Transportation Commission - Regular Meeting

Excellent. Alright. Good evening, everyone. I can't believe we're already the April. Boy, the year is going. So welcome. Looks like we have nobody joining us online. So we've got everybody here tonight. We'll start with the call to order. Vice chair McGill? Here. Commissioner Keilman? Here. Commissioner Rupun? Here. Commissioner Ting?

Here.

K. And commissioner Kurtz and commissioner Marciante, know are absent and are excused. So we do have quorum, so that's great. Nice to see everybody. Alright. First, we will start with the approval of the agenda that you have, in front of you. Do I have a motion to approve it? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

Are there any amendments? Seeing none, we will go with the agenda as is. We will jump now to the oral and written communications. Kevin has been good as always affording to us the communications that come in by email. Oral, do we have anybody signed up for tonight? No. We haven't. Interesting. Nobody signed up. And it looks like is there anybody in the room who would like to speak?

Is there anybody online who would like to speak? If so, please raise your hand. K. We are not seeing a hand. Give you another couple seconds just in case. Okay. Seeing no oral communicate no comments tonight, we will move on. Communications from city council boards and commissions. I do not see council member Newhouse tonight. He's here. Is he supposed to join? He will be joining us. Okay. Okay. Then we'll jump to commissioners.

Anybody have anything to report? K. Alright. Staff reports. Kevin, all you or Mike? You go first. Okay.

We have several staff reports. The first one is we have a hazard mitigation plan that's in draft form and is out for public comment currently. So Christie is lead for this, and she's passing around the comment form. So it's really just, awareness, and you may wanna take a look and feel free

to comment.

I think it closes sometime in early May for comments. So

the ask is for us to go to this link It's up to you. If we would like to.

Yeah.

Okay. And and behind this was just as the picture describes, did did citizens ask for this, or was it the city? Or

It's probably explained on the web page. But Christie's here so she can maybe give us a couple bars about that.

Sure. Good evening, commissioners. I will, a couple of bars while you get that off the screen. Thank you. So the hazard mitigation plan came along from we have typically had an annex in the county's plan.

And one of the things that FEMA and the state had asked is that jurisdictions have their own dedicated plan. And so back in 2021, I started a grant process to be able to get us some planning dollars with FEMA to be able to do a plan. Finally, in about 2023, I was granted those dollars. I've been working with OEM do this plan so that what it allows us to do is look at the hazards that we have in the city and then also how we can mitigate some of those before some of these disasters happen. And there is dedicated hazard mitigation grant funds that, you can go for to be able to to mitigate some of the, actions, but you can't go for any of that grant money unless you have an approved plan.

So Okay. We are working through that process. This is we're at the, draft stage and hopefully hope by the end of the year that we will have a completed, plan to be able to use. And then every five years, we will update that plan and hopefully be mitigating some of those hazards that are out there. So appreciate if you have any time to be able to go ahead and page through, look at it, or give any comments, it would be wonderful. Thank you.

Perfect. Thank you. K?

So second announcement is our report staff report is the related to the printed memo that was included in your packet for the transportation facilities plan. Yes. So we are working with our finance department to understand the financial forecast. We had hoped to have it for tonight, which we don't have. But as indicated in that memo, we do anticipate that the finance staff will be able to join us at the meeting on June 12 K. To share the financial outlook, which, you know, preview, not not good in in terms of capital. K. So so, yeah, we're gonna have a pretty tight budget for our TFP. K. All indications are.

And then the the third report has to do with forthcoming vacancies on the the commission. Yep. And Kevin can bring us up to speed on the status. K.

I've got a message from the the city clerk's office indicating that we have 14 applicants for the two upcoming commission vacancies. The city clerk typically puts together a packet for us, for the the chair, myself, council member liaison, to review the the the candidate statements and qualifications, do a short list for interviews, and, have a council approval before our June 12 meeting so we have a full slate of commissioners at June 12.

Yeah.

So the process has begun, and we're we're beginning to review candidates.

Okay. Okay. Good to see there's a lot of interest. Lot of interest.

One one other one other item, if I may.

Sure.

Just as a reminder, if you haven't yet already, let me know if you intend to attend the commission's reception on Thursday night next week on the on April 30. I guess it's Wednesday night. Wednesday, April 30.

I'm a yes if you need to know an answer now.

So, yeah, you you you've already given me a yes. And we'll I I've already let the the city clerk know. She's trying to get a head count for catering.

K.

Right. And just for for now from now until election day, there will be a special announcement that the chair makes prior to oral communication regarding the rules re regarding public comment, regarding candidates or ballot issues, which is not allowed for one second. If if it starts to happen, the the chair has the authority to shut it down immediately according to Washington state law.

Yeah. Okay. So staff reports are done. Moving on now to public hearing. So tonight, have a public hearing, which we don't always have. And so how the process will go tonight is Christie will give us a brief introduction to the 2025 transportation improvement program. And then once she has provided that information, I will be reaching out to you guys to seek a motion to open the public hearing. We'll ask for any kind of testimonies and then, of course, do the closure. So we'll start with Christie and her information.

And good evening, as chair Stash said. This is for the public hearing for our 2026, 2031 transportation improvement program. The public hearing is actually mandated by the RCW for the transportation improvement program plan. It allows the public to be able to make comments on the projects that are in the recommended plan. Any questions that might come from any of the comments will be addressed during agenda item seven a when I'm back up for the actual presentation.

One thing to note that is a difference from the approved list that you approved back in February is that there was, one project deletion. And what it is is that one of our ongoing CIP programs, that covered minor capital traffic operations program, so it had different kinds of traffic engineering, traffic operations, and has actually now been just merged in with another CIP ongoing program still done by the same group in traffic engineering, called w r 46 as our traffic safety implementation program. So they've just taken the elements of those two programs, and they've actually consolidated them together. So as far as efficiency of those programs, anything, nothing has changed. They're just consolidating the programs for efficiency's sake, and that is the only change that they have.

So, chair, when you're ready, you may open the public hearing. Alright.

I'm now seeking a motion to open the public hearing.

So moved.

Is there a sec? Second.

K. Is there anybody here who would like to provide testimony? Do I see a hand in the back? Come on up. And just a reminder to please speak your name. Yes. Of course. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Hello. My name is Nicole Myers, and I just wanted to express that we are currently looking at adding a lot of housing in the neighborhood areas through the middle housing changes that the planning commission just voted on to be forwarding to council. We're also simultaneously looking at up upping some of the density in mixed use areas and adding apartments and more affordable options in neighborhood centers and other urban areas. And I I know that for some of these, have, particularly in the neighborhoods, potential for significant growth that would be in areas that are not served well by sidewalks.

I've seen so much work to upgrade just, you know, in this last week. There are, you know, cement trucks everywhere and crews, you know, working on our street corners to make them more accessible. And I just I'm sorry I haven't had as much time to dig into exactly where I think we need to have, you know, more allocations for sidewalks. But, you know, as we think about how to connect people specifically to the places where we know we're gonna have transit with the rapid ride, where the rapid ride is coming, where people are gonna, you know, connect to light rail. I hope that we'll continue to focus on making those places very welcoming for pedestrians.

