City Council - Regular Meeting

evening i'd like to call this meeting no order will you please rise and join me in the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice all right please start with the roll call Council President Perez. Council Member Vaughn. Here. Council Member Albertson. Here. Council Member Rivera.

Here.

Council Member O'Halloran.

Here.

Council Member McIrvin. And Council Member Prince. Here. Roll call, Mr. Mayor, two absent.

Mr. Mayor.

Yes.

Move to excuse the absent council members.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Albertson, seconded by Council Member Prince that the absent council members be excused. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay. Motion carries. All right. Tonight we're going to start off with a public hearing and it's the 2027 through 2032 six-year TIP or Transportation Improvement Program and we have Ellen Talbo from

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and council members. Tonight, my name is Ellen Talbo. I'm the Transportation Planning Manager in the Public Works Department. And tonight, I am here to present our Six-Year Transportation Improvement Plan. I recognize that This presentation is similar, very, very similar to the Committee of the Whole from two weeks ago. And so I will do my best not to be too repetitive, but for the benefit of the public and the public hearing tonight, I will continue with the presentation. Just as a reminder from what you've seen before in previous years, again, this six-year TIP and our annual update is required by law, but also we do an update every year to reprioritize or reposition projects for delivery of our capital project program and to move projects and advance them and prioritization to help them become eligible for grants. And so essentially what the meat and potatoes is of our annual update is really we are adding, excuse me, we are removing projects as they've been completed and then we are adding new projects and bumping those up in the rotation to advance for funding prioritization. And so this year, in this year's update, we've added new projects, and those are on the right side of the slide here, the Panther Creek Culvert Talbot Road project, the Talbot Road Cleveland sidewalk project, just in front of our future Cleveland Richardson project. And then the Southwest 7th Street Corridor Safety Project, which is essentially the installation of a cycle track along Hardy between 7th to Rainier. And then kind of more minor updates, really just in the numeration and identification numbers of the projects along the way, updating our maps and status updates on the project pages. Here you've likely seen this slide before, but this is really just touching on the funding status and essentially the way that we move projects as they move through their funding cycle towards completion. And so we are accommodating in this tip, update projects at all funding levels, including partially funded in the design and construction, and then even our candidate unfunded projects. And we include our our unfunded candidate projects, because they are still priorities of the of the council. And here we are showing that further dialing into the prioritization is we want to be transparent with how we are considering all these projects because they are we all have needs throughout the city and in order to weigh the needs across we are assigning a criteria point or a factor of such so that we can rank these projects of of greater weight towards the others to position them towards prioritization in the list for funding. And so those priority factors are here. And this all feeds into the kind of calculus, if you will, of the ranking. So as you can see, those factors such as life safety, plan implementation, system operations, financial feasibility, direction, directive of the council and the mitigative aspects of these projects all fall into this ranking of 36 projects. Essentially, if you look at projects 1 through 14, these all kind of, these are Projects that we continue, that we will be asking for budget in the 2027-28 biennial CIP section of that budget, and along with the other partially funded and program funded projects. programs in this list i think if there's anything to uh differentiate here it's just that the projects that are noted as pro as program funding it really just means that these are operational in nature but also have capital project aspects of smaller spot improvements within each of these programs and so we are asking for or in our biannual budget process to keep these programs funded so that we can continue advancing the systemic improvement that these programs add to our transportation network. I would also mention that the prioritization that you see here has not changed from last year. We are still keeping our sidewalks and walkway program at the top of the list, as well as our bridge inspection program, traffic safety, which we heard last year was important to the council, street overlay, and the other projects as they continue on that you can see in the list. And of course, there's further detail in the attached tip document in your packet. And so this slide here, this list is a bit shorter because it's not showing the program-funded projects. We just simply chose not to map each and every little tiny spot improvement on this map, but it does really convey the major capital roadway and transportation intersection projects that comprise our six-year capital program. And I just wanted to add this slide in at the last minute, just reminding and summarizing the walkway program projects that I talked about, that I was here presenting to the council a couple months ago, but essentially wanting to convey that how and where we are making progress in our sidewalk and walkway program. We are completing Maplewood. In fact, the construction has been completed and we are closing out that project. We are continuing to work on 116th southeast 116th, and we are closing up on the southeast 172nd project. And then we have these four projects. So number 11 down here is the sidewalk in front of the future Cleveland Richardson Park. 55, which is not labeled, but this is Aberdeen, this green star here, and it's not It's a prioritized project on a local collector road, so that's why it's not shown in red numeration. And then 76 is 164th. Same thing, it's still a high priority project, but it's just a local collector, so it's not shown in red. And then Hoquiam, which... i caught in transportation committee and i apologize that my green star didn't make it over to number four instead of 14 but that these these projects are prioritized for design in 2027 and or construction in 2028 so Essentially, we are planning to use the transportation benefit district funds proposed to be programmed in the 27-28 budget for these projects. Here I wanted to touch on the fact that the funding needs for transportation projects will always be greater than what is available, but we benefit here in Renton from the Transportation Benefit District funds, which were created in that ordinance was created in August of 2023. And we began collecting sales tax towards that benefit district in April of 2024. And so that the TBD funds have allowed us to make headway in our rehabilitation, road, street rehabilitation, and sidewalk projects. And so to date, as of December 2025, we had about $4.4 million in sales tax income towards the TBD fund. And then we had about $1.18 million of expenditures. And so there are expenditures that we will continue to increase against that fund as we continue working on 1-16th and bring on design for new projects. But at the same time, we have not finished collecting sales tax. We will be continuing to collect sales tax through the end of the year. So those two amounts will track with each other. I also want to touch on the red bars here indicating the grant funds. This year in 2026, we applied for approximately $3.4 million worth of grant funds, particularly in state transportation improvement board funds. And we applied for projects that we are currently that we currently have been planned to work on in the 2026 allocated budget. And so we will anticipate hearing word about the about those brands in November end of end of November beginning of December. And so for new funding that we are adding to this TIP update, we received a contribution from Sound Transit to implement the Lake Washington Boulevard hawk signal near the May Creek Trail. So that is in design right now. And then we also received grant funding a little more than a year ago for the last phase of Rainier Ave. And that is actually a road diet project. So we are looking to make that the more complete streets friendly end of Rainier Ave. And so that will be heading into design currently and then Southwest Street corridor safety improvement we received just a small contribution from Sound Transit, but really this project is being led by King County Parks They are as part of as part of Design that they are working on from their 2025 parks levy so I'll touch on that again in just in just a moment and And then also a nice contribution from Sound Transit that we anticipate bringing to the council next month for about almost $23 million for the park and ride. And so again, I won't go over these too much, but only to just say that, touch on that Seventh Street project again, and that just to recap that the segment here that we're really talking about is Hardy Ave between Seventh and Rainier. And the reason why this is a key segment for right now is because this is the segment that wants to connect the future Lake to Sound Trail, which King County Parks is designing with the Renton Transit Center. on the other side of Rainier. So this project, Hardy, will drop down from 7th and then cross over Rainier to the station. So right now the project is at 30% design, and when I have a cost estimate from King County Parks, I will bring that information to Transportation Committee to keep Council looped in. And then finally, just touching on the projects that we've worked on in the 25-26 budget and made progress on completing or are making progress to complete before the end of the year. So the projects here, Southwest 43rd is still under construction, but most of these other three have been completed. And then 116th is in construction and the Renton School Pedestrian Crossings are gearing up for construction. And so with that, I will close here. But just mentioned, just the staff recommendation for you tonight is to approve the annual updates to the 2732 six year tip and and and the resolution is in front of you for adoption following tonight's public hearing. Thank you.

All right. Thank you, Ellen. Any questions from staff this time? All right. Thank you very much. And I have nobody signed up for public comment at this point. Do we have any correspondence?

Mr. Mayor, I received no request to speak or comments or correspondence.

Okay. Thank you. What's the wish of the council?

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Council Member.

Move we close the public hearing.

Second. it's been moved by council member alverson second by councilman prince that the public hearing be closed all in favor signify by saying aye aye opposed nay motion carries all right thank you very much appreciate your presentation all right we're moving on to the uh administrative report

All right, good evening. Council meetings will be paused for the next three weeks while City Council enjoys a well-deserved summer break. Regular council meetings will resume on Monday, September 14th. Come celebrate with us Sunday, September 6th from 11 to 2 p.m. at Liberty Park as we celebrate our 125th birthday in style. Step back in time with a walk through Renton's history, enjoy games and activities, live music, and of course, birthday cake. We can't wait to celebrate with you. On Saturday, August 29th, Metro will launch its fall service change to add more frequent service, expand operating hours, and improve connections throughout Renton and the Eastside Transit Network. Metro developed this network to improve transit connections throughout the Eastside as Link light rail service expands. When fully implemented, the Eastlink connections network will include extended service hours, new weekend service, and faster regional connections for Renton and other Eastside communities. For more information, visit our website at rentanois.gov. You still have plenty of opportunities to enjoy summertime fun with concerts at Kulan Park, movies, music, and exercise classes and more at Legacy Square. Be sure to check out our website for an updated list of these events by visiting our website, rentanois.gov slash events. Information about preventative street maintenance, traffic impact projects, and road closures happening this week can be found on our website. All projects are weather permitting, and unless otherwise noted, streets will always remain open. That's all, sir.

All right. Thank you. Next up is audience comment. We do have a number of people signed up to speak tonight. I want to remind everyone that all remarks must be addressed to the entire council. When I call your name, please step up to the podium. Give your name and city of residence for the record. Everybody will be given three minutes. There's a timer right in front. Please keep an eye on the little yellow light and start wrapping up your comments. when the red light comes on, that's three minutes and we will move on to the next speaker. I will also call the person that's coming up and who's on deck. So please come up and get ready and that way we can give everybody a chance to speak here. So the first person up will be Daphne Baird and on deck will be Brandon Connolly.

Good evening, council. Daphne Baird, resident of Renton. As a human trafficking survivor, though I don't usually detail my experiences, I found the use of human trafficking victims as a rhetorical tool in last week's meeting disgusting. Most survivors of human trafficking would do anything to save others from what happened to us. And that usually looks like choosing one part of our experience and just figuring it out. It is hard for us to reach a place where we have the distance, bandwidth, and time to read research rather than rely on gut instinct. Most trafficking survivors have conflicted feelings about surveillance. On the one hand, we were controlled through heavy surveillance. On the other, we are desperate for proof that could evict our traffickers and stop their horrors. The data shows the latter simply doesn't work like we hope. Kidnapping only occurs in 4% of trafficking cases. Even in countries with good CCTV, they usually locate those survivors with anonymous tips and raids, not cameras. Even if we were to assume a flock is a perfect system and their cameras were what allowed our officers to reunite victims with their families, those very actions would harm other victims. Experts estimate 12% of all trafficking victims are children trafficked by their family. When a children run away from their trafficker, officers treat it as a missing person or kidnapping case. Well meaning police sending us back into hell is one of the most validated fears victims and survivors have. Given the police returned one of Jeffrey Dahmer's teenage victims to him, and he wasn't even their legal, he didn't even have legal custody, this isn't a problem where you can take shortcuts. what protects trafficking victims are education food and housing away from the traffickers rushing through turning flock back on or criminalizing homelessness tells survivors you care more about optics than you do about us please stop listen and research thank you

Okay, next up is Brandon Conley and Fatima Pinamenta is up on deck.

