Arts Commission - Regular Meeting

Alright. Thank you, Miriam. Good evening, and welcome to the March Parks and Community Services board meeting. Michelle and Steve can oh, can you put your sign down? It's blocking the camera. Oh. Alright. Thank you. So let me start over. Good evening, and welcome to the March Parks and Community Services board meeting. Michelle and Steve cannot attend the meeting, and no members are attending remotely. We are at quorum, and so this meeting is now called to order. Is there a motion to approve tonight's agenda?

So moved.

Thank you. A second? I second. Thank you. Let's vote. All in favor to approve tonight's agenda, say aye. Aye. Any opposed, say no. The agenda is approved unanimously. Alright. Next up is the approval of minutes from the Park Board's February 2026 regular meeting. Is there a motion to approve the February 2026 meeting minutes? So moved. Yeah. Thank you. And there's a second. Thank you. Let's vote. All in favor to approve the February 2026 meeting minutes, say aye.

Aye. Any

opposed, say no. The minutes are unanimously approved. Thank you. So next up is oral communications. The Parks and Community Services Board values community input and looks forward to hearing from you during its meeting.

Please please be aware that in compliance with Washington state campaign laws regarding the use of public facilities during an election, no speaker may support or oppose a ballot measure or support or oppose a candidate for an election, which includes your own campaign. Any speaker who begins discussing topics of this nature will be asked to stop. There are rules adopted by the city council limiting the topics about which the public may speak during our meetings. Under ordinance six seven five two, the public may only speak during public comment about subject matters that are related to City of Bellevue government and are within the power and duties of the Parks and Community Services Board. Following the board's bylaws, the total time allowed for oral communication shall not exceed thirty minutes.

Each speaker will be allowed to speak one time for up to three minutes. We will follow the order in which individuals signed up. If you do not get a chance to speak this evening, you are always invited to email your comments to us at parkboard@bellevuelaw.gov. So now I'll turn it over to Ryan, who will read names from the online and in person sign in sheets.

Thank you, chair. We have one preregistered speaker this evening, Alex Zimmerman.

Wait. I don't speak. You're still stealing again. My name, Alex Zimmerman. A president of Stand Up America for many year. I'm a 15 time candidate for local damn Nazi fascist government 15 times. Better you prosecute me seven times or seven times case dismissed. Yeah. Mayor Robinson, together with Mohammed, Iranian Muslim, a pure anti Semite and bandit. You know what this mean?

Give me for two year trespasses. Yeah. Everybody knows this. Yeah. So what is everyone speak today about situation what is absolutely critical for? Many year, I speak, you possibly show people faces. You don't doing this. It's a crime by 100 percentage. I speak from Tacoma to overhead more than 5,000 time. Every week, I speak seven, sometimes 10 times. Everybody show faces. You're only one. Each committee here in Room 113 who now show faces. You're quiet in this council, this dirty Nazi buster. You know what this mean?

Quiet too. Don't have sense. Number two. Twelve year ago, counsel cut us freedom of speech, First Amendment. This in camera. You can find this. And they publicly talk all oh, because Alex Zimmerman very boy bad boy, and I speak for thirty years. Yep. So my question right now to you, to everybody. No. I don't talk to you because you would look for me about a dirty Nazi buster. No. I speak for my people or for city of Belvieu. So when Alex Zimmerman a very bad boy, why is 150,000 people cannot speak more than thirty minute in 10. Whereas you find these rules.

He said, I give this to you so you know you are criminal. You are bandita. In number three, what is I want to explain right now. We have a mayor, Iranian mayor, Iranian Muslim, anti Semit and Benmita, who have He's to fix

within the parks and No.

This about the equity. You see, you have today equity. So this ex don't interrupt. I doing exactly what is here. So he he make a meeting for Iranian Muslim for human right. Where is my human right? I'm a Jew, support Israel, and Donald Trump.

Where is my topics

related our Trump. We were new Americans. This is your next point. Slab and happy cow. Stop acting like a piece of garbage. You think you're smart? It's very stupid, and everybody accepts this. This

Your time is up. Thank you.

Okay.

At this time, we can open, the floor up for additional speakers if they wish to, speak. Open it up first to anyone in the room. I don't see any hands up. If there is anybody online who would wish to speak, please raise your virtual hand at this time.

Oh, an online.

Hi. Joe Kunzler here. I just sat for a few minutes of shit show, and it has no place at a parks commission. And to be discussing the wonderful parks of Bellevue. Bellevue has wonderful parks and campuses like the Bellevue City Hall.

That is majesty of modern engineering right next to an inter majesty of modern engineering in the doctor Lynn Robertson train station that, magically will soon connect Bellevue, not just to the greatest city on Earth, which would be Redmond, but also to Seattle. And, you really don't deserve to be spoken to the way the previous speaker, Adolph Zimmerman, spoke to you. That's really disgusting, and you should kick him out for six months. You really deserve a lot better. You know, it's important to make sure the citizen input on on things like the parks and planning and such without this kind of hate speech and lies about great public servants like mayor Mohammad, who immigrated from from a oppressive regime in Iran and fully supports America and the American people.

I wanna thank you for your public service, and I want our exterminator to go to hell. Thank you.

Alright. There aren't any other speakers at this time, so I'll turn it back to, the chair. Thank you.

Thank you. Next item on the agenda, is city council communications. Councilmember Breyer isn't here, so we'll move on to the director's report. So we'll turn it over to deputy director and acting director Shelley McDaveen for the director's report. Thank you for coming.

So good evening, everybody. I'm Shelley McVayne, deputy director. For those of you who have not had the opportunity to meet before, many of you I have at some of our previous retreats or events throughout the city, so nice to see everybody again. Just gonna highlight a few activities in front of you. You do have the summer new activity guide that's just coming out as well as the summer day camp guide.

So you have all of list of all the many activities that are coming in the city. But I thought I'd just highlight a few and maybe some of the things that we're doing to try to get the message out and help, increase access and accessibility for people, in the community. So registration begins Monday, March 30 at noon for our residents and Monday, April 6 for noon for our nonresidents. Crossroads Community Center, though, will be hosting a summer camp open house on Saturday, March 28 from nine to one. And this is gonna be just a really great opportunity to help teach people that need help with learning about registering for camps and classes and activities.

