Remarks by Robert Vanderpool
80 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 2 of 4
- Play at 10:45
“still here so thank you for that and thank you to your your shy and brave podium partner for being up there because I know that it's not easy councilmember Vanderpool hi again hi Ally thank you for coming out I remember last year when I went over to talk with you and it was a very stressful day and we had long conversation about where things are and and and grants from the federal government and the struggle that nonprofits were having in the community. But I'm glad to see the organization is growing and coming back because having it happen on near an anniversary, it was just nerve wracking.…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 16:06
“impacting urban, suburban, and rural communities, and disproportionately affect marginalized populations, and whereas overdose deaths are preventable and can be caused by alcohol and over-the-counter medicine, stimulants, and opioids, and whereas, like many places across Washington State, we need to continue to treat drug-related harm as a public health issue,”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 21:03
“I just want to say I appreciate everything you folks do over there. You guys are really a hub for a lot of services. It's one of the proudest organizations I think of in the community because, you know, Being on the regional housing council and working around homelessness and houselessness and dealing with folks that they're helping folks in the community You being there helps so much for us and helps us meet our goals Because if you didn't exist it would be really hard for us to meet those goals. And so I just want to Just say my appreciation for everything you folks do over there Likewise,…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 39:01
“Just a couple of them. Because some of these items are going to be coming back at the end here. I figured I'd just respond real quick. You know, appreciate you folks coming out. I appreciate hearing your concerns about the by names list and and the hygiene needs in the jungle. These are things that we think about quite often. The plan that we're working on around the jungle is very detailed, and there's a lot of folks that are involved in it. That said, I do appreciate continued feedback and ideas around it because it's not an easy process. We're trying to house over 200 people in a humane…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 55:15
“Council Member Vanderpool. Thank you. I pulled it because to the exact point, I was a little like, okay, you know, $952,000 is something that I was like, oh, well, that's quite a bit for the second floor of the city hall. But it sounds like you're having to build a building within the building almost, right? You have to build the walls and the separate entrances and all of the utility around that. um but that's really what my question that's why i pulled it um because it to to me or to anyone in the public who happens to read the document they're probably like oh wow look at that you know so…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 58:42
“Council Member Vanderpool. Thank you again for the explanation. Are you expecting us to continue to be doing both of these at the same time into the future as we go through our capital facilities? Each year we're going to continue to have both our internal crew and contract into the future.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 1:17:57
“Thank you. Council Member Vanderpool. Really quick, you know, I'll kind of speak to this a little, but one of the criticisms I've heard from folks is the closing of the list, right? And I think that one of the things that has to be made clear is that that's a commerce policy for the way the program works. It's not a City of Olympia policy. Um, because a lot of folks will feel that, uh, I've spoken to service providers and different folks in the community have felt, uh, we wish the S we wish the list system was set up differently, but it, it, it turns out a lot of that is commerce ruling…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 1:18:56
“That's it. I just wanted to clarify that because that is a very important distinction. I appreciate the answer. Thank you.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 1:22:08
“All right. Council Member Vanderpool. I'm not sure if it's ahead in this presentation, but I guess in addition to that, do you want to briefly talk about the navigator potential to use a, the, the housing navigator to help move along that pipeline? That's something that, uh, the regional housing council has approved, but, uh, and that'll come to this council.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 2:00:31
“I guess just one last thing. I just want to thank staff for working on this. I mean, this is not an easy process. I mean, we're dealing with a systemic issue that is all over the West Coast and in parts of the East Coast, part of the Midwest. It's just more visible in certain places, right? There are encampments that exist in the county, the greater county, that are just... that are just not seen, right? And taking on the responsibility of managing this is not easy. I think that The fact that we're able to do so much with dwindling resources from the federal government and concerns around the…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 2:09:23
“Council Member Vanderpool. I'm also, thank you for the quick response to this, because sometimes these types of policies usually don't even take much longer to respond to, honestly. And I appreciate the quick turnaround. And I'm glad that we have our housing, our homelessness emergency to kind of help back this policy change. But my one question, and it just came to my mind, is a lot of folks that are experiencing this may not be aware of this policy. Is there, for example, the thought that comes to my mind is when code enforcement goes out to talk to them, could this memo or, like I say,…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 2:14:31