Hello, my name is Brandon Conley, and I've lived in Renton the last seven years. I'm asking you to vote no on ordinance 6199, the camping ban. I'm also still against the flock cameras. Please cancel our contract. I could not find a clear reason why Renton is doing ordinance 6199 now, the camping ban, but this follows camping bans nationwide, an attempt to reduce the symptoms of homelessness as felt by those who are more fortunate. In previous comments at the previous meeting, my neighbors have already dug in a bit on why this is a bad policy. I'll leave that work to them. I want to tell you instead about my personal experience with homelessness. The first time I was nine, my family moved to Oregon and the house we bought fell through and we suddenly had nowhere to live. It was years before I understood that in those cold, soggy weeks, we were homeless camping on public land. The youngest of my two little brothers was four. The second time I was 15, home life had gotten bad enough that I left. A few months later, my landlord, who was also my employer, fired and evicted me. I slept that night in a public park, then couch surfed for a while. In 2008, my youngest brother lost everything. It took my wife and me a week to track him down. He had been sleeping poolside at apartment complexes and hotels, changing locations frequently so that it looked like he was just sunbathing. He had not eaten in days and he was badly sunburned. He stayed with us a few months. Now he drives a truck for a dairy co-op. The Federal Reserve publishes a report called the Survey of Household Economics and Decision Making. One finding from that report, the share of Americans who do not have enough cash to cover an emergency $400 expense has never been lower than 32%. That's one in three people can't afford $400. Too many of us are one bad day away from losing everything. What separates the people in this room from the people this ordinance targets is not character, it is a safety net that happened to hold up. In high school, I needed my friends and their parents. In childhood, I needed a soggy camping trip in the Oregon woods. Today, I'm a software developer with the free time and spare energy to give back to my community. If you want to tell me the homeless population of Renton is a nuisance, fine. If you want to tell me we cannot absorb the people displaced by similar bans in Tacoma, Auburn, Burien, Kent, and Tukwila, fine. Let's make this a state issue. Point me upstream and I will spend my time with them hassling them. But if you want to pull this crap where I live, then I'm back to enjoying my Monday nights with y'all at the City Council. Vote no on 6199. Thank you.

All right. Next up is Fatima, and then on deck is Adam Monet. Hi.

Hello, my name is Fatima Pimienta. I'm a new resident of Renton, and I thank you all for welcoming me to this beautiful city. It truly is an honor to join this community. As a Mexican woman with a name shared with my Islamic brothers and sisters, you can see why the topic of surveillance hits very personally. I've been to secondary revision across the border and multiple search stops since September 2001. For multiple weeks, many of my fellow citizens brought forth literature and media regarding severe government surveillance, dystopia, the loss of human rights and dignity. While one might wonder why fiction is being used to argue for our current reality, I ask our council to consider the context of when and why these texts and media were created. History, as any expert will confirm, will repeat itself in echoes. We have seen from World War II to our own Japanese internment camps, the Red Scare, and multiple anti-LGBTQIA laws that our free country government is not above persecuting its own citizens. We have seen that surveillance and secret policing and the loss of privacy leads to very real danger to every single person. They say if you're not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to fear, until they change the definition of what is wrong. We have seen evidence time and again that this proposed tool exponentially does more harm than good. It is currently being used to stalk, to harass, and hunt down its targets of choosing. This tool feeds incomplete, incorrect, and inappropriate information to our police and to ICE. We have seen innocent people be at minimum scared or arrested and then released or at worst taken away indefinitely without due process. I wonder how many of you walk around your day to day with your passport and your social security card on your person just in case someone with ill faith has suspicions. Are you ready to be treated as guilty until proven innocent? You stated in our previous meeting that this tool is to be used for crime prevention, yet evidence has yet to prove these cameras are effective in preventing, aiding, or solving any of the violent crimes you claim the worst of the worst have committed. You stated that we will not base our policies on the actions of other cities. I believe a term for learning from previous instances can be called established precedent. I am pleading you to look at the evidence Look at the facts. Look at what these cameras are currently being used for. Why other cities have terminated their contracts and what happens when you actually leave them on. Let us not keep going down a path after we have seen where it leads. Let us not make the mistakes of the past over and over again. Let's continue to make history, not repeat its tragedies. Thank you.

Adam and Amy is on deck.

Good evening, Renton City Council. My name is Adam Honay, Renton member of the community. You've got a lot of folks here tonight. I think more than you've probably seen in the past several weeks. I'm hoping that this implores you all to consider how unpopular some of the legislation that you're putting forward is. Some of us have spent the last week going through data that we were able to find for flock cameras and for audits of the flock system. And we've been disappointed with the information that we've found. We found case numbers that are filled in with numbers like 9999 or testing, things that shouldn't be in those systems. And I thought we were promised that these should be safe and secure and there's going to be audits and the information is going to be in there and that our police department wouldn't do such a thing. But clearly we have evidence to the contrary. So again, I'm going to implore you all to consider not renewing the contract and not moving forward with a new contract. Switching topics, because we have another new fun thing for us to talk to you all about today, ordinance on criminalizing homelessness. Yeah, that's a fun new one for you all. Criminalizing people for existing. Okay, so put yourself in those people's shoes. Earlier we heard many of us are just one paycheck away from not being able to pay for our rent, to be able to pay our mortgage, to be able to pay for an incidental. I'm pretty sure a lot of folks here probably don't have fantastic health insurance and having something like a catastrophic car accident and having to pay for injuries could very well put them out on the street. We have other communities around us that are already trying to push them out somewhere else. And as you start moving people, because they're not desirable, you make their living situation even harder. You make it hard for them to be able to have possessions that help them through their day to day. And you make it very difficult for them to be able to move out of that homelessness situation and back into society. So again, I'm going to implore you to not move forward. with this ordinance. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. Next up is Amy and Diane Dobson is on deck.

Good evening. My name is Amy, resident of Renton. I'm here to ask you again to cancel the FLOC contract and to oppose proposed ordinance 6199 to criminalize homelessness. Some members of this council seemed confused last week how FLOC could just change their contract terms and Renton be subject to those changes. Private companies, especially cloud service providers, do this all the time in a few ways. First, a FLOC could add or remove functionality of the system to make you agree to a new license term before restoring prior functionality, or click wrap licensing. FLOC could present a pop-up to ask you to agree to new terms before allowing you to use the interface. Any city employee could click, I agree. How many times have you checked I agree without reading the terms and conditions? I think we've all done that. Do you really know if the contract agreed to in June 2024 is the contract currently in place? And even if it is, are you comfortable with those terms or the terms as they stand in August 2026? If you re-sign a contract with Flock, you'll be signing the updated terms, which as a reminder, mandate contract disputes be arbitrated in Georgia under Georgia law, making Washington state law completely irrelevant, and to give Flock a perpetual, irrevocable license to use Renton's data for any number of purposes, including to train AI. So please don't renew the contract. Anyways, proposed Ordinance 6199 to criminalize homelessness ironically states that the preferred enforcement approach for camping and related violations is outreach, contact, and offer of services if available. To my knowledge, reliable, effective outreach is not happening through the city or law enforcement. And if outreach is a preferred approach to homelessness, why aren't we focusing on outreach? And the proposed ordinance merely encourages, not requires, law enforcement to offer resources prior to issuing a trespass order. If offering services is a preferred approach, as stated in your ordinance, why aren't officers required to offer services? Also, nowhere does this ordinance offer any protections for belongings seized by police, such as cell phones and tents. Police can literally take everything a person owns. This ordinance will only displace the problem, not solve it, since it doesn't address the root causes. Other solutions to consider include Staff mental health professionals in the police department like Bellevue Police Department started in 2023 with the Community Crisis Assistance Team. This is a crisis outreach team made up of mental health workers and specially trained police officers who offer outreach and resources. Or explore a basic income project like the one in Denver, Colorado that resulted in 45% of the unhoused population securing housing within one year and saved the city half a million dollars by reducing ambulance costs, treatment costs, ER visits, hospitalizations, jail costs, shelter visits, etc. At the end of the day, a crucial part of public safety is the prevention of crime, not just action after crime happens. And that's where Renton is really falling short. It's 2026. We know better. Let's do better. Thank you for your time.

Next up is Diane Dobson, followed by on deck will be John Verdin. Diane Dobson.

Good evening, Council and administration. My name is Diane Dobson. I'm the CEO of the Renton Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber works with more than 250 nonprofit organizations through RANU, Renton Area Nonprofits, Unite, and our Task Force on Homelessness. Around that table are outreach workers, behavioral health providers, shelter staff, churches, first responders, people with lived experience. Over the past several months, we've hosted meetings and listening sessions on the use of the opioid settlement investments, the Renton Stabilization Center, and most recently, the proposed use of public space ordinance. Participants have included Evergreen Treatment Services, Reach Renton, St. Matthew's Church, Salvation Army, Valley Cities Behavioral Health, Fine Maple Place, Neighborhood House, St. Stephen's Housing, Orion Industries, King County Library System, Pure Washington, Valley Public Defenders, Recovery Navigator Program, Friends of Youth, and other organizations. Throughout those discussions, and perhaps not always where opinions started, the overwhelming takeaway has been support for giving the city an appropriate use of public space tool. Thank you to the council members who have joined those conversations. These providers see the ordinance as one additional tool, a combination of opportunity and accountability to help move someone towards shelter, treatment, recovery, and stability. They have also been clear. We cannot put the cart before the horse. While the city needs a runway to implement this ordinance, enforcement cannot get ahead of available referrals. If we tell someone they cannot remain in a public space, there needs to be meaningful places to direct them. Renton is building those options through AHA Housing, The More We Love Women and Children's Crisis Center, Reach Center of Hope, Compass House for Veterans, Vision House, and the Sidney Wilson House. With that path forward established, I'm persuaded by the organizations and providers doing this work every day. Their experience tells us this ordinance can be one helpful tool among many, and I hope the council will consider supporting it as part of that broader approach. I want to close why this matters to me personally. My brother lived on the streets, struggled with addiction, and ultimately died of an overdose. If people could simply decide to leave addiction, trauma, or behavioral health challenges behind, many would have already done so. To me, compassion means more than offering help or allowing someone to remain in circumstances that may be harming them. Sometimes it means creating a path forward, one that may include accountability to help someone move towards stability when they may not be able to choose that path on their own. Thank you very much.

Thank you. John Burton and Leslie Jensen on deck. No, John. All right, Leslie Jensen.

On deck. Who's on deck?

What's that?

Who's on deck? Leslie Jensen. After Leslie.

Oh, no Leslie either.

No, she's here. I said, who's on deck? Who's on deck after Leslie?

Oh, I was waiting for Leslie to come in. Tammy S. Tammy S. is on deck.

Sorry, I'm limping. It took me more than 30 seconds to walk up here. Leslie Jensen, East Renton Highlands. I very much appreciate the intelligent and thoughtful people who come here week after week with well-written statements that include facts and statistics and studies that show that ALPRs are more dangerous than they are effective. However, I'm unimpressed and disappointed with the folks who are pro-ALPR as they have not provided a single fact or statistic or study that backs their pro-ALPR stance. It's disturbing to me that I live in a city where some of my representatives don't care about facts. You have made that clear by not providing any facts to us and dismissing any facts that we provide to you. It's disturbing to me that I live in a city where some of my representatives and the police department prefer to assume that people who live and work in our city are to be treated as guilty until proven innocent. Mass surveillance by its nature is a message to the people we're not trustworthy and we must be watched 24-7. It is disturbing to me that the same representatives who don't trust us demand or expect our trust and at the same time trust a private corporation, in this case Flock, who have shown over and over and over that they are a bad actor. There is no point in my reiterating how Flock is untrustworthy because you have made it clear that you don't care. And nowhere is your lack of care for your fellow human beings more obvious than the camping ban you want to pass. It is the perfect example of cruelty over compassion by literally criminalizing poverty. Rather than follow the lead of other cities who have had proven success with a housing-first approach, you prefer to waste our tax dollars on putting poor folks in prison. Shame on you. In closing, I'll say that I've never looked forward to a local election as much as I do for the one that's coming up in 2027.

All right, next up is Tammy Hess with Ron Bensley on deck.