So thank you very much.

Thank you. Is there anybody else, Mike, online who maybe has chimed in in the last couple minutes?

I I I see nobody with hand raised, so I think we have nobody

And we have no one else left in the room?

Speak.

Okay. Then I will be seeking a motion to close the public hearing.

So moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay. That was easy enough. Okay. Then let's jump on to agenda item number seven, which is the study session. So Christie is back up here, giving us more information on the transportation improvement program. He she will be seeking our action to recommend the 2025 update of the transportation improvement program to the city council. So this is an action for us tonight. She will also be asking us to approve the transmittal letter that was in our packet information before the meeting. So both of those and I guess, Christy, I turn it over to you.

Great. Thank you very much, and thank you for opening and closing that public hearing. That was nice and efficient. We like that. So, again, I'm back, chair Stash, vice chair McGill, and commissioners to talk to you about the approval of the transportation improvement program plan for, this year, which are for our years for this, year is 2026 to 2031, so it was a year ahead.

I am asking for two actions to take place, this evening after our conversation. So, again, I'm gonna give you a little bit of background about the, transportation improvement program plan, the how it's mandated for an annual update so you see me every single year I come and visit you, how the TIP's relationship to all of our other planning and programming processes, going through the various sections of the TIP as they were in your handout, showing what the recommended changes were from the current, 2025, 2030 plan, then asking you to, do the two actions to, approve this plan to be able to go to the council for adoption as well as approving the recommendation memo that will go along with the agenda memo. And then I'll tell you the next steps I've got left in the process. So again, a little bit of background and how we come up with these things. This is a mandated plan by RCW that we have to do annually and it is something that we put together and need to do so that we can submit it basically to be able to be it helps us to be eligible for grants.

So when you see some of those ongoing programs that have some projects in them, those are some of the projects that are on our ongoing programs list that we think might be good or eligible for grants. And That's why we call them out separately. So in our process, can see where we start with that big vision of the comprehensive plan. Then we use our other functional plans. We've talked about this before, how those all fit into the mobility implementation plan that then is, as you know, from our other process that we're doing, prioritizes the concepts that actually go into the TFP process.

All of those projects actually feed into the TIP, including what is in the current transportation facilities plan, so the 2022, 2023 transportation facilities plan, and the current capital improvement program, which is a '25 to 2030. And then how our process works is if you have made it into the capital improvement plan, that is the funded plan where project implementation actually starts. But all of those mechanisms feed into our what we call local transportation improvement program plan. A couple of other pieces that fit into that also are other programs and initiatives that we might have that are outside of that, such as transit plan, our transportation demand management program, some of those types of things. And then we have a section also that has things for regional or other outside agency led projects that we would want to be calling out that the city would like to be able to participate in if we have the resources to be able to do it.

So once all those things have actually fit into the TIP, then the TIP goes to both the Regional Transportation Improvement Program, which is managed by PSRC, and goes into the State Transportation Improvement Program called the STIP, which is managed by WSDOT. It's mandated that this program goes into both of those plans by June 30 of every calendar year. So if we go and we talk about the sections of the transportation improvement plan, it is broken down into four sections and if for some of you who have been with us for a while you'll remember that a few years ago we actually took the projects out of the comprehensive plan which was the Comprehensive Transportation Project list, and we embedded them into our TIP. So that's why when you see the numbers in Section three, there are a lot of them because those are some of those other projects that came from studies and other things that we've been doing. So this list continues to grow.

We have 141 projects that have project numbers. There are some other there are actually more than that when we really count all of the sub projects that we call out. But in Section one, which is our capital plan, there are 42 projects that are in our adopted plan right now. The remaining projects that are in Section two, there are 29 of those, and those are the remaining projects that are in the adopted twenty twenty two-two thousand and thirty three plan. So you can anticipate next year when we come, we will be talking about the projects that were adopted into the twenty twenty six-two thousand and thirty seven plan, hopefully.

Section three again has 65 other projects. A good portion of these projects were candidates right now for our transportation facilities plan project. So we put all of the other candidates go into this plan. So we're not losing any of the projects that might not get into the TFP. This is kind of the house for them.

This is where they will live. And then the purple section, which is section four, has five of the regional or other outside agency led projects. If you look at that part of the list, you'll notice there are projects for 04/2005, 05/20, I 90 for, sound transit three and, and the like. So when I was last with you, we talked about some of the changes that we needed and wanted to, make for this twenty twenty six two thousand thirty one TIP. So we'd have six new projects in section one.

There's going to be 14 projects that were removed. There are three projects that are transferring sections. And when we mean transferring sections, it usually means that in the CIP, maybe they were only funded for a design study and they don't have full funding yet. So they'll move back down. If they have a TFP number, they'll move to the TFP section. If they don't, they'll go to section number three and they'll live there until they get more dollars. In this case, one of those three projects that moved out of the CIP was actually the overlay program. It is now in our general fund, so it is down in section three. In section two, that is the TFP. Again, we had two projects that were removed and we had seven projects that transferred sections, and most of them moved up into the CIP during the CIP process.

Section three had 34 new projects, which the bulk of those were all from the transportation facilities plan process that we're doing right now. And then we had three that transferred sections, and those three actually went to the CIP. And then we have section four, and there was actually no change this year in any of the project information in section four for the regional or outside agency led projects. So what I again, what I'm here tonight for is for an approval, from you for the project list as you see it in front of you now. Since the time I saw you in February, we have made sure that we have matched up our project descriptions.

We have used the latest costs that we have for the projects that is available, to us. And then also would like you to approve, and transmit the the commission recommendations to the city council. In a meeting that we had earlier this afternoon with chair Stash and vice chair McGill, chair Stash noted a couple of things for me to change, add the e to mayor Robinson's name, which it was an oversight on my part, and then also, doing a little bit of grammatical change with a capital l and local in most of it. So those changes have already been made. If there are other changes or anything else you would like in that memo, that is that is fine.

We're happy, to do it. If you have changes, substantive changes, we've done it before where you tell me what those would be, and then we just agree right now that I will make those and forward it on that way. We do not ask that anybody go to the city council. When this is approved, we put the letter in with the memo. This is a consent item for council.

K. Thank you. Then I will ask if there are questions from other commissioners. Go ahead.

Just for my own knowledge. So section one is fully funded. Is that right?

Not necessarily. Those are those are Full or partially funded? Yes. Those are, yeah, projects that you would find in the capital plan.

C three and four don't have funding. Definitely don't.

Excuse me. It's about my help. No. Two, three, four have funding. It is just that, so if you see where it says unsecured funding, those are other dollars that if we if we had the ability to get them, it wouldn't allow us to do more.

So if you see if when you're looking at the document itself and you see local funding, that is the funding that has been approved by council. If you see other funding, those are usually grants or other, or other agreements that we have made with other jurisdictions or like Honorable View College Connection, we have some agreements with with, with Metro, and such. So that middle section that says secured project funding, that is what has been council approved. The unsecured section is the dollar amounts that if we had could have them and have the resources in that six year period, that's what would help progress these projects even further.