It'll provide one on one support on financial assistance for those that need assistance in

Sorry.

One moment. We'll close the door. Thank

you. So, again, they'll be providing one on one support with financial assistance, and we'll be providing some translation services so that we can help people learn about our programs and learn how to be able to access them and any assistance that they might need. So that's gonna be great on, again, March 28. Our Bellevue YouthLink annual unity through diversity event takes place on Friday, April 3 from six to 8PM here at City Hall. It's a free event, but pre registration is required.

So if you're interested, make sure to go online and register for that. And it'll just feature cultural performances from community members showcasing talents of our youth throughout the city. Another upcoming great event to just highlight is our Bellevue Botanical Garden, the Dahlia Tuber Sale on Friday, March 20. We'll be ten to two at the garden, in partnership with the Puget Sound Dahlia Society. And our March on Sunday, March 22, ten to one in partnership with the Northwest Perennial Association.

And then finally, just a reminder to put a placeholder on your calendar for Saturday, April 25 for the sheep shearing. So there's many, many activities that you have in front of you, but those are just a highlight of maybe a few that are are coming up. So that's it.

Well, thank you so much. Does anyone have any questions about these events? You sound really fun. So awesome. Thank you so much. We'll move on to the next item of our agenda, board communications. So maybe we'll start off one end of the table and go around. Paul, would you like to start first?

Yeah. Thank you for, yeah, recognizing me to speak, and thank you for taking over, director McVeigh. It's great to know that we have McVeigh, sorry that we have such a great wealth of talent in our Parks Department that it is incredibly encouraging to have absolutely zero concerns about the interim time and knowing that we are in good hands. With respect to the last month, I don't have anything particularly new. Just a lot of, jaunts through the downtown park, including, earlier today.

I noted for anyone curious about the usage of the Inspiration Playground this week. It was during the day moderately, moderately attended. But during last Wednesday's rain, it was actually dead empty. We had a a point where there was literally no no child in the Inspiration Playground around noon. I thought that was yeah. I'd I don't think I'd ever seen that before, but that was more a testament to the weather, I think, than anything. Other than that, yeah, good to be back.

Eileen? Nice to see you again, Shelley. I think it was, like, golf event. It was okay. Two years ago. Yeah. We went okay. Two years. I wanna share, about indoor kite flying. Do you guys remember? So I think it was last year when Crossroads Community Center, when they came and present their and then they mentioned about indoor kite flying. And at time, I thought, oh, how interesting. I wanna go check it out. So I I don't remember if I went there January or February, but one of I think they only run on Thursdays during, like, lunchtime. So I went over and then, went to check it out.

It was it was actually quite interesting. There were, about maybe 10 to 15 people there at the cross in the gym. They're, like, several families, including, kind of founder who started this activity. And then they showed me different kinds of the kites. And so they put me on the beginner level of kite with, like, single gliders.

And I and then the like, they told me there's even, like, more complicated ones with, like, quad lines. Like, you have to manage, like, four lines. And it was actually harder than I thought because you there's no wind. Right? So you have to do different, like, pumping your arms to to generate the wind and to kinda lift the glide.

And so, so my kite, like, kept falling down the floor. But but I had a fun. And then I was talking to, like, a mom there. I didn't realize, actually, there's a lot of health benefits with that because walking backwards, I guess, it's a essential skill for indoor kite. And then one of the moms said that, I think her son maybe had some health challenge, and this activity actually helped him regain his balance and, you know, on, like, motor skills.

And so I thought that was interesting, and they were very grateful for the city to let them use the space. I think it's, like, every week. So I thought, like, if the city ever wants to highlight some programs or have some stories to tell, this could be one of them because I think it's unique. And then there's some kind of heartwarming, like, stories, and there's actually health benefits with the program. So so I thought I would share that. Yeah.

Mhmm. Thank you.

Thanks, Eileen.

I had the pleasure about three weeks ago, to meet with members from Bellevue's human resources as it relates to their team working on homeless camps. I had reached out to them in association with the municipality that I work for to get ideas on how their their program work, and I was extremely pleased to to really dig down into the program that Bellevue has. I bring it up here at the parks board meeting because we're coming up on a season where we're getting warmer weather. More people will be attending parks even though they're used throughout the years, but that also includes our homeless population and the human services that go with that. So I was hoping, not that I need an answer now, I was hoping that I might hear back as to what our parks does as it relates to monitoring, and we have our park rangers that are out and about.

What type of communications are set up for that? I I know they exist. I'm just not familiar with it. I wanna follow-up. I may reach out to the park rangers and talk with them as well. But it'd be nice to know what cooperation interdepartment is going on to help with that. I know the police department also is involved with that, and Bellevue is on the forefront of making sure we're providing services to those individuals. And there's times where we have to take more drastic measures. You know? The police get involved as it relates to enforcement, but I always know that's a last resort.

So I'm interested in hearing more about how Parks is planning on preparing for the upcoming good weather where we know we see an uptick in that type of activity, making sure that their needs are met while at the same time, the community's needs that sometime get impacted by that type of behavior. So I appreciate it. Aside from that, I did not get to visit any of my parks and start off my park list since we met last. But, again, with the good weather coming and the wife now making me go out and walk with her more, since her walking buddy, is unavailable, I'm sure I'll be able to check a few more off. So thank you.

Thanks, Eric. Elizabeth, would you like to go next?

Yeah. So thank you so much for all of the reports, and welcome, Shelly. We're glad to have you here. I Aileen, I love that you do all of these interesting things. It's very inspiring.

I didn't also get to visit any new parks, but I do wanna share a couple of things. First of all, I just wanna say I'm very grateful to live in a place where we do have the freedom, even though it's very uncomfortable and sometimes unpleasant, to hear opinions that we find distasteful. It's a right that I strongly value because even though I may find certain things disgusting, I would rather have freedom of speech than not have to hear things like that. So I just want to say I understand how annoying and repulsive some things may be, And I don't share those opinions, but that is part of freedom of speech. And it's something I celebrate.

And I'm grateful to be on the community services board, where we get to enact these democratic processes. The second thing I want to say is I had the opportunity to go to Silicon Valley on a work related trip, and I want to speak to something I saw there. I would love to hear more about how we can do things like this, or we're already doing things like this. So didn't go to a lot of parks while I was at my conference, but I did commute a lot on the train to and from where I was going. And I saw a lot of micronatural areas that they had, and spring is coming sooner there.

