this is informational I know that so maybe you can consider this when you think about what you bring back to us.

Yeah it's just a caveat on existing uh uh residents you know to see if there's an opportunity to caveat that and the extension with that something to consider so uh happy to take offline conversation and go deeper as well but that's I will send an email on that.

Okay great okay so yeah one question are we planning on adopting this on December 2nd or is that just another touch or it it appeared you wanted to have this adopted by the end of the year but that doesn't give us very much time.

It doesn't what we're planning to do is bring back uh draft spike three code language for your consideration on December 2nd um and so depending on on how that discussion goes then we can identify the adoption timeline okay thank you and we you're welcome to put any emails comments on this as we think about it and before then okay well we are done with our meeting we will be back uh next week on the 28th we are adjourned thank you