Okay. So if I'm looking at this, so section one is what if if I wanna get excited about, hey. A project's gonna happen. I probably wanna focus on what's in section one?

You'll you'll want to, focus the ones in section one, yes, because they actually are already in the capital plan. K. But we have had during the biennium, we have had projects that have gotten approved for other reasons and moved from a different section up to section one. If we get development opportunities where we get a developer contribution or something like that or if something at the Mid Buy is really hot on the council's agenda and they want it to be in there, they can do that as well. But yes, Section one are the funded projects

Commissioner or Cheng?

Thank you. So two quick clarifications. My understanding is that within this list, there is no prioritization. This is just a list of items in no particular order.

No particular order. So the first section is done alphanumerically by the types. So m are are minor capital maintenance projects, r is our roadways, w b is our walkway bikeways, g is general government because we have that for Eastrail. And then the TFP is in TFP number order, and the other ones are just the order that they came into the TIP, basically.

Okay, great. Thank you. And my second clarification is that there will be an opportunity to comment on the other sections, specifically looking at projects within the CIP or the TFP at a later date. In other words, right now, we are just looking at the overall list. I mean, that's the way that I've always thought about it is that the TFP sorry, the TIP is unconstrained financially, and therefore, it's just a list of projects that we think are important but not necessarily funded. But we're not making specific decisions right now about what's, say, in the TFP section versus the CIP section. That's not the intent of this meeting. Is that correct?

That is correct. We don't actually have the TIP doesn't have purview over changing anything in the CIP section or in the TFP section. Those are handled during their own processes. So the things that you'll be changing in the transportation facilities plan is the other process that Mike and I are doing with you right now. Perfect.

So any of those changes, you'll see reflected in the next iteration. And then the capital plan, that is the one that goes to council and everything. So, yes, if you had any changes of projects that were in the blue or the purple section, that section or if you had wanted to, you could make a a change in that section. Anything being added to this plan does have to have a vetted kind of scope or project description as it's written on there and some kind of cost estimate to work into the plan, though.

Great. Thank you. You're welcome. Question, Piguil?

Yes. And thank you for answering the questions I sent. Welcome. Really trying to understand the process a little bit. Can you go back to that flowchart that you had with TFP, all the acronym. Yes. That one right there. Just from an just really trying to understand this from a more specific way on how this works.

Sure.

Let's just talk about I just wanted to run one through here and make sure I understand how it works. So we had which is it? It is it's the missing link. What it what number is that? I think it's

Is it the one from your email?

Yes. It is the one from my email.

So the one from your email was number 19. 19.

Yeah. T okay. So 19.

Was also number 111.

So the way I think this worked and correct me if I'm not right.

I

think that's my so that came out of BikeVelView, which is not on here, but it was a study. And that then goes into the TFP, and then it's in the TFP, and it progresses. That's a project that would go through the TFP, and we actually haven't seen it in the TFP. We haven't fully discussed it yet. Right? So

we're a little

bit out of order. It goes in there, and then it goes to the TIP from the TFP. So

so numb so project number 19 that's in the yellow section of the CIP was not a Bike Belvieu project. That was actually one when we did the whole development of the Spring District, and all of the things that happened in the Bell Red, area. So that's a that's one of those. Project number one eleven is out of Bike Bellevue. Okay.

And they're actually on different in different areas. So the one that is project 19 is specifically on Spring Boulevard from 1 24th to 1 32nd. The one that is from Bike Bellevue actually runs from the the intersection crossing of Northeast 12th and Spring Boulevard, and then it goes along Northeast 12th until Northeast 12th turns into Bell Red Road and goes to 1 32nd. So it actually is more on Northeast 12th and 1 32nd, not on Spring Boulevard. So they're in two separate they're in two separate areas.

So that's answering a lot of different questions too because, so 111 did you say one eleven that Yeah. Came out of the TFP? So when we, when this when the council decided they wanted to continue to study Bell Red Road, did that become 111? Is that how it ended up?

These were the the the one that ends up being one eleven is one of the candidate CIP I mean, candidate TFP projects that are in our current TFP process right now. So every candidate TFP project that was not already in either the CIP or TFP moved into this plan because we want to still be able to hold those projects. And right now, we don't know which ones are going to make it into the TFP or not. And so this still holds those projects whether they make it into the TFP or not. So we're still having those conversations with you guys about what projects those are.

This just enables us to still keep it somewhat kind of like being a transportation master plan, if you would, of projects. So we pulled, like I showed you before, 34 projects into the blue section as new, and it's because most of them were candidates for the TFP because, otherwise, there's no place for them to go once that process, is over with.

Okay. So 19 is multimodal, which includes bikes.

Right.

It includes bike lanes.

Mhmm.

So, you know, essentially a complete street, I think, is what it's being talked about right there.

Right.

So if nineteen gets funded somehow, then it it, accomplishes some of the goals from other, sources. In other words, it's kind of a complete, and that's why I was also looking at the price tag on that. It was, like, $75,000,000. Yes. If you just did the bike, corridors through there, it would be presumably less. Okay. Well, thanks for spending the time on that because it helps me. Hopefully, you know, it it helps helps us understand how things flow through this whole flowchart right here. It's just one little example, but it was one that we spent a lot of time on.

So Right. So an another thing and, unfortunately, that project price probably take when it go down that much because that doesn't exist out there right now.

Yeah.

So but the one thing to remember is the mobility implementation plan is really just the vessel that holds where all of those gaps are. It doesn't have money. There is no dollar. There are no dollars that are actually in the mobility implementation plan. It has the project concepts.

So the transportation facilities plan, as we've talked to you about, it has that constrained funding where we have whatever is left in the capital plans years plus the additional whatever year. So for us, twenty six to thirty seven will have four years of our capital plan, and then the remaining eight will be constrained because we're just kind of guessing at what we're going to have in those out years. Right? The capital improvement plan has the funded plans that have been approved by CANCEL, that's been adopted by CANCEL. The TIP, as you can tell in its billion plus price tag, has whatever if all of a sudden money started falling from the heavens for us that we would want to be able to have to be able to make these projects a reality in a six year time frame.

K. Thank you.

Yes. Go ahead.

This may turn out to be a two or three part question depending on how you answer the first part. Are any of these projects listed apart or residuals from Bellevue?

So they would be in the blue section right now if they were a part or residual of Bike Bellevue because none of those are in an adopted plan yet.

Okay.

Yeah. They would be in the blue section right now.

Thank you. That answered all

of them?

Yep. Alright. Other questions? Clarifications? Okay. Then let's close this one out before we go to the transmittal letter. So I am seeking a motion to recommend approval of the TIP as was sent to us earlier this week. Do I have that motion?

So moved. Second? Second.

For the vote, anybody disagree? Okay. Looks like we got through that one. Let's move on to the transmittal letter. Hopefully, everybody got a chance to read it. It's just a quick one page letter. Any comments, questions, clarifications from the commission? No. Okay. Seeking a motion then to approve this transmittal letter as sent to us earlier.

So moved.

Second.

Any disagreement? K. We have a unanimous vote. Christy, you have both that you were seeking tonight.