And one thing I noticed is that at almost every single stop on their train station, you could see parks, but you could also see smaller areas that had been restored, restored wetlands, places where birds were landing. And it just really highlighted to me the importance of the connectedness and parks in these urban environments to natural animals. It's obviously extremely built up in the Bay Area, and yet you still saw geese, different types of birds, magpies. It was really beautiful. And I thought that was inspiring because as we continue to grow, and they've been growing for longer than we have, we want to continue to value that natural environment because it was still a very pleasant place to be.

So was that was something that I wanted to bring back to the board. And I actually lost my train of thought for the second one, but I'll just leave it at that. It was really it was really enjoyable to spend that time and to get that outside perspective. Thanks.

Thanks, Elizabeth. So mine's pretty short. Mainly went to Woodlawn Park across the street with my dog, so that's been fun. I haven't gotten a chance to do too much with the Bellevue Naturalist recently, but there is an Earth Day event at Wilburton Park on Saturday, April 17. So if folks are available and interested in that, that's an opportunity.

Unfortunately, I also have a conflict that day, so I won't be able to join, but I thought I'd share. And, one fun thing I saw in the Bellevue connection is that applications for Bellevue's essentials is opening, and that's a program that Paul, Aileen, and I actually did to get us to learn about civic engagement. So that's a great program if you know someone who wants to get involved in the city, to apply for. But, yeah, that's kind of it for me today, if that's alright. Yeah. We're all class of 22. Oh, yes. Oh, I think it's on Saturday, April 17. I'll have to double check, but I know I think oh, it's eighteen?

Seventeen is Friday.

Oh, okay. I Eighteen. Oh, shoot. I must have written it wrong. Sorry about that. Yeah. I

I just knew because my anniversary, eighteenth. Oh, that's the only reason I forgot that.

Thanks for catching. Alright. With that, that concludes board communications. And so the next item on the agenda is our fun discussion item, the report on city of Bellevue's diversity advantage plan 2035. And joining us today for that is, Douglas Raiford, diversity equity inclusion program administrator for the parks and community service department, and Sarah Boyle, diversity equity inclusion, community outreach, and engagement administrator for the human resources department.

Thank you so much for joining us tonight. Oh, and then the mics. Oh,

there we go.

And as far as sharing slides, what is the best way to I wanna do that in a second. Oh, you have the slides? Oh, perfect. Okay.

And then Great. Our screens aren't on here, so we're gonna turn around

a lot. Sorry about that.

You don't

see them here. Can't Sorry.

You don't have my my

hands, Spencer. Wonderful. I'll go ahead and get started. Well, good evening. Thank you so much for having us. Again, my name is Sarah Boyle. I'm one of the DEI administrators for the city.

Doug Rayford. I am the parks and community service DEI program administrator, so I work specifically with parks, whereas Sarah works for the to sort of does DEI for the whole city. Yeah.

K. I'm gonna start off. This is the first part of the presentation. It's giving an overview of the citywide diversity advantage plan that was adopted by the city or by the council in December, and then I will pass it off to Doug to speak to the specifics with, parks and recreation. So okay. Let's go to the next slide, please. Thank you. Oh, there we go. Thank you. So just briefly, what is diversity advantage plan 2035?

So this is an update to the city's first and original 2014 DAP. It is a council adopted plan that, outlines milestones for our DEI work across the entire enterprise. There are 41 what we call equity objectives, which are those long term objectives that we are trying to achieve, and these are all categorized into the council's strategic target areas to make sure this work is really easy in alignment and complementary to the city's strategic work. The plan includes both external service delivery and looks at our internal operations, staffing, that sort of thing. And, this was very much designed to be in alignment with and really nesting with multiple citywide strategies and initiatives.

We know that this work is most successful when it is most easy, so we really wanted to make sure that this plan was working nicely, playing nicely with existing plans. Some departments, such as parks, do have multiple strategic plans they're juggling at once. So we wanted to make sure that diversity advantage plan was really in conversation with all of those plans. So, of course, you know, why this plan? What is the need for this?

As all of you are aware here at this table, we have one of the most diverse communities and ZIP codes in the country. Over 60% of our population identifies as a race other than white. About 40% are born outside of The US, about half speak a language other than English at home, about one in ten or ten percent identify as having a disability, and the most recent data, that was not actually available in the previous Diversity Advantage Plan tells us that about seventeen percent of adults in the Seattle Bellevue Tacoma Metro Area identify as LGBTQ. So we have a lot of different diversity and identities showing up in our community. This work is really part of, providing that exceptional public service to our community.

It's about understanding that a one size fits all approach will not meet the different and diverse needs of a changing community. This plan really helps us think about what are those things that we do have to do to ensure that everyone is getting access to the services and benefits that they, need as community members. So a little divert or a little background on diversity advantage. So as I mentioned, we had that original plan in 2014, that had over 60 goals over seven different categories, and that has really been the, start of a lot of really amazing work here at the city. But in addition to that, we've had this work really deepen into our values as a city.

So in 2024, the city named DEI as a core value. And then, again, this plan was actually adopted in December 2025. Well, the 2014 plan initiated so much work at the city. It's actually so much work we weren't even able to document at all. It was our first time doing this, so over the course of those eleven years, we actually learned a lot about what worked well and what presented some challenges implementing diversity advantage plan.

So some of the things that we are thinking about as we implement the new plan is not just the updated goals and objectives, but really trying to understand what needs to be in place to make sure that this work is being implemented strategically, that it is really being infused across the organization, across the community, and it's something that we can easily communicate to the communities that we serve. So some of the things that we noted in the previous implementation of this work, oops, excuse me, was that we had a really varied use of departmental DEI work plans. So some departments had them, some didn't. They looked very different. We had no central reporting process or tracking system, so really had no way to document the good work that was happening, and we had no metrics that really told us if we were meeting, the the standards that we had set for ourselves.

So not really being able to, communicate that to the community was a major concern because we really wanted to make sure we had that transparency built into this plan. Yeah. I think this is an older version. Might go out of order here for a moment. Excuse me.