“I guess to add on to that, is it possible to have a, we've discussed this before, but a visible permit, like a, you know, visible permit that could be printed out and be in the window of the vehicle so that there, it's just to avoid the interaction entirely as much as possible that an unneeded permit”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 2:26:32
“So one item, yesterday we had the Thurston Climate Mitigation Collaborative. We, I guess the one item that I think is the most, probably the most important was the vehicle miles traveled gap analysis.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 2:26:58
“And, you know, I guess the short story is that we're not reaching our reduction goals. You know, it's but what's interesting about this is the second part that's going to come after this is going to be the specific recommendations for our region. They have a I have right here a strategic effectiveness list, and some of it is we're already doing in Olympia land use density, mixed use development, changing your kind of your zoning. But there's some other things in here that are interesting because I'm not sure if any cities do any of these some or some probably do road usage charge congestion…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 51:14
“Just a quick question. So on the non-traditional services negotiated through contract, how often does that actually occur? And if we, like, how often does that occur in a city? Would they take on, because we do a multitude of non-traditional services, including downtown. So I'm curious, how often do private owners do that? And would those jobs transfer?”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 52:59
“Yeah, and that would be a part of the that be a request proposal after the initial contract or that be a part of the main contract usually”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:12:34
“I guess the best example I can come up with is at Intercity Transit, we were looking at electric and hydrogen. Hydrogen has its own problems and is also very expensive, but hydrogen buses had double the range than the electric buses, and they couldn't because you have to run them all day long. And so part of the, I would even say, probably in the same situation is, You don't want to have to have double the amount of vehicles to meet that range of having that heavy, all that usage all day long because you don't have time to stop and charge it even at a fast rate. So it's, I mean, I wouldn't be…”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:29:06
“This is kind of a what-if question. You may not be able to answer it. You know, as we were in this meeting, I got a news update about the situation with Lacey and their own waste services and their rates changing and going up. I'm not sure where they are with their system, but when I'm looking at this timeline here, I'm wondering if we went the route of building the Carpenter Road facility and Lacey's looking at their own contract. I brought this up last time, and I know that going from privatization to public takes a lot of work, but I wonder about that a little bit, where they're looking at…”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:31:25
“It does, but it is something that if we go down a certain route as a council and as a city, I want to put that out on the table as an option in the future.”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:32:35
“Council Member Vanderpool. 10 years plus the cost to construct things go up every day.”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:48:01
“I agree with what I'm hearing to my left and my right. So very clearly, not private, right? But when we're going through this, and I like what I'm hearing about income-based rates, thinking about the cost of living, right? That's not your words. That's my words. That's my words. I was thinking about incomes and the cost of living and your comments about that. Give me this look.”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 1:48:29
“OK. So I was thinking about incomes. I was thinking about the cost of living and making sure that we have rates that work with affordability that people are dealing with. And I was thinking about income rates an idea. But I think outside of that, when I was thinking about where do we decide on these types of things, and you go out and you talk to folks in the community, I think heavily about who are we serving and why are we doing what we're doing. The public supports this just like we support the fire department and parks and all of the other things we do as a city. And so I have no interest…”
City Council · Aug 18, 2026
- Play at 39:02
“Yeah. I'd like to thank all the folks for coming out. Um, yeah, next week we'll be having that conversation on waste services. As you probably know, I'm not a fan of privatization. It's just a variety of reasons, and we'll talk about that more next week. I also want to thank folks coming out for talking about the food systems plan. This is something that my council member, Dan Madrone, is super excited about in a way that is palpable and exciting just to be around. So I'm very interested in how that conversation tonight And then to the folks that came to comment about the trail subdivision, I…”
City Council · Aug 11, 2026
- Play at 41:18
“Tim, would it be possible for the folks who signed up to public comment tonight, I don't know if we can ask to put their contact information into that so they know the hearing is coming up? I don't know if that would be possible to get that pooled.”
City Council · Aug 11, 2026
- Play at 41:33
“Yeah, yeah, get their contact information. We can put it on the list for when the hearing happens.”
City Council · Aug 11, 2026