City Council - Special Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the special meeting of the Federal Race City Council meeting for Tuesday, September 1st. Would you all please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. have a welcome everyone it's great to see uh... it's still folks here uh... first of course a session we're here from our some transit friends uh... some transit operations and made its facility and uh... he's a uh... egos uh... but also we have our reports here record you like that first off yeah just as an introduction tonight uh... these are presentations that were previously done at uh... south county area transportatio

Yes, thank you for your presentation. My first question is slide five, the OMF South details. So compared to the Bellevue facility, what's the scope or how does it compare to that facility, the size and the scope?

So I do appreciate the economic and community support. part of it and if it really does generate 600 jobs like your presentation says and they're livable wage jobs I do support that and I appreciate that actually but also we've heard those types of promises in the past from different programs and so I would hope that Sound Transit would uphold at least 600 POSITIONS OR JOBS, ESPECIALLY LIVABLE WAGE JOBS THAT OUR COMMUNITY COULD TAKE ADVANTAGE OF AND BENEFIT FROM.

Thank you so much, Mayor. It's good to have sound transit here, and obviously this is an important aspect to our community and to the future of not just this community but our region. I appreciate my colleagues' questions or comments regarding the jobs. 600 jobs is good. It's great. And I definitely hope to see that come to fruition. Those are new jobs, correct? Yes. Or are they people from a different maintenance facility moving into this one? Are they brand-new jobs?

Great. Well, I definitely look forward to tracking that and getting updates on that just out of curiosity and to be aware. My last comment is I'm happy to see a very strong effort on the pre-apprenticeship programs opportunities for working families, for our kids, and anybody, quite frankly. So that's a really important aspect for me and to see that connection and And so I just wanted to comment to that and saying that I'll be watching that pretty closely as well and another comment I I am very curious and I know that will be covered at some point when I don't know but the rerouting of If peop

Is that it? I actually just moved there, so I'm going to be heavily impacted, so is that 20th? Okay, I'm told that's the 20th, yes. Yeah, I mean, if you have information, or I can wait for it, or yeah. Thank you.

I appreciate that. That means a lot. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Oh, I have some questions. So I've been to both the Seattle facility and the Bellevue facility. And when we were at the Seattle facility, it was before COVID, I believe. It only operated at night and early morning. And I don't know about the Bellevue facility because it wasn't open when we were there. And I would say when we were at the Seattle facility, I thought it was very noisy. Every time a train moved, it beeps three times and they moved a lot. And we're going to have more trains at this facility and it's going to be running 24 hours, I believe you said. So for the

Right. Every time a train moved, it had a beep so that people knew it was moving.

Which sounds amazing, and I like that. I just remember in the Seattle facility, because we were there at like 1 o'clock in the morning, I think 1 to 3, how noisy it was. And I couldn't imagine living next to that. So I'm hoping that something changes or some technology is new that that doesn't happen here.

Okay. And my last question, because I know we need to move on, is I think you said you're going to build a new wetland and protect the existing High Labus Creek? That's right. Why do you need to build a new wetland?

Thank you so much, and thanks for being here today.

Yes, thank you very much. Great presentation. All right, and now we are going to move on to the next part of our presentation, the King County South Link Connections Mobility Project. Jeremy Fitchner with King County South, South King County Planning Lead.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Jeremy, for that presentation. I'm particularly interested in the MetroFlex. How is that going to be different than, like, say, Uber or Lyft, and have you received any feedback from those companies?

Okay, and have you received any feedback from those companies at all on this?

Mr. Fickner, could you go back to the MetroFlex website?

Thank you for the pilot zone. So the areas, they look quite small. Are you just trying these out right now, or...?

So somebody told me that they called and found out that you wouldn't go west of Peck Highway. Is that correct?

So it's going to be two years before that's able to be changed?

Sure. I can understand the people who live over on Military, and on that side, they would really need that. But there's also people on the west side of Peck Highway that they were quite excited about MetroFlex coming in. In fact, one... A person told me that they might get rid of one of their cars so that they would only have to have one car instead of two. Another person who's mobility limited was quite excited and then found out that that wouldn't be available to them because they don't west of Pack Highway. So trying to figure out how we can help those folks.

Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. And then there's one other question. We were quite excited about we've been talking a long time about getting some way to get our people from the – neighborhood areas so that they could get to light rail without having to call an uber so if they call dart or how long is the time frame from when they call to when the service would be at their door

Okay. Then I just have two more comments. One is, is this available to anyone or does it only have to be seniors or low-income or disability?

Oh, that's interesting. Okay, thank you. And then I have one other person who's asked me, they have a bus stop in front of their home. There's nothing there other than just the pole. And wondering how they could see if that could be moved down to where there weren't any homes like a block away because the people who ride leave a lot of garbage, trash.

How did they contact you? Did you have an email? Send it to the council somehow or whatever. Thank you. Thank you. You aren't related to our IT person here by any chance, are you? Not that I'm aware of. Okay, thank you. Thank you.

I have another flex question. Sure. So recently I heard that Bellevue has electrified their flex buses for their downtown area. Have you heard anything about that?

Yeah, they picked them up from the riders from the transit station and then ferry them around the downtown area. I was just wondering if you had any plans of electrifying the flex fleet that will be in use here.

Yes, thanks for your presentation. This is kind of following up on Council Member Kochmar's last question. Here in Federal Way, it seems like the places that are most likely to have challenges with trash along the road is at the Metro bus stops. And what is Metro doing to better patrol and take care? of the trash at the bus stops. It seems like that should be a metro responsibility, not a city responsibility.

I think that a lot of the problem isn't the lack of garbage receptacles, but garbage receptacles overflowing and not being maintained.

All right, thank you. Public Works folks keep in touch with you about that. There have been certain instances, I can think of probably two or three right off the top of my head, where we've had those issues. You may want to relay that to your folks, but we'll have our Public Works people communicate with you about that. Council President Honda?

Thank you. Could you put up the zoning for MetroFlex, that slide? Thank you, Heather, or whoever is doing it. First of all, thanks for being here. I appreciate it. Looks like Auburn has a really large area compared to what we have in Federal Way for their zone. Could we get more of an area since they have such a large area? And how did you pick the zone areas?

Square mileage for that for the areas, but we like I said we were you know trying to balance the quality of service with the Geography served here with both of these But is it so if I imagine this is going to take off I do think people will be using this If you get enough calls for service for Metro flex outside of the zones Before the two years are up. Will you consider expanding the zones I

So if somebody calls for MetroFlex and they're told you're not in the zone, does the operator, if they're on the phone, because I imagine we'll have people using the phone, will the operator then tell them about DART or the other options they might have for transit?

Because we could also let people know about that if we had the correct information, so we could help educate the public about their options for transit.

That would be great. Thank you. I really appreciate that. Council Member Suffer-Dawson.

Thank you. Thank you. So with the earlier and late trips that are the increase, I appreciate it. However, the areas that were already transportation desert continue to have shorter time frame. For example, 182, the area that I live. And yes, there has been a little change, but especially on the weekends, it starts at 7, but A lot of people work, go to work before 7. And so how do we meet those needs? Because they need their jobs. And so even getting to transit center around 7.30 or 8 may not work for them. And I have two young ladies living with me who now have cars, but I used to take them to

I hear that. Appreciate your feedback. Thank you. Council Member Coachmark?

Well, I was just going to suggest maybe, Mayor, in your newsletter, you could add an article on this whole Metro Transit, Metroplex, and the... DART and who to contact. And we might just suggest that they do a lot of calls for service for MetroFlex so we can get some more earlier than two years from now because I know some folks would love it.

That's right. It's going to be a popular service. Okay. Any other questions, Council? Well, a big hearty thank you to both the folks of King County and Sound Transit. Thank you so much for your partnership and for all the work you do for the people of our community. All right. With that, the study session is adjourned. We have an executive session for item four here. It is property acquisition pursuant to RCW 42301101B and potential litigation pursuant to RCW 42301101I. Duration is approximately 15 minutes. We'll be in recess for that purpose. All right.