Thank you very much. This has been a great process with you guys this year. Just to give you an update on what my next moves are, I am slated to go to council on June 3 for the adoption of this plan. Up from now until then, I will actually be working on the agenda memo and actually making a draft plan, of this. And then once that is approved by council and I get the resolution back for it, I will put together a final package that will then be submitted to the state and PSRC by June 30 this year, and I will return to you next probably February to start the process over again. So thank you for your time. I appreciate it.

Oh, quick question. Questioner thing?

Yes. Sorry. One quick question. What feedback do we ever get from the PSRC? I'm just curious.

So, again, it goes into their regional plan. And so what it does is they really work with our grant coordinator when we are submitting our projects. One of the questions on grant applications is is it in either your regional tip? Is it in the STIP? Is it in another, adopted plan? And so that allows us to say, We can prove to them. And this these so it goes to the PSRC librarian and our descriptions and the locations is what goes into their regional their regional plan.

Do they actually provide any substantive feedback beyond, yes, it's in the plan now?

No. Not really. Not not to my knowledge that I've had to deal with, because I take it to the fact that that would happen through our process, through having a public hearing and through having, the council adopt it Okay. Resolution.

And also for the STIP at the state level? Same. Okay. Alright. Thank you.

So thank you to Christy. You always run a very well planned out process. She doesn't come to us all of sudden June 15 saying, I need you to read this 38,000 line spreadsheet and tell them if you have comments. I need her answer tomorrow, so thank you.

We only had to do that during COVID, and it's just well,

you know. So

Thank you, and we will see you again, I know, for sure. Yeah. Moving on to the mobility implementation plan update. So Chris is here, and he will provide information on the bicycle level of stress traffic stress definition. He will be seeking commission concurrence tonight on this, and he will take us through what we had talked about last time, the change that we had asked, and he's provided some additional information. So all of yours, I guess, both Kevin and Chris. So whoever's first.

Thank you, chair Stash. I'll I'll start off and and seek support from Chris as we go through this very brief presentation. As always, I will review with you the recommendations you made from the last meeting, talk about the concurrence we're seeking, for tonight on two separate items separate but related items, and then I'll go through the calendar for the next steps in this process. So on on March rather, the commission approved an updated, bicycle level of traffic stress table to include changes to the speed limit and the the definition of shared use path, which was called formerly a physically separated bikeway. You approved that.

Thank you. You also approved a an alternate route for the primary or, yeah, primary bicycle corridor on Spirit Ridge, Sammamish River connection called the East Bellevue Greenway. You approved that corridor. Thank you. We didn't get through to approval on on a couple things.

One is is with respect to the table four in the MIP. We sought concurrence to repeal this and instead to refer to our transportation design manual and to our professional associations for guidance on how to what to include in intersection improvements to help achieve the intended level of traffic stress. Trying to maintain the the order level of traffic stress through the intersections, which can often be difficult to to navigate without the right just bicycle facilities. So you wanted a little bit more information on that. We we will have a little bit more to share.

There was a lot in your memo as well. Associated with that, staff presented a a map that identified the performance targets, the bicycle level of traffic stress performance targets at intersections along the bicycle network corridors. And we didn't get to concurrence on that one because you wanted to talk a little bit more about the the table that talked about the intersections. So we you've you asked that we bring this back tonight. So we are.

So a a little bit on the intersection performance targets for bicycle level of traffic stress. As you know, we recommend removing the prescriptive table from the MIP, from the mobility implementation plan, just because each intersection is unique and there are specific design concepts that will work to achieve the intended level of traffic stress through the intersection, to maintain that comfort level along the corridor. There's so many tools that we have to use, including our own, engineering judgment on what to implement along a, at an intersection along a bicycle network corridor. But we rely on the standards and guidance from our transportation design manual, which is a document adopted by our transportation director. And we we belong to the National Association of City Officials, which has just recently put out an updated guide for bicycle network corridors, and intersections, and there's a lot of good information in that as well as from the American Association of State Highway and Transportation officials.

We refer to all of these documents, for for guidance and tools, as we do all sorts of transportation projects, not just bicycle corridor projects. Wanted to give you proof that we have these documents. These are the these are the these are the covers of all the documents that I just mentioned. The the transportation design manual is in two parts. One is, like, the the design manual, which is kind of the standards and and the drawings that would be implemented through in projects that the staff develops or as the private sector develops as part of their development projects.

And the Complete Streets guide is more of a a a kind of it's it's it's more of a policy illustrative guide that that provides sort narrative and illustrations for the for how bicycle network facilities would work along a corridor and at an intersection. So we refer to all these bef before making design decisions. The the the graphics on the right are some example from our from AASHTO showing, you know, like, almost everything you could throw at an intersection to to achieve prescribed level of traffic stress. It's not necessarily that we would do all of these things, but these are kind of a set of tools that could be used at an intersection to achieve the level of traffic stress you're looking for. And the the photos on the right on the left are examples of intersections in Bellevue where we've implemented some of those tools to help bicycles navigate a a sometimes complex intersection.

So that's the substance of our presentation, seeking, questions and clarification from you and also seeking concurrence to have two actions again. One is to repeal table four and instead to refer to our our guiding documents, and the other is to, change the figure 12 to include the intersection performance level of traffic stress targets. We'll go back to this one first.

K. Quit questions, comments from commissioners? Yeah. Commissioner Vapone?

Mhmm. So, I mean, in an ideal world and you had all the space, you needed to implement the whatever we needed to do for the level of traffic stress, that that would be great. But what happens when you when we're constrained? Like, how do we work with that? Do we I mean, do you just kinda work with what you have and make it as good as you can trying to achieve that level, or are we talking about trying to buy neighboring properties or things like that?

Yeah. And and, again, that that's why the context sensitivity nature of our proposal is important because often you can't achieve the intended level of traffic stress within the constraints of the space or the budget or number of other constraints that you'd face. So you you want to have some flexibility to get the best you can get. When when we're talking about achieving a level of traffic stress, there's several components that go into that. One is the actual space that you provide for the rider, the width of the space that's designated to them, and the the separation that space from the moving vehicles because you're moving through an intersection at the same time, basically, unless you have some time separation with a bike signal that gives you a head start.

So you you've maybe be able to move through an intersection before traffic even starts moving. So there's those three components that you try to mix and match together to achieve as good as you can get at the intersection. If there's if Christie finds us lots of money, we may be able to move the curbs so that to provide for more space. But, typically, for for a a bike network intervention that is not a full blown CIP, if we're just dealing with an intersection along a corridor, you you you work within the constraints between the curbs.

Other questions? Question time?

When you take a look at the corridor versus the intersection, how typical is it for one for them to to match in terms of meeting the goal?

The intent is for them to match. You want you you don't want the intersection to be a constraint for a person riding along a corridor. So if the corridor is LTS two, for instance, you wanna design the intersection to be compatible with the intended level of traffic stress along the corridor. So you'll provide, you know, provide for an intersection with components that help you achieve that level

And of right now, how close are we to meeting I guess if I looked at a map that showed the compliant or the the quarters that meet the, the goal and the intersections that meet the goal. Are those maps is very similar, or do we see, for example, that there are are lots of areas where the quarter meets, but the intersection doesn't or vice versa?