So to try and, kinda problem solve some of these challenges that I mentioned previously, there's a couple of things that we, mapped into the design and implementation of DAP twenty thirty five. So first off, we established a consistent DEI strategic planning process that was used across departments. So departments all created something called a short term equity plan, which really kinda sets a minimum standards for how departments think about their short term work that really rolls up to those longer term objectives in DAP 2035. We have a selection of key equity indicators, so we're actually measuring our progress on this work. We are creating a centralized tracking and reporting tool, which will include external and internal data dashboards to communicate that work.

And then we're also establishing internal review processes so that at a leadership level and with our council, we're able to review this work at regular intervals to understand where are we in our progress. So where are we now? That's a big lift. So since December, when we had this plan, actually adopted by council, many things have happened. So we actually started working with departments last June in preparation for council adoption, to start working on the development of these short term equity plans I've mentioned earlier.

As of February, all of that planning was complete. And then across the city, departments identified over 100 activities that they'll be implementing in the next three years that will move the move the dial on one of those 41 equity objectives that we have in diversity advantage plan. Some departments, like Parks, already had very active diversity plans for for so for them, this is really just a matter of taking some existing work and existing plans and really kind of restructuring it into a a new format. We also worked with departments to identify what we call key equity indicators or KEIs, and this was a way to really measure to what degree are we making progress on those 41 equity objectives, to what degree are we accomplishing those. And we finished that process up also in just earlier this month, actually, and we have over 100 k key equity indicators or KEIs that we're using to track this work.

Some upcoming things that we have. So we have all this beautiful raw data. We have our 100 activities that were selected. We have our, equity indicators. However, we have not gotten to the point of actually building the dashboards yet to communicate those.

So we are committed by June 30 to building those dashboards internally for staff to review, and then by September 30, we will have our external dashboards available for the public to view so they can really see this information and understand what is it the city is doing, what is it that Parks is doing to move forward on this work. One thing we did wanna talk about briefly, before we dive into, Parks' work is what is a key equity indicator? Because an indicator, a measure can mean a lot of different things. So for us, KEIs really help us understand to what degree are we achieving those 41 equity objectives in diversity advantage plan. And a lot of times, when we think about measures, we sometimes measure the work that we're doing.

Right? How many programs did we do? How many, you know, things did we distribute? How many services did we provide? And we really wanted to change the conversation a little bit when we think about equity to focusing on impact.

So to what degree are this is it amazing work that the department is doing, the city is doing actually having the impact that we wanna see? So these KEIs are very high level. They are measuring impact at the organization level, at the community level, and they're really not being used to measure, like, individual programs, individual services. Parks has a plethora of measures that used to do that already, but they're not part of the package of metrics that are gonna be then reported to the community as part of diversity advantage plan. So you'll really see that a a lot of times, these KEIs, they're pretty high level.

They're long term. These are slow moving data. It's a ten year plan, so we really want to, take a little bit of a different approach and think about those long term impacts. So we'll give you an example here, and, actually, this is a example for Parks. So a lot of this work for KEIs was actually about taking some of the things we already measured and applying an equity lens to it.

So for example, an existing KPI or key performance indicator for parks is looking at, the percentage of residents that live within one third mile walk of a park or a trail. Right? Because we are a city in a park, we really wanna make sure that our residents have access to that open space. So by itself, this is a, you know, looking at national average, Bellevue is doing great. We're really meeting that goal, meeting that vision of being a city in a park.

When we do apply an equity lens to it, though, one of the things that we can do is start looking at, is that true for everyone? Right? Is everyone having the same experience? So when we look at this disaggregated by neighborhoods, for example, we see that in Factoria, only 10% of Factoria households have access to a park or open space. When we think about that from a perspective of equity, we know that we have a higher percentage of folks of color that live in this community, a higher percentage of folks with a disability, and a higher percentage of people that have a lower income.

So one of the things about these KEI that's really important to note is a number alone doesn't tell the whole story. Right? There's a whole host of complexities that are wrapped up in this number. So one of the things that we're really working really hard on is making sure that this data dashboard that we create is not just sharing these numbers in a vacuum, but it's actually an opportunity to really discuss what's the full narrative here, what are the complexities that wrap up in this, what is the department currently working on, to under to make sure that we are responding to this, what's possible, what's not possible. But this is really a starting place for the city to start thinking about we have these goals.

We have these things that are important to us. How do we know if residents are really having that same equitable experience? With that, I'm gonna pass it to Doug to start talking about what this looks like for Parks and Community Services.

Thank you. Yeah. So I think this is an older version, but I You

know what you said. Okay. Okay. Great. Thanks. Did anyone have any any questions while we do this?

I have a question.

Yeah. Do we have some more oh, I'm sorry. Yes. I have a question actually about the statistics we saw on the first slide. So some of those were at the regional level, and I was wondering if we could get some of those I know some of them exist, at least for just King County or for smaller areas. Would it be possible to see some of the diversity statistics for Bellevue itself as we frame the discussion?

Yeah. So are you talking about the kind of first demographic slide that I shared? So all of the demographics on there except for the percentage that was about the LGBTQ community is for Bellevue specifically. Yeah. The demographic around understanding the LGBTQ community.

So, actually, this is not a question that's asked on the census. And prior to 2020, we didn't have any data on that. But thanks to a new survey, the '20 or the census pulse survey that was developed as part of the response to the COVID nineteen pandemic. They did ask questions around sexual orientation in that survey. However, they only captured respondents in certain metropolitan areas that had a certain level of residents in it. So Seattle, Bellevue, Tacoma was one of those metro areas. We do not actually have any city specific census tract specific information on the LGBTQ community.

So that would be then my feedback would be that's an important demographic for us as a city to capture. Like, sure hopefully, we we were able to do that to get something more specific. Because I think there's, you know, rural versus urban, and our metropolitan area is really large. Yeah. So Yeah. Okay.

Thank you. Is a shortcoming of the data, unfortunately. Yeah.

Oh, Aileen has a question.

