On May 22, 2026, the Bellevue Environmental Services Commission (ESC) held a special meeting at 6:00 PM to consider revised policy options for expanding the utility bill assistance program. Commissioners Lutterman, Dupertis, and Laxon were present; Commissioners Hainosh, Margolis, and Tyson were excused. The commission voted 3-1 to adopt a new recommendation (Option B1) that preserves the current 70% discount for low-income seniors and disabled households while expanding eligibility to households earning up to 80% of area median income (AMI) with a 35% discount for new participants.
Alright, it's 6 p.m. And I'm calling. All right, it's 6 p.m. And I call the May 21st Environmental Services Commission special meeting to order. First up is a roll call. Commissioner Lutterman. Present. Commissioner Dupertis. Commissioner Hainosh is excused. Commissioner Laxon. Present. Commissioner Margolis and Commissioner Tyson are both also excused. But we do have a quorum. Good evening and welcome to the May 21st Environmental Services Commission meeting. First off is the approval of tonight's agenda. May have a motion to approve. Move to approve the agenda. I have a second. Second. Thank you. Are there any objections or modifications to the agenda? Hearing none, the agenda is approved as motioned. Next up, oral and written communications. Joe, are there any written communications tonight? There are no written communications. All right. And we appear to have no one registered for oral communications. So then just if anyone has not registered but would like to speak and is in attendance, please come up. If you're attending remotely, please use the raise your hand feature in Zoom or press star nine if you're attending via phone. Nothing online. All right. Then we will move to the next item on the agenda, which is the new business. So tonight we will be hearing about some revised policy options to expand the utility bill assistance program. Scott and Matt, I believe you are up. Good evening, Commissioners. Tonight, appreciate the opportunity to come back. All the good items get three touches with the commission. So this is a fun one. Um tonight we are providing you with an update. Uh you were you last received the options to consider expanding the utility bill assistance program back in March. And obviously, you made a recommendation at that time. We are back because as part of the 2027 to 2028 budget development process, we've had an opportunity to refine the cost estimates that uh will fund some of these options. And I think in some ways this is a good news item tonight for you to consider uh some revised cost estimates and options for consideration uh for ways that we can expand or consider expanding uh the utility bill assistance program. I'm gonna directly turn it over to Matt Hobson, who's gonna run through the entirety of the presentation, and then we can obviously answer any questions as we go. Thank you. Good evening, Commissioners. Uh the presentation tonight is likely less than 10 minutes, so hopefully it's it's mostly discussion amongst uh the commission. Uh so we are here to update um the utility bill assistance options that we presented to the commission back in March. Um, as part of the 2027-28 budget development process, we have been refining cost estimates across our budget, including uh the estimates for the bill assistance program, um, and we want to present those updated cost estimates to the commission for consideration. Now, we don't often come back uh to the commission to ask you to confirm or revise something you've already decided upon.