I I bet Chris can handle that better because he's doing an inventory of our performance target gaps. But I would say that your assumption is pretty close, that the corridors are more complete than the intersections.

Yeah. And I think that's a a fair assessment, and not just practice here in Bellevue, but historically, the industry was has been much more cognizant of getting the corridor right, but the intersection turns out to be the hardest place to get that LTS addressed because that's where you tend to need the most lanes. So you're already constrained with typically widen out to add turn lanes and whatnot. It's an afterthought in many cases to try to shoehorn a bicycle facility in there. Some of the newer facilities that Bellevue has, that's been a a conscious effort to make sure that the intersections are matching the LTS.

So, like, with the 108th Corridor, for example, It's not fully implemented, but, like, where the whatever the Pokemon building or whatever that is, they're at Northeast 8th And 108. The southbound side now has a separated bike facility, which was called out for wasn't there as fully built out with a bicycle signal to provide a lead, as Kevin said, to keep bikes from getting sort of cut off by right turning vehicles. That's matching the LTS for that corridor now using one of the designs that's in those those manuals there. But the one of the intents of this update is to actually call out the intersection LTS target, which is in the map that we're asking you to provide some concurrence around so that it's very clear so that when, for example, our development review engineers here in the city are working with a developer, it's clear what is the intent at that intersection, not just along the corridor so that the design engineers or a private developer can help to to meet that. So it's it's the industry is catching up.

But if you go around most of the city, we're still we're still lagging on on the intersection side.

Got it. And let me know if I should ask this later. But is it more important is there a guideline or a general rule of thumb to say that it's more important to tackle the intersection versus the corridor first if one of them needs improvement, or is it just completely situational?

I I would say it's situational. Ideally, you try to get everything. If you're gonna implement a corridor, you try to get the whole piece built at once, but there's practical matters that that's not always feasible. Sometimes you have an opportunity to get part of a corridor built out, and the intersection can be a pretty big bite, and that might be left to not quite fill the gap or vice versa. You have the chance to move some corners on an intersection for a utility project or something. You can do that. So it's it's very much Bellevue, like most communities, is is takes opportunistic chances to get the system built out over time, but ideally, you you do them at the same point.

I guess maybe a slightly different way of asking the question is, do we find that it's safer for the cyclists if we focus more on the corridors or the intersections? Or is it, again,

completely situational? Yeah. It's very situational depending on, yeah, the conditions either along the corridor or the intersection. Both of them can be challenging.

Okay. Thank you.

Other questions?

Yeah. So I think the figure 12 revision makes sense. Right? You're just putting intersection LTS on there. And I think I understand how you do the LTS at the intersection. It's the lower of the two segments that can add Better. Which makes sense. So that's very clear. I guess, I'm just trying to I guess maybe if there is a concern, it's that before we had table four, it was very clear what would be required to meet the LTS target. And now we have a number of different documents that could be utilized.

And so I'm kinda wondering, how do you do you really k. So you know you need an LTS three intersection, and right now, you've got an LTS four. So how how does the public know what it's gonna take to make that from to to to go from four to three? Is there It's almost like you had a very defined criteria, and I get that you wanna have more flexibility because you wanna be able to handle all these different variations. But now you have so many variables.

So how would you address people in the community that would wanna know, hey. I wanna know what an LTS four intersection take an LTS four to a three, what that's gonna look like so that I can make comments on it and so forth.

There there's there's various levels of of public engagement in projects such as this. As Chris mentioned, sometimes these projects are developed in coordination with a private sector developer, in which case the infrastructure components are in are sort of derived from the transportation design manual. There there's not a lot of public input on what you should do at an intersection. It it's prescribed by the design manual. In other cases, like if it's a CIP project, if it's a a major corridor, then there's more opportunities for public involvement in the sort of design concept development for that CIP corridor.

And then at that in that process, you can, sort of work with the tools that are available to design an intersection in a corridor that that meets the performance target. So it it again, it's it's contextual. It depends on the scale of the project, the location, the relationships with other things that are going on, with regard to the public engagement. But, typically, it's more administrative than than than publicly vetted.

So if if yeah. I'll just be quick. If we went to some of those design guides, which I'm not familiar with, I need to pull those up. I guess the question is how much public input goes into those guides? And would you be able to go in there and figure out what an LTS three intersection needs to look like?

There's there's not so much public input. It's more professional input. It's best practices from practitioners that inform the development of those guides. It's not a general public kind of input opportunity. Okay.

Let me think about that for a little bit.

Am I right, Chris, about Do you have anything?

They are. But I I think one way to to consider this is that if you're looking at public a comparable example would be that professional guides guidelines dictate what is at a it makes an accessible intersection for with the Americans with Disabilities Act. There there's a similar guide. It's called PROWAG, another acronym. We love our acronyms.

That is defined that says, here's the suite of tools that a community can use to implement an accessible intersection. If a if a layperson was to go in there and say, what is exactly it going to look like? They will not be able to determine because it's context context sensitive to site conditions. They could see all the options that are there to make an accessible intersection, but it would be up to the design engineer on-site to make that final call. This is very similar in that those guides will say, here's what it takes to create a low stress environment at an intersection for bicycles in that in this example or pedestrians.

But the could you exactly define if we're gonna work at an intersection in Bellevue what it will look like? It won't be a 100% clear because the site conditions need to be fit. So it gives you an indication of what it might look like, but it you can't exactly know. But I for a a public project where there's a design design phase, I just personal experience, working with folks in the city, I email the the project manager that's on the city website and say, hey. What are you thinking about?

And to the degree that the design is baked out, they're like they pretty generally walk me through what's going on. So it's not there's there's that's the appropriate stage is when you're knowing what all the is there a big 96 inch utility pipe that's in the way of of moving things around or not? You can't know that at a design manual stage.

Did that address your question enough?

I'm not gonna think think it

through.

Mull it over bit? Okay. Thanks. Alright.

Can we follow what is your concern that that maybe we can help be

more responsive? So I'm just trying to think about this, this would actually work. So maybe we use an example that we're probably all familiar with. Main Street, and I think it's it's in front of Bellevue High School, 108th Main Street.

Okay. It's in Main Street.

I don't know if we're I wanna use it as a specific example so I can see how this would actually work. So that's got a separated bike lane. It's got an advanced bike signal. That to me looks like a full on bike intersection. Right? That is an LTS one. So the the question well, the question is, is that an LTS one? And how would we know? So if we look at that example without going into all the guides, how would we know, hey. That's an LTS one, and it's, you know, matching on either side?

Or because I think you're gonna have to make a prioritization on how you spend money if it's not LTS one and more money needs to be put into that, what are you really trying to achieve? Does that make sense?

Sure. And and that's a really good example because the design of that intersection has evolved a couple times in in my career here, which is long, but that that intersection has been subject of several design iterations to help it move towards that level of traffic stress one that you're trying to get. It didn't always have a signal. It didn't always have green stripes across. Yeah.