Yeah. Can I ask a question about can you give some examples of this KEI? I think it's my first time hearing. I mean, obviously, I've heard of KPI. And specifically, like, the example you give, like, the KPI was 74% of Bellevue residents live within the third mile. That's not obviously a good KEI. So what would be a KEI to to to make sure that we have, you know, equitable access to parks? So

in this case, what we would do is take that 73% Mhmm. And then we'd separate it out by different neighborhoods because parks are right geographic. And we actually have a tool that we get to use at the city that helps us understand what are the different demographic groups that live in those communities. So we might see that, oh, this community, you know, has a higher percentage of, seniors or people that are elderly, maybe having access they don't have as much access to parks. That would, you know, tell us information around serving that particular community.

Maybe we see, like in Factoria, for example, we see a higher proportion of historically under resourced communities. So that might tell us there's some equity issues at play and really wanting to maybe prioritize, you know, trying to find open space in that neighborhood, for example, which I know something that, you know, Parks is already thinking about. Mhmm. So a lot of times, it's gonna be taking a measure and then looking at it with different separations. So looking at it with race, gender, age, income Mhmm. Most of the KEIs are working that way, where we're kind of looking at the overall story and then separating it out into different neighborhoods or different demographic groups.

Is that why you

would end up having, like, over 100 KEIs? So each of them is specific to a demographic group or race or something? So we have so that is actually not even including separating it out by different demographic groups or geographies. So for the 41 equity objectives, the equity equity objectives are pretty high level. Doug will share an example here in a little bit.

So a lot of times, one metric is not gonna tell us the whole story of that equity objective, so most of them have multiple. So, for example, our fire department has their CARES program where they send people out to provide services to people who might need more than just, like, a 911 call that might need some community resources, that might need mental health support. One of their KEIs is looking at the percentage of their calls that actually result in their client getting connected to services. So that'd be an example of a KEI. So are people that have the most need getting access to the services they need.

Yeah. I I just just to add up.

Turn on the mic. Sorry.

Yeah. Sorry. That was my fault. I turned I had it on, and then I kept going, mhmm. Mhmm. While she was talking, so I turned it off. But I would just like to add on to that is that when we're looking at equity and inclusion work in general, it's about a shifting of the culture. And so it's a lot harder to put metrics to it. And so like, the KPIs or performance indicators is more metrics. Right?

It's more like data, numbers. Like, how many this and that. Right? So when you look at the KEIs, it's more of the impact, and it's more about how it's affecting a certain group. And so a lot of that data that we that we collect, we also have to look at it through focus groups, through surveys, through everything else to sort of see what sort of how has that benefited or created roadblocks or barriers to community members that are not showing up in data specifically.

Right? Maybe we're not looking specifically at data, but it is showing roadblocks that we just hadn't thought of at the time. And so it it it takes a little bit longer, and it's a lot more it's not as solid. It's a little more squishy than than I think when you when you think of, like, solid data numbers, if that sorry. Oops. Sorry. That's my phone. Because I don't I don't want you to to to, like, over like, try and figure it out from from a data perspective because it's not always data driven, if that makes sense.

Think we we have some more examples of KEIs we can share towards the end.

Yes. We do. Great. And so I'm gonna start talking about parks and community service, and it's more along the lines of giving y'all a little back background of how we're doing it, how we're getting to these KEIs. So I'm gonna go through sort of to start with the parks community service strategic plan that we have for 2025, and that's so the strategic plan is more of an overview of what we're doing as a department, as a whole, and our sort of vision and mission. So do y'all know the vision and mission for Parks? Someone wanna read the vision for me?

I used to be a teacher. In

Bellevue, everyone can connect to each other and to nature through experiences that help them to live, grow, and thrive.

That's great. Right? It's kind of broad, but it's great. Vision. What about our mission? Can someone else read the mission?

K. The mission. We build a healthy community through a integrated system of exceptional parks, natural areas, recreation, arts, and culture, and a broad space of community services.

Yeah. And those community services, we know are, like, our probation and our human services and that sort of thing. And so it's kinda getting there. We go, okay. We know we know what we're talking about now, kinda. Right? But let's look more specifically. So as Sarah had mentioned and as I found out, I've been in this position for almost five and a half months now. There are a lot of plans in parks. I don't know if y'all realize this, but there are a lot.

And so and so under the strategic plan, we also have plans for each of our divisions. And so when we're looking at our parks development, so we're looking at our parks and open space plan, One of the things that we list in there is that we want equitable and inclusive access for each and every Bellevue resident. Okay. That's good. But what does that mean in terms of the the work that we're trying to do?

Well, we looked at the diversity advantage plan that was created and sort of looked at, okay. What's another way of saying that, and how can we get more specific around that? And Sarah worked with us, and we gave her a little bit of a headache.

And and

the diversity advantage plan brought it down to equal access to parks, community spaces, and essential public infrastructure. Right? So now we're starting to get there. We're starting to figure it out. So what are some activities? What is an activity that speaks to that? Right? So then we have our STEP activity. Does anyone remember what STEP stands for? What do you everyone know their acronyms still?

Nice. That took me a week. You took it. So we have our short term equity plan activity, and that's creating accessible park spaces through renovations, renovations that remove barriers and inclusive designs and construction of accessible features. You see how we went from parks and open spaces to the step activity where it's more clearly defined on, like, what are we looking for? We're trying to hone down. And when we say that we're trying to be more equitable about a certain area, about a certain thing, what does that actually mean? Right? What does that mean? That means we're trying to remove barriers.

Inclusive what does that look like? That looks like inclusive design and construction and accessible features. And then we get into, like, okay. So if that's something we wanna do, we have a lot of projects that that we do right now that that we think will speak to this activity. And then we go to the KEIs that Sarah presented that will say, okay. Are the are the projects and the things that we're doing actually making that impact that we're trying to do? Does that make sense? I see Elizabeth saying, I don't know. I mean no. We could we can yeah. Go for it. It.

Oh, I'm looking at one thing in particular. I would like to understand where DAP 2035 exists if it's park specific because I see also we have, like, an essential public infrastructure, and I I don't know if we can do that. Like, I'm not opposed to it. I want that for everybody. But can Parks and Community Services do anything to affect that if it's not found? So I just wanted to understand, is the DAP for all of Bellevue, or is that Yes. Just for all of Bellevue. Okay. Good. Thanks.

And then so so the DAP 2035 is a plan it's like a it's like a ecosystem. So all of the the departments have to work together to make DAP 2035 work. And we're saying, okay. What is parks and community services part in that ecosystem to reach that goal of e 4.6?

Thank you.