My name is Tammy Hess. I'm a Renton resident and a member of Radical Women, and I've worked as a domestic violence advocate supporting survivors of abuse and trafficking. I've also worked directly supporting the unhoused community. Different experiences, but the same truth. People are trying to survive systems that were not designed around their safety. And I'll be speaking directly to the camping ban and to canceling flock around this issue. In domestic violence work, sometimes safety means being invisible. I worked in a confidential domestic violence shelter and our location was not shared, even with law enforcement. Survivors and their children came through a separate intake location and from there we transported them to safety. We took location tracking very seriously, we had to. National Domestic Violence Safety Guidance recognizes that survivors may need to decide when location tracking is safe and when it needs to be turned off. That was not theoretical in my work. It was a core component of safety planning. Because sometimes the most important information about a survivor is the information that must not be known through tracking on their phone or their vehicle. So when I hear survivors used to justify expanding surveillance like Flock, I have to ask, who is actually being consulted about survivor safety? I don't doubt that police have found Flock useful in investigations, but finding someone after a crime has happened is not the same as preventing that crime. A system can be useful to an investigation while still creating extreme risks for people whose movements are being recorded. Those voices need to be a part of this decision. And I want to connect that directly to the camping ordinance. I have worked with people who were already struggling to survive. You cannot make someone safer by taking away the few places they have left to sleep, to rest, and to keep their belongings. And there's never enough room in these beds, in these spaces we're talking about. If someone is sleeping outside because they have nowhere else to go, finding them, moving them, or putting them in jail does not create housing. It does not create stability. It takes an already desperate situation and makes it even more dangerous and vulnerable. We should be asking what that person needs to become safer and housed, not how we can punish them for being visible because we don't like seeing them. It does not solve homelessness. It just moves the problem and these people and families that are carrying this, they suffer more. Whether we're talking about a survivor hiding from an abuser or someone sleeping outside because they have nowhere else to go, the question should be the same. What actually makes this person safer? Not more visible, not more punishable, actually safer. Really think about that. Privacy is not opposite of public safety. Sometimes privacy is the public safety. Please keep flock off. Do not expand ALPR surveillance. Do not pass this camping ordinance. Choose housing over punishment. Choose services over surveillance. Choose safety and the safety that actually protects people, not systems that trap people. And when they need help, punish them when they have nowhere to go. Thank you.

Okay, Ron Bensley, and then Christopher Cocho on deck. Christopher Cocho on deck.

Ron Bensley of Renton. Thank you, Mayor and council members. I'd like to review the parliamentary procedure at the tail end of last week's meeting. And I'm being very sincere We had a, one of our council members did bring up a motion that was clearly on this hot button issue. And I respect that there's differences of opinion the real problem was that the council was kind of ended up with a 3-3 tie vote. I'm not going to condemn the mayor. He shouldn't be forced against his will to make a tie vote if that's not his choice. But you need to figure out a 3-3 if it doesn't have a majority. In courtrooms, that's a hung jury. That doesn't pass. I don't understand why there wasn't a second vote or a second motion presented to have a new vote so that the council would have an opportunity. Why that didn't happen, I don't know. This is probably not the last time that you will face this, having a tied council and whoever happens to be the mayor, they don't choose to cast the tie ballot. I think you can't force somebody against their will. But doggone it, you really needed to do a second vote. You present a new motion. If indeed that was your idea, you didn't get 50.01%. Exactly 50 doesn't pass. I would invite the mayor to have the city attorney review not only Robert's rules, but also state law about exactly what are the circumstances where there's a tie vote on a council. Thank you.

All right, next up is Christopher with Cheryl Freese on deck.

Good evening, Mayor and council members. My name is Christopher Kiyochow. I am a proud Renton resident. Tonight, I want to talk about public safety, but I also want to talk about what we call a solution. Now, I support permanently removing flat cameras from our city and declining to renew future contracts. I understand that this technology was introduced to make our community safer, and that is something that I still wholeheartedly believe in and believe that the council should continue to invest in. Public and community safety should not be measured by our ability to investigate a crime after it's happened, rather preventing it from happening in the first place. It must also include privacy, civil liberties, community trust and the security for our most vulnerable community members, which are immigrants, as well as those seeking special medical needs. If we want to be serious about public safety, if we want to be serious, we have to consider fiscal responsibility. and invest our public dollars in solutions that hit things right at the root. Instead of investing in surveillance technology, how about investing in human and behavioral health professionals to accompany our first responders? How about investing in ways to remove, if we're so considerate about people on our streets, how about we invest in actual ways of providing Behavioral health services, shelter, outreach, and community management. Let's allocate resources that actually create pathways towards permanent housing. Because being unhoused should not make someone a criminal. But a camping ban might remove a tent, but it will not move them out of homelessness. And that brings us to a larger issue that we should be talking about, which is housing affordability. There are policies out there that are working that address tenant protections, eliminating junk fees, creating housing stability, and also partnerships that keep people housed before they even reach the point of crisis. We need solution-based leadership here. And we don't have to choose between compassion or public safety, between helping people or fiscal responsibility, because good policy should accomplish both. Now, I say yes to fiscal responsibility and meaningful public safety, yes to housing affordability and making choices that hit at the root of core issues, and no to policies that just move them somewhere else. So I really would love to continue this conversation with each and every one of you, not to talk about what I oppose, but actually what we can build together. Thank you.

All right, next up is Cheryl Fries, and Zach Moore is on deck.

Cheryl Fries, Renton resident. As with many other things in this city, strategic, thoughtful planning was not part of the equation when you decided to sign a contract with Flock. As you've heard from many audience members, including several engineers over the last few months, including those involved with HIPAA compliance security, there were very telling signs about the extremely high likelihood of problems, violations, and breaches that signing with FLOCC and the cameras would cause. You had the ability to identify subject matter experts from tech and other fields who could have looked at the technology and equipment and contract and proactively shared numerous concerns and probabilities. Yet again, here we are today after the fact and talking about this still. This criticism of Flock is happening nationwide. The, using a favorite word of some of you, nefarious activity cannot be surprising to you. The harm that Flock has caused cannot be surprising to you. The changes they are currently making cannot be surprising to you as they are scrambling to save their existing contracts because the amount of cities canceling their contracts is obviously having a tremendous impact on their revenue. Desperation causes desperate behaviors. They raised over nine rounds of funding of more than $1 billion. Their last round, which was a series I alone, was for $207.92 million. They are beholden to their investors, not to the peoples whose lives they are irreparably damaging. As of August 3rd, their valuation has decreased almost $2 billion. That was after their Series I, which occurred in March 31st of this year. That is a loss of $16 million per day. The CEO says he's run and founded two successful companies, yet Clutch Technology, where he was the technology founder, silently folded after raising $12 million. And then Moment existed for two years with no data left, or today, on the acquisition, folding, or any other current information on the company. So what I'm trying to determine is where those two successful companies were. Is it any surprise to you that now he's backpedaling and saying we got this wrong? So how many times does he get to say we got this wrong until you see the damage this technology does far outweighs the benefits? A contract review or revision will not change the fact that this is harmful technology and we should vote no across the board. No to revising the contract, no to the technology, no to flock. Thank you.

All right, Zach. Zach Moore with Julian Kinberg on deck.

Hello, Zach Moore, City of Renton. Did you guys hear all that honking out there earlier? That was your constituents voicing their opinion, their opposition to mass surveillance, be it by flock or any other group. Crime was already trending down before you installed these cameras. And as we've demonstrated again and again, it had nothing to do with this boondoggle you've saddled the taxpayers of Renton with. We saw with last week's clown show of a vote that the mayor doesn't want to be on record supporting flock. Understand that the cameras will be coming down one way or another. Please know that any vote to delay that is a vote to be replaced by someone who actually listens to their constituents. The cameras will come down. Regarding the cruel and capricious camping ban, I have to point out that this is another ham-fisted attempt at solving a problem where our tax dollars would be better spent on prevention. Instead, the mayor proposes to turn Renton into a no-go zone for people who have little to no resources available to them. Does the city intend to do anything that actually works, or is the only intention to waste our money and resources on authoritarian policies that only make people's lives worse? When will the council discuss providing permanent low barrier housing, safe injection sites, drug and alcohol treatment, mental health treatment? When will we stop wasting our time and money on enabling fascism in favor of real solutions? Thank you.

All right, next up is Julian Kinberg with Howard Carter on deck.

Good evening, Council. I'm Julian Kinberg, resident of Renton, representing South End Indivisible and the American Party of Labor. Many of us working people of Renton are confused as to why you don't seem interested in serving those who elected you. Why is it that you continue to entertain the ideas of spying on us with mass surveillance and criminalizing the existence of our unhoused brothers and sisters? I've discovered some things that everyone here might be interested to know. Mr. Pavone, your job as mayor of Renton, combined with your business and rental properties, grant you between $490,000 and $1.16 million. Excuse me, sir.

This is your time to talk to the whole group, yet no signaling out any individual person, myself included. Okay. No, we're not going to have outreaches here. All right. Well, then, in that case... So kindly talk to the entire group. All right.

In that case, I can get around this. Y'all are really, really super rich. Y'all are really, really, really rich, as some of my comrades have figured out. Is it reasonable to expect someone in this kind of wealth and status to represent the interests of the poor and working class citizens of Renton? This explains, in part, your total lack of compassion for those of us who you would gladly incarcerate just for trying to survive on the streets. Another one of you is not as rich, but they own stock in Tesla owned by the fascist trillionaire Elon Musk, Facebook owned by Trump-friendly billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, but most tellingly Palantir, the mass surveillance technology company that gathers data on us without our consent and hands it over to Amazon, which that person also actually owns stock in. Both of these companies openly share our data with ICE, better enabling them to terrorize us. This arrangement constitutes a flagrant and extreme conflict of interest. You are financially incentivized to sell your constituents out to the profit-driven corporate terror machine. Now, we understand better why Renton Police Department has established a contract CAG-21-227 with Axon Enterprise, who shares data with Amazon and Palantir. In your election campaigns, did any of you disclose that you were planning to allow RPD to spend $17.5 million of our money on invading our privacy? It seems like pretty important detail. Through Amendment 5, proposed in December of last year, the contract would appropriate an additional $1 million a year for Axon to supply RPD with fleet cameras, APLRs, AI tools, virtual reality training, drones, tasers, and data management software. I've mentioned before how Axon Enterprise supplies the IDF with means by which to terrorize and murder our brothers and sisters in Palestine. How far are you willing to look the other way while they begin to do the same to us? How much money is the suffering of every family torn apart by ICE worth? How about the lives of hundreds of thousands of dead civilians? Thank you very much. Are all of your millions worth it to you? Thank you. We will continue exposing the nature of your system. Thank you.

You've made us all very angry. Weep the consequences of your treachery. Our charter is up next.

Howard Carter is up next with Gabriel Diaz on deck. No Howard? All right, Gabriel Diaz. And we've got, that's fat him up twice, Mike Westegard on deck after that.

Hey folks, my name is Gabriel Diaz, and I'm here today to speak about the Ordinance to Criminalize Homelessness and Flock. Firstly, I want to kind of point out, you know, to a certain member of the Diaz, you know, they love to, you know, they're very quick to say, you know, hey, don't call individual people when their wealth is mentioned, but not much of a response when people on the Diaz calls out individual members out here. Good thing to notice. Anyway, I'm going to start with turn the cameras off. Look at how many people want this. Look at how many people demanded this. It's time to turn them off. If we're having to present to commissions literally promotional material from the company, that may be a good sign that we don't have a lot of research to back this up. However, I want to focus today on the criminalizing homelessness legislation. This is something I've been incredibly focused on. Now, I've gotten to read through a few parts of this ordinance, and it's been really concerning to me. The first big thing is there's no requirement for offering services before we charge people for being poor. We can say it's highly encouraged all we want, but if we are going to punish people and send them to jail for being poor... Without a single warning, that's still an option. There's massive issues at play. We're also seeing people's items being taken. I have done a lot of volunteering with groups like Stop the Sweeps, where I've seen how much of a reset that can be. People who are just starting to get on their feet and be able to exist, how much a reset can be to have their stuff taken and stolen. I've also seen how poorly ordinance like these go. I'll tell you exactly how a sweep goes. The team shows up, they take their stuff, take the stuff they need, and you tell them, hey, you can't be in this area. So they move two blocks over. What has changed? Nothing. They're just two blocks over now. This is not going to solve anything. It's just going to make it so we can pretend we've done something. We are also seeing the council repeat the failed policies of soap and soda by adding exclusionary zones. Zones that would make it harder for people to exist. These zones say, if you've been caught being poor twice in this area, we can ban you from parts of the city. They've got the city in six parts. We can ban you from two parts of those cities. Do you know how many people are going to affect that if you can't prove you're going to a doctor's office? You don't have any proof you're going to a doctor's office or you're going to get treatment, get the help you need. You can go right back to jail. Now, we're going to have people who say, housing first doesn't work. It's really a drug problem. I know many folks who have read the op-ed done by King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn. However, so many issues with that op-ed. Firstly, that has shown that people who do housing first are more likely to stay clean and stay off of drugs. Whereas, they're more likely to stay off of drugs if you have a place to go. I can't say I'm surprised by this, honestly. If you are housed, you are less likely to be around people who are using drugs, where if you're homeless and you're living in massive encampments or out in the streets, you're more likely to have access to drugs. We can say we want to push them inside, but if we don't have the inside to give them, where are we pushing them? We can say we want to make the choice for them, but a study done by the International Journal of Drug Policy showed coerced treatment and involuntary treatment is less effective and leads to higher overdose rates. We don't want policies to appease me. We don't want policies that are not going to make the issue better. Thank you. I'm wrapping up. We don't want policies that are just going to make us feel better, to look like you're doing something. We want policies that are actually going to solve issues, not just a little pat on the back at the end of the day. Thank you. I urge you to vote no as camping ban. Thank you.