It it sort of ended the the bike route on 108 going south sort of ended at the intersection, and then you had to make your way across the intersection on your own and going with the traffic and until you hit the bike lane on the other side. But subsequent modifications to that intersection have restricted through traffic. Car general purpose vehicles can't go through that intersection, so that does relieve the pressure the the the the competition for space for bikes going through that intersections because all the cars turn right. The bike signal prohibits right turns when the bike has a green, so there isn't the right hook kind of confrontation that that could happen. So that that's a a really good example of how as we learn more, we can implement better.

And then by having a prescriptive toolkit as shown in table four, you sort of eliminate the opportunity to get creative as you learn more or have more more resources to to invest in an intersection.

Is that an LTS one compliant intersection?

It's it's sub I mean, there is there isn't just like on a corridor, there are factors that contribute to the level of traffic stress that's achieved. At an intersection, as I mentioned, there is the space provided. There's the separation of vehicles and the separation in time, and I think that achieves all those things.

And so so just on that intersection, the the LTS one just means the maximum amount of separation from a bicycle to have a risk of an in in a con a a car. For a hundred and eighth side, yeah, it's it would meet the LTS one because all phases of the bike movement are protected. You can't you unless somebody's not following the rules, they won't come across. On the main street side, which is this is new because we we at this at a couple meetings ago, we said we should adopt the the lowest stress identified for an entire intersection on all approach. The Main Street side does not meet LTS one for a couple of reasons.

One, the main street approaches don't have protection for the bike phase. You just kinda go with the flow with the with the traffic flow. And the way that the on the westbound or eastbound approach, it requires you to weave across a right Okay. Lane, which would be a an LTS two facility, but not an LTS one facility at at the the intersection based on how the the the transportation department staff have been implementing that. So that's as an example, this is Exactly.

A case study in in evolution as as Kevin has noted, and the side that is identified for LTS one, that intersection meets it. Not all intersections on Hundred And 8th are there yet. It's close, but not quite there. But that's just in part because of the the evolving practice.

Commissioner Ting?

Thank you. So what's the process by which you're going to grade all of these intersections, and how are you going to ensure consistency in the way they're graded?

So we are so we've rated the intersections per the the LTS target. So as a sort of a live example right now, this commission identified the advancement of some bicycle facilities that came out of the bike beltway process that don't require any lane reallocations on a number of streets, the 1 20th Northeast 4th. Sorry. Specifically with regard to intersections. I'm getting there.

Okay.

Thank you. So that process is looking at the this guidance. And as we are moving to from project concept to specific design to move towards actual implementation, that is where the intersections are being rated, evaluated, and designed to meet the level of traffic stress. So it's in the design phase when you have a full inventory of how much space do you have, what's the traffic volumes, what's the what's the bike LTS expectation. We know what the target is, and that's where the specific evaluation of what's there today and what's the design to get you to where you need to be.

So right now, do we have ratings for all the intersections?

We do not have ratings for

we don't

have gap map, if you will, for all the intersections at this at this point. We have the targets, but not where the gaps lie.

I see. And so how do we figure out what the ratings are? We basically go to each intersection and do a design evaluation?

So I the where this is currently implemented, that that's we're in the process of updating the the corridor level of traffic stress for across across the board. But at this point, right now, the intersection LTS evaluations are being done where there's a specific project that would be seeking to change the intersection. So it's like where we're touching the intersection, we're looking at whether or not we're meeting the LTS. It's in fact very similar to how it's sort of like a ADA inventory is done that when you have to touch the intersection, you have to see are you meeting the ADA target or not. So that's the current state of the evaluation of of the intersection.

I see. So we won't actually know where we are until we start doing our inventory. So we don't actually have set of ratings for the intersections at the moment. Is that correct?

We don't have a target yet until we adopt until we adopt our we we have we haven't had a target yet. So that's we we will, but that we're not we're not there yet. So

Okay. So if we have this target, we'll still have to go and see if the intersections meet the targets by doing this evaluation. Because one of the problems with the the old system is that it was too prescriptive. Right. But one of the benefits of table four is that it was prescriptive. So you would have a level of consistency and you could understand what was BLTS one, two, or three, or four for the intersections. So I guess this follow-up question then is how are you going to ensure that there's a level of consistency in the grading or the ratings of these intersections? Because we no longer have a set of guidelines that people can point to and say, well, that's clearly a BLTS three versus a two.

I think that I mean, that's a it's a fair fair point. In working with the design engineer staff right now, they have a pretty clear indication, right, of of what they expect the intersections to be to be performing at under sort of an ideal condition. So I don't know, Kevin. I can't speak for for the team, but it seems like something that could be a a matrix that could be developed.

And I

I I think, commissioner Ting, you're you're you're asking for more specificity than this process allows for at this time. Remember for the the bicycle network corridors themselves, it was either met or it wasn't met. That that was the that was the toggle. We didn't get well, this is this is supposed to be an LTS three, but it's or it's supposed to be a one, but it's only a three. We didn't get to that level of specificity because just that the massiveness of the inventory of data would not

And and that's fair. Not be possible. However, I think now we've sort of flipped the switch. Now we have no definition of, like, what is a BLTS two for an intersection. I mean, if you talk about the characteristics, I mean, can you list them off?

Or I mean, how do we, either as a commissioner or as the public, know kind of getting back to Commissioner McGill's Vice Chair McGill's question how do we communicate whether something is BLTS two or three as an intersection if we don't have a set of criteria or guidelines or even high level principles that give enough specificity so that people can understand what they are? I'm not talking about specific implementation, but people should be able to point at something and say, yeah, I think that's a BLTS two or three.

I probably would disagree that the city's engineering staff, if to look at an intersection and determine whether or not it's a, BLTS one, two, three, or four, I think they could come to a pretty close consensus based on what the practices and the design guides from those documents that have listed are. Is there a is there an exact rubric to score all of those elements? No. It has to do with the degree of protection as we've talked about before that for a BLTS one intersection, there's sort of complete protection, And then it steps down to a again, when you look at the corridors, just to just to geek out for a second here, for a BLTS three corridor, it basically says that you can have a a striped bike lane or a shareo depending on sort of the volume of the street, and the intersection expectation is pretty much like many intersections in the city. So long as you can get to the intersection and cross it, you're there.

That's generally what those guidelines would identify for that. Are there variances within that? Say it's a particularly massive intersection that you might want some additional guidance. That's for the the design engineers to perhaps weigh in and say that, well, for this intersection, we might have a very heavy right turn. We might wanna provide a little bit more visual indication for even though it's a a BLTS three intersection to highlight to the presence of of bicycles. And that's where having an exact rubric and scoring, I think we could probably get there. It just hasn't been defined at this at this level.

So I don't think we need to have an exact scoring mechanism. I understand that's very situational, and so I I don't think we need that. However, I think we need something in between, which is going to be either the principles, the general guidelines, the thought process, whatever you want to call it. But when the engineers start doing this inventory, my guess is they're going to they're going to start to form a visual map of why we think this is a BLTS-one versus -two. And having some level of description that we can share with the public, I think that would be very useful.

So maybe that's my ask is we don't need to have something that's prescriptive in the way that we've described it here because that limits the flexibility in terms of design. But perhaps we need some sort of populated table that communicates how the engineers reach a decision. Not prescriptive, but gives the general idea and the concepts, the principles, the guidelines, whatever, so that the public then knows what do I expect out of a BLTS two versus three?