Yeah. Of course. Anyone else? No? Okay. I thought someone was pressing her button. I thought I I think it was pressing her button, but she was just fidgeting her finger. So that's one example. And I was told, Doug, one is not enough. We need more.

So let me do another example. So this one speaks specifically to our programs and services. Right? So in our PCS diversity strategic plan, another plan, which we have, we say, we want programs that provide opportunities to receive feedback and input and ensure that programs and services are appropriate and equitable. Right?

So we want we wanna make sure that we wanna have these programs, and we wanna make sure that we're able to create this feedback loop with the community, and we're hearing what they need. Right? And so we looked at the diversity advantage plan, and we're like, okay. What do they have in there? They have accessible and culturally responsive programs and culturally engagement opt engagement opportunities. Right? So that's for everybody. Right? That's citywide. We want everyone to be doing that.

What is Park's part in that? So our STEP activity, access improvements improvements to recreational programming previously identified through an evaluation process. Right? So, as we mentioned, parks have done programs and has services, and we've done surveys, and we've done needs assessments. And so we have some of this data.

Right? And so we have data that we've already collected and data that we will collect, and we're gonna be using that data to make sure that moving forward we are creating these programs and services to make sure that that that our program and services are equitable, and they reach anyone and everyone has access to them. So, for example, I'll give you one example of of something that we're doing. So we have a barriers team. Right?

And the barriers team is made up of recreation staff from people who work in the community center, who work in as park, you know, park rangers from all areas who do work with recreation. And it's sort of just like, okay. Let's all get together and look at some of these barriers that we've been that have been identified as problems, either through us as staff noticing at the frontline or through community members who have who have told us these are the issues. And we're gonna work on creating programs, processes, best practices to help fight these overcome these barriers that that that are going. And then we'll use key equity indicators to some degree when we can to help us identify whether or not the the changes that we've made, the programs that we've that we've created are actually making that impact that we're looking for.

So those are two examples that I have. I could go on and on. We have a lot of KEIs and a lot of step activities, and Sarah made us windle it down a lot because we had a lot. We had a

You should be very proud of your parts department because, they had the problem of they were doing so much. It was actually hard to communicate in the format that we had, to actually be, you know, communicated publicly in one spot eventually. So it's a very good problem to have. But, yes, I did we did have plenty of conversations saying, Parks, I'm so glad that you have, you know, 72 projects you're working on. Can you scale down a bit for me?

And that's just for sort of, like, the visuals of it. Right? So those projects and those other things that we were doing, we're still doing. Those are not going away. It's just in terms of presenting the the the information back to the diversity advantage team and Sarah, we we wanted to, like okay. Let's start with some hone in on some some specific things. And so we looked at programs and services. We we have stuff from human services, from the probation department, division, from, resource management. Everyone has given some input and some ideas on things that were like, okay. What are some step activities that we could do?

And, also, Sarah was very adamant of saying, okay. Those are the step activities. How are we gonna do it? What's the key equity indicators? How are we gonna know if this is working? Right? So that's sort of what's been going on behind the scenes. I hope that makes sense.

Well, no. You know, as a reminder that all of this is leading up to wanting to create that centralized place that staff and community members can go to to really get a full picture of what is the work that's actually happening on the ground to get us closer to these 41 equity objectives. The good news is if we let departments report everything that they're doing on this centralized place, I think we'd need a full time staff position every department to do that, and I think it would take a community member a full working week to read through all the information and data that would be included here. So part of this process has been how do you take this behemoth amount of information and turn it into something that people can really digest and understand and get a sense of the full story, without having to, again, sit down and read through a thousand different KPIs. So that has been part of the the challenge is kinda translating ten years of really good work and ten years of planned work into something that we can easily share and communicate with the the general public.

So

And Sarah's been really good at at herding us cats and and with the 12 departments as well. And it's it's a it's a lot, but it's been great work. So and the parks has been you know, I've done this work at other cities and here at Bellevue, only speaking for the parks department, they've really gone above and beyond in in in the equity equity work. So y'all are in good hands.

Any additional questions?

One other question? Oh, Elizabeth?

Well, first of all, as always, thank you so much. That is a massive amount of work. I personally am really excited at seeing the data. However it comes out, whether it's in a dashboard, I would love to poke around there. That is it's super interesting. My question is around actionability. So obviously, we're not collecting this so that we can be like, oh, wow, this neighborhood is really challenging to live in. That's too bad, right? We want to act on it. And there's an inherent tension between what it means to be a minority or disadvantaged group and the scope of impact, because some of these groups are very small, right?

People have really specific challenges, like especially people with certain types of disabilities, right? If we unblock a certain type of disability, then that's really only going to impact so many people. So metrics aside, how are we thinking about that as a city? How are we thinking about the impacts for some of the smaller groups of folks, whether it's smaller languages, specific disabilities, whatever? Such a good question. And, I mean, I think the answer is I don't have the perfect answer. Let's put it that way. But I think one of the

things I when I think about these KEIs that are, again, pretty high level and, again, they some of them are gonna give us information that it's not gonna be super actionable to your point. Like, parks cannot easily turn around next year and raise that 10% to a 76% because of an abundance of structural issues that are in place. But for us, the KEIs, if reviewed correctly and if they have the correct information surrounding them, should ask us help us ask the right questions. Right? So I'm just gonna keep on going back to the Parks example as it's what we have.

When we see that that 10% in Factoria, what we hope happens, right, is that leads to are we doing more community outreach in this community? Are we understanding opportunities to provide more recreation short of having public lands available to develop parks? Are we able to understand what are some of the specific needs of communities that live in this neighborhood? So the KEIs don't in any way or form replace the very real, like, human to human outreach that needs to happen to really understand what does it mean to be a person living speaking this specific language or this specific disability in the city of Bellevue, because it's gonna look different than someone that might get grouped into that that category of, you know, English as a second language or into the category of I have a disability. So luckily, we have in addition to this team, we also have a citywide community engagement team that is working really hard to make sure that those those conversations and that learning and understanding is happening, you know, parallel to and complementary to the KEIs in this work.

Yeah.