That was Michael Westegard and Marissa Chong on deck.

Michael Westgard, resident, city of Renton. I was going to talk about something different, but since it's come up, I'll just be talking about this shit because I don't want it to define me. But when I graduated from high school, I was unhoused. And that's what led to my brief stint as a criminal in the eyes of King County. And led to a lot of substance abuse issues that I struggled with throughout my life. Um, so I didn't have to deal with some kind of camping ban at the time because that wasn't such a thing. But I can tell you as somebody that's, uh, like struggled and had to walk the streets at night or sneak into places just to find somewhere to sleep that, uh, terrorizing people does not work. And then people that struggle with substance abuse, the number one marker when they're interacting with counselors and getting the wonderful diagnosis, the number one marker is a resistance to objective pressures and continued behavior. So like despite being punished, you continue to use the drug or the alcohol or the substance. That's the marker. That's what qualifies you to get labeled addicted. or substance abuse. That's it right there. So if you are going to do policy that leads with punishment, but the people that are struggling with substance abuse, their number one marker against coming out of their issue is that they are going to continue to do the behavior despite the punishment, it's not going to work. So do what you want. This is more where I wanted to have the conversation today, but yeah, do what you want. But right now, we have a wonderful group of people that are coming here regularly, and we are fighting for a politics of the people. and we were fighting for representation. And I have done a lot of work over the last 10 years in politics. I'm the e-board member for SEIU. I'm a delegate for MLK Labor. Both of those organizations do endorsements. I'm a member of the 11th Legislative District Democrats. They do endorsements. It's a wonderful thing. I have a lot of connections with AIM, a lot of the other unions in the area. So that is going to be my focus with me and my neighbors. that however you vote, however this comes out, and whatever policy gets set forth, we are going to respond, and we're going to have boots on the ground, we're going to knock doors, and we are going to get the word out about how much work we were doing, and what we are fighting for. And that is housing first, banning flock, dismantling that system, and pay workers living wages. Because if you want to talk about all this other policy issues and all this other stuff, if people just had the money they needed to survive, we wouldn't nearly need the safety net system that everybody's trying to fight against or create. So I hope you guys have a wonderful evening.

Mayor? Mr. Mayor? Kind of information, Mr. Mayor? Can we check on our colleague who's been out for over 10 minutes or have the record show that he's been missing for over 10 minutes?

It's a priority to be out if you want. I wasn't sure.

Good certification. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Marissa Chong is up and Jeannie DeMond is on deck.

Hi, good evening, Mayor and Council Members. My name is Marissa Chong. I'm a resident of Renton. I'm here to reiterate again to not renew your FLOC contract, period. No changing of the contract will make things better for the Renton community except to get rid of the FLOC contract and get rid of these cameras. Also, when exactly will that town hall date happen? I've heard two different timelines. I'm mostly now wanting to speak about the ordinance to criminalize homelessness. and how that is not a good idea either. The homeless are already at a disadvantage and it is incredibly hard to survive in this economy, even for those of us who are housed. I cannot imagine what it is like for a homeless person to figure out how they will survive day to day and on top of that to get incarcerated for just trying to find a place to rest. How are you supposed to find someone who doesn't have money to begin with? What would be the point of putting that person in jail? Who would then have a criminal record for only sleeping in public? Regarding the offering of services, it seems like there is no requirement for the officer to offer available resources. It says, quote, authorized officials are encouraged to refer persons to available services before or in addition to enforcement. where the suspected violation is camping and services are reasonably available, the official should offer services and document the offer before issuing a citation. Not only is there no requirement, but I'm not sure what it means when services are reasonably available. What does that mean? To me, this all sounds like an ordinance just to make the rich and privileged feel more comfortable and not have to see what is happening to others. The ACLU Washington has said laws like this only exacerbate their struggles and perpetuate a cycle of instability. And that criminal legal system spends valuable resources on enforcing these laws when redirecting these resources towards housing solutions would be more effective. Look how many of us keep coming week after week with even new people coming. This many people can't and this much passion can't be wrong. We are here because we care about our Renton neighbors and community, both the flock cameras and the ordinance to criminalize homelessness, and are issues that we are strongly against because of our compassion for our Renton neighbors and community. No to the flock contract and no to the ordinance to criminalize homelessness. Thank you.

Next up is Jeannie Devine with Ashley Fadan, I think.

Jeannie Devine Fadan Thank you, council members. I'd like to first express my great gratitude and deep respect for the survivors who showed up here today and shared their stories with us. They are people to listen to. I'm here again today about flock cameras because I still have questions. In fact, as I look at the data, I have more questions, not fewer. You've been presented with a lot of information tonight. I'm going to speak about just one of the examples that was presented. Block says you have to have a legitimate case number to access the system. We've seen cases in data logs where this is clearly not the case. A series of nines, the word none, or some other placeholder has been entered under case number. Clearly not an actual case number. Maybe there's a reason or an explanation, but it doesn't make the misleading statement By flock, true. When someone misleads me, I begin to question every statement and every assertion that they make. I'm asking you all as responsible elected officials to dig into the actual records and question every reassuring statement made by a big company that has a big financial stake in your decision. And I'm asking you to keep the cameras off until we get answers to those questions through a town hall or some other mechanism. And hopefully, we will have the facts that support keeping the cameras off for good. I'm asking you not to give up on controlling technology. It's not your fault that you as local officials find yourselves at the sharp end of the stick in defending our civil liberties. But there you are. You are the first line of defense, and we are depending on you. Finally, as the city council that represents all of Renton, I would find it, although legal perhaps, a travesty of democracy to force a vote on this issue without every council member in attendance. Everyone needs to be on the record for an issue this important and this contentious where this many residents have shown up at so many meetings to express their opinions and their questions about it. Thank you. Thank you.

All right, next up is Ashley Fedan, and on deck is John. I cannot read your last name, but you're from Bellevue, so you're on deck, John.

Hi, Ashley Fedan, nurse, advanced practice nurse, who actually works in our community and is at Boots on the Ground. As I'm sure many of you have seen me here before, this time in uniform, other times I'm wearing regular civilian clothes. If you heard loud voices over a speaker earlier, that was me. Because it doesn't seem to be loud enough to be saying it here on camera in front of all of you that flat cameras don't help public safety, it does not protect my patients, it doesn't prevent stalking, it doesn't prevent human trafficking. I appreciate people's opinions, but after last week, I actually did this thing called research. I reached out to SAFE, I reached out to the network team, people who are actually known across the country in preventing human trafficking. And flock, although helpful after crimes are done, is not helpful. If flock cameras were super helpful in our city, we would have flock cameras out in front of every illicit massage parlor. which is a lot of where our human trafficking occurs in our city. You want to know where they aren't? They're not there. Neither are the police cars to save these human beings and these safe souls from being abused and trafficked for money to line the pockets of others. You guys are more than happy, though, to hear me through a bullhorn and collect your data and sell it on behalf of everyone here. That's the value. Yeah, you sell, you are responsible for the camera that holds on to the data that is sold to other conglomerates. Amazon, right? You don't own that data. I want to pivot over to the homeless situation. And I noticed here that before this began, you all said the Pledge of Allegiance. When we say the Pledge of Allegiance, we put our hand over and we honor our God, wherever our God perceives them as to be, no matter the religion. Everyone here stood up, and I witnessed that. And I thought it would be very, very important to remind you of the words of Isaiah regarding those who you are choosing to other, dismiss, or consider yourself higher than. Is this not the kind of fasting I have chosen, to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with the shelter, when you see the naked, to clothe them and to not turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then the light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear. then your righteousness will go before you and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. As leaders and policy makers, you hold up the culture of our city. It is you. I want to point out that everyone here repeatedly, with every vote that you make, we witness the hypocrisy that you hold when you say you believe in indivisible government under God. You are hypocrites in this process. Think beyond your political career and think about the culture that you are promoting in our city. Please do better. Please do better. Thank you.

Courtney is on deck.

I'm John Pincus of Bellevue, and I run the Nexus of Privacy newsletter. Thank you for the opportunity to provide comment tonight. My comments tonight are also about ALPRs and why it's so critical to keep the flock and acts on cameras off. Please listen to your constituents on this, and they've done such an amazingly good job of highlighting the issues on the ALPRs and on the criminalizing homelessness. I really want to emphasize a point that's come up repeatedly. Surveillance isn't safety. These cameras don't prevent crime. They don't keep people safe. As you've heard, Flock is scrambling to save their business with a bunch of PR, including claims that they're putting in new safeguards. But none of these safeguards address the threat of federal law enforcement agencies like ICE, CBP, and DHS getting this data and using it against immigrants, protesters, trans and queer people, and anybody else the information decides to target. If they get a warrant from a Trump-appointed federal judge, there's absolutely nothing Renton PD can do to protect the data at that point. And they're already using administrative subpoenas to target protesters in Minnesota and combining them with gag orders. They're doing that here too, as far as we know. And they may well have done this with Flock already. Encryption won't help. Flock could put in a backdoor and the gag order would keep them from having to reveal it from RPD or anybody else. The only safe option is not to collect the data. As another speaker mentioned, it's really worth understanding why so many other phases are turning off ALPRs. Just two quick examples. In Los Angeles, LAPD cited serious concerns around civil liberties and civil rights issues, particularly around privacy and the data that's being collected from these families. I mean, from these cameras. If this is a problem for LAPD, who I don't really think of as always that strong on civil rights and civil liberties, think about how bad this must be. And in North Texas, here's what Hood County Constable John Shirley said. These cameras were constantly scanning and recording regular folks just going about their day. That kind of permanent, warrantless tracking doesn't belong in a free society. So please keep the cameras off in Redmond. Surveillance isn't safety. There's just no way to keep the data from AI-enabled surveillance systems like Flock or Axon or other ALPRs from getting to the federal government. Turning the cameras back on would put your constituents and everybody who visits Renton at risk. All right.

Courtney is up and Lexi Diaz is on deck.