Maybe even at broad brush of separation, space, timing, hey, an LTS one has all three. Two has two of them. Three has one of them. Again, with I know there's gonna be a little bit of flexibility, whether it's a striped arrow or a chair or whatever, but just something that could give some indication of how we got how why were we determining this the intersection to be a one or a two.

It's not the chair is is on to a good a good point because those items that you mentioned are the performance metrics.

Mhmm.

And we we've we've developed tables with performance metrics before and then the the outcome of traffic stress related to those performance metrics. So I wouldn't be surprised if our consultant team and staff could work up a very simple table that had performance metrics and BLTS outcomes for intersections.

Yeah. Something like that, I think, would be very useful. And it doesn't have to just include metrics. It could also include some of the more qualitative metrics or not much qualitative issues that you uncover that would help people understand the differences between the different BLTSs. Okay.

And I will get back to you. I've seen your hand up. Did you want to

are you related? Deal to Susana and

Are you related? Or after.

Are you

related to this topic before we leave it?

It it is related.

Okay. Then jump in.

And this may be working backwards from from what you said and and a little bit of what you were saying, commissioner Ting, of walking it backwards. If we don't need to have specific metrics or performance measures to perhaps look at what the goal is. And if the goal is is LTS one, to walk it backwards from that. So that way, the consistency is the checklist from LTS one. And then if it doesn't meet x, then y to equal subsequent categories.

Go ahead.

Yeah. And I was just gonna say something similar. I mean, because, really, the engineers, being engineers, are gonna want criteria. They're gonna have to use criteria to rank these intersections anyway to to the level of what they are today. We just wanna know what those criteria are and then make them transparent to the public, and and you don't want people digging around in those documents. Right? That would be your realm.

They're publicly accessible documents.

Okay. Yes. I'm sure they are to to maybe time constrained, but but, yeah, as as as our chair said, you've already identified space separation and protection. So those could be the main block areas you could describe. Here's the kind of space you would be looking for in an l t BLTS one and so forth. Right? And just to give people an idea of what you're looking for.

We we can do that.

Okay. Further questions? Alright. Then let's close out this first one first. So seeking a motion to repeal the MIP table four, so that that very prescriptive one, and instead for the documentation to reference these other reference materials that Kevin showed us the the pictures of, along with, I would add, our ask of some kind of tied performance metrics provided.

Conditional on us doing

that. Okay. So do I have a motion to put that on the table? So moved. Seconded?

Second.

Any disagreement with the motion I stated? Okay. That one passes. The second motion then is to add the b t l BLTS targets to the intersections as shown on this map in table 12 with a reminder that the when there's an intersection in two different LTS numbers, the lower number is what's provided here as a target on the intersections. So do I have a motion to adopt this table as shown?

So moved.

Is there a second? Second. Any disagreement?

I would just actually like to point out that given that we don't have the table yet, we're actually voting on a set of BLTSs that we actually don't quite understand yet. Having said that, I think we understand the general direction that staff is looking for. But I think in the future, if we want to vote on the adoption of a particular BLTS level, we should have a a clear understanding of what that entails. So it's just a comment.

We could say that with the second motion that we're approving this table 12 with the assigned BLTS as defined in the previous motion, which is the performance metrics.

Which is which I think is great. But, of course, we don't know what those levels are at the moment. Having said that, I trust that staff will come up with the appropriate definitions.

Okay. Is there a motion for an amendment to the motion?

Well, I think I just stated it. Should I state it again? I mean, I guess

Amendment.

Does any do do people accept the amendment that I just stated? Is there any discussion on it? Should I restate it just so that we're really clear? I just to be sure. So the motion is to add these BLTS targets as shown on the new table 12 that take the lower value BLTS number from the corridors that go through that intersection and that are based on their performance based on the performance targets that will be established as we talked about in the previous motion.

Is there a second to that motion?

Yeah. I second that motion, Pines.

Any further discussion? Any disagreement? Okay. I think we're good.

Great. Thank you. Great great conversation. Great direction. Thank you. I think you added a lot of value to this topic for tonight. Appreciate it.

Okay.

K. So but one more slide. Yes. Upcoming attractions for the mobility implementation plan. The next meeting on May 8 will feature Chris and Molly Johnson. I will be absent from that meeting. But the the purpose of that meeting is to review the the updated tables, maps, figures that will go into the, 2025 MIP update document. So no action will be requested at that meeting. It's just so here's the status. Here here's here's the status as of 2025 with regard to all those maps and tables and figures.

So that that will be presented on on May 8. And then, we'll take a month off from the MIP in June to focus on the transportation facilities plan, but that gives us a month to consolidate all the input that you've given us so far into a preliminary document for you to review at the July meeting. Yeah. K. That's all I've got. Thank you very much.

Okay. Then I'm going to see see see if there's any problem with commissioners. If we go back to agenda item number four, since we have council member Newnhouse here, is there any disagreement to modify the agenda to go back to item number four just briefly? No? Okay. So I don't know if you have any updates, but we figured we'd give you the floor, council.

Thank you,

In case you did.

Can you hear me okay on this? Okay. Yeah. Sorry for my, tardiness, but, had to get from another meeting to this one. So, yeah, a couple of updates. Some of them, I'm sure you are aware of already. Council member Stokes is retiring, and we appointed Vishal Bhargava to the, to the council, during one of our last meetings. So, so he will take over, for, Stokes' seat, which is position one on on May 2. He's been a member of the planning commission since 2020 and, you know, brings a decade of experience in in urban planning, and some community service to the position. So we're excited for him to join us.

As you're probably aware, council members, Suma Dwaria has already joined us. I think she's been on the council now for two weeks. So she, has also joined us, and she took over from, from, council Marzan, who's down in the legislature now. Both of them will need to, need to run this year in order to hold on to their seats. So this will be an interesting year in Bellevue, where we will actually have five, seats up for, election this year.

Wilburton land use code, that's something that we've been working on. Planning commission has been working on for for quite some times, and it's an update to our transit oriented development area land use code amendment. That land use will rezone, and advance the, 2024 comprehensive plan amendment, which was adopted, yeah, sorry, in 2024. And so that'll establish some new zoning districts and development standards. These changes really aim to support, a lot of affordable housing, sustainable design, and, really a connected, walkable, neighborhood as well, more of a urban environment, if you will.

Now, of course, we are encouraging, public amenities, such as open space, green space, multimodal access, etcetera. But, that's moving along, pretty good. K Line, something that all of us should be, interested in, hopefully. In late March, we, endorsed the King County Metro's, plan for the Rapid K Line target to begin operation in 2030, which seems like a long time away, but it'll it'll happen quick. Right?

So they presented their results, for that third phase that they did of community engagement for the line, and that really focused on refining the, the route and the related project aimed at enhancing the the speed, the reliability, and the accessibility of it as well. Really great engagement, over a thousand, respondents and and hundreds of participants, that showed up at different table events, open houses, and briefings. So that was really great to see. And the quarter will run, between, Totem Lake in Kirkland and Eastgate Park And Ride with stops in Downtown Bellevue. And, Metro Plan details a scope and budget for that infrastructure improvement, as a business access transit lane or bat lane as commonly referred to.