And I would I would also say that the KEIs and the work that we're doing with the DAP twenty thirty five and how it's present on the dashboard is also to provide some transparency to you as a community and hold us as a city accountable. So there will be that in there as well. When it comes to specific changes around certain to to to help barriers for certain groups, even, say, small groups, I think sometimes we don't see it at first, but sometimes removing that barrier for that small group ends up benefiting a larger group. You know, we look at things like the doors for the ADA where you had the button to push the doors so for people to come in. And at first, we thought, oh, man.

It was another another ADA thing that we gotta do. But when COVID came, everyone was really happy to have those door buttons. Right? And so there are things that we do that we don't necessarily think that it's going to be beneficial to the larger group, but it ends up helping more people than we had originally thought. So you're welcome.

I oh. Oh, I was let me I guess I have a question about the barriers, actually. So the park board, sometimes we give input on, like, park designs and things like that. So I'd be curious if, like, the barriers team kinda noted anything that is pretty common that we might miss that, like, might be helpful for us when we help provide inputs on future park designs.

I don't know of that specifically. That's something that I could look into with Ryan and and see about. I don't know if the Barriers team specifically because they look more into more, like, the recreational programs and services side of it. But in terms of, like, capital projects and the the design, I know that the folks that I've spoken to who are who are doing some of the park design are interested in looking into that and finding out. And and we've been talking a lot.

Like, we talked with about the community engagement team here who also we've been working with the source, like, how do we do better engagement to find out some of those barriers that are happening at the parks and design at the very beginning before it gets to a point where there's no room for input on that sort of thing. Right? So I know that's something that's being discussed, but I I'm not an expert in that area, but it's something I could we could look into.

Okay. Yeah. Thank you.

Yeah. I might add a little bit to that. Yeah. So as you mentioned, Doug, the I think a lot of the well, if we think back, the recreation program plan, which, we looked at an update of a couple of years back, you know, that that plan is really based, heavily in these barriers and trying to reduce those barriers, so cost, timing, accessibility of programs. And so that's those are some of the the key elements that that team is looking at.

But on the capital side, the physical planning side, we we are also, you know, trying to move in a direction all the time to making our parks more accessible. So we now have an accessibility planner as part of our capital team working through our our park system there. And we're learning more all the time. And so groups like this, you know, I made a note in thinking about our system plan later in the year. How might we work some of this into, some of the presentations and and and work that we're doing related to that. So good observation.

Thanks, Ryan. Did you have a question, Paul?

Hi. Yeah. Thank you for presenting today. I had two questions. One centered around the idea of trying to construct or maybe convey a narrative in the dashboard as opposed to allowing it to be purely data driven. I mean, I've looked at a lot of corporate dashboards over the years. And then, you know, there's always an attempt to format and or group and or architect the the UI, so to speak, to try to do that. But is are you talking about something more than that with respect to your comment about conveying a narrative?

Yeah. So mostly because these KEIs, they often are going to be trying to relay information that, I mean, even I as a city employee, some of the KEIs we were developing were around things I had very little knowledge in, right? What is our development services department doing? What are we, you know, looking at for measuring equity in our utilities infrastructure, for example? So the narratives are really there to provide some some context to the users so they really understand what is this KEI actually telling us, what is it measuring.

So one one of the

things we talk about is scope of influence as well. So some of our KEIs are directly related to how Bellevue structures its services or programs. Some of them, for example, like looking at the percentage of residents that are considered cost burdened in their housing costs, is larger than the scope of influence from just the city of Bellevue. So the narrative kind of helps under helps the user understand what is it that I'm actually measuring right now. What does it tell us, and what is Bellevue's role in contributing to this KEI? Because sometimes they are at different levels.

Yeah. It's hard to visualize what that looks like on a dashboard, though. If you get where I'm going, like, you could have a literal narrative.

It's it's a literal narrative. A literal narrative.

Mhmm.

Yep.

Well, at that point, your dashboard from UI perspective starts to become something else, if you're not careful. And I know you're probably balancing those two things, but it's that whole thing about don't put more than five bullets in a PowerPoint slide or Nice. Yeah. And it's obviously, it's slightly different for this, but it's in the same ballpark in terms of what Yep. What you need to try to avoid.

Okay. I mean, I'll be curious to see what, yeah, what the first version of that looks like. The other thing I wanted to just make more of a comment was some of the metrics that may be under development for parks. I mean, we've seen the third mile thing forever, and that's good. I mean, we've seen it forever because it's a good thing to keep our eyes on.

But it doesn't tell the whole picture. Bellevue is almost uniquely among suburbs of our size, and certainly uniquely in this area undergoing rapid urbanization, which carries with it a different set of challenges and opportunities. And with respect to just, to use it as an example, that third mile thing doesn't really capture whether or not there's sufficient park inventory downtown or in Bell Red. There's issues of congestion. There's issues of third mile how.

A

third mile in highly urban landscape can be very different than a third mile in Lake Hills. So Lake Hills is great, by the way. But it's different. So that that's just more of a a general exhortation to at least consider the three to five rapidly urbanizing or already urbanized areas like the one we're in right now in regard to some not some, but maybe most of those metrics, as well as the fact that you get very different demographics living in those areas, which may contain a separate vector to consider as well.

So I think you did a wonderful job highlighting the need for those narratives. Well, thank you.

Thank

you. Eileen? Yeah. Thank you for the presentation. So right now, it seems like the way the city is, working on the DEI is that there's a central group working on DEI, and then there's, like, 12 departments. Each department has a kind of a liaison into their department defining their specific DEI. And then the dashboard probably allows them to kind of click down into different departments and then consolidate. Right? A 100%. So so so then one thing that I kind of comes to my mind is that in this process of working, when do you get community inputs? Yeah. So And Sorry. Go ahead. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Mhmm. So diversity advantage plan, so the 41 equity objectives, were actually the way they were developed was we did some really significant community engagement, in 2023, especially. We had over a thousand separate pieces of, input, ideas, feedback from the community, and it was actually going through an analysis of those thousand different pieces of ideas that we developed, the 41 equity objectives. And then from there, we did some further work with our Centering Communities of Color board and then also our Bellevue Diversity Advisory Network that took these big ideas and then got their input on what does it mean to put these into more actionable kind of bite sized pieces. And we actually had a lot of that work looked at by our Centering Communities of Color team this past November, I think it was, departments came and worked with that team.