Before you start my time, I just want to say thank you for turning on the closed captions. It's helped make your meeting just a little bit more accessible, which should be the default. Good evening, Mayor and members of the board. My name is Courtney and I'm speaking as an individual citizen and a longtime resident of Brenton. I brought some more literature with me. Last week, I asked you to dream about, I asked you, what do you dream about for our city? What is your definition of safety and who are you trying to keep safe? I hope you are still thinking about these questions as you make decisions that impact the citizens and member people within our community. In his book on tyranny, Timothy Snyder describes 20 lessons from the 20th century to counter fascism. He wrote this in 2017 as a warning, and now, rather than just a warning, it is a dire emergency. Number 10 tells us to believe the truth because discarding the truth dismisses academic freedom. And without freedom, there is no power. You've been provided a plethora of data and evidence as to why FLOC contract needs to be canceled and the cameras kept off. That truth needs to be heard and followed. This leads me to his 14th lesson. which is to have a private life. The flock cameras and the technology used do not even allow members of the community to have the option to have a private life. Testimony has been given asking how long the data is kept in the city of Frenton, how is it used, and major concerns about the 1% of data that is kept by flock to train its AI. 1% doesn't seem like a lot, but when 1% of 100 is 1, and 1% of 1 million is 10,000, that's a lot of data. The more cameras, the more surveillance, and the less privacy. You've heard testimony from my fellow community members to demand that they keep the flock cameras off and to not renew the contract. I'm here to tell you about the why and offer some literature for you to read because education and literacy is the antidote to fascism. The new Jim Crow is about why the system is working designed the way it's due. This is about mass incarceration, and that's what criminalizing homelessness would do. And we know that black and brown folks, as well as folks in the LGBTQI community, are overrepresented in the criminal justice system. STAMPED, WHICH TELLS US WHY THE SYSTEM IS WORKING THE WAY IT'S DESIGNED TO. YOU HAVE A LOT OF PRIVILEGE. YOU CAN CHANGE THE SYSTEM TO MAKE SURE IT'S DESIGNED TO KEEP EVERYONE SAFE, NOT JUST THOSE YOU DEEM DESERVANT OF SAFETY. Braiding Sweetgrass and What Unites Us, this actually tells you about what you can do, not just to not do something, but it tells you what to do to build the community that we want that actually includes every single person. Policies that continue that other people and continue to spread the narrative that some people are better than others are not beneficial. In a city that proclaims to welcome all people, our policies need to match our actions. I'm telling you, do not consider the ordinance of criminalizing homelessness. Keep the flop cameras off. Thank you very much.

All right, next up is Lexi Diaz with Matthew Lang on deck.

Hi, I'm Lexi Diaz. I am a longtime rented resident. So I think we can all agree that being efficient with taxpayer money is a good thing. One way we can achieve this is a preventative approach for crime. The ordinance to criminalize homelessness is going to be expensive for our city. It's been a studied and proven fact that an individual is more likely to recommit once they have been in jail. Additionally, it will suddenly become very hard to get a home if someone can't get a job because they have a criminal record. I also ask that you look up the rates of poverty in crime. It's also very well studied. We can talk all day about the additional barrier of how awful SCORE is for our community, how it has consistently killed people under their supervision. But what's more relevant for today is that it is expensive to continuously arrest people and have them filling up our jails. We can save this money by using our resources to provide more services that there just currently isn't enough of in Renton. This also applies to Flock. It's an expensive contract, too expensive for the risk it causes, and it's a flawed system. People have been getting wrongfully detained because Flock cameras are incorrectly logging their license plates. Reactionary policing is not effective. Please look at the evidence. Don't pass Ordinance 6199 to criminalize homelessness.

Okay, Matthew Lang is up with Tina Harris on deck.

Hi there, council. My name is Matthew Lang, and I'm here to speak out to end the FLOC contract. At first, let's stand in solidarity with those folks who are speaking about that. But I have a lot to say about the ordinance to criminalize homelessness. I am a Renton and Cougar Mountain area resident for most of my life, a small business owner here in Renton, and I'm also formerly homeless. When I was in school, it was right after the 08 crisis. My family, we were living out in May Valley Road. We lost the house to foreclosure. Father lost the business. Everything fell apart. I lost my student housing. And I was out in Pittsburgh for a couple years trying to figure it out. I had a car. That was lucky. I didn't have to camp. But my ability to get around the town was primarily marked by whether the Pittsburgh Parking Authority was giving me tickets and towing my car. And I'll tell you what, in the five times that my car got booted, towed, taken away, I, while I was homeless and was pleading my case to the folks there, I lost so much every time. I was locked into my student community and every time that I was taken out of the situation where I could be with them in my community with the people who cared about me, I was done harm. I was sleeping in a parking garage somewhere downtown. I was figuring out if I can stay in the supply closet at the local grocery store, staying in the second floor of the restaurant I was working at, barbacking. That's real. Now, what's proposed here in the Ordinance to Criminalize Homelessness is a wide soda and soap zone. What it seeks to do is put zones where people can't be. If I was made homeless right now for whatever reason in the Renton Highlands, I would be cut off from my family, I would be cut off from my resources, and it's not if I didn't have a car, which I don't currently, I wouldn't be able to re-access those. If I had to go to Benson Hill, if I had to go downtown because I couldn't be in my own frickin' neighborhood, that ain't right. So please do not pass this.

All right. Tina Harris with Brian Hughes on deck.

Good evening, Mayor Pavone, Council, and the Renton community. I do apologize for getting over this call from last week. My name is Tina Harris, and I am the victim advocate with the City of Renton, specifically the Renton Police Department. I would like to also state that I appreciate those who've come before me, the courage and the strength of the survivors to speak to you tonight. of the advocate to speak. That's a lot of courage, and they do have a lot of wealth and knowledge with those that they've also served. I am speaking on behalf of the victims that are not here to speak. I'm speaking on behalf of the victims' families in the past year and a half that I have personally served that are victims of homicide. I'm also speaking on behalf of the flat cameras who have assisted law enforcement to find the criminals who have committed these heinous crimes. I too, over the past many, many years in advocacy, seen things evolve and change. I've seen how technology and be used in an effective way. I also have a lot of compassion for the concerns that many here have. I do believe there needs to be a check and balance. I do have faith in all of you that are sitting before me. I do have faith in the judicial system. I do have faith in our law enforcement system. I do believe that there is a way that we all can get together, have a town hall meeting, have these questions asked and answered. everybody is sitting here tonight i think we all can agree and or disagree that technology is concerning however i am speaking on behalf of those who can't speak my myself can't really speak either but i'm trying so bear with me i was here here last week voicing my opinion on the topic of vlog cameras being utilized by the city i'd like to stress the importance as a tool for law enforcement to bring a positive resolution to the victims' families that we served of those homicidal families in the past year and a half. I cannot sit here and tell you each and every case, because those cases are currently pending. That would be unprofessional of me to do so. So when people ask me, give me facts, I can say that in the past year and a half, I can give you cases. You can also look those up if you need. It's also not a matter of if but when someone you know will be a victim of a homicide or a crime and need the service of law enforcement, whether it be in our city or elsewhere. I'm personally aware that the fog cameras have been used to assist in the past cases whereby criminals have been found. These are the most egregious cases. These are the most egregious cases law enforcement sees. And then to have this tool for law enforcement and the detectives to go out and find these criminals is important. I do understand and respect the concerns about the safety. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you to those who have spoken.

Next up is Brian and Angie Lanolin is on deck.

Brian Hughes, a Renton Highlands resident. A camping ban does not help someone who has nowhere to go. It instead tells them they cannot exist here in Renton. Focus our resources and efforts on housing affordability, housing stability, and support on those who need a house and care. Renton should be leading the region with compassion for those who need it most, not sending those who need help away, not with a criminal record. Renton is better than this. Next, I've been looking at the 2,000 queries in Renton's flock logs from three months earlier this year, and I have concerns. I will say up front, I am not a professional auditor, nor have I seen Renton PD's audit reports or corrective actions they may have taken. I also must be clear I am not accusing any individual of malicious behavior or misuse. However, I do have concerns I feel are worth raising and worth taking time to investigate before you rush action. First, an individual with the name of employee hyphen flock ran a total of four queries into our database in February and March. Second, there are 458 lookups and 91 searches, which are missing a case number, even though that was supposedly required. This is 26% of the queries in this dataset. This does not include when an officer typed none, out of state, unknown, or similar, which are all accepted case numbers. Also, there were 13 times when officers put in case 99999, excluding training queries. There's one last query I want to mention. When you read through the logs, it's just one innocuous line. An officer ran a search for a nine-day timeframe, but provided no full nor partial license plate, nor any vehicle filters. They therefore, I believe, got every vehicle across all 166 networks and 1,649 cameras in the state. using Renton PD stats on camera images, this means that this search had 200 million results. Just imagine the amount of data that was unnecessarily and unreasonably available to one individual in that moment. These are innocent people. I can reasonably assume the officer could not possibly have looked through all this data unless they copied it, because assuming they looked at one image per second without stopping, it would take six years. flock searches can be unbelievably broad beyond what any single case needs an audit also needs to have certainty of what was accessed beyond a shadow of a doubt or it fails to be an effective audit and flocks audits leave too much uncertainty please do not pursue the can't be banned and end our relationship with flock thank you

next up is angie um and gabrielle is on deck good evening i'm angie laulainen my comments tonight are simply to state some facts for the record May 4th, 2026, city council considers writing an ordinance to approve giving our streets to Renton School District. When the vote was split, one would expect that some consideration would be given to the huge opposition presented by all the speakers from the community that night. But no, without hesitation, the mayor declared that he would break the tie and approve with his own vote. The Transportation Committee reviewed the ordinance. I attended their second meeting online, which was entitled Final Approval for Street Vacation, which seemed to acknowledge that the decision had really already been made. This meeting was closed to public comment, except for the school district. Their comments were included, but no public comment. Then last week council voted to pass the ordinance to vacation the streets Tobin and Tillicum with only one council member suggested caution and voting no. Thank you for that. In that final discussion before the vote, there were statements that basically threw a written history under the bus disregarding the sense of community and family honored by these street names. It was stated regarding the community opposition to vacating the streets that those arguments are somewhat harmful when they were applied so late in the game, right? Because this wasn't brought up when the land was taken, when the land was sold time and time again, when the houses were sold and resold. shocking when we have been coming to council for two years commenting about this topic then when council was asked for any further comment there were none i asked how can you sit by and not correct those statements acting like the community has only just now brought up their concerns and opposition to closing these streets even if you were still going to vote to approve don't you have an obligation to say wait a minute that's not true the community has been asking to save these streets for the last two years Here's some examples, go back in time two years. September 9th, 2024, myself and other neighbors came to council for the first time and implored your help. Catherine Fleury Smith commented specifically that she had been told for 20 years that her street Tobin was a necessary backup arterial to Airport Way. For the next two years, many citizens spoke at city council meetings. When seeking help from council about saving homes and the streets, we were told, that's not our purview, and council looked the other way. when inquiring about the street vacation process with council members and city staff we were told we had to wait until the official street vacation request was submitted by the school district before council could be involved February 24th 2025. My comments included this. The city of Renton needs to preserve its place names and these streets that were designated to recognize our rich history. The city will have to approve the vacation of these streets. You have the power to oppose this and say that these streets are important. These streets should remain in their entirety in this location. Like Tobin and Smithers allowed the Native Americans to remain in their homes, the city of Renton should hold up the same values for its citizens. We need the city of Renton to help protect our neighborhood And I don't mean at the time that they apply for the vacation, I mean now. That was February 2025. July 7th, 2025, Margaret Perez Bauer spoke to you of events that made the Renton Reporter front page and the Seattle Times. On June 25th, she said, there was a protest at the school board meeting and folks came together to present a position of 548 signatures and a collective letter that was signed by three community organizations, South Renton, North Renton, for a better rent in and 29 businesses in the local downtown area. And so the reason why I think you should care about this is because while I understand that your jurisdiction is not the Renton High School, you do have the power to decide whether or not to give Tobin to the school board. Then at that meeting, the mayor said, we take all audience comments seriously and we heard everything that was said tonight. But last week you acted like you never heard these comments and not one council member spoke up. but went right to the vote. No one corrected the untrue statements, so council basically acknowledged them. We are told to wait, then we're told we waited too long. We're told our arguments are actually harmful, but also in reality, it seems most of our comments are not even considered or included in discussion. At least this is how it appears. Then it was just bizarre to feel like the community was getting lectured for not speaking up in time when we started speaking up two years ago, and also that by speaking up at all, we were being harmful to the process. The way this was conducted was confusing, discouraging, biased, and just ridiculous.