And we're gonna optimize that service to achieve, an expected 24% travel time savings along the corridor. Now the one disappointing piece of this was, counts our representative Zahn was able to advance a bill. I think it was bill house bill ten eighty, if I remember correctly, which would allow for, private, or, corporate, shuttles to make use of the bat lanes bat lanes as well as long as they're adhering to protocols set forth by King County Metro in terms of safety and and all the rest of it. Unfortunately, that bill appears to have failed, but, we will continue to work on that, as we believe that and why we advanced it and and and hope that King County Metro would look at it was because there's a lot of value in allowing, Amazon, Google, you know, our major employers, who have some fairly significant, employer shuttles running around our city if they can make use of it as well. So that was a disappointing, but, hopefully, we can, revisit that at some point.

And then the and then lastly, the council, that you may have heard, took some positions on some state revenue proposals as well. As you probably know, again, the state is, looking at a 12 to 15,000,000,000 budget shortfall. And the legislatures revenue proposals, is trying to address that shortfall, in a couple of different ways. Increasing the b and o tax for, for businesses, increasing or looking at a wealth tax, payroll tax for, large employers, and then increasing the cap on property tax assessments in, in Washington state as well. There is a 1% cap currently on property taxes.

The senate bill failed, but the house bill is still, in play, which would allow, municipalities or the county to raise, up to 3% each year going going forward. So that's something that, that we have pushed back on, for hopefully, for very obvious reasons. I mean, one of one of our competitive advantages that Bellevue, has had, you know, an example of what Seattle did with their payroll tax. They called it the jump start tax. Well, three, four years later, they're seeing Seattle seeing a significant shortfall in their revenues because Amazon and others have moved to Bellevue.

So we don't wanna see that happen to the state, and, we don't want companies to leave Bellevue and entirely leave the state because if you've moved from Seattle to Bellevue, where do you go next? You you would have to leave the state if you wanted to, avoid those taxes. So, so that was something that we that we did in coordination with a lot of, major employers and chambers, etcetera, but, we saw it as a major, threat to the economic health of the city, moving forward, and that's why we, we took that action. So that's my my update. Excellent. Thank you. You bet. Thank you.

Any follow-up questions on that? Okay. Then let's go back to agenda item number eight, approval of minutes, needing a motion to approve the minutes from the March 13 meeting.

So move.

Is there a second? Second. Is there any disagreement to approve those meeting notes? K. So passed. Let's move to the March 27 meeting minutes. I am seeking a motion to approve those.

So so moved.

Second? Second. Anybody disagree? Alright. Excellent. And then we did not have a meeting early in April, so that gets us up to speed on those. Thank you. Agenda item number nine, unfinished business. As far as I know, there's none. Anybody to add anything? And any new business agenda item 10? Anybody to have add anything? Looking around the room? No? Okay. Then let's go to the review of the commission calendar, which you'd all have in front of you, and Kevin will take us through.

I'm good. Go ahead, Mike. Go

ahead. Sure.

Or Mike.

So you have each of you the copy of the calendar. I'm sorry. Copy of the calendar looking forward. So next meeting will be on May 8, two weeks. We will have one staff report memo at for that meeting regarding the curve pricing project.

There will be three study session items, including the mobility implementation plan update, so the next step on that, transportation facilities plan update, and the micro mobility code amendment. Then the subsequent meeting will be in June. That will be the opportunity to elect a new chair and vice chair or may maybe renew chair and vice chair positions as well as hopefully introduce new commissioners if if we have them on board at that point. And then we will have more another iteration of the you know, advancing the threat transportation facilities plan. The expectation is we'll have a financial forecast at that point, and we can have a substantive conversation around which projects could make the cut.

So that's that's what we're looking forward to in June. July, we'll have a meeting as well. Likely, we'll still be finalizing the TFP at that point, transportation facilities plan. There will be, again, MIP as a topic, mobility implementation plan update. Micro mobility codeman, we anticipate will be on the calendar then as well. And we may have a briefing from the environmental sustainability initiative or plan. Again, that's a matter of whether we have space in the agenda or not. July retreat is, I think, still more to come on that. So, Kevin, we'll get into conversation probably in June on that one.

Yeah. And in fact, I'll throw it out there. We've had trouble in the past with trying to set up a retreat in July. You've said that you're out? Right. I was jumping out.

Yeah.

Potentially. Okay. I know I'm out. Does anybody know for sure that that July is gonna be

a tough month for them? Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. So I think we we got our answer to last year, we ended moving it to November, which worked fine. So I I think we might just wanna kinda plan on that. Okay. Alright. Go ahead, Mike.

So does that mean we have no meeting in July?

Or We have it July 10. But no retreat.

Okay. So July 10 meet oh, yeah. We already have it. Sorry. So then we do take a break, in August, and we'll return on September 11 with still more mobility implementation plan update and a Vision Zero report as well. So that's really looking ahead where what we've got on the pipeline.

Perfect. Yeah. Go ahead.

Yeah. I'm just wondering what the schedule is for the micro mobility. Both the schedule for us from a transportation commission standpoint, I know there's been some discussion about it, but also perhaps from a broader perspective and how the council will be looking at making a decision on micromobility changes to policies and so forth.

Right. My understanding is that the scope of the changes is intended to be pretty narrow and that the expectation is we want to get that to the council, I I believe, this summer. Maybe Molly, my sorry, planning supervisor can can fill in a little bit more if if she probably has more information than I do, but, that's my understanding is we wanna move that one right along.

Did you wanna add something to it, Molly? No. Now you're good.

So we are looking at what the scheduling is. We're running into some scheduling issues because of missing the earlier meeting this month and then having our TFP being off schedule, and that has to get in this year. So we're fitting the micromobility around it. We hope to be able to get to it by to council by September. But it because we lose August, we're gonna have to figure out how we can work that into the schedule. I don't I'm not sure we can get there by July.

Yes. Commissioner Tang?

Can you give us a quick preview? What is the subject of the next meeting on the TFP update?

Yes. So we'll we will at the staff level, we've gotten our larger interdisciplinary subject matter expert team, you know, couple dozen folks from different departments. We've gone through all the list of projects, and we have categorized them as projects that we will suggest be included in the TFP with funding, Projects that we suggest, be included in the TFP with placeholder only funding. So meaning they're, you know, above the line in the TFP, but there's really no money to allocate to them other than a placeholder modest placeholder amount. And then the final category would be projects that just may may be good projects, but they're not priorities at this time.

Okay. So you'll detail the cross modal prioritization structure? Or

We will discuss that. Frankly, there's so little money that that there's not a lot. I mean, it's there's just very few projects that are all very strong projects. You can guess what they are already. You know? And and so even those only get, you know, not as much money as they need probably in terms of we'll get the financial forecast, but but the outlook is, you know, as I indicated Okay. Pretty tight.

Thank you.

Any last questions on the calendar? Okay. Are there any objections to adjourning the meeting? No? We are done early tonight. Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Thank you.