So community engagement has been part of this development process Mhmm. From day one to get us to this point. Mhmm. And then one of the things we're also committed to is every year having some sort of public forum where we're actually reviewing the work that's happened, reviewing the progress on these KEIs. So we're having that continuous back and forth with the community. Mhmm. I don't know if you wanna add anything else from Parks' perspective to put you on the spot.

Yeah. I from Parks, I would say that while the diversity advantage team is doing more of this big citywide look, Parks is still doing its needs assessment. It's still doing its surveys, still doing, you know, engagement through its events, at the community centers, or what have you. And so through that, creating that feedback loop with the community through those types of things is is how we will know whether or not the things that we are already implementing, the projects that we've already started working on, are they are they having an impact? And so that's for right now, as far as I I I know, that's how we're sort of, like, engaging with the community and making sure that we're staying on the right track and going to this is what we heard.

This is what we're doing. Did was that right? Did they did we do that right, or did we mess that up? Do we need to go back and fix something?

That's great. So, like, for, let's say, the last, big input milestone was around 2023. And given that we're 2026, like, in the last three years, what do you think are, like, some of the top highlights the city has done to address maybe some of the more immediate concerns from the community in terms of the DEI? I can speak to a couple.

Yeah, sure. Just getting really in the weeds. So for example, one of the topics that came up in the community dialogues that we had was wanting to establish some sort of community court program, so for folks that had committed certain kinds of crimes, that there was opportunities to access resources as opposed to having more punitive or punishment measures. So our prosecutor or our city attorney's office did open our first community court this summer back in July. So that's functioning, and it is making sure that folks, again, who have committed certain kinds of crimes are able to access community resources and go through a program, and the idea is to try and reduce the recidivism, and having really good results with that.

So, that was a really specific ask that came from the community that has happened. There was a lot of conversation in the community around we did these community dialogues, and people really liked them, and they wanted more of them. So there was a lot of conversation around we want more community engagement like this. So the city did create a new citywide community engagement team. So they are working on establishing some best practices and toolkits to make sure that the city is engaging their community consistently, whether you're in parks or utilities or fire, that those departments are getting that kinda on the ground face to face interaction with the communities they're serving.

Mhmm. Another one I had mentioned is for our last budget process, we created an equity framework to apply to our budget process called the budget equity toolkit. Mhmm. It's the first time the city's ever done anything like that, and that was another thing that arose from those community dialogues. So a few examples for you. That's great.

I'm gonna mention one, but it started before I got here, so I may not get all the pieces right. Yeah. But I know when I first got here, I know I know about it because they were super excited. Recreation had heard back about a grant that they give out to people so that they can take classes. Right?

It's a it's a you know, if you make a certain or under a certain amount, you you your child can take you know, use this funding to take certain classes. Right? And it'll pay for it. Well, there was an issue where parents were felt like the funding was enough for either the classes or either the the the the day camp, the summer camp. And right. It was enough for both. And so now they've changed it so that the it's you have you can do the summer camp, a grant for summer camp, as well as additional funding for for classes. Is it so that so that children can do both, so the kids can do both. And I think that came directly from what they heard from the community.

It's it's the scholarship fund.

Scholarship. Sorry.

Yes. So the amount the amount of money that's available to engage in our programs, has been increased. So it it expands the opportunities for for people to participate in programs. And then directly tied into that, what I was trying to highlight before at the start of the meeting, some of and it's tied to the barriers work is just increasing opportunities for training. So, again, learning, you know, how to register for classes, providing people information, providing one on one support and assistance in doing that, as well as translation services Mhmm.

For non English speaking. And then the application process, we've heard that some people have difficulty in filling out the forms necessary, and they're allowing people to get approved in advance. So one of the things that I know that Shelley and her team have been working on is getting people approved so that when the registration opens, because our classes fill up so quickly

Right.

They're already approved and know that they're eligible for that scholarship money. So And it's gonna hopefully increase the access and barriers. So it's directly tied to you you're exactly right. The example is correct that yeah.

It's Well, I was exactly right. But thank you. It

is increasing. It's the goal is to increase access and accessibility for everyone, and so it's it's allowing access maybe for more opportunities as well as letting everybody have that equity access so that when time's open, everybody can have that same access to engage. So that's great. That's another example of the work that's going on. That's great. And a direct result of

what we've seen. Okay.

Thank you. Yeah. That's awesome. Thanks.

Questions? No? Okay. If

we

have any follow-up questions, shall we just email you all? Or Sure. Yeah.

Oh. I I might jump in with a couple of things here at the end. So this has been a great discussion. Thank you all. And I I wanna thank Doug and and Sarah for joining. They've had a busy week. And so, I know when I first talked to Doug about this, he he looked at me like a little crazy and because, they had Human Services Commission on Monday, I think it was. And so there's been a lot going on, but this is really timely in sort of level setting what the city is doing because looking forward, you know, this this body is going to be taking up some things that are are very related. I mean, all of our work is related, but there's gonna be some specific action items. We're gonna be looking at the budget.

So budget recommendation moving forward later this year and into 2027, we'll be taking on a parks and open space system plan update process. And so all of the things that I've heard tonight, you know, those all play into that work. There's also a recreation program plan, minor update scheduled kind of in parallel. So I'll I'll there are a lot of plans, as you said. But just sort of thinking about all of this as we get into that work is important. So thank you.

Thank you for the additional context, Ryan. And, yeah, thank you so much for your presentation tonight. And, yeah, we'll probably be in touch with questions when we go over those plans later in the year.

Yeah. I know.

Is new business, and we'll turn it over to Ryan.

Yes. Thank you, chair. Yeah. So for our April meeting, as as I kind of alluded to there, we'll be starting, in looking at the budget. So we'll review the the current, really focusing in on the capital improvement program. And, so we'll we're the intent is to review the current, projects and what's been happening, within those projects over the past, two years at this point. So that's that's what's on tap for April.

Fifteenth, tax day?

Fifteenth sounds right.

Are we done?

Yes. So if, yeah, if there's any conflicts that anyone is aware of or, is thinking about remote attendance or being absent, please let us know. Let Miriam know or myself. Yeah. That is the fifteenth.

Okay. Alright.

I think that's all I have.

Thanks, Ryan. And then I guess with that, we've completed all the items on tonight's agenda, so I'll call the meeting now adjourned. Thank you.