next up is gabrielle with ed sun on deck um good evening everyone uh gabrielle weidling rent and resident um i think we all know each other well enough at this point that you know how i feel about what happened at the end of last week's meeting so i'm just gonna say we gotta get us together folks like we're gonna end up on john oliver and not for a good reason um lot of that was spurred by flock i do want to touch on it briefly and say that i found it really troubling that when one council member made a motion to not renew the contract that had been talked about in the cow as it was written that that was dismissed as being irrelevant although it should have been an easy yes if you didn't like the contract as you all seem to state in the cow And also that you had to wait for the town hall and that also a council member was absent and it would be respectful to wait for that person to return. But then immediately moved into a vote about turning the cameras back on and those thoughts were suddenly lost as three of you voted yes to turn them back on. What happened to that contract feeling? What happened to waiting for a council member? Then we had the whole tie debacle. Wow. So I just wanted to then move on to ask, where are we at on covering those cameras? I'm a rock climber. You give me a note that says I can do it. I'll foot the bill for the bags. I'll get up there. I'll do it myself. I also want to speak with a little less levity about the ordinance to criminalize homelessness that is being brought forth. I watched a community services committee meeting a couple weeks ago. I was lucky to have caught that meeting. The topic was not on the agenda, which was brought up by one of the council members there. I found that troubling. The police did not provide a draft of that ordinance for that group to review, also troubling. Those committee meetings are not recorded. Bummer for all of us that maybe want to participate but can't live In that vein I also want to touch very briefly on the Equity Commission meeting which I also attended this past week That's right. I'm busy. I'm here. I'm everywhere the Equity Commission Had a presentation by the police department in which they shared directly from flocks own website propaganda That is not what we mean by do your homework and learn the things The Equity Commission seemed more concerned about being flip-floppers and rescinding their letter to you, which was a big topic of discussion just for your edification. They are very split on whether or not they should have sent that letter to you in the first place, affirming the use of flop in our city. They did not get a chance to touch on that camping ban. In that cow that I mentioned previously, everything about the camping ban, the ordinance to criminalize homelessness, rests on the head of Kent Hay and the way he designs that program, which is not how you can do things. If that one person goes away, you're sunk. And secondly, it was very subjective in the way that it was described. I will wrap up. I understand the amount of time. And I will say that as for that well-deserved break, that's for people who do their jobs. And right now, I'm doing more of your job than you are. Thank you.

Alright, next up is Ed. Ed, you're up.

Even folks, my name's Ed's son. I live in Bellevue. And I'd like to start off by saying I think your camping ban sucks. You should not pass that. nor she knew the contracts. But being that you are the elected officials and I am not even one of your constituents, I'm sure you'll do what you'll do. So in that sense, I'd like to ask some questions for you to consider based on some stuff I heard earlier today at Seattle City Hall press conference after a handful of people were given a tour of the real-time crime center. Axon and Flock are not the same company, but both these are cloud-based systems. On top of that, with Axon at least, it does not require a VPN to log into. It's a web-based interface open to the entire internet. I'm sure you guys have technical experts that can tell you what a security risk that is. that any hacker that could access it and has enough time to mess with it could access or otherwise access a cloud, be it an out-of-state law enforcement agency with a contract, perhaps from a state like Idaho or Texas with abortion bans. They could look at all that information. It's being sold online. Apparently, being that these are AI-enhanced systems, well, I'm sure y'all have heard of AI hallucinations. Does that with that, too. Seattle City uses kind of a digital pixelization filter for masking sensitive locations. Now, I don't know if this problem exists with the flock cameras, but apparently the Axon ones, when they are power-cycled or left off long enough, Technician has to go out in the field and reapply that filter. Lastly, on the camping ban, I'd also like you to consider how many people who work in rent and are unhoused, working unhoused, living in their cars, perhaps camping outside while holding a job. Your ban would criminalize that. Thank you for your time.

All right, thank you. Well, as always, we appreciate your willingness to come and provide input and comments to the council. And we're going to move on now. Next item is the consent agenda. There are 12 items for council's consideration. Mr. Mayor? Yes, Council Member.

I'd like to pull item C for separate consideration.

Okay, item C is being pulled.

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Council Mayor.

Hearing no other exceptions, I move to approve the consent agenda as published. Minus item C. Minus item C. Minus item C. Second.

Okay.

Mr. Mayor?

Yes.

I do have an inquiry. Yes. On why we're pulling item C, if I'm allowed to ask. It will be.

She'll address it after we vote on this. all right uh it's been moved by council member allerson and um seconded by council member prince that we approve the consent agenda um as published minus item c all in favor signify by saying aye aye aye all right council member o'halloran

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This item C is related to our previously approved motion that the administration review the request for a memorial bench in honor of the Houston family. Staff has assembled the necessary work and in consultation with Mr. Houston, they are preparing to move forward. There's no budget action associated with this request as existing supply budget will absorb the cost. concurrent with this evening uh concurrence this evening will allow staff to move forward without delay while we are on holiday to procure the materials and begin the project their goal is to install their goal to install the bench before weather becomes a potential delaying factor in addition i I recommend providing flexibility for staff as they finalize the language on the plaque, which may alter the pricing, and to amend the agenda bill to a not-to-exceed amount of $3,000. And my understanding is that staff has worked very closely with Mr. Houston. And with that, Mr. Mayor, I move to approve the request as amended as counsel concur. Second.

It's been moved and seconded to move the amended item to council concur. Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay. All right. Motion carries. Thank you. We're on to unfinished business. Let's see here. Everybody's gone. Council Member Vann.

Thank you, Mayor. The Utilities Committee has three committee reports to present.

Hey, Utilities Committee Committee Report. The first one is regarding an agreement with KPFF Consulting Engineers for the Panther Creek culvert replacement at Talbert Road. The Utilities Committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to authorize the mayor and city clerk to execute a professional services agreement with KPFF Consulting Engineers Incorporated in the amount of $1,396,944.70 for engineering services for the Panther Creek culvert replacement at Talbert Road project. This was approved by the committee chair and members.

Mayor.

Council member.

I move that the council concur with the utilities committee committee report.

Second. It's been moved by Councillor Vann, seconded by Councillor Albertson, that the council concur with the utility committee report. Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay. Motion carries.

All right, the next report is regarding an agreement with Ferguson Enterprises for replacement of census-based stations for our automated metering infrastructure. So the Utilities Committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to approve or to approve in the staff recommendation to authorize the mayor and city clerk to execute the agreement with Ferguson Enterprises, Inc. in the amount of $206,198.55 for the purchase and installation of three new census TGB stations and one census VGB station to support the continued operation of the city's advanced metering infrastructure system. This, too, is approved by the committee chair and members.

Mayor? I move that the Council concur with the Utilities Committee Committee Report.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Vance, seconded by Council Member Albertson, that the Council concur with the Utilities Committee Report. Any discussion? All in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries.

Next one is utilities committee. This one is for an agreement with Geoengineers Incorporated for Cedar River maintenance dredge project. The utilities committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to approve the amendment number two to contract 1857 with Geoengineers Incorporated in the amount of $272,600 for year 10 post-construction mitigation monitoring and reporting services associated with the Cedar River gravel removal project. This, too, was approved by the committee chair and members.

Mayor.

Councilmember.

I move that the council concur with the utilities committee report.

Second. It's been moved by Councilmember VanSack, by Councilmember Albertson, that the council concur with the utility committee report. Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries. All right, thank you. We're moving on to Council Member Alderson.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, the Public Safety Committee has three reports to present.

The first agreement was with the memorandum or with the King County Sheriff's Office for the use of the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network. The Public Safety Committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to approve the memorandum of agreement between King County Sheriff's Office and the City of Renton for the use of the NIBIN with the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network. The MOU authorizes Renton Police to utilize King County Sheriff's NIBIN technology for the use of criminal investigations. NIBIN NIBIN technology is used to identify and remove illegal firearms from public circulation and detect firearms used in criminal activity. NIBIN helps investigators link firearm-related crimes by digitally comparing unique markings left on the cartridge casings by a firearm. When potential matches are identified, investigators can connect shootings that may involve the same gun. GENERATE INVESTIGATIVE LEADS, IDENTIFY PATTERNS OF CRIMINAL ACTIVITY AND SUPPORT THE DEVELOPMENT OF SUSPECTS AND CASES ACROSS JURISDICTIONS. THE MOU WILL GRANT WRITTEN INVESTIGATORS TIMELY EXPEDIENT BALLISTIC RESULTS FROM NIBIN. ACCESS TO THE KING COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE NIBIN WILL ALLEVIATE THE LONG WAITING PERIODS TO PROCESS BALLISTICS AT THE WASHINGTON STATE PATROL CRIME LAB. IN TURN, THIS AGREEMENT WILL ENHANCE SWISTER SERVICE TO VICTIMS OF GUN VIOLENCE and better serve our community members. There is no cost for this MOU. This is signed by the committee chair and members.

Mr. Mayor.

Yes, Council Member.

I move that council concur with the recommendation of the public safety committee report.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Albertson, seconded by Council Member Halloran that council concur with the public safety committee report. Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay.

Motion carries. All right, the next report is regarding federal enforcement activity on city property. The Public Safety Committee has reviewed the issue in policy development of federal immigration enforcement activity on city property. The committee concurs in the staff recommendation that no further action by the city is necessary at this time. The Public Safety Committee recommends that the referral regarding this matter be closed. This is signed by the committee chair and members.

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Councilor.

Move the council concur with the recommendation of the Public Safety Committee committee report.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Albertson, seconded by Council Member Halloran, that the Council concur with the Public Safety Committee report. Any discussion?

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Council Member Rivera.

Yes, I do want to have a discussion on this matter. I appreciate it. I understand that based off federal legality, law enforcement cannot tell federal agents what to do. So in the end, what can we do to really keep ICE out of city-owned property? and it's unfortunate that we couldn't even do the bare minimum of what king county did to at least post signage that we aren't going to allow immigration and customs enforcement to engage in civil immigration business on city property that's a bare minimum we could do and king county has done that i'm really disappointed that we're coming back to say we can't do anything and i get that even that might be a little bit performative because i would assume closing the matter out means that we're closing the matter out and were not doing anything on the matter, based off what I have read, based off the information that was provided to me. And the concerns I have is maybe it's not legislation, right? But it's very rare I get to evoke my dissertation and what I did for my master's thesis, which was what is called doing the right thing. It was a study of police decision making. And I know as a daughter of a cop, law enforcement is very hierarchical. They're very militant. They are very much about, let's, you know, we're going to follow the rules, we're going to do this, and we're going to do that. And that's worked out really well. And from talking to officers, they don't feel comfortable calling out federal and law enforcement because that goes against the hierarchy. That goes against a lot of the militaristic ways of law enforcement. And so I think that we could at least do is review this for a resolution to at least encourage our officers to question federal law enforcement, to at least create the climate in the city where they feel comfortable questioning federal law enforcement, and they feel supported by the council and the mayor doing so. Because if I'm being arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or I'm getting an interaction, and RPD sees it going on, and they're just going to drive on by, that makes me really sad. And I know that's, again, a very unique case because, you know, everyone would know I'm a citizen, right, with the name Carmen Rivera, obviously. But my point is that I don't think that this isn't anything. We're not doing anything. We're saying that there's nothing that can be done. I just don't believe that to be true because at least we can foster a culture of questioning immigrant and custom enforcement because in the end, they're ruining it for everybody, right? The minute we see ICE acting egregious That plays out to every law enforcement official, unfortunately, because we do cluster them all together. We saw it happen after the horrendous, horrendous acts of Derek Chauvin murdering George Floyd. And we saw what happened after that. And what we're seeing with ICE, I want to foster trust with RPD. And the way that we can foster trust is encouraging them to question ICE.

Mayor?

Yes, Councilmember. Councilmember Albertson, then Councilmember Benn.

After looking at this, investigating this, this wasn't anything that was just... Blindly tossed aside and that sort of thing the fact of the matter is with federal Preemption laws and things like that. There's there's actually very little that police officers can do in the way of interfering with a federal law enforcement activity that is that is considered with their carrying out their duties and the last thing is we want to do is put our officers in a position that will then potentially put them in a position of quite frankly breaking the law or possibly having some action taken against them. What we have done, there is a policy being put in place for all city employees that essentially will um, instruct them. They are not to, um, aid ICE in any way, uh, allow them into any, uh, city, uh, city owned non-public, uh, place, uh, unless a valid warrant is, is shown and that sort of thing. So they will have the power to do that. Now we also, we are not having the citizens or the, uh, staff put themselves in harm's way, uh, because that could be a whole different issue. So when people will come up with a scenario that, um, that would essentially kind of present that notion. We are not expecting and certainly not requiring staff to do that, to interfere with federal law enforcement. And the fact of the matter is, and my colleague suggested that, to a great degree, this would be a performative type of ordinance or whatever we're talking about here because literally our officers cannot interfere. So will we have some instances where we can put up And what King County and Seattle has done, essentially, they don't interfere as well. If something's happened, they will put up signs to say you are not allowed here or anything like that. That is basically the conclusion that we've come to. And that's maybe what we will eventually look into. But as far as this ordinance and what was asked as far as enforcement activity to interfere with ICE, it's really a non-starter. There's nothing that can be done.

I don't have a great memory from when it was motioned, but I think it was to keep allowing federal agencies to use our city facilities and property. I'm kind of thrown off in terms of the research has been done for this. Well, I understand federal law. I understand the jurisdiction and the authority, but as a city to protect a citizen and as the motion back then, I don't think we've done our research on that. And also if we're talking about encouraging staff or empowering them, I think what needs to happen then is what is the things that were deliverables that were coming out of this? And that's not stated in this as well. I think it's important to go back and do further research because once we close this out, like we did with the hazard pay during the pandemic, the way we worded it very beautifully during committee report was that they all got their protective gears and all those other things. So therefore we couldn't do further research. So this is another example of what we've done that really didn't further the protection of our community. So I think it's important for us to think about this, whether this is maybe staff can answer in terms of what is the next steps once this is voted on and if it were to be closed out. Do we need to make separate motions to put up signs that our city facilities will not be used for ICE purposes? Would we put up signs, a motion to put up signs for empowering our staff? Because I think there's a lot to unpack here.

Mr. Moon.

Yes, I'll turn over to Halloran.

So the committee report was about the request to look into an ordinance. And that's what was done. And the committee report is the result of looking into having an ordinance. It doesn't mean we're done with the subject. Staff is currently working on a policy to help guide our employees on what they can and cannot do, what they should avoid doing, and especially any type of physical encounter and or again putting themselves in harm's way. So we're not done with the topic. We have just determined that an ordinance is not the way to go about it because there's absolutely no way of enforcing it. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mr. Mayor. One more thing to put out there, and we very well may get the signs and things like that, but even when that happens, everybody needs to understand that then that would still be a civil litigation matter, and RPD cannot come in and arrest ICE officers who happen to be bypass the sign and that sort of thing. So that's still, I think, the expectation that our officers are going to come in and actually be an impediment to the federal officers doing whatever they're charged to do. That is an expectation that we should not have. That is just not the way it's set up now with law. Whether you agree or disagree, that's just the way it is. So, FYI.

i don't think i've ever had those expectations nor the community and folks who've been disappeared um i think this is very um tone deaf for us to even consider just putting this pass right for me i've asked the chief early on last year and of course he said they could be there to uh basically there's an email sent by the chief basically just to witness Now, to bear witness, if that's the least that we can do, okay, sure, why not? But if it's not ICE, if it's someone who's pretending to be ICE, someone's going to get kidnapped, all those other criminal activities that could be had during a situation, I think it's our responsibility priority, utmost priority, to protect our community members, whether it's from ICE or from any kidnappers. And I think it's really important for us to realize that. And I do acknowledge the chief's email, and I appreciate the jurisdiction and authority, but to sit here and say, let's not have these high expectations, I never did in the first place.

All right. Please kindly refrain. This is a business meeting. Kindly refrain for outbursts. Thank you. Mr. Mayor? Okay. Yes. Council Member.

I have a question because the original motion was kind of referenced. I was referencing my motion from June 1st, banning ICE from city-owned facilities. Is this in regards to my motion on June 1st or Council Member Vann's motion regarding prosecuting officers? Which motion are we referencing here?

the clerk please read that again uh let's see here shane you worked on this yeah first uh your referral to the administration this was a referral to the administration for consideration back and the administration came back with a recommendation on that all right and that's different than this one no that's what we're talking about that's what we're talking

So I didn't motion for ordinance. I motioned for us to ban ice from city-owned buildings. I apologize.

Okay, so any other discussion?

I do have concerns because we're saying that the motion that it was motion that this is putting the matter to rest, but my motion was not about an ordinance. It was about banning ice from city-owned facilities. And so now I'm concerned that we're putting a motion to rest. But I'm also hearing that we are developing other policy. And so am I to safely say that we are still going to look into ice misusing city-owned property? Correct. All right. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Any other discussion? All in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay.

Nay.

The ayes have it. Carries.

All right. The next committee report for public safety is an ordinance adding a new Chapter 6-34 of the Rent Municipal Code, public property use, camping, and trespass. The Public Safety Committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to adopt the ordinance, adding a new Chapter 6-34 of the Rent Municipal Code, public property use, camping, and trespass, repealing Chapter 6-30 and 6-31, and amending subsections 298B10 and 298C10. The committee further recommends that the ordinance regarding this matter be presented for first reading at tonight's council meeting.

Yes, Mayor.

Yes, Council Member.

Move the council concur with the Public Safety Committee committee report.

Second. It's been moved and seconded. Any discussion?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Yes. Thank you so much. I do appreciate it. And Council Member Vann has her hand up as well. I just want to signal to her. Thank you. I just want to reference and give a little context. We first started actually talking about criminalizing homelessness and a camping ban in the retreat, council retreat back in 2025. This is a conversation that has been going on for over a year and a half. And when it comes to this particular ordinance, I still think there is more work. I don't think this is the best that we can do in the city of There was a study that came out last year. I'm just going to reference it. I'm not going to pronounce her name right. Hannah Lebovitz and Andrew Sullivan, they did a study that got published last year. They created a data set of over 100 of the US's largest cities between 2000 and 2021. Over 100 cities over 20 years. It's a great data set. I recommend all of my colleagues look at it. It's basically looking at the policies in the cities that passed ordinances criminalizing homelessness such as this. They matched each city to its continuum of care, the federal geographical unit that reports the annual homeless counts, like the homeless counts that King County does, and they did a differences in differences design. For those who don't know what a differences in differences design is, don't worry, I'll let you know. It's the primary assumption of the difference in differences research design that the trends in the outcomes between treatment and control groups would have followed the same trend if the treatment never happened. They also looked at the interaction between cases where different cities adopted different ordinances during different years and comparing the homelessness trends in cities that passed an ordinance against those that didn't before and after adoption. This is an excellent study. Just from one former academic nerd to the general public, this is an excellent, excellent study. So across the board, spoiler, there was no statistical significance of the effect in either direction, all right? The homelessness rate was not significant, but it did actually increase by 1.6%. The unsheltered homelessness did not change as a result of the adoption. On average, there was actually a 2.2% increase in unsheltered homelessness. Again, statistically insignificant. The emergency shelter beds showed a small upward trend over time, but also statistically insignificant. And all of this is going off the effect of deterrence logic. And deterrence logic is like, it's deterrence theory, right? I'm not going to want to commit a crime that's going to result me maybe going to prison because they don't have wine in prison, right? That's a deterrent for me. I'm joking a little bit, but they're the deterrent. You don't want to run a red light because you're going to get a speeding ticket. Neither deterrence. The red light at the bottom over by Talbot and all of that, everyone knows we don't want to get the ticket there. That's a deterrent effect. What deterrence actually does is it assumes rational mind. The deterrence theory is fundamentally assuming rational mind. Unfortunately, not everyone who is unhoused is of the rational mind. As has been stated, many are those dealing with addiction. They've been unhoused for many years. Can't pay has even told us how lost people have been and how much work it takes. I can tell you, as the only person here who's worked in a prison, I've had to teach children how to take care of themselves hygienically because they've been so lost. I'm not talking children. I'm talking 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15-year-olds. I've had to reteach them things that their parents never taught them. I can tell you one thing, though, for sure, from not only this study, but I know for certain. A $1,000 fine is not going to deter a houseless person. Going to jail is not going to deter a houseless person. There isn't going to be effective deterrence. Because I knew of kids and I knew of people who would just get arrested so they could get a warm meal. They could get arrested so they could have a night of shelter. And so one night on a cold night or over hot, you know, they might choose to want to get arrested because that means, hey, guess what? I get to go to SCORE. I get that nice meal. I get my health care checked and all of that. And what further adds to my concern around this is that we've been a co-owner of SCORE since it opened in 2011, from what I believe. Feel free to correct me on this. And the 15 years that we've owned SCORE, we have never done a study on its effectiveness. So that is not fiscally responsible. This ordinance is not fiscally responsible. What it will do, it will make it seem like we have taken homelessness out of the picture or we've seemingly taken care of it just in time for the election year next year. And then it will come right back up, especially since we will not have the Renton Resource Center going by January 1st, 2027. And the AHA housing isn't in Renton. We're shipping people outside of Renton. There are a lot of holes in this. And I think we're putting the ordinance, as I said maybe a little earlier, the cart before the horse a little bit. Because we don't have the shelter, the housing, the housing first, the mental health, the infrastructure to really take care of people. Because I've worked on this side of it. I've been on the ground. And criminalizing it is not going to help it long term. This is a performative fix. It isn't going to be a long-lasting one. It's not going to be effective fiscally. And I'll end with this. If we feel like we need a stick to take care of people, and we haven't even really tried anything else, what does that say about us as leaders? And I will be, again, I will happily share all of this again in three weeks if we have to revisit this. But this is factual information. Please review the study and please look at this before we choose to pass this on the dais tonight.

Well, now, kindly, I really need you to stop the outbursts. This is a public meeting, We're handling our business up here. Please allow them to do their business. So yes, Council Member Vann.

Thank you, Mayor. I will keep it quick. Just like we've mentioned, I've mentioned in community service committee a few weeks ago that, you know, the best strategy would be presenting it through a cow and having a discussion. Really, you know, there's many reasons why folks are ending up in homelessness. Myself, country-less, right, for a second in time and as a refugee, thanks to the sponsor who helped us for 90 days, living in her basement with four other siblings and my mother. I think the intent of this is great, and as an attorney, I see all the sides, just like how when we talked about Blake's decision, when someone is not of sound mind, we need to intervene, whether they're on the streets, at home, on the dice, wherever they're at, we need intervention. It's important for us to look at the model that Kent Tech has done and to support that. However, there's a lot of things that's missing here. First, I just want to say that, you know, clearly Shane tells me never to read the ordinance or the contracts in general because I'm not a city attorney, but I think it's important to address issues of the trespass zone map. I think it's just broad, causing more hurdles and barriers. It's important to also look at the issue of the systems that we put in place. Are we tracking folks with one or two, three violations, just like the Blake decision did not track, so we had to intervene? I also think that this ordinance is actually a little A little too late out of the whole thing. We could have used it perhaps in the pandemic of some sort, but in a different version, of course. It was presented in council retreat back in whatever year it was, last year or so. And right off the bat, I said I didn't like it. And I still don't like it because what we want to have good intention, we're going to cause more barriers for individuals. And I also want to ask staff, did we even get this across to the Equity Commission? I'm sure there's folks with lived experiences there that could also shed some light to this. I think it's important not just for us to move forward because obviously votes, folks know how to count to four. I think it's important to heal the community and making sure that we have an ordinance that actually works for us all.

Yes, council member.

I just want to reiterate that we do have shelter and supportive services under contract. And this people in the past have mentioned Auburn's model and how successful that is. And this is modeled after Auburn's no camping ordinance that has been in place since 2021. And to date, At the time of the original conversation with this, there have been zero arrests made in Auburn under this no camping. Its intention is to get people into sobriety and shelter, not into jail. Thank you.

Any other? Yes.

Am I able to understand that now we're passing ordinances that actually won't result in arrest when the intention is to result in arrest? Because now I'm a little confused. I'm confused because officers, when they're told that this is an ordinance and you can arrest, typically arrests do happen, but now we're just passing a performative ordinance that won't result in any arrests, allegedly?

Mr. Mayor? Yes, Council Member. So, the preferred enforcement approach for camping, I'm reading from the ordinance, and related violations of trespassing on public property is outreach, contact, offer of services, direction to leave, issue of trespass only after noncompliance, and repeat violations with criminal prosecution as the last result.

Thank you for the clarification, Mr. Mayor. Okay. all right thank you any other discussion mr mayor yes thank you i just want to thank my colleague for the response my concern is with the term preferred and leaving that up to the level of discretion when it comes to this particular ordinance i know that we prefer services and we want to encourage people and that one of our neighboring cities and has apparently done this effectively based off their data sets for the last five years. I'm asking, is there a way for us, because a lot of these things I'm hearing are under contract, we still don't have enough housing, and I don't know if we'll have enough by January 1st, 2027. when this ordinance is going to come into play. And again, I find it a little concerning that we're passing an ordinance that will permit people to be arrested, but that's not the priority. It's just something we're giving in our back pocket to practice with discretion, knowing that there's a disproportionate amount of black and brown people and LGBTQ people who are unhoused. And that, to me, doesn't seem equitable or follows our business plan around equity.

All right, yes, Council Member Vann.

If I may have staff answer the question, because I haven't heard, did we run it through the Equity Commission?

All right, any other discussion? For the public, that was a no. Any other discussion?

And then Mayor?

Yes.

And then in terms of, is there a plan to run it through the Equity Commission?

I haven't set their their schedule, but I'm sure at some point they will be updated on the actions of the council.

And it prior to prior to second reading, if any.

All right, any other discussion?

So is there a plan to prior to second reading?

It's not it's it's not scheduled right now, but they get updated on everything. So they get to take a look at all policy.

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Councilmember.

Thank you. I find it concerning that we haven't had this reviewed by our equity commission. And since we've been in conversations about this since over a year and a half, that we really haven't sought public feedback on this particular matter, that just raises concerns for me. And additionally, I would encourage my colleagues and the people out there who may love the history I bestow upon you and some who may not like the history I bestow upon you, but I would encourage you to look at the history of trespassing and trespassing ordinances. and where that's really rooted from. And again, some might not like that, but it is history, and reading is fundamental.

Male Speaker 1 All right. Any other discussion? All right. All in favor, signify by saying aye. Male Speaker 2 Aye. Male Speaker 1 Opposed, nay. Female Speaker 2 Nay. Male Speaker 1 Ayes have it. Motion carries.

Male Speaker 2 That was the final report for public safety.

Male Speaker 1 All right. Thank you. We're on to Council Member Rivera.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, the Transportation Committee has one committee report for you.

This report is regarding the 2027-2032 Six-Year Transportation Improvement Program that we heard earlier this evening. The Transportation Aviation Committee recommends concurrence in the staff recommendation to, one, approve the annual updates to the 27 through 32 Six-Year Transportation Improvement Program, two, conduct a public hearing on August 17th, which we did, and three, present the resolution for reading and adoption following the public hearing tonight. This is signed by the committee chair and members.

Mr. Mayor.

Yes, Council Member Rivera.

Sorry, I had a brain fart for a moment there. Forgive me, it's starting to get late, maybe past my bedtime. I would like to move that the council concur with the recommendation of the Transportation Committee Committee Report.

Second. Okay, it's been moved by Council Member Rivera, seconded by Council Member Prince, that the council concur with the Transportation Aviation Committee Report. Any discussion? All in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries. Council Member Halloran. No unfinished business, Mr. Mayor. Council Member Prince.

No unfinished business, Mr. Mayor.

All right, we are on to legislation where we have one resolution for adoption, one ordinance for first reading, and one ordinance for second and final reading.

Yes. One after that also, sir.

Oh, yeah, we have one quick verse in the advancement decision.

Yes.

All right, the first piece of legislation is Resolution 4569 regarding the six-year transportation improvement program. Resolution of the City of Renton, Washington updating and extending Renton's six-year transportation improvement program for 2027 through 2032. Mr. Mayor. Yes, Council Member.

I move the resolution be adopted as read.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Rivera, seconded by Council Member Prince, that the resolution be adopted as read. Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay. Motion carries.

All right. The next ordinance is regarding the public property use, camping, and trespass. An ordinance of the City of Renton, Washington adding a new Chapter 6-3-4, Public Property Use, Camping, and Trespass to the Renton Municipal Code establishing prohibitions on camping, unauthorized property storage, shopping cart possession, trespass after order, failure to obey an order to leave, unauthorized entry on restricted access property, and violation of property-specific rules on city property, establishing a unified trespass order system with geographic trespass zones, providing for city property classification and public access rules, amending subsections 298B10 and 298C10, of the rent municipal code, repealing chapter 6-30 and 6-31 of the rent municipal code, providing for the continued effective orders issued under the repealed chapters, authorizing corrections, providing for severability, and establishing an effective date.

Yes, Council Member.

Move the ordinance to be advanced to second and final reading at the next council meeting.

Second. Okay, it's been moved by Council Member Albertson, seconded by Council Member O'Halloran that the ordinance be advanced to the second and final reading in the next council meeting. Any discussion? Yes.

Yes, thank you, May. I know we just discussed that when the committee report was presented, but I also want to reiterate there are lots of concerns. It hasn't been run through the Equity Commission to see the inequity of this ordinance, but also knowing that the committee reports had already passed from the votes, count to four or three at this point, since we have two council members not here, I move to...

We're in the middle of a motion already.

A discussion.

We have to finish the motion, I believe.

No, it's already been first.

Unless you're amending the motion.

I'm going to move my amendment because it's a discussion. Yeah, so I move to amend the language of encouraged to provide services to a requirement providing services. Second.

In the ordinance, I'm sorry?

Yes. Okay.

All right. It's been moved by Council Member Vance, Second by Council Member Rivera, that the word encourage be changed to require. Any discussion? All right. All in favor, signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Opposed, nay.

Nay.

I did it. So we had one nay and then one... I didn't hear everybody. That was... Okay. All right. Motion carries. All right. So we're back to the original ordinance.

They're going to do it anyway. You can change it.

Okay. So back to the original ordinance. Discussion's over with. All in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Opposed, nay. Nay. Okay, three to two advances.

All right. Okay. All right, next is Ordinance 6198, and this is regarding a docket item. An ordinance of the City of Renton, Washington amending subsections 48070H3, 48070H3, L48080G and 49200B1 and 49200H through K of the Rent Municipal Code amending zoning regulations for master plan and development agreement review and process standards for the Valley Community Planning Area, authorizing corrections, providing for severability, and establishing an effective date. Mr. Mayor?

Yes.

I'm very happy that we're getting to our Valley Community Planning Area. I move that the ordinance be adopted as read.

Second. It's been moved by Council Member Prince, seconded by Council Member Vann, that the ordinance be adopted as read. The second final reading requires a roll call.

Council President Pro Tem Albertson. Aye. Council Member Vaughn.

Aye.

Council Member Rivera.

Aye.

Council Member O'Halloran.

Aye.

And Council Member Prince. Aye. Roll call, Mr. Mayor. All ayes. All right. Motion carries. Final ordinance tonight is regarding the moratorium on data centers. And ordinance of the city of Renton, Washington, establishing a moratorium on the filing, acceptance, processing, and approval of application of permits for the siting, establishment, or expansion of large data centers within the city, adopting findings of fact, establishing a work plan, providing for a public hearing, providing for severability, declaring an emergency, and establishing an immediate effective date.

Mr. Mayor?

Yes, Council Member.

I move that the ordinance be adopted and passed with red.

Second. I believe you want to move it for second and final reading tonight.

I do want to move to second and final reading tonight. You're correct there, sir. Thank you so much.

All right. It's been moved by Council Member Rivera, seconded by Council Member Prince, that the ordinance be placed on second and final reading in advance tonight. All in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries.

All right, I'll read it again. An ordinance of the City of Renton, Washington establishing a moratorium on the filing, acceptance, processing, and approval of application of permits for the siting, establishment, or expansion of large data centers within the city, adopting findings of fact, establishing a work plan, providing for a public hearing, providing for severability, declaring an emergency, and establishing an immediate effective date.

Mr. Mayor? Yes. I just made a mistake of putting away my cheat sheet of motions, so please forgive me. I move the ordinance be adopted as read.

Second. It has been moved by Council Member Rivera, seconded by Council Member Prince, that the ordinance be adopted as read. This is the second final reading. All right, motion carries.

We're on to new business. Council Member Van, please now.

The utilities community does not have any official business. And I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank community members for coming to share your concerns. I would always love to head home to my family, but, you know, I appreciate you being here and continue to be here until the policy that is reflective of our community. So thank you.

Senator Albertson.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, on behalf of Council President Perez on, well, no new business for public safety. But August 24th, Monday, August 24th, there will be no meetings. It's Council holiday. And on August 31st is the fifth Monday, so there are no meetings. And then on September 7th, that is Labor Day, so there will be no council meetings. And then basically on September 14th, The Committee of the Whole will be held here in Council Chambers via video conference. One item on the agenda, King County Regional Homelessness Authority Update. And then at 7 p.m., the regular council meeting here in Council Chambers and via video conference. And that's all, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Thank you. Councilor Rivera.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, there is no new business from the Transportation Committee, but I will share that I am back at my office hours tomorrow at the Rose Gift House and Coffee House from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Feel free to come by and say hi and chit-chat with me. I'm looking forward to chatting with you. Council Member O'Halloran.

Yes, Mr. Mayor. On Monday, September the 14th at 3.45 p.m., the Finance Committee will be meeting in Council Conference and via video conference. We have seven items on the agenda. Amendment number six to CAG 2122 with Axon Enterprise for the purchase of Axon Justice Pass-Fast. Item number two, application authorization land and water conservation fund outdoor recreation legacy partnership grant to support the Cleveland Richardson Park development. Number three, professional services agreement with geoengineers for the May Creek Trail Bank stabilization project. Number four is sex offender cost reimbursement agreement with King County Sheriff's Office. Number five is agreement with Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission for attack officer. Number six is vouchers and seven is emerging issues in finance. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Alright, thank you.

Mr. Mayor, I forgot. I am speaking for Council Member McIrvin today, since he's absent.

Okay.

I forgot. Council Member McIrvin wasn't able to make it today. He asked Chair of Community Services. I'm announcing Community Services at 3 p.m. on Monday, September 14th. We'll be returning with two items on the agenda. One is Paul Wong's appointment to the Parks Commission, and two is Emerging Issues in Parks and Recreation. And that is all, Mr. Mayor. Thank you for giving me some grace tonight.

Yes, Mr. Mayor. At 4.45 p.m. on Monday, September 14th, the Planning Development Committee will be meeting in the Council Conference Room and by video conference. We have two items on the agenda, middle housing and accessory dwelling units, a year in review, and emerging issues in CED. And that's all, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Thank you. What is the wish of the Council?

Yes, Mr. Mayor, actually. I move that council meeting recess in an executive session for approximately 20 minutes to discuss potential litigation pursuant to RCW 42.30.110. subsection I with no official action to be taken and that the council meeting be adjourned when the executive session is adjourned.

Second. Okay. It's been moved by Council Member Ollerson, seconded by Council Member Halloran, that the Council adjourn into Executive Session for approximately 20 minutes and discuss potential litigation pursuant to RCW 42.30.110, subsection 1, subsection I, to recess immediately after. And I'm going to take the liberty to add no action will be taken. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries. We're adjourned to executive session.